Tom Sawyer

pyrrho,

OK, good point. Worthless was the wrong word to use. It would be better to say that their love was not enough and they were not important enough to you to keep you alive.

No. I'm not saying that, I don't believe that and I don't see how you came to that conclusion based on what I wrote. Please elaborate.

I agree, your life is your own. I also agree that you should not do things that cause harm to others. How I would expand your definition is to say that you should try to avoid doing mental harm to others as well as physical harm. If you disagree with this, please let me know how.

Different levels of choices affect the people in your life in different ways. For instance, I'm married. If I decide to go out after work for a couple of beers with my friends before coming home, she may be slightly annoyed with me, but it's not all that big a deal and doesn't affect her life very much, so there's not much of a moral qualm about it. Now if one of those friends offers me a job in California and I accept and want to uproot both of our lives and have her leave behind her job, friends, etc to follow me across the country, then this affects her significantly and I should consult her before making a decision, since my action will not only affect my life, which I choose to do, but hers as well to a great degree. Since I know this to be the case, I would be immoral to accept the job without consulting with her first, since it involves both of our lives.

Referencing this back to suicide, all the people with whom my life is involved, especially those who love me, are affected by my decision to end my life. My wife, who has chosen to build a life with me; my parents, who invested a lot of time and effort to raise me; my friends, who enjoy spending time with me - they are all adversely affected to a significant degree by my decision to end my life so to do so without taking their feelings into account would be an immoral act on my part.

I agree, parents should not expect their children to do whatever pleases the parents. However, they do have a valid expectation that the child should do something. They have invested a lot of time, energy and money in the raising of the child and do deserve some kind of payback for that effort, in the sense that their prgeny goes on to do something with his life. If somebody does something for you, I think that there is a moral obligation to do something for them in return - that's why people do things for others in the first place. Even if they don't ask for anything in return, giving them something back is the decent thing to do.

If a parent says to a child, "I've invested a lot in your upbringing, so pay me back by being an accountant" and the child says, "No, I wouldn't be happy as an accountant, so I'll pay you back by being a musician. It's not what you wanted to get, but you'll still have a happy son who enjoys his life." The parents still get something in return. If the child kills himself, though, then they get nothing in return and their investment was useless. Basically, you've stolen from them and that is immoral.

The question behind that is why do they consider it better to die? What is happening in their lives and how permanent are the negative events? What mental state are they in and how rational a decision are they able to make as a result of that? If the person is overwhelmed by temporary negative events and wants to end everything when things would get better in the future if they are able to live through the temporary period when things are down, then they do benefit from not dying.

A serial rapist would evaluate the situation of him assaulting innocent women to be of benefit. However, his evaluation of the situation is not rational and so others must make the evaluation for him. It's the same for suicide. Just as I feel justified in saying that a rapist is not making a sound judgement call without knowing anymore of the situation than that he's raped someone, I feel justified in saying that an otherwise healthy suicidal person is not making a sound judgement call wihtout knowing anything more of the situation than that he's trying to kill himself.


Also, suicide is the ultimate form of quitting and is therefore not worthy of the level of respect that should be given to other decisions.

winstonjen

Then there would be a penalty - the interference. The punishment is that they would have to find a way to kill themselves without arousing the attention of cops.

Tom Sawyer:

No, it's the ultimate level of self-determination. Retirement could also be viewed as quitting, if the person has no intention of working again.

So people who have no friends or family have no obligation to stay alive? Or are they still wrong to commit suicide because they could have contributed to society? Are their lives worth any less? Why doesn't prevention of their suicides take the same priority?

Shadowy Man

You may not respect someone for making that decision, but it is still their decision to make.

Pyrrho

I very much disagree, and have already given you an example. Changing your religion can upset others as much as killing yourself. How upset everyone will be depends on what everyone's views are. If your parents are fundamentalist Christians, and you become a devil worshiper, you may upset your parents more than if you kill yourself. Therefore, if you believe that one should not do anything that would upset others to the extent that one's suicide would upset them, then you believe that many other options are not permitted either in many cases. In my opinion, freedom of religion should be pretty much absolute, regardless of how upset others might be.

There are other kinds of examples as well, as one's choice of spouse could upset one's parents and other family members very much. However, I think that one should be free to choose as one pleases, without regard to the opinions of anyone else (except of course the person one marries).

