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topicquestion
MindWhat good is your perceptual awareness of the objects around you?
Thought & LanguageIs there more to the meaning than reference?
PoliticsIn what way, if any, are you responsible for the harm of world poverty?
MetaphysicsWhat is metaphysically necessary for your personal survival?
ActionOf the events involving you, what determines which are your actions?
EthicsWhat, if anything, is ethically wrong with suicide?

How to revise?

Cover the basics,
do more research,
and practice writing.

\title {Central Themes in Philosophy \\ Lecture 18}
 
\maketitle
 

Lecture 18:

Central Themes

\def \ititle {Lecture 18}
\def \isubtitle {Central Themes}
\begin{center}
{\Large
\textbf{\ititle}: \isubtitle
}
 
\iemail %
\end{center}
 
\section{The Argument from What Is Good for Me}
 
\section{The Argument from What Is Good for Me}
What moves people like Feinberg and Mcmahan and others to think that people have a right to kill themselves if they rationally judge that doing so will make their lives better?

‘there is a presumption in favor of deferring to a person’s judgment on the subject of [her] own good’

Therefore:

‘a person has the right to make [her] own life shorter in order to make it better’

Velleman, 1999 p. 607

One last thing: I think this helps us to understand where Feinberg is going when he uses the slur ‘paternalistic’div
 
\section{Velleman on Suicide}
 
\section{Velleman on Suicide}

what is good for Ayesha’s car

vs

what is good for Ayesha

The former matters only insofar as Ayesha has a use for his car. The latter matters insofar as Ayesha matters.

Velleman’s key distinction

what is good for a person vs the value of the person herself

Velleman’s other key distinction

doing what is required by her personhood

vs

ensuring that she gets what is good for her

‘there is a presumption in favor of deferring to a person’s judgment on the subject of [her] own good’

Therefore:

‘a person has the right to make [her] own life shorter in order to make it better’

Velleman, 1999 p. 607

Will consider another argument

1. A person’s good matters only insofar as she, the person, has value.

‘what’s good for a person is worth caring about only out of concern for the person, and hence only insofar as he is worth caring about’ \citep[p.~612]{velleman:1999_right}.

2. A person’s right to shorten her life would be a right to destroy her value.

In ‘Children of Ruin’, a tiny group of interstellar explorers function quite happily light years (and a lifetime of travel) from the nearest humans until one day they discover that they are the last humans alive. They experience a loss of value.

Therefore (from 1 & 2):

3. Preventing a person from exercising such a right would not be intrinsically wrong.

Therefore (from 3):

4. No such right exists.

Velleman, 1999; 2008

What does Velleman’s argument imply for the left half?
One last thing. This isn’t an argument for an answer to our question about whether suicide is intrinsically ethically impermissible; it’s an objection to an argument for a negative answer to that question.
‘A Kant-inspired variant on this latter position has been advanced by Velleman (1999). He considers that a person’s well-being can only matter if she is of intrinsic value and so that it is impermissible to violate a person’s rational nature (the source of her intrinsic value) for the sake of her well-being. Accordingly, he holds that it is impermissible to assist someone to die who judges that she would be better off dead and competently requests assistance with dying. The only exception is when a person’s life is so degraded as to call into question her rational nature, albeit he thinks it unlikely that anyone in that position will remain competent to request assistance with dying. This position appears to be at odds with the well-established right of a competent patient to refuse life-prolonging medical treatment, at least when further treatment is refused because she considers that her life no longer has value for her and further treatment will not restore its value to her’ \citep{young:2019_voluntary}.

Q

What, if anything, is ethically wrong with suicide?

Is suicide intrinsically ethically impermissible?

Feinberg, 1978

Yes, if the right to life is mandatory.

Maybe not, if the right to life is discretionary.

Velleman, 1999; 2008 [approx]

The right to life is not discretionary in Feinberg’s sense.

Note that this is not an answer to the question (Velleman’s answer is that suicide can be ethically permissible, but it is intrinsically ethically impermissible to shorten your life for the sake of your own good.)
This view is nicely summarised by McMahan, who writes that on Velleman’s view (which he opposes), ’To kill a person for a reason other than to respect his rational nature is to treat his rational nature as commensurable in value with, and sacrificeable for, some other value---and this is to violate the person’s worth’ \citep[p.~478]{mcmahan:2002_ethics}.

Velleman, 1999, 2008 : suicide is ethically impermissible if done for the reason that it will make your life better

 

Objections to Velleman on Suicide

 
\section{Objections to Velleman on Suicide}
 
\section{Objections to Velleman on Suicide}

We can construct an animal that doesn’t matter but whose good matters (McMahan, 2002 p. 275).

\subsection{Objection 1}
Velleman’s first premise is that a person’s good matters only insofar as she, the person, matters.
Objection: We can construct an animal that doesn’t matter but whose good matters (McMahan, 2002 p. 275).
The animal’s ‘mind is so simple that it altogether lacks either synchronic or diachronic psychological unity. That is a reasonable basis for claiming that the creature, as an individual, does not matter at all. It is, as Singer would say, replaceable without loss by another creature of its sort whose experiences would be equally good. But [...] it seems wrong to suppose that the sequence of the creature’s mental states cannot matter at all. It matters impersonally whether, for example, the creature’s experiences are pleasurable or painful’ \citep[pp.~475--6]{mcmahan:2002_ethics}.

‘to respect a person is to show appropriate acknowledgment that his good is important in the same way that any other person’s is, and to defer to his autonomous will in certain matters, principally those concerning how his own life should go’

‘[...] we honor or show appropriate respect for the person’s worth precisely by ministering to his good, provided that this is also what he autonomously wills, even when what is required by a concern for his good is that his life should be ended’ \citep[p.~482]{mcmahan:2002_ethics}.
Note that McMahan sometimes misconstrues what is at issue in his argument with Velleman. For instance, in summarising the issue he puts his position as the view that ‘[t]here is simply no sense in which a person’s worth is upheld or affirmed by his mere persistence through suffering’ \citep[p.~482]{mcmahan:2002_ethics}. But this is something Velleman could also accept.

A person’s good matters only insofar as she, the person, has value.

A person’s right to shorten her life would be a right to destroy her value.

Therefore:

Preventing a person from exercising such a right would not be intrinsically wrong.

Therefore:

No such right exists.

Velleman, 1999; 2008

This is what the objection targets.
Is the objection decisive, or can Velleman’s argument be saved?.
I think the objection requires modification rather than abandoning Velleman’s argument. ‘Whether or not it is true quite generally that an individual’s good cannot matter unless the individual matters, it is reasonable to believe that persons do matter, that they have a value in themselves that is independent of their good’ \citep[p.~476]{mcmahan:2002_ethics}
How is this a potential objection?
I interpret McMahan as challenging the idea that Velleman’s conclusion is an objection to the idea that it’s ok for a person to shorten her life for her own good. But I am very unsure. I don’t think I properly understand the objection (and quite possibily not Velleman’s view either!)

conclusion

In conclusion, ...

Q

What, if anything, is ethically wrong with suicide?

Is suicide intrinsically ethically impermissible?

Feinberg, 1978

Yes, if the right to life is mandatory.

Maybe not, if the right to life is discretionary.

Velleman, 1999; 2008 [approx]

The right to life is not discretionary in Feinberg’s sense.

Objection : some (imaginary) valueless animals’ good matters.