The essay that I chose to read was Active and Passive Euthanasia by James Rachels. This essay brought up a moral issue that there is no moral difference between active and passive euthanasia. But according the American Medical Association active euthanasia is condemned for doctors to practice. But on the other hand it is permissible for a doctor to “perform a passive euthanasia.”
According to the author, active euthanasia is the act of killing someone to put them out of their pain or misery by the consent of the patient and or it’s family members. An example of this would be a person suffering from an incurable cancer that is going to die within a couple of days for a fact, even if the patients treatment is ongoing the result is still going to be the same. Even though the patient is going to die and is in extreme pain it is illegal for a doctor to expedite the end result, which is death. Even if the doctor has the consent of the patient and or family members to expedite the death. Not only is it illegal, it is condemned in the American Medical Association (AMA) doctrine for the doctor to administer death.
On the other hand in the same doctrine, it is permissible for a doctor to withhold treatment for patient and let them die. That is known as passive euthanasia. Passive euthanasia is actually letting a patient die by not administering any treatment to prolong their life, or not doing a surgery required to prolong the life of the patient. The doctor taking part in passive euthanasia is contradicting his profession making his action immoral according to Kant.
The author brings up a very controversial argument that both active and passive euthanasia is not only ethically wrong but morally wrong too. The author gives the example of two people, in the same scenario but with a minor difference. The two adults have an orphan cousin they are looking after. These orphan cousins have an estate that they inherited, and if somehow they die the estate will go to the adults their caretakers. Both adults want to inherit the estate of their orphan cousin. Both adults have the same motive, which is financial gain. Adult A has decided to kill his orphan cousin while he is taking a bath. Adult A goes in to the bathroom and holds the cousins’ head underwater and killing him. Making it seem like an accident. Adult B decides to do basically the same thing but rather then drowning him with his own hands, he opens the bathroom door, startles his cousin which makes him slip, injuring his head, falling into the tub to drown. But adult B does not save him nor did he kill him. He just watched and let his cousin die. Did either man behave better then the other? The author claims that just because adult B did not directly kill the orphan cousin does not make him more moral or ethical then the other person that directly drowned the child. Which is a really good argument.
The author does a very good job persuading his audience, that killing someone is basically the same thing as letting them die, both actions are equally both immoral and ethically wrong. He shows you this by telling you, that Adult B and the Doctor that let his patient die; they both did not do anything that directly killed them, but in fact they did do something, they both chose to let the person die. Which makes both of their actions, subjected to moral appraisal.
