Procedural Arguments against the Death Penalty and Abortions - Assignment Example

 Assignment 21 1. I will not consider endorsing Warren’s analysis on the concept of personhood because it can create a new type of discrimination that goes beyond demographics and economic status. 3. A newborn infant is not a person, even if it has enough consciousness to feel pain and can communicate through sounds it does not have self-awareness, reasoning, or even abilities for self-motivated activities (Warren, 2011). On the other hand, infanticide must only be considered in uncontrollable conditions that destroy an infant’s quality of life and create suffering such as an incurable and fatal disease. This makes living more painful to the infant, thus infanticide will only be a humane end. Assignment 22 Marquis’ (2011) premise that abortion is immoral because it deprives an individual the right to have and build a future, to be a productive person, and to experience life is a sound argument as to why elective abortion that does not pose risks for both the pregnant mother and the baby must not be allowed. This is because a fetus is not much different from a newborn, wherein aside from the former living inside its mother’s womb and the other already living outside, both beings have potentials of growing up and experiencing a future. Thus, if it is wrong to kill an infant under various reasons, then it should follow that abortion is also wrong because it is essentially killing an infant as well. As such, I agree with Marquis that abortion is immoral because similar to infanticide, it prevents a child from realizing and reaching its future. Assignment 23 2. Thomson’s (2011) account to the right of life is defensible due to taking into account certain events or situations that remove a person’s right of choice. However, it lacks support in situations where the people had a choice and understand the consequences fully. Assignment 24 I have mixed views on Lee and George’s (2011) stand on the immorality of abortion. I believe that in special situations abortion may be permissible by allowing the mother to live while sacrificing the child’s life, since the main goal is to choose the one with higher chances to live, preventing a greater loss of lives. On another note, killing a fetus is deemed no different from killing a six month-old infant, because if fetuses must be killed because they are parasitic, then should it be the case for all newborns because like fetuses, they cannot fend for themselves, and constantly rely on another without giving any in return? Assignment 25 In my personal opinion, Little’s (2011) argument on the possible effects of continuing an unwanted pregnancy and resulting to a child growing up with feelings of rejection may not be entirely true. This is because such arguments discount the possibility that a child can overcome such ideas, that a child can grow to become resilient, that a child can learn how to love life despite being conceived unwantedly, and these are just some of the possibilities in the future of some human beings if they were not aborted. It must not be forgotten that there will always be at least multiple sides for possibilities, wherein positive and negative outcomes have equal chances of happening, and allowing a child to be born gives it an opportunity to experience the future, and even if it still ends up with the child gaining feelings of rejection, the child still has a whole lifetime ahead of it, and the fact that it was given a 50-50 chance to live is worth more than not giving it any chance to live at all. Assignment 26 Rachels (2011) mentioned two examples in his article that compare active and passive euthanasia, wherein the only thing that sets the two apart is that the first example showed Smith actively ending his six year-old cousin’s life by drowning him, while Jones in the second example showed that he merely watch his younger cousin to die. These two examples should be treated as equals despite the different methods in producing the same results due to the similarities in Smith and Jones’ intent: of killing the younger cousin to gain a larger inheritance (Rachels 2011). In this case, even if one actively participated in killing while the other one did not, the fact that the intention or motive was similar is enough to say that Smith’s crime is no different from Jones’. Assignment 27 1.Yes, “killing” is distinct from “allowing to die” because while the latter means letting someone die due to natural causes such as disease, the former means forcing death upon someone who is not expected to die in the absence of a fatal disease or condition. 