Opposition to physician-assisted suicide is immoral
Plus: Would you care if we cured cancer?
This entire post is mostly outsourced! Here are few links via the blog:
Tommy Blanchard: A Cold Dead Universe Full Of Wonder And Meaning
Tommy’s gunning for the Carl Sagan crowdRelationships: Just Do It (Plus: The things we choose)
This was the most popular recent post, probably for the comicThe great Matt Ridley: CO2 is greening the Earth
An inconvenient truthMatthew Gault: If AI Is Sentient Then So Is ‘Age of Empires II’
Who is Matthew Gault?
Silly Song: For people who know the excellent Nirvana song “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” this Weird Al version is just too funny.
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Almost forty years ago, I wrote an editorial saying that one way (some) non-human animals have it better than us was that we (generally) don’t let our cats and dogs suffer horribly at the end of their lives.
Losing My Religions covers it succinctly:
Opposition to physician-assisted suicide is immoral.
Why oh why do we think we can tell anyone that they can’t end their life in as painless a way possible? Who do we think we are? We let “any butt-reaming asshole” bring any number of new lives into existence, regardless of circumstance, regardless of how much the child will suffer. Yet we deny those same people the right to end their own life? Crazy....
This recent Freakonomics episode on the topic is pretty good. Anne and I note that the failed priest’s “other side” anti-medical-aid-in-dying argument is: “It is wrong to want to end your life because you don’t want to lose control. [Because I decree it!] Therefore, I should control your life.”
He also goes on and on about “free will,” all while insisting that people shouldn’t be allowed to make choices about their lives!
(Ad hominin but still: he took a vow before God to serve God. Then met a woman and said, “Just kidding!” And now he wants to dictate how others can live, insisting, “I will be vindicated.”
He’s not saying that his arguments will prove superior, or that society will do more than pay lip service to “human dignity.” No - he insists that he, personally, will be vindicated.
God save us from moral fanatics.)
I'd really like to have that option available to me when I'm older