Wesley J. Smith

The Canadian philosopher and bioethicist, Margaret Somerville, has a splendid column out in the Ottawa Citizen on the importance of human exceptionalism and the need to reject animal personhood.  From her column:While I strongly endorse their goal of preventing cruelty to all sentient . . . . Continue Reading »

Our legislators are nuts, that’s the only explanation. California is impecunious.  We’re dead broke. We are flat on our faces, so deeply in debt it seems we will never get out.  In short, we have no money, our pockets are empty, we are one step ahead of the kneecap . . . . Continue Reading »

The assisted suicide advocacy organization, Compassion and Choices, clearly opposes the right of medical professionals to refuse to participate—or be complicit in—the intentional taking of human life.  This issue is going to be one of the biggest in bioethics in the coming decade, . . . . Continue Reading »

The Washington Examiner reported today, as noted here, that Obamacare is officially dead.  Other news outlets have merely said it is is dying, with life support soon to be removed.  Whichever it is, the people clearly want to go in a different direction.As an illustration, Gallup has a . . . . Continue Reading »

Huge victory!  It looks like Obamacare is dead—at least in its present iteration.  From the story:Congressional Democrats are abandoning their massive health care package in the face of strong public resistance manifested in the election of Republican Scott Brown of Massachusetts to . . . . Continue Reading »

The new Scotland Parliament bill to legalize assisted suicide—which I noted in an earlier post, permits disabled or dying teenagers access to “end of life assistance”—clearly includes active mercy killing.  From the bill (no link, my emphasis):1. Lawful to provide . . . . Continue Reading »

A very telling bill has been tabled in the Scottish Parliament to legalize assisted suicide. Notably, it is not restricted to the terminally ill—but allows people who can’t live independently to receive poison pills. Also, the age limit is only 16. From the End of Life Assistance Bill . . . . Continue Reading »

A very telling bill has been tabled in the Scottish Parliament to legalize assisted suicide. Notably, it is not restricted to the terminally ill—but allows people who can’t live independently to receive poison pills. Also, the age limit is only 16.  From the End of Life Assistance . . . . Continue Reading »

Across a wide swath of issues, we see pride going before the fall.  In today’s example, the UN has now officially admitted that its ridiculous claim about the Himalayan glaciers disappearing by 2035 was a “mistake,” as previewed earlier here at SHS. And that is the report that . . . . Continue Reading »

The newest edition of my podcast What It Means to be Human concerns the need to legally protect the consciences of Hippocratic physicians and other health care professionals.  As I have stated repeatedly, this is going to be one of the biggest bioethical issues in the coming decade.  Here . . . . Continue Reading »