This is not to say that there should be no regard for the opinions of others, but suicide is a very personal decision, and other's opinions are irrelevant. Not allowing people to kill themselves is a kind of slavery.

In other words, certain kinds of "mental harm", as you put it, should not be considered relevant.

(To avoid the possibility of misunderstanding on a certain point, I am not saying that I think that mental harm should never be considered. For example, when raising children, one should not call them "worthless" and otherwise mentally abuse them. In part, this is due to their dependence upon their parents.)


If you have made a commitment to not kill yourself, then you should not do so (under normal circumstances). But that, too, is your choice. Whatever agreement you have made with your wife regarding such things should be considered, though obviously extraordinary or extreme circumstances may make the commitment irrelevant (Kant would disagree with me on this). In general, one has no such commitment to one's parents or other blood relatives, nor to one's friends. You may, for example, move to the other side of the world, and never see them again. Perhaps you will choose to live in a remote village, and be unable to communicate with them ever again, so you may as well be dead as far as your future interaction with them goes. But, presumably, you have made some sort of commitment to stay with your wife, though perhaps not.



I disagree completely. Children did not ask to be born, nor was it possible for them to agree to any commitment. They are forced into the world by their parents, who are completely responsible for their existence.



No. They decided, for whatever selfish reasons, to have a child. The child did not agree to be born. It was forced upon the child without its consent. The obligation is completely one-sided.



No, you are wrong. If I do something for you, you may not have wanted it in the first place. Suppose I buy a subscription for you for a magazine that you detest. You obviously don't owe me anything for it, unless there was a prior agreement between us.

Furthermore, what you are suggesting is the elimination of the concept of giving gifts, and reducing every transfer of property to a business transaction. When I give someone a GIFT, I don't expect anything in return. I am not the mercenary you accuse me of being. If I do expect something in return, it is not a gift, but a sales transaction. Giving people a gift does not make them morally obligated to do anything for you. If it did, it would be a way of controlling them, which is directly counter to the concept of gift giving.



Sometimes, but not always. When I give something to a friend, I don't expect them to give me something in return for it; it is a gift. And I certainly don't want them to give me back things in a one-for-one correspondence, in which I am "given" things that have precisely the same monetary value as what I have given them.



That is ridiculous (and also shows very much that you seem to believe that people's lives are their parent's property, not their own). The parent did not draw up a contract, in which the child agrees before it is born, to pay back the parents in any way. The parents decided, without the consent of the child, to have a child. Their decision to have a child causes the parents to be obligated to care for the child, but the parent's decision cannot obligate the child to do anything at all.

It is impossible for a child to be "stealing" from the parents in the manner in which you suggest. The parents, by having children, owe the child as good of an upbringing as they reasonably can provide. The child accepting this is only accepting what is owed to it, not something that makes it obligated to do something else. If you owe someone $5, when you pay it to him or her, he or she does not then owe you something in return. Likewise, a parent owes a decent upbringing to the child. Paying that debt, that the parent decided to take on, is all that is happening when a parent decently raises a child.


Incidentally, in your hypothetical case, the child's decision to become a musician may displease the parents as much as committing suicide. It all depends on the details of the situation.

In any case, their child will die at some point in time, and any parent who is not aware of this fact is a moron. Some die sooner than others, and that is the risk one takes when one chooses to have children. If someone does not want to accept such risks, then they should not have children.



I remember an interesting interview with a burn victim. He, when he was being "saved", begged and pleaded with the doctors to kill him, as he was in great pain. They ignored his wishes, and saved his life. Later on, he met a woman, fell in love, and was happily married. He was leading a good life at that point. He said that it was not worth it; that no matter how good his life was at that point, it could never make up for the excruciating pain he was forced to endure.

Everyone should make these judgments for themselves, and not have others force their way on these matters.



The difference between these examples is quite extreme. A person who commits suicide is not thereby harming others, but a rapist necessarily is harming others. The one is no analogy for the other.

