Counterfactuals about what a patient would consent to, if he were able to consent, are often cited as justifications, or partial justifications, for acts of euthanasia. In virtue of this fact, they deserve special scrutiny by moral philosophers. In Chapter I, I examine terminology that is essential to further understanding the relationship between euthanasia and counterfactual consent. I propose a definition of 'euthanasia', an analysis of 'consent', and I present a brief description of counterfactuals. In Chapter II, I consider two questions. The first is, "When it is appropriate to invoke counterfactual consent in an attempt to justify an act of euthanasia?" By making use of an improved version of the voluntary, nonvoluntary, and involuntary distinction among acts of euthanasia, I am able to determine when it is appropriate to cite counterfactuals about consent in an attempt to justify an act of euthanasia. The second is, "to what end is counterfactual consent used?" I contend that counterfactual consent does morally justify some acts of euthanasia, and defend an argument for this claim. Finally, I look at the role of counterfactual consent as a possible legal justification for acts of euthanasia. In Chapter III, I use possible world semantics to analyze counterfactual consent. Traditional counterfactuals are determined to be true if in the closest world at which their antecedent is true, their consequent is also true. Counterfactuals about consent have a less straightforward reading. I consider and reject several possible ways of reading counterfactuals about consent, before settling on the correct reading of counterfactuals about consent. In Chapter IV, I consider evidence for the truth of claims about counterfactual consent. I consider and reject the claim that no counterfactual is either true or false. I examine both Living Wills and the practice of surrogacy, neither of which offers sufficient evidence for the truth of claims about counterfactual consent. In Chapter V, I contrast counterfactual consent with actual consent. I review and refute the arguments for the claim that actual consent is preferable to counterfactual consent. I conclude by presenting a principle about the relationship between actual and counterfactual consent.

This dissertation examines the historical forces that have rhetorically and discursively transformed suicide from a philosophical, legal, religious, and political issue into a primarily medical problem subsumed under the rhetorical banner of "mental health." In this dissertation, I examine the print press' articulation of the institutional belief that suicide is the act of irrational, mentally ill, disturbed, or otherwise impaired people in need of "prevention," "intervention," "help," and "care." What is said in the mainstream press about the self-inflicted deaths of U.S. residents---who are physically healthy, have caring friends and family, are relatively well-educated, have some measure of means, and, thus, are perceived by their peers as having everything to live for---speaks directly to the political nature of discussions about suicide and suicide prevention. Mainstream news media discussions of suicide tend to focus primarily on the mental health and "personal" problems of those who kill themselves, while suicide prevention is routinely represented as a fundamental right, a necessary public service, and a form of benevolence. What are the social, economic, political, and philosophical implications of representations of suicide and suicide prevention that ignore or downplay the specific lived reality of the people who commit suicide? Are there views of suicide that diverge from the dominant view of suicide as a health issue requiring professional medical solutions? And if there are, how does the mainstream press treat those ideas as rhetorical constructs? What can and cannot be said about suicide in the major media? Who speaks and who does not? Who are the people whose stories are told in the press? Why are these particular stories told? Does the wide-spread disapprobation of suicide in the U.S. limit understandings of suicide that do not privilege medical, psychiatric, and scientific explanations? What exactly is at stake in treating suicide and suicide prevention as political issues as well as mental health issues? By mapping the historical progression of the major ideological currents informing how this culture thinks and talks about suicide, this dissertation considers suicide's potentially subversive, political, and resistive nature.

