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Comment by chronofar | Hacker News Reader

It’s exactly the same situation by the criteria you just gave. Intoxicated driving is illegal because it puts the lives of others at risk.

If you don’t find that particular analogy salient surely you can think of others. How about just driving itself in cars that can go faster than the speed limit? The point is there are a multitude of things that provide benefit and also the opportunity for abuse, but rarely, virtually never, does this justify forgoing the benefit.

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no, if I get drunk than that's my decission (with all due respect); If someone else wants to end my live, and is able to apply all sort of trickeries to argue that this is in conformance with the law, then that's a different thing.

How about from a different angle, without this law if someone wants to keep me alive at all costs against my will and force me to live in agony they an "apply all sorts of trickeries" to do so. For me, extreme prolonged agony is a fate worse than death. Death does not scare me, profound suffering does.

Again, the law you're after here is preventing elder abuse. This is indeed something we should pay great attention to and try as best we can to carry out the wishes of the elderly. This abuse is no uncommon, even if it's comparatively benign by changing estate inheritance at the end of life for instance.

It really has nothing to do with assisted suicide.

That’s already the case with say pollution. People constantly argue about how many people they can kill while it’s still legal. Assisted suicide is hardly a special case.

Yet, we don’t shut down every coal power plant because it’s useful just as we don’t ban cars etc. The benefits of assisted suicide are similarly significant and therefore worth it.

The law that has been passed requires that the person who is going to die gives consent twice, with a 15 days difference, and that a medical comission approves the decision. It has nothing to do with someone else deciding for you.

>If someone else wants to end my live

You're saying this as if we're talking about involuntary euthanasia.

You are confusing agency and ability. "If someone else wants to end your life", it's not assisted suicide, no matter how much trickery you apply.

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