R U A Meritocrat?

Posted on June 13, 2013 by

LESLIE
Well I think it’s shocking. Did you see those figures in the Telegraph last week?

HILARY
What figures were those?

LESLIE
They were looking at what people paid towards welfare and pensions in the last Tax Year. Someone earning £15,000 would have paid over £700.

HILARY
That’s a lot of money. No wonder the Government is trying to find ways to cut down the welfare bill.

LESLIE
Oh that’s nothing. Someone with £50,000 a year would have paid over £5000. That’s seven times as much!

HILARY
I don’t think that’s relatively bad – after all the £50,000 earner is making so much money it’s peanuts to them.

LESLIE
Sometimes I despair of you Hilary. Leaving aside the fact that everyone’s circumstances are different it’s really foolish to confiscate so much of the earnings of successful people. We’re rapidly heading for a mediocre society of the lowest common denominator. This country really achieved prosperity by allowing the successful to get the rewards of their work. That’s only justice.

HILARY
So you believe in the meritocracy?

LESLIE
What do you mean?

HILARY
It means quite simply that you believe that the world should be run by the “fortunate” people – who might, if they have the mind to, chuck a few pennies at the less fortunate.

LESLIE
It’s not a question of being fortunate; it’s a question of working hard to be successful.

HILARY
Tripe! One thing all the experts agree on is that the intelligence level is the most reliable measure of future success. And that, my dear Leslie, is inherited. Sheer chance who your parents are!

LESLIE
Just as a matter of fact only about 50% of IQ comes from parents.

HILARY
Let’s not quibble about the exact figure – but the other 50% comes from upbringing. And that’s chance too.

LESLIE
How come?

HILARY
Well we know that upbringing in a successful educated household is a huge advantage. The children get a big vocabulary. They come into contact with books right there in the home. The parents care about homework being properly done. And the children are likely to be encouraged all the way. Children in poor families are more likely to be reprimanded than encouraged. That’s the problem: well off parents tend to produce successful children, parents who happen to be poor and relatively uneducated don’t. So history repeats itself.

LESLIE
Come on. Hilary. There’s an excellent free education system in this country – and they all work to the National Curriculum. Everyone has a chance to get to the top.

HILARY
You do live in fairy land, don’t you? I’ll leave aside private education – just remembering that it’s often paid for by family money. The fact is that the quality of a state school is hugely variable. If you want a good school you’d better live in a good area. But if you’re stuck in a poor area you’ll get a sink school. Parents, I’m told, run themselves ragged to get their children into a good school. And, believe me, middle class parents can run faster.

LESLIE
So what you’re saying is that well off and successful people depend on the good fortune of good genes and good parents. There’s no dam’ merit in it.

HILARY
That’s certainly true. There are plenty of people who work hard and long hours in boring jobs to make ends meet. And plenty of others who tread a gilded path. And the difference is brought about by no more than chance. Of course I accept that you can’t put everyone on identical wages – but I shed no tears when the fortunate are required to contribute really quite large sums in taxation in acknowledgement of their good luck.

LESLIE
I’d like to stay and explain to you what damage your ideas would do to our society. Fact is, I’ve got my mid-week round of golf in an hour. It’s with Jem Wilcox, of Personnel. Remember, I promised to have a word with him about your boy. I’m sure he’ll find him a job. He owes me a favour

HILARY
Oh..er… thanks.

EXEUNT

This website allows you to see the contributions made at different income levels towards public services.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/10106437/Revealed-how-much-you-pay-towards-benefit-bill.html

Posted in Church and Society, Moral judgment | 32 Comments

Clear conscience

Posted on June 6, 2013 by

The teaching of Vatican II on conscience is often invoked in discussions about moral obligation. While the traditional doctrine of the freedom of conscience is stated clearly in Gaudium et Spes (and Dignitatis Humanae) it has been read by some people as a general licence simply to decide for oneself.

