Human Dignity and Bioethics

Dignity and Bioethics | 487
one of the primary means of doing so.
As argued above, however, the fundamental reason one provides
health care is out of respect for intrinsic dignity. And intrinsic dignity
inheres in the human with a radical equality. In its intrinsic sense,
dignity is inalienable and does not admit of degrees. Thus, a duty to
build up the inflorescent dignity of human beings through health
care, founded upon respect for intrinsic human dignity, applies
equally to all. So, while there might not be a natural right to health
care, a just society has a moral obligation, founded upon human dignity,
to provide equal access to health care, to the extent possible
in its particular ecological, historical, physical, social, and economic
circumstances.
Thus the conception of dignity presented here provides a normative
basis for determining what it means for a society to distribute
health care resources justly. This would seem to make dignity a useful
concept.
Euthanasia
As I discussed earlier, understanding the three senses of dignity presented
in this essay helps to explain three very different ways the
word has been invoked in debates about euthanasia and physicianassisted
suicide. This, in itself, seems a significant contribution to
bioethics. Proponents of euthanasia and assisted suicide argue that
the practice ought to be permitted because the assaults that illness
and injury mount upon the attributed dignities of human beings
can be so overwhelming that some patients might be led to attribute
no more worth or value to themselves, thus making euthanasia a
reasonable option. Opponents of euthanasia make two dignity-based
arguments: one based on an inflorescent sense of dignity and the
other based on an intrinsic sense of dignity. Neither argument denies
the assault that illness and injury can mount against the attributed
dignity of a human being. The argument from inflorescent dignity
suggests, however, that the value of the human is expressed most fully
(i.e., flourishes) in the ability to stand up to such assaults with courage,
humble acceptance of the finitude of the human, nobility, and
even love. To kill oneself in the face of death or to ask to be killed,