Furthermore, you have given absolutely no reason for us to believe that suicide is in any way irrational. Frankly, I can think of a reason for everyone to commit suicide. Everyone dies, so one cannot avoid death. What can be altered, however, is the manner of one's death. Some deaths are more unpleasant than others. As long as one continues to live, one is running the risk of an unpleasant death (and such unpleasant deaths are by no means uncommon; do some research about how people die in hospitals, and you will find that many suffer for quite a long time before they receive the relief known as death). Therefore, if one wishes to avoid a painful, unpleasant death, one should choose one's death, and bring it about as soon as practically possible. That means, of course, that one would commit suicide. Those of us who choose to continue living are the irrational ones.



That may be your opinion, but it is no more than that. Some parents have no respect for their children becoming musicians, either. But in both cases, it is NOT your decision to make. Unless, of course, you commit suicide or become a musician.

Secular Elation

Therefore, if one wishes to avoid a painful, unpleasant death, one should choose one's death, and bring it about as soon as practically possible. That means, of course, that one would commit suicide. Those of us who choose to continue living are the irrational ones.

An interesting view. I would say, though, that while it is true that most of us want to avoid a painful, unpleasant death, I think most people remain alive despite this because they hope to live a good life--they stay alive for the possibility that their lives will become great, that their lives will be all the worth to live for. However, that specific motivation to stay alive does not work for all people.

Although, I must acknowledge Tom's argument. His mentioning of the mental pain that I will cause to others if I kill myself is tough to argue with. I agree, it would be a horrible thing to do to my family. But what's more important--the pain I am experiencing or the pain my family will experience upon my suicide? If the former, then it is an entirely selfish decision--if the latter, it is an entirely altruistic decision. Which one is more important? I suppose that is for each to answer for their own.

Tom Sawyer

pyrrho,

I don't believe that people's lives are other peoples properties. However, I do believe that we are members of society and the actions that we take affect the other people in the society and those effects must be taken into account when deciding whether an action is moral or not. Of course we can always ignore the effects that our actions have, but I would question the morality of doing that under the best of circumstances since the sole reason for morality, IMHO, is to govern our interactions with others.

While peoples' individual decisions should generally be respected, the reason behind the decision should be taken into account. If an otherwise healthy person wants to kill himself (euthanasia is a separate topic), then the question must be asked why he wants to do so. It is an irreversable decision that will disallow that person from ever making any other decisions. The finality of it makes it different from any other decision the person could make because there is no possibility of the person being able to change his mind later. Because of this, the state of mind of the person is a much more important factor in determining whether they are making a reasonable decision for themselves than with any other decision and the factors influencing the decision must be examined much more closely than with any other decision since there is no possiblity of recourse if the person isn't in a rational state of mind to make the decision or they haven't fully enough considered the factors that influenced that decision.

When an otherwise healthy person decides to kill himself, it must be asked what his mental state is and whether he is presently rational enough to make this decision for himself. If he is suffering from depression or another mental illness, recently lost a love one, etc then these are criteria that can lower his ability to make rational decisions and as a result, the rationality of the decisions he makes must be questioned. The more significant the decision, the more questions should be asked about his ability to make those decisions. Since suicide is among the most significant decision someone can make, more questions must be asked about his ability to make it.

The factors that influence the decision must be taken into account as well. Since suicide is a permanent decision, if the factors the person took into account when making his decision are temporary then his weighting of those factors must be called into question. For instance, take a teenager is considering suicide because he's bullied a lot at school and doesn't have any friends. Once he gets out of school, he won't have to deal with the bullies anymore and at later periods in his life, he will have the opportunity to make friends, so both of those are temporary factors that are being used to make a permanent decision. Although the teenager living through the situation may view them as permanent conditions of his life, they are not. He may not be able to see this as the case, though, since he is living through it and may not have an objective view of the situation. That being the case, if it appears that he is giving too much weight to temporary factors when making a permanent decision then his conclusions about how to act based on that decision must be called into question.

pyrrho, you and I seem to have vastly different opinions about this matter, so let me ask you - what would you consider to be some rational reasons why an otherwise healthy person would want to kill himself? Because I can't think of any.

Secular Elation

so let me ask you - what would you consider to be some rational reasons why an otherwise healthy person would want to kill himself?

Not everyone agrees on what is and what is not rational---one person may consider one thought rational, while another considers that same thought insane.

In regards to your question, I'll try to think of a potential scenario.

