Letting Someone Die Analysis

Dramatic evolution and developments in medicine as well as technology has given doctors, and health care teams in general, the ability to save more lives than ever. In fact, since the beginning of the 19th century, doctors and scientists have dramatically increased their knowledge of health of human body. This implied that doctors were able not only to save more lives, but also to reduce the pain and suffering of those affected by diseases. In parallel, the development in medicine and technology also led doctors to sustain patients’ lives. In fact, medicine development allowed doctors to maintain very ill patients to stay alive, even when these patients have lost mental and/or physical capabilities. These evolution and developments are basically

The fundamental difference between these is action or inaction: when once lets someone die, they are passive. On the opposite, when once kills someone, that person actively causes the death of the patient. The person who kills is directly responsible for the death of the killed individual. From that point of view, it seems like killing and letting die produces the same result. However, from a legal and moral point of view it is obvious that killing is worse than letting die. Author H. V. MacLachlan draws the moral distinctions between killing and letting die. To him, acts and omissions might have the same outcomes but are not morally identical. McLachlan uses the example of a ventilator to prove his point. In fact, the use of a ventilator is to prevent from certain causes of death. However, if the ventilator is to be turned off and a death occurs, that death cannot directly be linked to the fact that the ventilator was turned off. The link between the two events is not direct, but indirect. Another useful example is the example of a drug addict. If one decides to restrain a drug addict from taking his daily dose of drugs, but then ceases to do so, and the drug addict dies then that person is not directly responsible for their death. Also, it is naturally for humans to restrain killings from each other, but we do not feel obliged to try to ‘save’ everyone who is in danger of death. Here again, in the context

We believe that killing patients is wrong while allowing them to die can be acceptable. Philosophers also evoke the parity of reasons. In fact, what makes an action good or bad is not its intrinsic nature, or intrinsic moral worth, but what it was done for. As a consequence, both brothers from the previous example should carry the same responsibility because both of them wished for the same thing, the death of their father. If we apply this in the context of euthanasia, the result is the same. In fact, individuals performing passive euthanasia and individuals performing active euthanasia wishes for the same thing: for the patient to be relieved from their pain, for the patient to die. The outcome is the exact