(November 13, 2013 at 12:07 am)leodeo Wrote: So how do we feel about euthanasia?I believe that suicide can be a selfish act, depending on the circumstances. A person seeking to die rather than deal with legitimate obligations to others would be choosing suicide for his own selfish ends. Killing yourself for selfish purposes isn't very bright IMO, but it is what it is.
I think that in cases where there is clinical depression, it's important to get the person professional help. Depression can change our emotional outlook to one that is very different from what we would feel normally, and a person who is feeling suicidal when they are depressed may feel very different once they are in a more normal state of mind.
A person who is in his or her right mind and has thought through the issue should be free to decide his or her own fate. A person suffering in the throes of a terminal disease, for example, should be allowed to end it if so desired. A person who is otherwise fully capable but feels that he is "a loser with no hope" should be free to take his own life as long as he is of sound mind and has thought his decision through.
"Well, evolution is a theory. It is also a fact. And facts and theories are different things, not rungs in a hierarchy of increasing certainty. Facts are the world's data. Theories are structures of ideas that explain and interpret facts. Facts don't go away when scientists debate rival theories to explain them. Einstein's theory of gravitation replaced Newton's in this century, but apples didn't suspend themselves in midair, pending the outcome. And humans evolved from ape- like ancestors whether they did so by Darwin's proposed mechanism or by some other yet to be discovered."
-Stephen Jay Gould
-Stephen Jay Gould
