Italy is being wracked by a Terri Schiavo-esque political feeding-tube fight. In 1992, Eluana Englaro, then 21-years-old, was in a serious car accident and struck comatose. Two years later, her doctors declared her condition irreversible. Since then, she has been on feeding tubes in a vegetative state. Last November, Englaro’s father won a court order allowing her feeding tubes to be disconnected, but Italy’s Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi, has fought to keep her on life-support. Catholic newspapers accuse the father of wanting to kill his daughter; the Catholic Church has forcefully insisted that the government must keep Englaro alive.
Berlusconi’s cabinet issued an emergency order on Friday outlawing the cessation of artificial feeding and hydration. President Giorgio Napolitano has refused to sign the decree, however, claiming that the prime minister is violating the separation of powers between the executive and judicial branches by ignoring numerous court rulings supporting Mr. Englaro. The family’s lawyer told the Corriere della Sera that the family was going forward under the judicial decree; the paper reports that Englaro’s feeding tubes were disconnected on Friday.
These wrenching moral dilemmas obviously have no simple or permanent answer. A bright-line rule that humans must be kept alive for however long as medical technology permits is certainly easier to administer than a more nuanced position that takes into account mental capacity, quality of life, and the desires of family members. A bright-line life support rule also avoids any possible slippery slope towards an intolerance for the feeble and handicapped. But to call the always-use-medical-technology position “pro-life” gives too little weight to a family’s agonized interests, I think. After 17 years watching his daughter in a coma, Eluana Englaro’s father did not come at his decision lightly, it would appear. Like Terri Schiavo’s husband, the father has been forced into the fiction that Eluana communicated her wish to not be kept indefinitely on life support. The more honest position is probably something along the lines of: ‘we know our daughter, this is not her, it never again will be her, she has suffered long enough and so have we. Death is a natural part of life; it is time for her to die.’ Yet with medical technology becoming ever more sophisticated, we may become slaves to our capacity to keep people, especially the very elderly, technically alive through machines that compensate for their failing organs or damaged brains.
Meanwhile, the backlash against Nadya Suleman, the mother of six artificially-conceived children who gave birth to another eight two weeks ago continues. The nine-week premature octoplet’s delivery required 46 doctors, nurses, and assistants; in twelve days, their care has likely cost at least $300,000 and counting. Here’s a possible rule of thumb: If you are a radical pro-lifer and believe that every artificially-conceived embryo must be brought to term, no fertility treatments for you unless you are prepared to bankroll all the resulting medical costs yourself. Either accept your God-given condition of infertility or accept a human condition on the man-made science for overcoming that infertility: use within reason.
I didn’t say cousin. And I would always defer to parents except when they are divided. Because they are the one’s who invested the time and resources to bring up the child. Quite simply they own the stake.
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I just scrolled through the comments but I didn’t see even one that addresses the 14 artifically induced children borne by Ms. Suleman. I find this very strange indeed.
OK Maybe more like a points scoring system. So that you could take into account things like: What if the parents were absent or what if the older brother brought up the child. What if the parents are dead. Perhaps built on Bayesian lines.
Spouses might not need to have zero input. But they would only be one of the stakeholders. The guiding principle though is that there are multiple stakeholders and close genetic relatives count.
Individualism is way too simplistic. Genes control what? More than half of our behaviour?.
Feel free to make the first comment carolyn c.
Unstrange us.
Can I point out that the Catechism of the Catholic Church disagrees with the absolutists who were demanding Eluana Englaro be kept “alive” forever? It says, “Discontinuing medical procedures that are burdensome, dangerous, extraordinary, or disproportionate to the expected outcome can be legitimate; it is the refusal of ‘over-zealous’ treatment. Here one does not will to cause death; one’s inability to impede it is merely accepted. The decisions should be made by the patient if he is competent and able or, if not, by those legally entitled to act for the patient, whose reasonable will and legitimate interests must always be respected” (2278).
Torrentprime: Why is it “not my place” to question Michael Schiavo’s decisions, when you yuorself question the decisions made by her parents? Or are some matters off-limits for discussion: no one dare question Michael Schiavo’s motives or knowledge? You wouldn’t happen to BE Michael Schiavo, would you? You certainly are a passionate defender of his. And I’m happy to know he proved what Terri wanted. Can you document that?
Torrentprime: Why is it “not my place” to question Michael Schiavo’s decisions, when you yuorself question the decisions made by her parents? Or are some matters off-limits for discussion: no one dare question Michael Schiavo’s motives or knowledge? You wouldn’t happen to BE Michael Schiavo, would you? You certainly are a passionate defender of his. And I’m happy to know he proved what Terri wanted. Can you document that?