<p> The purposes of this study were to: (1) examine the use of religious/spiritual coping by emerging adults coping with perceived life stressors; (2) assess the relationship between positive and negative forms of religious coping, and overall religious/spiritual coping with perceived stress; and (3) identify the specific religious/spiritual coping behaviors used by emerging adults when in times of perceived stress. The study analyzed self-report data collected from 715 emerging adults from a diverse undergraduate public university in California. Frequency analysis indicated that emerging adults commonly use prayer for self and others, count their blessings, and try not to sin when under moments of stress. Additionally, many of the respondents reported frequently seeking G-d's love and care, asking for forgiveness for sins, and meaning making as a means of coping with stress. Zero-order correlations revealed a positive and significant relationship between negative religious coping and perceived stress. Furthermore, when comparing differences between religious views (conflicted, secure, doubting, seeking, and not interested) t-test results found decreased use of religious coping, spiritual coping and positive religious coping for those who endorsed "conflicted" religious views. Conversely, those who indicated feeling "secure" reported higher use of religious coping, spiritual coping, and positive religious coping. Emerging adults who identified themselves as "doubting" were less likely to use of religious coping, spiritual coping, and positive religious coping and reported greater use of negative religious coping. "Seeking" emerging adults, identified using less spiritual coping. Finally, those who endorsed "not interested" reported less use of religious coping, spiritual coping, and positive and negative religious coping. Clinical implications for emerging adults and clinicians are discussed.</p>

<p>I argue in my dissertation that the Marxist ethical claim against capitalism could be bolstered through: 1) a recognition of the inaccurate human ontology that capitalist theories of entitlement presuppose, 2) a reconceptualization and replacement of that old paradigm of human ontology with a concept that I call “organicism” and 3) a normative argument for why this new paradigm of human ontology necessitates a new political economy and a new way of structuring society. I use the debate between Robert Nozick and G.A. Cohen as a launching point for my case.</p> <p><br></p> <p>In his book, <i>Self-Ownership, Freedom, and Equality</i>, G.A. Cohen argues that Robert Nozick’s “entitlement theory” is unable to produce the robust sense of freedom that libertarians and capitalist proponents aggrandize. According to Cohen, the reason for this is due to the limitations and consistency errors produced by the libertarian adherence to the “self-ownership principle.” (the moral/natural right that a person is the sole proprietor of their own body and life). Namely, that the pale freedom that the proletariat enjoys within capitalism is inconsistent with the Libertarian’s own standard for freedom. So, Cohen argues for the elimination of the self-ownership principle. My project picks up where Cohen’s leaves off, claiming that the consistency errors don’t lie in entitlement theory’s use of the self-ownership principle (it is important that we don’t throw out the baby with the bathwater). Rather, the errors lie in the principle’s metaphysics - specifically in the ontology of the human being. The self-ownership principle is only faulty because it presupposes an impossible self. I show that entitlement theory heedlessly presupposes the self (or a human ontology) as a “rational, autonomous, individual.” I then deconstruct each of these three features (rationality, autonomy, and individuality) to show that this picture of the human being is not necessarily incorrect, but it is incomplete.</p> <p><br></p> <p>Although we are indeed rational, autonomous, individual creatures, these are only emergent characteristics that merely arise after the organic and socially interconnected aspects of our selves are nurtured. I encompass these latter features of our selves under the heading: “organicism”. So, my contribution is to provide a different ontological foundation of the human being – “organicism” – to replace the Enlightenment grown: “rational, autonomous, individual”. I draw heavily from Karl Marx’s philosophical anthropology, and G.W.F. Hegel’s theory of the unfolding of Geist/Spirit, with a little inspiration from Aristotle and ecological theory to construct “organicism” – a pancorporealist, naturalistic materialism. It is the theory that the human being is, in essence, an organic creature, inseparable from nature, but <i>through </i>the nurturing of these material, organic, symbiotic relationships (with other humans and with the ecosystem) that these “super”-natural capacities of rationality and autonomy arise along with and because of a <i>full</i> self-consciousness.</p> <p><br></p> <p>Finally, I infer the normative implications of this ontology of subjectivity. This organicist conception of the self has transformational effects on our notions of property and the way we structure society. So, I contend that organicist ontology then serves as the foundation for a normative theory of political economy that sees the flourishing or health (broadly speaking) of the organicist human as the primary ethical goal. I speculate on an alternative political economy that can provide the robust sense of freedom that Nozick’s entitlement theory (capitalism) was lacking because it actually produces the <i>conditions</i> necessary for rationality, autonomy and individual freedom.</p>