1. Discuss if mercy death is significantly different from mercy killing. Or, in certain situations is mercy killing morally preferable? Give reasons for your answer.
2. Is mercy killing morally justified in all or only under circumstances? Give reasons for your answer.
3. Analyze one of the issues dealing with allowing someone to die utilizing one of the major ethical theories. Evaluate the same issue according to a different moral theory. Did you reach the same conclusions? Explain your answer.
4. Why have dramatic advances in medicine forced us to take an increasingly harder look at allowing someone to die, mercy death, and mercy killing? Substantiate your answer with specific examples.
5. After Karen Ann Quinlan was taken off life-support, she lived for 10 years in a persistent vegetative state. Do you think the court would have made the same decision had they known the result? How will this judgment affect the judgment of similar cases in the future?
6. From ancient times, philosophers have taught that living a good life entails that one close his or her life well. In the light of modern medical technology, do you believe that Advance Directives help people control their final days and hours and end their lives with dignity? Give specific examples to substantiate your response.
7. Should physicians assist patients with suicide? Give reasons for your answer.
8. It has been alleged that doctors and nurses administered lethal doses of medication to up to 34 people in the aftermath of Katrina. Legally, this is second-degree murder. What should be done in cases of forced abandonment? What obligations do doctors have to patients?