2. I agree with Callahan’s (2011) stand that a physician’s power must be used only to cure or comfort, never to kill because it is the sworn duty of physicians to cure patients and alleviate their pain, both of which contradict the very nature and definition of killing. Assignment 28 1. Considerations of self-determination and individual well-being are sufficient to establish moral legitimacy of voluntary active euthanasia because whereas doctors can only provide cure and comfort, a (conscious) patient can weigh in on the pros and cons of prolonging life support while having the burden of suffering from a lack of a quality life. 2. Voluntary euthanasia is compatible with physicians’ roles as healers because they not only need to heal the ailments but also the pain that goes along with it (Brock, 2011). Also, patients should still trust physicians because they are sworn to put their patients first, they are not allowed to do any harm or unwanted treatment to them unless it is with their consent. Assignment 29 Potts’ (2011) arguments rejecting the institutionalization of euthanasia were based on the basic premise that there will be increased leniency within the medical field if euthanasia was allowed by the government. However, it was not mentioned in the text that doctors, hospitals, and drug companies actually have a lot more to gain by allowing their ailing patients to continue on living in pain and suffering while continuing to provide medications and treatments, which will be paid by the patient or the patient’s family, and this in itself sounds just as disturbing, if not more so as taking a patient’s life in their own hands. It also does not take into consideration patients who would rather die than become laboratory rats in hopes of finding treatment breakthroughs. Because patients have rights they must be allowed to choose their own way to pass, even if it means having to end their sufferings as soon as possible. Assignment 30 1.Legalizing physician-assisted suicide would be more problematic than legalizing voluntary active euthanasia because more avoidable deaths can happen, in the premise that these patients did not have terminal illnesses and that all treatment methods were not exhausted yet. 2. Physician-assisted suicide must not be legalized in every state because it subverts the physician role of providing exhaustive treatment and care, wherein the suicide itself becomes a definite end instead of an option for an end. Assignment 31 Terminal dehydration appears to be a better and more legal option than physician-assisted suicide or voluntary active euthanasia because the physician is not directly involved and the patient has more control of his or her life by terminating all food and fluid ingestion (Miller & Meier, 2011). It also prolongs a patient’s life without increasing the amount of suffering since some patients reported to feel lesser pain while under terminal dehydration, and there is also an added possibility that patients might change their minds to continue on living instead of dying faster due to the additional time to think. However, terminal dehydration is only a feasible option if the patient is of sound mind and still retains rational thinking, and has enough willpower to continue with this kind of slow-death, otherwise physician-assisted suicide is still much more humane since it shortens the time a patient has to suffer in pain. Assignment 32 1. I would endorse a retributive rationale for retaining death penalty, but under the premise that only some murderers will be sentenced to die, while others will only stay behind bars indefinitely. Those that committed acts of murder due to selfishness and without any potential of recovering rational thinking deserve to die since they are already a lost cause, while those who seem to display signs of recovery can continue living to be better people in the future. 2. If there are observed inequalities and discriminations in sentencing death penalty among inmates, it does not follow that death penalty must be abolished. Rather, the justice system must be changed to promote fair trials and prevent unwarranted detentions or deaths. Assignment 33 Nathanson (2011) gave strong arguments on why death penalty must be abolished, using the idea that criminals must still be treated with dignity despite them revoking some of their rights when they committed crime against other people. While this may seem sound because it allows a criminal awaiting a death sentence to gain reprieve or redemption, it must also be remembered that the reason why death penalty still persists is because its purpose is not just to punish criminals, but also to prevents others from committing similar crimes and becoming criminals themselves. In a way, despite losing dignity, life, and freedom due to the death penalty, these criminals are still able to contribute to society whether intentional or not by becoming examples to people and deterring others to commit crimes and becoming a criminal with a shorter life just like them. Assignment 34 1. Commonsense or anecdotal evidence can be a compelling basis to conclude that death penalty is a uniquely effective deterrent for a majority of people who fear death or dying. 