General practitioner Martin Scherer and medical ethicist Urban Wiesing will address a topic that is controversially debated in all modern societies and can be of central importance to an individual. It is about assisting suicide and the question: Is it permissible – and if so, under what conditions – to assist other people in a voluntary suicide? The occasion that now specifically leads to this event is the discussion around this question in Germany following the judgement of the German Federal Constitutional Court in 2020.
In the first part, Urban Wiesing will look at the theoretical, especially the existential and the moral aspects of assisting suicide. Who is allowed to decide on this in a liberal society and based on which criteria? What may a state regulate in this respect? In the second part, Martin Scherer will address the same issue, but from a completely different perspective. He will describe how the problem presents itself to him as a practising doctor and point out the difficulties of practising assisted suicide. A topic of central importance for the end life in the modern age will be examined from two different viewpoints.
This event is for our fellows and invited experts only.