Over the past fifty years, medical science has made tremendous advances in preserving and
prolonging human life. 1 These advances have raised serious questions about the validity of …

The moral dilemmas of selective nontreatment of handicapped newborns have been widely
discussed in the United States since the early 1970s. Weir's book is the first systematic …

The birth of a normal child is an event full of happiness and joy for its ftmily, yet the birth of a
handicapped baby can be a terrible human tragedy, since it entails difficult problems to be …

Life and death represent two of the most significant events in the human condition. Nowhere
is the meaning of existence more poignant than in the simultaneous convergence of these …

" To be told the meaning of your life by others, in terms which are not yours," sociologist
Peter Marris has pointed out, 1" implies that your existence does not matter to them except …

The main purpose of this paper (1) is to draw attention to a gap between the principles of
Common Law and the principles accepted by many leading medical practitioners on the …

Among those who have defended a policy of selective non-treatmentof defective newborns,
none have been as forceful or direct in stating and defending their views as have Duff and …

In April 1982, a Down's syndrome baby starved to death in a Bloomington, Indiana hospital
when his parents refused consent to operate on his blocked esophagus. 1 Court battles and …

It is not only the Christian or other theist religions which raise their voices against relaxing
laws against euthanasia. Many humanists, concerned with the future of mankind, express …