Respect for Other Selves
Philosophers have mostly advocated that advance directives should bear the same authority, with regard to refusal of life-extending treatment, as a patient's contemporaneous consent or refusal. Such authors typically support this position through a theory of persistent personal identity. I agre...
| Main Author: | |
|---|---|
| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Interlibrary Loan: | Interlibrary Loan for the Fachinformationsdienste (Specialized Information Services in Germany) |
| Published: |
2011
|
| In: |
Kennedy Institute of Ethics journal
Year: 2011, Volume: 21, Issue: 4, Pages: 349-378 |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Summary: | Philosophers have mostly advocated that advance directives should bear the same authority, with regard to refusal of life-extending treatment, as a patient's contemporaneous consent or refusal. Such authors typically support this position through a theory of persistent personal identity. I agree that the loss of mental competence does not render someone a moral stranger to their prior goal but argue that equating advance direction with consent is to ignore the capacity of nonpersons to attribute and withhold moral value. A distinction should be drawn between advance directives that seek to pursue deeply held goals and those that express contempt for the mentally incompetent. |
|---|---|
| ISSN: | 1086-3249 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Kennedy Institute of Ethics, Kennedy Institute of Ethics journal
|
| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1353/ken.2011.0017 |
