Transcript Document
Seminar Five 1. Review of Work Due 2. Look Ahead to final project 3. Course Content Allowing someone to die Mercy Death, Mercy Killing The right to die? Discussion Board: Two threads Both threads are based on the case study found in the online reading (click on the ‘reading’ tab in unit four). What are the basic facts of this case study? Questions for the first thread: Is Will's request to reprogram the morphine machine justified by an ethical right to decide the course of his own death? What are the ethical implications of Will's request that his physicians reprogram his morphine machine? Questions for the second thread: Would it make a difference if Will was on life support? Would it make a difference if Will was not terminally ill? Discussion Board: Two threads Our first thread deals with the topic of affirmative action. We are required to consider the Katie Sampson case study. We have three questions to consider: 1) Should Katie Sampson’s proposal be rejected? 2) Do all affirmative action policies create unjust reverse discrimination? 3) If not, which specific forms of affirmative action do you think escape this charge, and why do you think so? Our second thread deals with the topic of cheating. We have four questions to consider: 1) Why do people and companies cheat? 2) What damage is causes by cheating? 3) What ethical principles can be considered in relationship to cheating? 4) How have you dealt with this issue in your life? The Final Project is a portfolio of your learning. In a learning-centered class, you need to take control of the learning process as much as possible. You need to follow the outline and address all three areas given: analytical skill building, knowledge acquisition, and practical application of the class concepts. Analytical skill building: Improving your critical reading, writing, and thinking skills. To analyze means to break something down into its component parts in order to understand how the parts work together to make the whole. Examples of analytical thinking: Making distinctions in order to better understand a topic (for instance, letting die versus mercy killing ). Using analogies in order to better understand a topic (for instance, is letting a person die like putting a dog out of its misery?) The ability to make distinctions, for instance, helps make our thoughts more precise; the more precise we are (within reason), the less likely we are to be misunderstood. But of course, we don’t want to devolve into “lawyer speak!” The ability to use analogies well demonstrates that you understand relevant similarities from one case to another. Your final project does not need a reference page, but you should include evidence from the discussions, seminars, papers, and consensus threads. Your final project needs to stay on topic, be concise, and thoughtful. Questions about the final project? Who here has faced a difficult medical decision that required reflecting on your own set of ethics and values? What sort of ethical principles, if any, did you rely on when making your decision? Chapter ten of our text, like our discussion board threads, focuses on ethics at the end of life. To begin, what is the difference between killing and “letting die?” Is it easy to draw the line? Again, these distinctions are a part of our analytical thinking skills that allow us to help clarify our thoughts. Standard definitions: Voluntary euthanasia: the killing/letting die of someone who actively requests it for the purpose of avoiding suffering. Non-voluntary euthanasia: the killing/letting die of someone, requested by someone caring for another who is unable to make such a decision. Involuntary euthanasia: the killing/letting die of someone who does not request it at all. Allowing Someone to die: “Allowing a terminally ill patient to die his or her own natural death without interference or intrusion from medical science and technology.” (208) Mercy Death: “Taking direct action to terminate a patient’s life because the patient has requested it.” (208) Mercy Killing: “taking direct action to terminate a patient’s life without the patient’s permission.” (208) In the immediate days after Hurricane Katrina, reports began to surface of doctors and nurses who put individuals to death that were believed to not be able to survive for long without electricity or medicine. Was this wrong? What factors in the situation need to be taken into account? What sort of attitudes do we have towards suicide in the U.S.? What are the origins of these attitudes? Do all cultures share these attitudes? Why do many people feel that putting an animal out of its misery is an act of mercy, but that with humans it is wrong? One term that gets used when discussing this topic “autonomous” or “autonomy.” (Stressed in particular by Immanuel Kant) Another way of talking about autonomy is to use the term “selfdetermination.” In independence movements, people often justify political revolutions in the name of ‘self-determination’ There is a strong drive for people to want to be “masters of their own fate” if you will. Can we say that we have the right to die? One justification would be that as selfdetermining agents, (i.e., mature human adults) we have the right to choose whether we want to live or die. If we have the right to die, does this mean that others are obligated to help us? How have technological advances played a role in fueling the debate on this issue? Are ethical codes developed centuries ago relevant in the face of these new technologies?