Mind Matters Natural and Artificial Intelligence News and Analysis

TagCulture of Death

senior-woman-sitting-on-the-wheelchair-alone-stockpack-adobe-stock
Senior woman sitting on the wheelchair alone

Euthanasia’s Slippery Slope

Once a society embraces death as the answer to suffering, what counts as suffering never stops expanding.

Once a society embraces killing as an answer to suffering, the “suffering” that qualifies for termination never stops expanding. The Dutch have decades of experience with this. Since lethal-injection euthanasia became decriminalized — and then, formally legalized — the killable caste has expanded from the terminally ill, to the chronically ill, to people with disabilities, to babies born with serious medical conditions, to the mentally ill, etc., etc., etc.  And, as a plum to society — and an inducement to be killed — euthanasia is sometimes conjoined with organ harvesting. The normalization of medical homicide corrupts people’s thinking, which explains why huge majorities in a Dutch poll now support allowing euthanasia for a “completed life.” From the NL Times story: Voters are much Read More ›

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Hallway the emergency room and outpatient hospital. 3d illustration

The Small Steps That Lead to Dystopia

Revisiting a 1993 article warning about the future of assisted suicide

Editor’s Note: The following piece was originally published in Newsweek in June 1993. Today is my 76th birthday,” the letter began. “Unassisted and by my own free will, I have chosen to take my final passage.” Suicide. My friend Frances died in a cold, impersonal hotel room after taking an overdose of sleeping pills, with a plastic bag tied over her head suffocating the life out of her body. Frances was not a happy woman. She had family troubles. She suffered from chronic lymphatic leukemia and was facing the difficult prospect of a hip replacement. She also had a chronic nerve condition that caused her to feel a burning sensation on her skin. But Frances was lucid, aware and involved. Read More ›