But this is an old problem which Cardinal Newman explored in the 19th century. Gladstone had published a short book which argued that Vatican decrees and civil allegiance were incompatible. Newman came back with his celebrated Letter to the Duke of Norfolk. It opens with the words: “The main question which Mr Gladstone has started I consider to be this: Can Catholics be trustworthy subjects of the State? has not a foreign Power a hold over their consciences such that it may at any time be used to the serious perplexity and injury of the civil government under which they live?”

In the section on conscience Newman distinguishes the Catholic concept of conscience from the fashionable version. And, in doing so, he takes the opportunity to note the limitations of infallibility. There is an interesting background article by the  eminent theologian, John T Ford, for those who want a fuller picture (details below).

Here I have given myself the task of summarising Newman’s points. I do not focus on his references to Gladstone, but confine myself to his general description of conscience. The full text is available via SecondSightblog.net.

The Supreme Being has the attributes of justice, truth, wisdom, sanctity, benevolence and mercy as eternal characteristics in his nature, the law of his being. And, as Creator, he implanted this law as the rule of ethical truth, the standard of right and wrong, a participation in the eternal law in the rational nature. Although we may not all understand it equally well it does not lose its character nor its prerogative to command obedience. So it is never lawful to go against our conscience.

This differs from the fashionable view that conscience is a creation of man rather than the voice of God. The latter is the view of the Catholic Church and is broadly shared by the Reformation religions. The fashionable view has no concern with the rights of the Creator, it has no relationship to any moral law. Rather, it is an exercise of self-will. This is a counterfeit version unknown to previous centuries of Christianity.

The Church has indeed described freedom of conscience as a sort of deliramentum (See Pius IX, Quanta Cura, 1864). But statements need to be interpreted in context and here it is plain that the popes are referring to the “counterfeit” modern concept of conscience. Indeed, for a pope to deny true freedom of conscience would be suicidal since his fundamental mission is to proclaim the moral law.

But objections remain. Is it possible that the popes have distorted moral law to suit their own objectives? Can our understanding of moral law ever be free when it is so closely interrelated with religious authority? Would there not ensue an unmanageable collision between Church and state? And, to take it to the logical conclusion, how can the pope’s absolute authority be compatible with the absolute authority of private conscience?

We should recall here that conscience is not concerned with speculative truth or abstract doctrine but only with conduct: it is the practical judgment on something to be done or not done. Conscience, therefore, can never be in collision with infallibility because that is concerned only with the teaching of generaCollision with the Pope’s authority can only occur when the Pope legislates or gives particular orders and the like. But in all these the question of infallibility does not arise. Was Peter infallible when Paul stood up to him in the matter of gentile converts? Or Liberius when he excommunicated Athanasius? Was Urban VIII infallible when he persecuted Galileo? No Catholic makes such claims.

If a claim of conscience is made contrary to papal authority it must be the true conscience not the fashionable counterfeit. It can only follow thought, prayer and every available means of arriving at right judgment. The onus of proof lies with us. Unless we can claim in the presence of God that we must not, and dare not, act upon the papal injunction we must obey.

We must avoid that vulgar spirit which automatically bridles at the voice of authority, or that wilful determination to think or do just what we please – whether true or false. And, if we were to do that, defiance of papal injunction would be rare indeed.

It is also clear, from many authorities, that even an erroneous conscience must be obeyed. It may be our fault that we are in error (and we may have to answer for that) but we must still obey. So, for example, those who have been brought up in heresy, and are persuaded that we are idolaters, and should be shunned as pests, cannot with safe conscience hear the Church.

“Certainly, if I am obliged to bring religion into after-dinner toasts (which indeed does not seem quite the thing) I shall drink – to the Pope, if you please – still, to conscience first, and to the Pope afterwards.”