2. In the premise that potential murder victims do not have tendencies to kill, and convicted murderers are cold-blooded, it can be said that the latter’s lives are not worth the lives of potential murder victims, and must die. Otherwise, both lives are of equal value and worth. 3. I would endorse option (b) because it is a high deterrent for most potential murderers, and it supports the premise that it is worth saving innocent lives over killers because the latter has higher probabilities of recidivism than the former not contributing to societal betterment. Assignment 35 The weak points of the three arguments that Reiman (2011) used to refute the usefulness of death penalty as a crime deterrent were shown by proposing that people are individuals, and would therefore be affected differently by various criminal deterrents. This logic follows that because some potential criminals might be strongly-deterred by death penalty, some would also be deterred by lengthy prison sentences. However, in using this same argument it is also possible that because some people are not deterred by either lengthy prison sentence or by the death penalty, murders will still occur one way or another despite the possibility that government or the authorities will have general repugnance of murders. In the end, the question of choosing the criminal deterrent that prevents higher crime rates still remains. Assignment 36 1. Death penalty should not be abolished on the premise that victim race is a factor on imposing death penalty since it is not enough to warrant anything, especially when there have been inconsistency on how these results were founded. 2. The mistake argument as a whole is not sufficient to support the abolition of death penalty because despite having mistrials and exonerations, there are considerably higher numbers of properly justified cases, thus the number of appropriate sentences still outweigh the mistakes. 3. The procedural arguments against death penalty are not collectively sufficient because each of these arguments contain inconsistencies and flaws in establishing the validity of each. Assignment 37: Case Study Report The subject of physicians performing euthanasia is sensitive due to the relative ambiguity and the lack of clear boundaries in establishing what counts as elective euthanasia, what counts as assisted suicide, and what counts as killing or homicide. It is also unclear to many people how and why euthanasia is deemed permissible, and there are those who are unaware on the myriad of reasons as to why some people elect to end their lives, or choose to elect to terminate their loved ones’ life support. Lastly, while some members of the general public are well-aware of the sworn duties of physicians to continually treat and cure patients to the best of their abilities, most of these same people also forget that physicians put into consideration the comfort of their patients and their immediate families, of making sure that they all live a meaningful and quality life, as well as saving the patients from various kinds of pain (Brock, 2011). As such, with regards to a patient’s quality of life, if all options have been exhausted and the only end that is seen is a painful and slow death, then these patients must be allowed to be euthanized to spare them and their close families the pain and sorrow that come from incapacitation from the illness. A case study from White (2011) shows how euthanasia could have saved a comatose girl named Karen from prolonged suffering and spared her father, Mr. Quimlan from paying for 10 years’ worth of care, only to have his daughter die in the end. This is because aside from the doctors’ judgment that she has no chances for treatment or recovery due to brain damage, her body has also been very weak and cannot protect itself without antibiotics, and can only survive by forcing nutrients into her body. This implies that because Karen’s body has become inefficient and weak, she already has higher chances of dying even without getting chronic care. In addition Karen has already become unconscious and has no cognition, control or awareness of her body and her father as guardian already has authority over her life much like how a parent has authority over a young child. Mr. Quimlan’s decision on removing her life support during the beginning should have been honored, even more so because he was to shoulder all of the expenses in caring for Karen. It is not morally right to withhold Karen’s antibiotics because