John,

I think the key here is coercion. Are the depressed being coerced by the people at Dignitas into taking their own lives?

No.

That doesn't make the members of Dignitas any the less..... warped.... in their reasoning, but if you're going to find fault with them for passing out overdoses of sleeping pills (or whatever) with which the depressed can take their lives, you're also going to have to find fault with, say, gun-shop owners who sell shotguns with which the depressed can blow their brains out (as far too many have, alas).

Yes, the depressed need treatment. But neither you nor I nor society in general are their mommies and daddies, and if they freely choose to end their lives, so be it. I don't like it any more than you do, but if you want freedom for yourself, you have to allow it for others, even if they seem hell-bent on misusing it.

I don't think that communism (small c) is an evil new to the 20th century. I ran into a fascinating article on the Pilgrims that argues that the primary reason for their nearly starving to death in the first two winters was... through holding property in common, and on a rotationary basis, so that no man felt a stewardship of the land.

Governor William Bradford wrote fo the experiment (emphasis added):

“The experience that was had in this common course and condition, tried sundry years, and that among godly and sober men, may well evince the vanity of that conceit of Plato’s and other ancients; that the taking away of property, and bringing into a common wealth, would make them happy and flourishing;—as if they were wiser than God.

“For this community (so far as it was) was found to breed much confusion and discontent, and retard much employment that would have been to their benefit and comfort. For the young men that were most able and fit for labor and service did repine that they should spend their time and strength to work for other men’s wives and children, with out any recompense. The strong, or man of parts, had no more in division of victuals and clothes, than he that was weak and not able to do a quarter the other could; this was thought injustice. The aged and graver men to be ranked and equalized in labors, and victuals, clothes, etc., with the meaner and younger sort, thought it some indignity and disrespect unto them.

“And for men’s wives to be commanded to do service for other men, as dressing their meat, washing their clothes, etc., they deemed it a kind of slavery, neither could many husbands well brook it. Upon the point all being to have alike, and all to do alike, they thought themselves in the like condition, and one as good as another; and so, if it did not cut of those relations that God hath set among men, yet it did at least much diminish and take of the mutual respects that should be preserved among them. And would have been worse if they had been men of another condition."

In just a few paragraphs, he lays out the probelms that communism has faced and presumably always will face, unless men were other than they are, as Bradford might say. When the success of your philosophy is dependent upon removing certain traits which have so far proven universal, or upon the idealism of all of its subjects, than one might easily declare it a failure.

Hale, you don't see my point at all.

What we have here is a snapshot of the moment when a slippery slope slips one more step. All the little Kervorkians have been insisting that they only want to assist the terminally ill. Now this guy has moved the ratchet another notch. There's always another notch, and always the same insistance that any more notches are inconceivable, and how dare you suggest anything so absurd!

If you read the article you will notice that this is being protested by handicapped rights organizations. Now why might they care about this, hmmm? What do you think they have to be worried about?

Do you think it's possible to have a "golden age?" How would one go about it? There are a lot of obstacles in the way of attaining that happy situation where everybody is young and healthy and prosperous. But it seems attainable. Just read Glenn Reynolds enthusing about anti-aging research!

But the obstacles are mostly in the form of human beings. People who are old or inferior or handicapped or crazy. It seems such a shame to have them eating up vital resources and taking up space when paradise is just so close you can almost taste it. And they can't be enjoying their miserable lives, anyway...

And then there's "stupid ecclesiastical superstition." That shouldn't be allowed to spoil life for everybody else. Religion is clearly a form of mental illness; academic authorities have shown it to be true. Same with those "conservatives."

Would you like to be young and handsome and sexy and rich for thousands of years? I suspect that's what people have in mind. And if everybody has to "fit in" and cooperate for that to be possible, well, that's a small price to pay, right? And if there are people who can't fit in, well, they won't be happy right? So it would be better if they are helped out of the misery of their lives, right?

There may not be coercion yet, but there's already lots of pressure. Europe's a few decades ahead of us, but it's here too. Pressure on families of the terminally ill, for instance. And I remember reading of a quadrapalegic woman who was in the hospital with a serious illness, and various doctors and nurses said to her, "You won't want to be resuscitated, of course?"

John,

Um, set aside your waspishness for a moment, would you? Please?

As I noted, the key is coercion. The moment those warped folks at Dignitas start forcing people to use their services, they've crossed the line. They're pushing it as it is, with their efforts to persuade the suicidal to succeed in taking their own lives. I don't like that any more than you do, but people may do as they please in a free country, as long as they don't inflict (that's where the element of coercion comes in) physical or economic harm on another.

