In “Active and Passive Euthanasia”, James Rachel discusses the two cases, explaining that in each case the adult would receive money if their young cousin were to pass away. They are both acting for the same thing: the want they have for the money they will get if the child passes away. In Smith’s case he goes into the bathroom while the child is bathing and actually physically drowns him by pushing him under the bath water and holding him there. Jones’s case is similar because he was planning to do this but as he walks into the bathroom, his cousin slips and falls into the bathtub, struggles a little bit and then drowns. Rachels concludes that we can’t exactly say one man was worse than the other in these cases. Even though Jones wasn’t the one to actually kill his cousin, he was planning to and he watched the child struggle and die right before his eyes (Rachels 1975). These cases can be compared to active and passive euthanasia. Smith’s case would be considered active euthanasia since he is actively killing his cousin. Jones’s would be considered passive euthanasia because he is letting the child die without actually doing anything other than watch him struggle then pass away. Rachels argument on how active euthanasia shouldn’t necessarily be considered worse can be examined with this example. Is letting someone die when you could …show more content…
365). This objection doesn’t focus directly on how it could be considered wrong to kill yourself in these situations, but on how it could be considered wrong for a doctor to assist someone in doing so. Some people think that in participating in something like this, a physician is not fulfilling or upholding the moral duty that comes along with their profession (Gill 2005). People may even say that in some cases assisted suicide is okay, but even in these cases they still think that it’s wrong of the doctor to help someone perform the act. Gill brings up the point that maybe since people say doctors should not assist people in suicide because of the moral aspects of their profession, another profession could (Gill 2005). He says that possibly lawyers could “provide lethal drugs to competent people with terminal diseases” (p. 371). In my opinion this objection doesn’t make much sense because it seems more moral for a doctor to aid someone from his or her suffering through assisted suicide if the patient wishes to do