“The issue is that she was a living breathing human being until she was starved to death.”
No, she wasn’t. Human tissue != human being. It’s necessary, but not sufficient — and it’s only ‘necessary’ because our technology is so limited. Eventually we’ll have human beings that aren’t made of meat.
But I’m guessing you make the same sorts of arguments in abortion debates, insisting that an eight-celled tissue cluster somehow deserves the same consideration as a toddler.
I’m speculating, now, but I’ll bet you don’t disapprove of organ donations after brain death. Am I right about that?
“You wouldn’t happen to BE Michael Schiavo, would you? You certainly are a passionate defender of his.”
I’m a passionate defender of him, too, and not because I am him, but because I believe he was right.
The decision that Schiavo would want to die was made by a judge, not by her husband. And, there are tons and tons of decisions on the matter for the curious. Michael Schiavo had nothing invested in this except to do what he thought his wife would have wanted. He was offered large sums of money to “give” her to his parents. Instead, he chose to do what he thought was right. That made him a villain, apparently. I’m sympathetic to the parents wishing to hold on to their daughter. However, the reality of adulthood is that parents don’t get to make decisions for their child anymore. The real travesty in this case was the attempts of outsiders to use this case to score cheap political points.
“One of the problems I have with the US constitution is its excessive individualism. There is no place in it for the rights of families.”
Because ‘families’ are not considered to have rights over individuals in our society; thus, there was no need to make provisions for them.
If you would wish to establish such rights, what would they be? And what protections would individuals have against the authority of their families? Protecting the individual against the authority of the system was once a major component of American thought.
I understand Caledonian. I compare the West to traditional Asia. We in the West are developing atomised societies. People in Europe have stopped breeding we are dying out. Everyone lives for self.
In traditional Asia, family has real power and prestige. It is an alternative center of loyalty. People marry, have kids, because it is family duty.
There are other flaws too I think. Individuals are frail vulnerable, alone in anonymous cities. There is a natural drift to statism and socialism. The State has become the substitute superfamily. It provides the welfare. Government is choking our creativity in it’s bureacratic, if well-meaning, embrace.
I fear radical individualism is doomed. It won’t last out this century. Man is not an atom.
Caledonian
Eventually we’ll have human beings that aren’t made of meat.
Uh! Oh! Careful with this…
@Daniel Dare
Different strokes…
I, for one, find the “traditional Asian” system to be horrific. In such systems, there is a natural drift to statism and socialism as the State takes over the role as the superfamily, demanding the power, prestige and loyalty which that society has inculcated as being owed to family. Obediance to the State becomes not a matter of conscience, but family duty.
Only the individual, freed from atavistic bonds to family “loyalty” is free to truly prosper. The other system is horrifically inefficient by pressing, through the falacy of “family duty”, choices on the individual in which he is not interested and for which he is not suited, solely due to the prejudices and misguided ideas of family.
Grant Canyon
Only the individual, freed from atavistic bonds to family “loyalty” is free to truly prosper.
Yes, the “traditional Asian” system is indeed horrific for the individual, but this is what is driving Chinese civilisation since a few millenia and it may very well outlast our own “western” civilisation.
The so-called “communist China” is just imperial bureaucracy painted red.
Terri Schiavo was autopsied following legal declaration of death. You can also see the CT scan results in the Wiki article about her. Both the CT scans and the autopsy showed that more than half of the neurons were gone from the brain, including the regions of the brain that are the seat of consciousness. In other words, the pro-life people were way off base. Terry was dead long before the case gained public attention in 2005.
Bill Frist deceptive comments on this issue is what cost him his credibility as a medical professional and, eventually, his Senate seat.
It is likely that regenerative medicine will allow for regeneration of brains from this kind of damage in the future (the basis of future revival from cryo-preservation). However, such regeneration in her case would make for a “new” person instead of Terry Schiavo as she existed prior to her medical calamity. You will note that none of the pro-life people ever discussed the possibility of such regenerative bio-medicine.
In any case, such a technology is sufficient far enough in the future (30-40 years) that Terry Schaivo would have had to be cryo-preserved into to take advantage of it. Of course, none of the pro-life people stepped up to the plate with an offer to cryo-preserve her.
If the pro-life people were truly interested in resolving these issues in favor of continued life, they would support R&D efforts to develop a robust regenerative capability as well as efforts such as SENS. They do not. This strongly suggests that they are more interested in simply jerking people around and making them suffer for gratuitous reasons instead of actually solving these kinds of biomedical problems in such a manner that people would choose to go on living.
This is why the pro-life people have no positive contribution to resolving these kinds of problems. They are not worth listening to.
