Ethics At The End Of Life

The 14 chapters in Ethics at the End of Life: New Issues and Arguments, all published here for the first time, focus on recent thinking in this important area, helping initiate issues and lines of argument that have not been explored previously. At the same time, a reader can use this volume to become oriented to the established questions and positions in end of life ethics, both because new questions are set in their context, and because most of the chapters-written by a team of experts-survey the field as well as add to it. Each chapter includes initial summaries, final conclusions, and a Related Topics section. TABLE OF CONTENTS John K. Davis, Introduction Geoffrey Scarre, Is it possible to be better off dead? Taylor W. Cyr, How Does Death Harm the Deceased? Benjamin Mitchell-Yellin, The Significance of an Afterlife Jens Johansson, The Severity of Death John K. Davis, Defining Death James Stacey Taylor, Autonomy, Competence, and End of Life Eric Vogelstein, Deciding for the Incompetent Paul T. Menzel, Change of Mind: An Issue for Advance Directives Nancy S. Jecker, Medical Futility and Respect for Patient Autonomy Paul T. Menzel, Refusing Lifesaving Medical Treatment and Food and Water by Mouth Thomas S. Huddle, Suicide, Physician-Assisted Suicide, the Doing-Allowing Distinction and Double Effect Michael Cholbi, Grief and End of Life Surrogate Decision-making Bruce Jennings, Solidarity near the End of Life: The Promise of Relational Decision-making in the Care of the Dying Colin Farrelly, Justice and the Aging of the Human Species