The term “euthanasia” was widely used in the earliest years that I discuss in this article (primarily the 1970s). “Euthanasia” at the time meant a death that is intended and caused by at least one other person; the person who dies is either acutely suffering or irreversibly comatose (or soon will be); and the means chosen to produce the death is as painless as possible. Today the term “euthanasia” carries a negative connotation, and it has largely dropped out of use in serious scholarly discussion. I will not use it here. I also generally do not use the now-popular term “physician-assisted suicide.” This term may be simply defined as a patient’s voluntary suicide with the assistance of a physician; the term does not entail that the person who dies be acutely suffering or terminally ill, but these conditions are usually the reasons for electing so-called suicide.
I avoid this terminology because it too tends to carry a negative connotation, associated with suicide, and also suggests that physicians kill, or help kill, their patients. In medical tradition, the term “killing” has understandably carried meanings of wrongfulness and blameworthiness. Similarly in medical tradition, the term “suicide” often carries an implication of illegitimacy, unacceptability, incompetence, or tragedy. This connotation has been transported into discussions of “physician-assisted suicide.” However, in contexts external to traditional medical morality, “killing” does not imply wrongful behavior; it refers only to causal action that brings about another’s death. These different meanings of “killing” have caused endless confusion in bioethics throughout the history of the issues discussed in this paper.
(Tom L. Beauchamp, "The Right to Die as the Triumph of Autonomy," Journal of Medicine and Philosophy 31 [December 2006]: 643-54, at 652 n. 1 [italics in original])
Note from KBJ: I published an essay on precisely this topic. Unfortunately, Professor Beauchamp isn't a good researcher.
Keith Burgess-Jackson, J.D., Ph.D. 