Link to Ford article:
http://www.pcj.edu/journal/essays/ford.htm

Link to original text:

http://www.newmanreader.org/works/anglicans/volume2/gladstone/section5.html

Posted in Catholic Herald columns, Church and Society, Moral judgment, Philosophy | Tagged , , | 106 Comments

Get rich quick

Posted on May 30, 2013 by

Would you like to become very rich? There are plenty of possible ways. You could develop and sell a successful social network on the internet. High school dropout, David Karp, recently sold his social networking site, Tumblr, to Yahoo! for more than $1 billion. You could play the market and, with reasonable luck make, or possibly lose, a fortune. You could become a banker. But surely the easiest way is to start your own religion.

But would it be successful? You could beat the odds by carefully following the formula which makes for religious success.

The starting point needs to be a revelation. After all if you haven’t got your own privileged piece of Good News you have nothing to sell. Imagine Christianity or Islam or even the Mormons without a revelation. And with the right story you really don’t need very much hard evidence. We take Scripture, and the story of Jesus, largely on faith just as the Muslims must take the Koran. The Mormon religion started with the revelation of the Angel Moroni to Joseph Smith. It was written on the golden plates which unfortunately were not available for later examination.

Of course you would need witnesses – and Joseph Smith had his – but then so does Christianity: St Paul was able to cite 500 brethren who witnessed the risen Christ. Are all these true witnesses? For your new religion it really doesn’t matter because your, sufficiently devoted, adherents will soon find that they are remembering things which somehow support their new belief. If you want to make that doubly certain, get a member of the Magic Circle on your pay roll: even the simplest of manifestations will impress those who want to believe.

What should your revelation contain? It may be best to think of it as connected with Christianity – but going well beyond any existing denomination. Probably it will offer reform of the manifest failings of contemporary Christianity. It must present a plausible and high ideal to follow. And it has to have its own radical and unique elements because your followers must be aware of how special they are in belonging to the group. It will also need pretty strong rules and disciplines because likely converts will have fearful personalities – and they need the security of demanding regime.

You might consider an “exclusivity” element so that your followers will only mix with other followers – that keeps people on a tight rein with a real sense of their own identity, and no chance of outsiders dissuading them.

Ritual will matter very much – and particularly shared rituals such chanting or dancing. In many ways the odder the better. Think of the bonding effect of the goose step: who would do something so absurd if it didn’t bring you together? Don’t forget the mind-numbing element of repetitive prayer – you might supply a device of beads on a string to help people keep track.

Naturally among those strong rules high financial contributions will figure. The higher they are within reason (“scoring” is a good idea – that’s twice tithing) the more willingly will they be given. And, once given, the closer the bonds. If you’ve invested that much, it must have been worthwhile.

Of course you will be the great I AM. You must be a mysterious figure, occasionally seen gliding around in your Rolls Royce. Your quietly publicised wealth will not be a sign of fraud but it will be evidence of the favour the Almighty shows you. You will have soaked yourself thoroughly in the King James Bible so that its vocabulary and rhythms come naturally to you when you address your followers. Even Martin Luther King did that. The word infallibility is not mentioned in case it should remind some of another religion, but it is absolutely clear that you are the mouthpiece of the Almighty. That way you can be humble and omnipotent at the same time. It’s a good trick. You will of course have your “elders” to help you run the operation. Being the elect they will be excused the most trying disciplines, and they will have considerable authority, but it will always be in their interests to support you rather than stage a coup. You and your elders will have ceremonial costumes to impress on special occasions. However yours will be a little grander than the others: it’s only fitting.

0 0 0

You might think this to be a very wicked idea. You will have founded a religion out of your own imagination, and you will have fooled a large number of people to enter a phoney and demanding lifestyle for which you require them to pay large sums of money. That’s terrible!

But is it? The people who join will be those who are looking for a community which will accept them – and a community which will make them safe by taking any decision-making out of their hands. They answered your call because their inadequate personalities badly needed an ideal to follow, and an absolute authority to which they can subscribe. You have given them what they need and they will undoubtedly be happier. If 918 followers of Jim Jones – who invented “Apostolic Socialism – could be persuaded to take cyanide on his say so, your benign regime by comparison is a merciful way of helping people’s deep needs. All the evidence shows that active member of a religion benefit – in health, longevity, conscious content, and in a wide range of other ways.