Person X is a shy, reserved, and lonely person. He has no friends, only acquaintences. Of course, the proper response to this would be to meet people and socialize--but such a thing is not always easy, especially for a person who's natural personality is that of shyness and poor socialization skills. Sure, he could try to do these things--at least he took the chance. But he couldn't improve in this regard--he couldn't overcome his own personality issues. He tries to meet and talk with people, but he always says stupid things, and can never carry a conversation. He doesn't know how to overcome these problems. He has the epiphany that his future won't be any better--he doesn't have what it takes to acheive, say, a wife, and he could never see himself adequately raising a child.

So what next? Therapy, indeed. Counseling sessions could show him what he needs to do in order to overcome his social shortcomings and become an outgoing, talkative person. But then he is attached with the stigma of a crazy person--he is undergoing therapy, and thus he has ashamed himself by revelaing that he has psychological problems. He is burdening others with his own problems--he has failed to solve them himself, so he has turned to professional help. And what if the counseling does not help him? He should try it--but it fails to help him.

He decides that he doesn't want to be himself, if it means being a crazy person with problems he can't quite overcome. But then he realizes that people would react condemningly if he revealed that he is experiencing suicidal ideation ("You want to kill yourself? Are you insane?!"). Thus, it will be difficult to receive help with these feelings without avoiding this additional stigma.

Then he has a philosophical realization. Say he does live on, and overcomes his problems. Eventually, he will still die. Once he dies, nothing more will matter--it will not even matter if he had lived a great life or a horrible life, because in the end, it doesn't matter. All lives, regardless of quality, end in nothingness, and once that nothingness comes, it comes forever. The very finite existence of life and everything in it makes everything meaningless and valueless for him. So he decides--why wait and live through it all, and just end it now? It doesn't matter what good or bad awaits in the future, because at one point, it will not matter for an eternity.

Harumi

Okay, from all the arguments here, it sounds like suicide and dying are much better choices than to continue living. Some people here seem to argue that living is irrational.

Because of this, I have some questions to ask:

1) What's the point of life?

2) How can life be sacred if, as people have pointed out, we're all going to die anyways and our lives won't make a significant difference to anything?

Once you answer these questions, I would like to then hold a suicide party, since we're all going to die anyways and we might as well die young, happy, and drinking, right?

How many people think this is a good idea? Anyone willing to join me?

Secular Elation

1) What's the point of life?

If you ask me, to live a happy, productive existence.

2) How can life be sacred if, as people have pointed out, we're all going to die anyways and our lives won't make a significant difference to anything?

Life is sacred because it is finite and unique. Each person in this world is an individual, unique life, and there is only one of each. That is why each one is special.

Tom Sawyer

Secular Elation,

Good point. It does not sound like there's a lot of point for the guy you've mentioned to keep living. He is a burden on others and has nothing to look forward to. His life appears to be a complete waste of time and an observer could easily conclude that it's better to just have him end it. He doesn't have anyone who cares about him and no one will be adversely affected if he kills himself.

The thing is though, the moral code of our society does not place more value on one life than it does another. If there is one person who wishes to commit suicide who has a life that is worth saving, then everyone who wishes to commit suicide has a life that's worth saving. If we could look into the future and see that if he remains alive until he dies a natural death and never does anything of value or has a happy moment during his entire lifespan, our society does not judge his life to have less intrinsic worth than someone who lives a happy, productive life.

Also, we cannot look into the future, so we don't know that he will remain unhappy. He is shy, reserved and unhappy. Who's to say that two years from now a doctor won't find that this is due to a chemical imbalance and can be fixed with a newly available pill? He can't see himself attracting a wife or raising a child, but what if five years down the line, some woman does fall for him and they have a baby and being a husband and father fills the empty void in his life and gives him happiness? He is alive and that means he has potential. He may never use that potential and die with it unfulfilled, but the fact that he has that potential gives his life value and it is our moral duty as members of this society to help keep him around so that he has the chance to use it.

He doesn't think that his life has any meaning and there is no value to his existence. However, the core belief I have that underlies all of my arguments is that life has an intrinsic value. I don't believe that there is any kind of higher power out there that has given it that value, but rather that the fact of life itself holds that value. Without it, there is nothing else and it is something special that should be held on to. If you disagree with that, you may as well just go to Harumi's party. Just make sure you bring a lot of cash with you as I intend to show up late and rifle through all your pockets.