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This first volume in the four-volume series The Moral Limits of the Criminal Law focuses on the "harm principle," the commonsense view that prevention of harm to persons other than the perpetrator is a legitimate purpose of criminal legislation. Feinberg presents a detailed analysis of the concept and definition of harm and applies it to a host of practical and theoretical issues, showing how the harm principle must be interpreted if it is to be a plausible guide to the lawmaker.

In this provocative book, a professor of philosophy examines the arguments for and against euthanasia, analyzes specific case studies, including those of Baby Jane Doe and Barney Clark, and offers an alternate theory on the morality of euthanasia. Various traditional distinctions--between "human" and "non-human," intentional and nonintentional, killing and "letting die"--are taken into account to determine whether euthanasia is permissible or not. Rachels presents a systematic argument against the traditional view, defending an alternative position based on the belief that there (...) is a profound difference between having a life and merely being alive. (shrink)

Introduction : death, metaphysics, and morality / John Martin Fischer Death knocks / Woody Allen Rationality and the fear of death / Jeffrie G. Murphy Death / Thomas Nagel The Makropulos case : reflections on the tedium of immortality / Bernard Williams The evil of death / Harry S. Silverstein How to be dead and not care : a defense of Epicurus / Stephen E. Rosenbaum The dead / Palle Yourgrau The misfortunes of the dead / George Pitcher Harm to (...) others / Joel Feinberg Reasons and persons / Derek Parfit Why is death bad? / Anthony L. Brueckner and John Martin Fischer Death and the value of life / Jeff McMahan Annihilation / Steven Luper-Foy Epicurus and annihilation / Stephen E. Rosenbaum Some puzzles about the evil of death / Fred Feldman Well-being and time / J. David Velleman. (shrink)

First, what constitutes a person's death? It is clear enough that people die when their lives end, but less clear what constitutes the ending of a person's life.

This first volume in the four-volume series The Moral Limits of the Criminal Law focuses on the "harm principle," the commonsense view that prevention of harm to persons other than the perpetrator is a legitimate purpose of criminal legislation. Feinberg presents a detailed analysis of the concept and definition of harm and applies it to a host of practical and theoretical issues, showing how the harm principle must be interpreted if it is to be a plausible guide to the lawmaker.

It is widely accepted that a person can be harmed by events that occur after her death. The most influential account of how persons can suffer such posthumous harm has been provided by George Pitcher and Joel Feinberg. Yet, despite its influence (or perhaps because of it) the Feinberg-Pitcher account of posthumous harm has been subject to several well-known criticisms. Surprisingly, there has been no attempt to defend this account of posthumous harm against these criticisms, either by philosophers who work (...) on the metaphysics of death or by those who draw upon this account of posthumous harm in their work in other philosophical fields. This paper will rectify this omission, by defending this view against the criticisms it has been subject to—a defense that will both be of intrinsic interest to those who work on the metaphysics of death and that will remedy the lacunae in the wide-ranging philosophical literature that draws upon this account of how posthumous harm is possible. (shrink)