And it really does not matter which religion. The programme I have laid out requires revelation, high ideals, close group bonding, strict rules, powerful shared ritual, major self-sacrifice, unquestionable authority, and a sense that one is very special compared to the rest of the human race. In fact if you look at Catholic Christianity you will find all the necessary elements well-bedded in there. Is that why it has been so successful over the ages? And is it possible that it is the weakening of many of these characteristics in recent times which is the real reason for the haemorrhaging of its current membership in developed countries? Think on it.

Posted in Quentin queries | Tagged , | 51 Comments

All in the mind

Posted on May 23, 2013 by

Tick off in your mind which of these benefits you would value: reduction of anxiety and irritability, improvement in memory, speeding up reaction times, control of chronic stress, lowered hypertension, increase in cognitive performance, a stronger immune system and improved pain control. That reads to me like one of those Victorian patented panaceas claiming to cure anything from gout to ingrowing toenails. Yet all these effects have been established in scientific, peer-reviewed, studies of mindfulness meditation. 

The last time I wrote about meditation, some three years ago, I confined myself to deep relaxation and mantra meditation. Now I want to go beyond this and look at mindfulness meditation. You can scarcely have missed press mention of this as more and more studies, often using brain scans for confirmation, have been published.
It all sounds a zany idea, doesn’t it? But in fact the essential instructions for its use were provided some 2,500 years ago, and attributed to Buddha. Within the limitations of this column I will attempt an overview.

Our minds tend to be continually busy. As we go through our day the brain is taking in, and processing, innumerable stimuli – and these are compounded by our memories on the one hand and our anticipations of the future on the other. And the problem of these two is that they have a way of clogging the mind. We find ourselves ruminating about our memories (particularly those we would rather not have) and our anticipations (often the fearful ones). We do not, in fact, have the quiet mind which the philosopher Epicurus (who wrote only a little after Buddha) claimed was the ultimately desirable state.

Think of mindfulness meditation as having a dialogue with ourselves. Perhaps for 10 minutes, or for 10 hours, we become aware of all our feelings and immediate experiences — from our contact with the chair to the deeper awareness of our breathing. Into our minds will creep the worrisome thoughts which interfere with our internal awareness. We notice these, at least momentarily, and then gently shepherd our focus back to ourselves – and this is often achieved by attending to our sensations of breathing. To begin with, these distractions come frequently – and that is good, because we are training ourselves in their control. Later they become less frequent. As George Harrison of the Beatles described it, he eventually only needed his mantra at long intervals, as an aid to focus. Distractions have been described as clouds scudding across: they come, we notice them, they disappear, leaving the sky blue again until the next cloud comes.

How does mindfulness work? One important element, often subjectively reported, is a realisation of the difference between the “I” who is meditating, and the sensations and emotions which the “I” is consciously contemplating.  I found this out many years ago as a marriage counsellor. It was only when clients saw that their feelings were not them, but things which they had, that it was possible to get down to useful work. If I am a “bitter person” I am saddled with it. If I admit to having “bitter feelings” then I am free to examine whether I need them or not. Indeed, the people who are truly open to the possibility of improvement put themselves straight into the hands of the Holy Spirit, irrespective of their creed.

Neuroscientists describe the effects through changes in the waves of the brain, each of which has its own frequency band. Put simply, the faster beta waves, used for problem-solving and active attention to the outer world, recede as the slower alpha waves (which introduce creative energy) increase, bringing a sense of peace and well-being. They increase our capacity to modulate and filter our sensory and emotional sensations and allow us to regulate attention. Other levels of brain wave such as theta or delta become more important at advanced levels of meditation. 