there has been an identified and better way to allow her to die, which is by giving her a fatal injection. This is because causing her to wither and die faster from an infection still prolongs her suffering compared to just having a fatal injection. As such, Karen should have been given the most appropriate and humane treatment so that her suffering would have been shortened, especially since it has been established that she will not recover despite breathing on her own. In the above scenario, before breaking down the events that lead to Karen’s ultimate demise it would have been easy to say that Karen should have been kept alive because she was still able to show responses to touch and sound (White, 2011). However, it must also be recalled that even if she was able to do so, she still has no cognitive function, and that her immune system has grown weak, thus having the need to take antibiotics to prevent infection. Should by a miraculous event she did regain consciousness, she would still be suffering because aside from a weakened immune system, she would also be in pain because her quality of life would still not improve, and that she could develop feelings of hopelessness and remorse as a result of losing functions to certain parts of her body and of having a weak immune system that in some ways will still prevent her from enjoying certain aspects of her life. As such, because all options have been exhausted in trying to cure from her unconscious and chronic persistent vegetative state, because she already has no control over her own body and its processes, and adding the fact that her father was already appointed as her legal guardian, Karen should have been allowed to undergo euthanasia and be given a humane death since she was already dying and was in the course of dying even before she was given medical intervention and treatments (Callahan, 2011). References Brock, D. W. (2011).Voluntary active euthanasia. In T. Mappes, J. Zembaty& D. DeGrazia, Social ethics: morality and social policy, 8th ed.(pp.75-78). Boston, MA: McGraw-Hill. Callahan, D. (2011). Killing and allowing to die. In T. Mappes, J. Zembaty&D. DeGrazia, Social ethics: morality and social policy,8th ed.(pp.72-75). Boston, MA: McGraw-Hill. Dolinko, D. (2011).Procedural arguments against the death penalty. In T. Mappes, J. Zembaty& D. DeGrazia, Social ethics: morality and social policy, 8th ed.(pp.150-154). Boston, MA: McGraw-Hill. Lee, P. & George, R.P. (2011).The wrong of abortion In T. Mappes, J. Zembaty& D. DeGrazia, Social ethics: morality and social policy, 8th ed.(pp.35-44). Boston, MA: McGraw-Hill. Little, M.O. (2011).The morality of abortion. In T. Mappes, J. Zembaty& D. DeGrazia, Social ethics: morality and social policy, 8th ed.(pp.46-51). Boston, MA: McGraw-Hill. Marquis, D. (2011). Why abortion is immoral. In T. Mappes, J. Zembaty& D. DeGrazia, Social ethics: morality and social policy, 8th ed.(pp. 18-24). Boston, MA: McGraw-Hill. Miller, F.G. & Meier, D.E. (2011).Voluntary death: A comparison of terminal dehydration and physician-assisted suicide. In T. Mappes, J. Zembaty& D. DeGrazia, Social ethics: morality and social policy, 8th ed.(pp.98-102). Boston, MA: McGraw-Hill. Nathanson, S. (2011).An eye for an eye? In T. Mappes, J. Zembaty& D. DeGrazia, Social ethics: morality and social policy, 8th ed.(pp.133-138). Boston, MA: McGraw-Hill. Primoratz, I. (2011). A life for a life. In T. Mappes, J. Zembaty& D. DeGrazia, Social ethics: morality and social policy, 8th ed.(pp.126-132). Boston, MA: McGraw-Hill. Pojman, L.P. (2011). Deterrence and the death penalty. In T. Mappes, J. Zembaty& D. DeGrazia, Social ethics: morality and social policy, 8th ed.(pp.139-144). Boston, MA: McGraw-Hill. Potts, S.G. (2011).Objections to the institutionalisation of euthanasia. In T. Mappes, J. Zembaty& D. DeGrazia, Social ethics: morality and social policy, 8th ed.(pp.78-82). Boston, MA: McGraw-Hill. Rachels, J. (2011). Active and passive euthanasia. In T. Mappes, J. Zembaty& D. DeGrazia, Social ethics: morality and social policy, 8th ed.(pp.67-71). Boston, MA: McGraw-Hill. Reiman, J. (2011).Common sense, the deterrent effect of death penalty, and the best bet argument. In T. Mappes, J. Zembaty& D. DeGrazia, Social ethics: morality and social policy, 8th ed.(pp.144-149). Boston, MA: McGraw-Hill. Thomson, J.J.(2011).A defense of abortion. In T. Mappes, J. Zembaty& D. DeGrazia, Social ethics: morality and social policy, 8th ed.(pp.24-34). Boston, MA: McGraw-Hill. Watts, D.T. & Howell, T. (2011). Assisted suicide is not voluntary active euthanasia. In T. Mappes, J. Zembaty& D. DeGrazia, Social ethics: morality and social policy, 8th ed.(pp.83-88). Boston, MA: McGraw-Hill. White, J. E. (2011). Contemporary moral problems, 4th ed. Boston, MA: Wadsworth. Read More