Using deductive and inductive logic - Essay Example

On the Issue of Surrogate Decision Maker: Deductive and Inductive Reasoning Introduction The right to die continues to be an issue in the modern time. Those who have embraced it, the right to die remains to be a subject of debate in relation to the logic unique to the subject matter. The practice of aid in dying for a terminally-ill patient is challenged on what means are required to show that the patient chooses to die. Thus, the concept and function of a surrogate decision maker are systematically defined.

The concept of surrogate decision maker is embedded in the principle of patient autonomy. This paper chooses the type of a surrogate decision maker as the projection of informed consent -- the competent patient makes a “living will.” Also, this paper claims that people have the right to die and that their living will is constant throughout.Deductive Logic The decision of the surrogate decision maker is also similar to the decision of the incompetent patient; the idea centers on the scope of time: past and present.

The choice from the past is still the choice of the present considering the principle of informed consent. It is debatable to say that a person’s decision changes over time, especially when that person expressed it in writing. The living will is a written form of the patient’s explicit declaration concerning his or her thoughts of an ideal life or death. The contents of the living will are true and valid for all time when the physically and mentally competent patient makes one. Inductive Logic Humans can choose either life or death especially when one is at the verge of utter helplessness.

Life as we know it directly springs from humans; and to exercise mercy killing or suicide per se sounds fairly human. A physically incompetent person, for instance, is better off than live a life not far similar to death; he or she is alive via the brain’s electrical activities but dead via the immobile physical body. A living dead, so to speak, is a horrible human condition. Therefore, the practice of physician-assisted suicide to an incompetent patient is perfectly human.Ethos The right to die is an inalienable and human right.

Nobody can take one’s life but himself or herself. One’s life and one’s body is one’s own. It is the prerogative of the individual who owns that body/life on when and how he or she wants to die. Death is sweet when the ideal life appears to be impossible to attain or is not attained. People have the right to die like their right to life. Death is the last option when life seems to be not the kind of life one perceives it; for in death, there is life as well.Pathos A terminally-ill patient should be permitted for the application of an mercy killing.

This patient feels physical and mental agony from day to day. His or her world is a universe of emptiness and prolonged suffering. The incompetent patient could not do the things like the normal people do: no ability to stand, walk, and even talk. This patient is like a vegetable: immobile. The patient could not also think properly. His or her life -- if it is life at all -- is merely sustained by life-sustaining treatment. He or she is alive but dead anyway.Conclusion The right to die is a basic human right.

The person who owns the body is the person who owns its life; life and death are interrelated. Of course, life as we conceived it is sweet. But it is better to die than to live a life not worth living. And when one chooses to die via a living will, it would be ethical to exercise what the terminally-ill patient desires to happen. Such decision is final and executory. A change to one’s choice is impossible particularly when one made it by a competent patient. For what kind of life that would be if one lives but dead in essence.