I hope that I have told you enough to decide whether you want to try mindfulness for yourself. You will find plenty about it on the internet. On Secondsightblog.com I give you a link to a reliable site. But you might get even further with the book Mindfulness by Mark Williams and Danny Penman (Piatkus, £13.99), which gives you a very good overall picture. It includes a CD of very helpful meditations which, after several weeks, I still use (an ebook may not include the CD, so check). (But see publisher’s comment, May 29 1:58)

You will have realised that mindfulness meditation does not necessarily produce early results; it needs practice and persistence. We are so used to being busy, busy, busy that actually spending time with ourselves alone may not come naturally. You may be helped by teaming up with a friend, or even starting a little group of like-minded meditators. There are, of course, different types of meditation such as mantra and deep relaxation, but the usual advice, with which I agree, is to use the method which suits you best: you are more likely to keep it up.

You may wonder how the secular skills I describe relate to religious meditation. Valuable though eastern meditation may be in its own terms, it is not part of the Christian tradition. But the application is direct: a mindful contemplation which considers how we recognise and experience the mysteries can deepen our prayer. It teaches us not to agonise over our relationship with God but simply to rest in his presence. It is just being quietly together with Him.

Posted in Catholic Herald columns, Neuroscience, Spirituality | Tagged , | 21 Comments

Mind that bus!

Posted on May 16, 2013 by

We have recently been discussing the pros and cons of changing from a straightforward clear cut expression of our religion into the complexities, arguments and uncertainties which accompany any up to date attempts at understanding.

So I look back and try to recall some instances in my Catholic education. I went to my first boarding school, run by the Jesuits, in 1943 – when I was about to have my eighth birthday. So here are some memories.

I had been told that my First Communion was to be a wonderful experience, so I expected ecstasy. But nothing happened – no flashing lights, no sign of my guardian angel, and certainly no sense of spiritual elevation. In fact my most vivid memory was being kissed on the cheek by my class mistress because of my holy innocence. The sense of ‘yuk’ still remains in my mind today – although I have had rather more pleasant experiences of being kissed since then. I don’t know how you explain to a child that something wonderful is going to happen – but that it simply won’t feel wonderful

Another association with Communion is a memory of trying to clean my teeth in the shared washroom without swallowing any water. This was apparently necessary to avoid breaking my fast. It dis not occur to me then that God might not be too concerned about such a details, and the clear threat that, in getting it wrong, I would end up in Hell for all eternity was something that I simply accepted without question. A year or two later we were asked to discuss in the classroom whether, if we had popped a chocolate into the mouth a second or more before midnight, we would be able to swallow it after midnight and still go to Communion the following morning. (The answer, our Jesuit class master explained, was that the process of eating had started before midnight so the fast was not broken.)

You may say that I had distorted or misunderstood the teaching of the good Jesuits. But I can document it from the night prayers we all said together. They came from The Manual of Prayers for Youth (1935 edition). Here is a passage: “Death is often nearer than you imagine; and many, who have promised themselves a long life, have suddenly been cut off in their sins. Are you so ready that, if death should come tonight, you would not be surprised? Do not live in a state in which you dare not die.”
And another:
“You can only die once, and if you die ill the loss is irreparable. If anyone from hell could return to life, how would he prepare himself for death? Let the misery of others be an instruction to you.” Good advice, no doubt, but perhaps a little strong for an eight-year-old when composing himself for sleep.

In fact, that preoccupation with mortal sin and sudden death was a leitmotif of all my education. In the teenage years I would note the daily queues of boys waiting to be absolved from sins of the flesh, just in case they died in the night. I remember my relief when a boy who was drowned in a boating accident was reported as having received communion that morning – and so could be assumed to have been in a ‘state of grace’ – that welcome, if almost accidental, condition. I learned, only recently, that self abuse was regarded as trivial in the early Church, and only a serious sin in those who had taken vows of chastity. That was to change. Indeed, by my time, to invite even an impure thought was matter for mortal sin. As I was to confess many years later, speaking at an Old Boys dinner, I did not so much welcome impure thoughts, as invite them in for the weekend. The loud laughter at my remark showed me that I had not been alone in my experience.