As for life-extension.... that's an entirely different kettle of fish, and I wonder how that got made part of the subject. Would I like to live for several thousand years at the peak, more or less, of my mental and physical powers? Of course! Who wouldn't, if those years could be spent in freedom?

Of course, there's a price to be paid for everything. But if that price is merely clean living and a course of medication, what's the problem? How does assisted suicide enter into the picture, John?

Thanks for that, B. I'll keep that link!

And Hale, the essence, the very flavor of a gun-shop is exactly the opposite of the "Dignitatus" scam.

The man buying a firearm is, though he knows it not, deeply aware of Original Sin. He knows that life is fleeting, and that human beings are flawed and erratic, and that any moment he may be called upon to face death. He is on the road to wisdom.

Hale, I question whether people in the grip of serious mental illness can be said to "freely" choose suicide.

I tend to think that talk about "freely choosing" things is misguided. Our choices are both free and also determined by the promptings of society, government, friends, family, upbringing, habits and routines...

And in most of our decisions, I think the free choice element is secondary. How often do you make a decision by carefully listing pros and cons? And how often do you just chose what is "obviously right?"

And I'm NOT saying that we are robots, or lack free will. We are in fact constantly creating the very surroundings that influence our decisions. On a micro scale, imagine being among friends mooting some choice, and you say, "Wait a minute, Amigos. We need to consider what is the moral thing to do here!" (Or what's "cool," or financially prudent, or whatever) You've just, voluntarily, changed the environment in which decisions are going to be made. (And of course your decision to raise the moral issue was itself both voluntary and also influenced by your surroundings, which you have yourself helped to shape---and so on in infinite regression.)

And you and your friends' decisions will quite possible be different in this changed environment. And if you are libertarians, or humanists, you will imagine that you are "autonomous beings" making personal decisions freely and without coercion.

Which is why I'm skeptical when my commenters write libertarian-ish things like, "just keep the government out and let people make their own decisions."

It is possible for an individual to kill his or her self without the assistance of a sucide clinic. The idea that the death inclined should be given a more comfortable, consequence-free method of passing seems ludicrous. If they are willing to face the Big Black for all eternity why should they care about experiencing pain on the passage, the possibility of failure, or the indignity of leaving a mess behind? I'm afraid that those who would use Minelli's clinic want more than death, they want their choice to be affirmed and approved.

affirmed and approved...and reinforced. They are choosing to temporarily join a little society because it will help relieve them of the burden of choosing suicide

Andrea writes:

"Hale, I question whether people in the grip of serious mental illness can be said to "freely" choose suicide."

And John, elaborating on Terry's point, writes:

"affirmed and approved...and reinforced. They are choosing to temporarily join a little society because it will help relieve them of the burden of choosing suicide"

You're both right, but also wrong.

We've talked past each other over the months and years in this comments section because I think we see our roles in life differently.

As I see it, our roles as citizens and human beings are distinct and have parts which don't overlap. What that means is that, as much as I don't like certain things on grounds of morality, I renounce the use of state power to prevent those things from existing or occurring.

Certainly, things like murder, rape, robbery, theft, fraud, and so on, should be prohibited. The prohibitions against them are as old as Man, and with good reason-- civilization is impossible without them.

But there are many other things, often classed as "victimless crimes", that are unlawful in this society of ours (the US, for our foreign readers, if any) and which should be made lawful. Prostitution, illicit drug use, and so on, while ugly are uglier still because they're unlawful. The "cure" is turning out to be worse than the disease.

Suicide is one of those things. I don't like it. If one of my friends or family seemed suicidal, I would do everything in my power to dissuade him (or her) from his apparent desire for death. I would even wrestle with him to keep him from putting a pistol to his head.

But I can't be with him every minute of every day. He (or she) is an adult, and in the end has to make choices for himself. And if he, behind my back, blows his brains out, so be it. I would be heartbroken, but it was his choice to make. To deny him that choice through the use of state power is a grave insult, as I see it. It's in effect a demotion to the status of child, and no adult should have to suffer that when they have committed no crime.

And that use of state power to demote adults to the status of children is ultimately corrupting and dangerous to our liberties. Taking away people's freedom just because they just might do something politically incorrect, however one cares to define that, is the very defintion of tyranny.

(Please note that criminal conspiracies are a different thing-- plots to murder, rape, rob, steal, and defraud should be discourged as firmly as the acts themselves.)

