A 45-year-old Dutch citizen with Lou Gehrig's disease is given a lethal injection to end his suffering. Is it murder or mercy?

A paraplegic is in need of an organ transplant. Will he be considered, or will his disability put him at the bottom of the waiting list?

Such moral dilemmas form the core of research by Alastair Norcross, the William Edward Easterwood Professor of Philosophy at SMU. He is working on an article, "Killing and Letting Die," to be published this year in the Blackwell Companion to Applied Ethics, an anthology of articles on central issues of philosophy.

"The question is whether there is a moral difference between killing patients who are terminally ill and letting them die," Norcross says. In his book, , Norcross discusses the difference between active euthanasia, also known as assisted suicide and mercy killing, and passive euthanasia, the forgoing of life-sustaining treatment including artificial life-support measures and artificial nutrition and hydration.

Norcross also is part of a group of philosophers, psychologists, doctors, and economists studying ethical issues surrounding the allocation of scarce medical resources when disability issues are involved, such as with organ donations.

Norcross cited a recent case in which a British teenager with Down syndrome was refused a heart and lung transplant. Doctors claimed that Down syndrome diminishes the chances of the operation's success. However, the patient's family claimed that she was unjustly discriminated against because she is disabled.

"There is a fine line between saying other patients have a greater chance of benefiting from a transplant because they have a better chance of success to live a 'normal' life and judging that the life of a disabled individual is not as valuable," Norcross says.

Norcross joined the SMU faculty in 1992 after teaching at Hobart and William Smith Colleges in Geneva, New York. He earned his Bachelor's degree in the classics (literature and philosophy) at Oxford University, and his Master's degree and his Ph.D. in philosophy from Syracuse University. He was named the William Edward Easterwood Associate Professor of Philosophy in 1998, then served as a visiting associate professor of philosophy at the University of Arizona in Tucson for a year.

For more information: Alastair Norcross
anorcros@mail.smu.edu
www.smu.edu/~anorcros