Lest you should think that my experience was not the norm you might like to look at the ‘official’ line. The atmosphere is well captured by this quote from Father Henry Davis SJ; his four volume work on moral theology was a standard. This is taken from the 1958 edition:

The Catholic Church insists therefore, in season and out of season, on the religious education of the child, explicit, dogmatic, determinate moral education in a religious atmosphere, thus giving him something to cling to against the time of vehement temptation. It indoctrinates its children during many years, until resistance to evil becomes an almost second nature. It does not wait until the passions have grown strong then to offer the youth the free choice of religious dogmas or moral antidotes. It says to the child: you must be good in the way I teach you to be good, so that afterwards you may know how to be good.

Much of this would be regarded as grotesque by an adult convert – largely because it was grotesque. I know this because I married a convert who found it mysterious. Having started life in the Church of Scotland her active conscience was still intact, while mine had atrophied. Indeed for many years I put put my moral questions to her, as I recognised that her unprogrammed judgment was better than mine.

Did I get over all this distortion? At a level of rational understanding I most certainly did. But at the emotional level the nagging possibility that Hell might be no further than the next careless crossing of the road still remains. Even my father’s view – that the English could never focus the mind sufficiently to meet the conditions for committing mortal sin – could exorcise it.

I am interested in whether my experiences sound an echo in other ‘born’ Catholics of around my generation. Were they affected in the same way, or were they left unscathed? And how about later generations – perhaps those who were educated after Vatican II? What was it like for converts? Were they taught much the same, and did it have the same effect?

Is it possible that the uncompromising, clearcut, teaching of my youth was valuable in keeping us within the Church, if only through fear? How should we teach the young today?

Posted in Moral judgment, Quentin queries | Tagged | 50 Comments

Body and soul

Posted on May 9, 2013 by

The Church teaches that our best understanding is that we are all descended from Adam, and from him inherit original sin. This is easily inferred from Scripture, but is less easily demonstrated from inheritance. This second method requires tracing back the lineage of the Y (male) chromosome. And so we reach our last common male ancestor who lived between 60,000 and 140,000 years ago. We can’t safely call him Adam because he may, in turn, descend from the first human being – who alone merits that name.

However we might modify our conclusion because in fact the late Albert Perry, who lived and recently died in South Carolina, who it turns out had a Y chromosome ancestor who lived over 300,000 years ago (New Scientist March 16, 2013). About 1,500 American men  have the same genetic history. Since the first fossils of homo sapiens date from around 195,000 years ago it is assumed that his ancestor must have interbred with a non-human “cousin: species. This of course is not unknown: DNA analysis shows that our species interbred successfully with Neanderthals and Denisovans – and a small portion of their genes remain with us today.

Quite where this leaves Adam is not clear. Interestingly, an article in the Clergy Review many years ago (I forget the author) suggested that the problems of incest arising among Adam’s children might well have been avoided by mating with “cousin” species. That now looks like a good guess. Presumably the proportion of truly human children would have followed the Mendelian distribution.

It is not easy to spot the moment when an ancestor species turned into homo sapiens. I use the word “moment” by virtue of the fact that the spiritual aspects of the soul are either present or absent. It is easy to detect the genetic changes which have occurred in the six million years since we last shared an ancestor with the apes. The changes are small, but small genetic mutations can play out as major changes in their effects. At what point in this development did our ancestors acquire a soul?

We need to consider the question raised by the Neanderthals. They broke away from the line before homo sapiens appeared. But they have the same brain capacity as us, they certainly made tools, and they had the crucial “speech” gene which at least suggests that they might have mastered speech. Indeed, even in our direct line, previous species of homo had developed different forms of tool. Did they have immortal souls and, if so, were they subject to original sin?