I'll say it again: If you want freedom for yourself, you have to allow it to others. Are they, by your standards, going to misuse their freedom? Quite probably. And you, by their standards, aren't going to misuse your freedom? And do you want to give them the power to compel your obedience to THEIR standards?

I sure as Hell wouldn't want them to have that power over me, and I don't think you do either. So why are you so anxious to give that power to "society"?

One last thought that came to mind as I hit the "post" button.....

The more authoritarian- or communitarian-minded among us are fond of saying that true freedom is found by living within a set of rules or laws.

True enough.

The problem is in the number and scope of those rules or laws.

Without an irreducible minimum of laws, existence becomes Hobbesian.

Yet the authoritarians and communitarians, as if they were wiser than God, insist on so many rules and laws that the very life gets crushed out of a society.

And that, John, Andrea, and Terry, is why I'm a libertarian. I'm an arrogant SOB, but not so arrogant as to think I'm God, unlike some major figures in both major parties.

Oh, and just what the heck does life-extension have to do with assisted suicide anyway, John?

No, Hale, I'm not wrong. You are.

Hale, I'm not interested here in the specific issue of whether assisted suicide should be allowed. Some other day I might be.

I understand your libertarian position, but what I'm digging at is a question that lies underneath it. You say that people should be allowed to make choices. What interests me is where the beliefs or attitudes that we use to make those choices come from.

You imply that many beliefs are fixed--somehow--in society and won't change. "...The prohibitions against them are as old as Man, and with good reason-- civilization is impossible without them..."

This seems to underlie your libertarianism. In fact it seems to me that it would be impossible to be a libertarian if you didn't believe this.

But is it TRUE?

That's what bugs me. My sense of smell, and the pricking in my thumbs tells me it's NOT TRUE.

Stories like this interest me not because I give a damn whether some crazy foreigners kill themselves (well actually I do, but not at this moment) but because I'm always sleuthing; I'm always, like Mr Sherlock Holmes, peering through my magnifying glass and looking for clues. Clues to this question, and related ones.

Suppose that the prohibitions against murder, rape, robbery are not fixed in us, but rather are cultural inheritances that can leak away, a little each generation? Leak away like the once-strong prohibitions against promiscuity or abortion have leaked away? I'm interested in this suicide business only as an example of an old prohibition oozing away, one drop at a time.

Life-extension ties in because all the other attempts to build utopias have involved killing people who are in the way. And life-extension is a big part of a "golden age" utopian project, which I sense is in the wind, and which will, I fear, also involve mass killings (plus many other things I think will be terribly wrong). Not in concentration camps, but in happy helpful clinics with the very flavor of this Swiss nightmare. “We should see in principle suicide as a marvellous possibility...". I can just just see that guy, rubbing his hands together, smiling and welcoming folks into their happy opportunity...

[And if I'm right it is perfectly reasonable to be waspish.]

*sigh*

One of the hazards of using a new computer is an unfamiliar keyboard. I had a snappy post all ready to go, and I accidentally hit a key-combination that wiped the post out irretrievably.

(mutters curses under breath)

************************

To Andrea,

Go watch Monty Python's "Argument Clinic" sketch and get back to me.

:)

John,

The prohibitions against murder, rape, etc., are as old as Man because, as Karl Marx (for whom I hope there is a special place in Hell) pointed out, we're economic creatures. We weigh our various possible courses of action based on whether they result in a net gain or net loss to us.

(True, religion, among many other things, influences how those courses of action get weighed, but the weighing takes place nonetheless.)

It's because being murdered, raped, robbed, stolen from, or defrauded involves a loss of some kind, to one degree or another, that we do our best to avoid becoming victims of such crimes, and because we're social creatures we seek to avert such loss to our families and friends.

And it's because such behaviors are "hard-wired" into us over the course of millions of years of evolution that schemes, such as Communism or socialized medicine, that run counter to human nature ultimately fail. The New Soviet Man and Hillary-Care Man are impossible because the raw material the schemers want to use is unsuitable to the purpose and is gloriously unrefinable.

As for assisted suicide being the price, or dark side, of life extension, I don't see it. It's like trying to link the emergency appendectomy (is there any other kind?) that saved my life in February 1975 with the disappearance and presumed death of Jimmy Hoffa a few months later.

Unless you're worried about a crowded planet, in which living-space for a modern-day Methuselah has to be gained at the expense of someone else's premature death?

