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Choosing death: the moral status of suicide^*

Queen Elizabeth Psychiatric Hospital, Mindelsohn Way, Edgbaston, Birmingham B15 2QZ

^* Text of guest lecture delivered to Psychiatry Section, Birmingham Medical Institute on 4 October 1994

Our moral conception of suicide is examined. It is argued that a neutral definition of suicide is difficult to achieve and that how we treat the question of suicide shows what value we place on the sanctity of life or on life as a means to other ends. The case is made that autonomy, the principle of self-governance, has acquired special importance in the modern world to the detriment of other ethical principles such as beneficence.