 If we look to Genesis in order to solve this problem, we have to be careful. What Genesis gives is a true picture of the underlying reality framed within the knowledge available to the writer. So we learn that our first parents had freewill from the beginning but they did not yet “know” good and evil. But this was knowledge in the semitic sense – not a matter of information but a matter of experience. Taking the fruit of the tree in defiance of God’s command was the first, but sadly not the last, experience of evil by the human race. And the second, as we might have expected, was the realisation through shame at their nakedness of the dangers involved in our sexual instincts. 

Here Freud’s concept of the id as the source of instinctual desires, and working on the pleasure principle, is relevant. Essentially a human being is a single entity but with two aspects. The first is the biological aspect which acts, as all the non-human animals do, in response to pleasure and pain, the second is the infused spirit whose aspiration is love. The metaphor of a ‘higher’ and ‘lower’ nature is instructive, for our lower nature, like gravity, is the default from which we can only rise by turning to the good which our higher nature presents.

If this is so, then the potential injustice of our inheritance of original sin ceases to be an issue. What we inherit is the whole of human nature with its inbuilt tension between animal appetite and aspiration. We cannot complain about this, because that is our identity. In the story, Adam and Eve actualise lower nature through their choice of disobedience, just as we actualise it in turn.

I write here as if turning to the good were a function of our native power. But, without attempting to develop the concept here, I note that it is the free use of the grace earned by the Redemption which is needed. That is a huge matter.

So, although we can only infer at what point in the development of homo the human soul was infused, we do know that it must have been the point at which our first ancestor recognised right and wrong and was free to choose the good and to reject the evil. Although the record is partial it is possible to suggest dates when skills of various kinds were achieved. They range from the development of tools to the development of speech, symbolism and religious awareness. In a future column I will look at some of the landmark skills the anthropologists have detected.

I have of course omitted reference to “mitochondrial Eve” – the mother of all the living. She has been traced and dated by a similar method since mitochondria is passed (relatively) intact from mother to child; it is racial DNA rather than personal. But, as far as Genesis is concerned, the omission is not of consequence since, being made from Adam, she inherited his DNA except for the substitution of one chromosome.

Posted in Bio-ethics, Catholic Herald columns, evolution, Neuroscience, Scripture | Tagged , , , | 56 Comments

With a bare bodkin…

Posted on May 2, 2013 by

There has been much discussion in the media about the desirability of ‘assisted dying’. The controversy over whether the Liverpool Care Pathway is a covert form of hurrying us to the grave or simply the best way to die peacefully has brought the question into the news. Before you read any further, just pause and ask yourself what percentage, do you think, of people in our population would favour a change in the law to allow this.

Opinions have recently been sought through a YouGov poll of 4000 people. This is a good-sized sample, and the YouGov methodology should give us confidence that the results are broadly accurate.

Some 16 percent were actively opposed to a change , and another 14 percent “were torn.” Bur, overall, seven out of ten believed that “people with ‘incurable’ illnesses should have the right to ask close friends or relatives to help them commit suicide, without the risk of those people being prosecuted.”

The main reasons given for championing “assisted dying” were the “rights” people had over their own lives, and the belief that it was better than prolonged suffering. About a third believed that the NHS could not provide decent end-of-life care.

So how do we feel about this? We all know the standard answer that our life is a gift from God and that suicide in whatever form can never be right. Do we actually believe this? Would we still believe this if we were dying in extreme pain and our relatives were willing to provide us with the, painless, fatal dose? Or if a much loved relative were to ask us to ease them out of life?

And, if we still maintained that it would be wrong, are we entitled to impose our prohibition on “assisted dying” over the rest of our society?

Telegaph report on the survey at http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/10026314/NHS-fears-fuelling-support-for-assisted-suicide-poll-suggests.html

See my column ‘How they die in Liverpool’ via the search box (top right hand side).

Posted in Bio-ethics, Moral judgment, Quentin queries | Tagged , | 82 Comments