“One of the problems I have with the US constitution is its excessive individualism. There is no place in it for the rights of families.”
This is incorrect. Parents are assumed to have legal rights as guardians over their children until they reach the age of majority.
“Yes, the ‘traditional Asian’ system is indeed horrific for the individual, but this is what is driving Chinese civilisation since a few millenia and it may very well outlast our own ‘western’ civilisation.”
I know. I was just drawing a counterpoint to the statements by Danial Dare as a way of showing that what we have here are two different ways of organizing society. I don’t believe that either has complete superiority to the other (or to any of the others which exist) in any absolute sense, but that each have benefits and detriments that the others do not. I know which I prefer, though.
The system that we have may very well outlast the other family-based systems or they may both continue on into the future.
Guys, you should be aware that those family-based Asian civilizations such as the Chinese now have a lower birth rate than our “individualist” loving U.S.A.
“Individuals are frail vulnerable…”
Perhaps we should make ourselves more robust. I believe this is the central purpose of transhumanism.
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This is incorrect. Parents are assumed to have legal rights as guardians over their children until they reach the age of majority.
It’s not enough kurt9. They move away. They break links. They form nuclear families, the old parents are left to the nursing homes and the retirement villages. The wives work, they have small families. Childcare is expensive. I am talking about the secular blue states in particular.
If it wasn’t for the Christian traditionalists, what would be the birthrate of white Americans? Same as Europe I bet.
You can’t survive with a birthrate of 1.4 children per female.
Christian traditionalists favor stronger family. So does traditional Asia.
Without the family, in the end you have individuals and Leviathan.
In the end there are only two possible solutions:
Either the family or the state will control the birthrate.
Those societies that don’t favor one of these two options will disappear.
In the end there are only two possible solutions:
Either the individual or the state will control the birthrate.
Those societies that don’t favor one of these two options will disappear.
Dream on Grant.
Individuals will always have better things to do. Travel, careers, the latest plasma TVs, whatever.
Only immortal institutions like the family or the state can impose the discipline.
Could be a religion I suppose.
Islam?
Fanatical Fundamentalist Darwinians? ROFLMAO
If it wasn’t for the Christian traditionalists, what would be the birthrate of white Americans?
How did that next-to-last word get in there? What possible relevance could it have to this discussion?
Both America and Europe have so many people who want to get into their societies that they could give up reproduction entirely and still continue as societies by passing their ideals down to generations of immigrants. (Of course nothing like that will happen as many people’s emotional drives to reproduce are still effective, and thus we have a massive oversupply of reproduction in pretty much every society.) Any society is necessarily a ship of Theseus anyway as its members are born and die. Genetic continuity doesn’t noticeably add to, and certainly isn’t a prerequisite for, social continuity.
Ideals and values are not bound to the genes, as the US-raised children of “traditional Asians” prove.
The whites represent the most deeply secularised population, most directly comparable to the Europeans.
But in the end secularization will proabably spread to everyone. Asia is secularizing. China and India already have made population control the business of the state. I don’t think we will hold 2.1 for long without making it somebody’s policy.
And another thing. It think there’s a real possibility of a population crash in the developing world later this century as the oil runs out.
Starvation may be unavoidable.
And here’s a third point: immigration.
How many immigrants will USA and Europe accept next year?
Anyone know how high unemployment is going to be in the OECD?
In the end there are only two possible solutions:
Either the family or the state will control the birthrate.
Those societies that don’t favor one of these two options will disappear.
I suggest a third: SENS.
I think it would actually be easier and cheaper than trying to push people into having kids they don’t want.
You know kurt9 you and I are on the same page on this.
It’s just that it is a bit more speculative so I don’t go on about it.
And you know it’s not that hard to make people have kids.
All you do is licence contraception to those who can prove they’ve had 2 children.
A state that has a one child policy can have a two child policy just as easily.
“All you do is licence contraception to those who can prove they’ve had 2 children.”
Of course. We all must do our duty for the Fatherland.
Back in ancient times when I studied ecology in college we learned that the birth rate of a sexually reproducing population is controlled by the number of females. Reduce the males and the remaining males can still impregnate all the females, reduce the females and the birth rates start to drop, reduce the females further and birth rates crash. Technologies that allow sex identification and selective abortion of female fetuses are increasingly available to traditional societies that favor males. Its already starting to happen in many countries notably China. These societies are commiting genocide against themselves by eliminating a large portion of the next generation of females.
Dana you are right but a world without females would be unbearable. There would be no light in our darkness.
Also there is the economic counterargument. You make females that scarce and they become very valuable. People start to kidnap them from villages and give dowries or brideprices. Soon there is a vast incentive to have daughters.