Stop reading UNscientific crap like Ehrlich and start reading real science-fiction by Niven, Pournelle, Forward, and others. (And if you already do, good for you!)

In any case, choice is the key. Don't want your life extended? Then don't undergo the treatments. Or maybe you DO want your life extended? Then go get the treatments. Can't afford them? Wait a bit-- they'll get cheaper with time, just like every other new-fangled device or process.

Hale-
I agree that the human prohibitions against murder, rape, and fraud have been around since the beginning of time, but I'd add the qualifying clause that they have rarely been universally applied. Integral to the founding of Rome was the rape of the Sabines, race based slavery was practiced in this country for almost a century, etc. It is only within recent memory that the privilege of humanity has been granted to those of a different race or nation. There is nothing inherent in man that restricts him from rape, murder, theft, and fraud.

The weakest part of your argument is this:
"We weigh our various possible courses of action based on whether they result in a net gain or net loss to us."

This is ludicrous. It's as silly as saying "we all weigh our courses of action based on what we consider the best thing to do" which informs us of exactly nothing. Men and women who are smart enough and tough enough to make a lot of money and produce many heirs nevertheless choose avocations that demand poverty and celibacy. This is my biggest complaint against Ayn Rand style libertarianism. Though its adherents might curse Marx they hold the same view of Man as a slave of economic transactions.

It is impossible to argue with a libertarian. Especially who thinks that Monty Python sketches, however charming and funny, are a fit answer to a serious objection to one of their notions.

Andrea,

I guess the feather-duster didn't work, so I'm going to use a two-by-four:

It's hard to engage in a battle of wits with someone who refuses to sally forth and give battle, contenting herself with one-line comments a la the "Argument Clinic".

If you want to argue with me, then argue. Who knows, you might even convince me to see things your way. (Unlikely, but possible.) You have no chance at all to convince me (or anyone else) if all you do is lob one-liners in response to opinions you don't like.

***********************

Terry,

Your point is well-taken about how what we think of as "universal" prohibitions becoming universal only recently. It's taken a long time for people to think of other people (ones outside their own tribe or clan) as being human and therefore deserving of the same protections as those given to fellow tribesmen or clansmen.

But that's beside the point. We're at the stage (thanks to Christianity and Judaism, primarily-- I nod in Andrea's direction) where those protections are (or ought to be) universal. (Islam is groping in that direction, but it's hobbled by its congenital defect of a hard link between mosque and state.) Perhaps I lack imagination, but as long as there's a United States, and as long as it promotes the spread of "high-trust" societies like itself, I can't imagine that those "universal" prohibtions would cease to be universal.

As for my argument about people weighing their courses of action according to the gains or losses of each, I'll quote myself:

"(True, religion, among many other things, influences how those courses of action get weighed, but the weighing takes place nonetheless.)"

Just because someone with the potential to become another John D. Rockefeller decides to instead become a Catholic priest doesn't refute my opinion. All it does is point out that for different people, the weight given to one factor or another varies enormously. And we can't know that in any particular person's case because we can't (thank God) read minds.

I should have be clearer. I meant only that people, taken as a mass, are going to respond pretty predictably to economic incentives. Discourage something (through heavy taxation or regulation), and you'll get less of it and at a poorer quality. Encourage something (especially through lower taxes and lighter regulation-- subsidies are perversity made monetary), and you'll get more of it at higher quality.

I think our experience of the last generation or so here in the United States bears that out.

Now, what does this have to do with morality? (I'm trying to tie this into the ostensible topic of the post.) If you have a smaller state, one that does not presume to act in God's place, you leave more room for genuine religion and all the virtues that come from genuine religious belief. It's no accident that societies that have state religions, or have strong official ties to religion, generally have sick religions and people who don't embody very well the virtues of those religions. That applies to Francoist Spain, present-day Britain, and (if you count Communism as a religion of sorts) the old Soviet Union.

That's why I have trouble with the communitarians and the authoritarians. The courses of action that they advocate are precisely the ones that would kill off the very things they want.

I don't think Andrea and I want different ends. I do think we disagree about the means to get there.

As for assisted suicide, and the presumably sick society that would allow it, it's my belief that a state that generally butts the Hell out of people's lives allows religion and its virtues to flourish, making John's feared wave of suicides a non-event. The suicides won't happen because the potentially suicidal will have the social and spiritual resources to choose life, thanks to a vibrant religious life made possible by the state getting out of the way.

I think I'll shut up, now. I've been beavering away at this post for over an hour now....