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All you do is licence contraception to those who can prove they’ve had 2 children.
Then you have a black market in contraceptive products. Also, guys that do not want kids would simply go overseas to get vasectomies. Thats what I would do.
The Russians have a proverb: For every rule there are 100 ways to get around it.
Infertility is NOT god-given. It can happen to anyone and for many reasons
It can happen after a miscarriage due to a too-agressive D&C.
No one judges all the mothers who get knocked up young, naturally, as ferociously as this woman. Sure she has problems, but don’t say infertility is god-given and those who suffer it deserve some higher moral standard when it comes to having kids. Millions of people have kids for crazy reasons in bad circumstances.
Children are not considered to be individuals in our legal system.
I consider this abhorrent, but that’s not the point here. Our system doesn’t grant power over individuals to their families except in very, very limited circumstances.
How would we do about defining ‘rights of the family’? What sorts of rights?
It always baffled me in the Schiavo case just how many people could doggedly ignore the actual legal and ethical issues at stake. At the time the case became a public cause, her husband wasn’t even “in charge” of what happened in any case, yet people still blather on about his conflicts of interest as if he could decide if she lived or died at a whim.
And whether you agree with the court’s ruling or not, can’t people at least acknowledge that issues like this sometimes need to be decided by courts (how else can we resolve matters of fact, by pistol dueling?) and that it’s important that there be some sort of due process and force behind court rulings?
Or the issue of whether feeding/hydration tubes are life support. Whatever you think about this, by law, they were considered so in Florida (and honestly, anyone who’s actually seen them in use and knows what sort of care, invasiveness and upkeep they require would at least not be so glib as to call it merely feeding/hydrating as if she were denied a plate of food or a cup of water).
Whatever you think about how the law should have been, don’t you at least agree that when we DO establish legal systems designed to safeguard important interests, that we should follow them, rather than deciding to do so or not based on media attention? If abortion became illegal tomorrow, would anti-abortionists be happy if we simply ignored that law whenever a pro-legal abortion person felt strongly that we should?
I can tell you that one effect of the Terry Schiavo case was to radically increase the interest in living wills and durable power of attorney forms. Washington State actually ran out of these forms the month following the Terry Schiavo case. This alone was a very positive outcome of this unfortunate situation.
Of course those of us interested in cryo-preservation have been quite familiar with these legal formalities for years given that they are necessary for effective cryo-preservation.
Caledonian, sorry I’ve been busy on another thread.
Well, how about the right to opt out of a large part of social security system and administer their own collective welfare system? And being granted major tax concessions to enable them to do it. I think a lot of larger extended families could do it. Wealthier ones too.
The ability to tax-exempt all sorts of intrafamily economic transactions.
The goal is always to encourage the formation of co-operative extended family groups. So that they remove themselves from the wider state-centric institutions.
Individuals could register themselves as a member of a particular family that would function as a collective. How they administer that could be decided democratically. They would have to hold regular family councils. They would have to prove genuine family relationship by marriage or descent or adoption, and it ought to be “opt in” maybe for a fixed contract period. Parents could act on behalf of minors.
It’s like you are setting up a extra level of democratic government. You have individuals<families<local<state<federal. The powers would be drawn from the other levels. Families could be less geographically based so that your cousin in another state could still be a member of the same family.
The goal is unashamedly to encourage the formation of a different model of society than that which now exists in the USA and the rest of the West.
Purely for discussion – this is not a manifesto.
Sounds like polyamory.
If we didn’t limit the growth of the system to only fairly closely related individuals, say 3-4 generations, it would become a clan-based system. But I wanted to be sure that the genetic connection was real enough, so that we have a social structure, which is actually backed up by the full power of inclusive fitness. This is Darwinian layer to society.
The people in a family pretty much compare to a stone-age tribe.
I have an idea for increasing the birth-rate. Allow those adults who are willing to have kids to enter into polyamorous marriages. The benefit of this is more adults to support the kids through their economic productivity and just spending time with the kids. This would also be attractive to the participating adults because they can have sex with more than one partner.
I don’t think it would work for me kurt9. I am a one woman guy.
But my concept is inspired by the Environment of Evolutionary Adaptedness. It’s what we evolved for, mostly in the stone age.
I am re-reading my copy of Nick Wade’s “Before the Dawn”. I’m at the part about the Bonobos, a primate species in Africa similar to that of the chimpanzees. The example of the Bonobos suggest that a society based on polyamory could possibly be stable and non-violent. Any thoughts on this?
As far as I know, most current and recorded stone-age societies are not like that.
I’ve heard there are groups like this today. Google is your friend.