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Future Projects and Tasks
The following are tentative future projects which I think are worth investingation and research. In some cases, I only have a vague sense about the direction of a project, and it may be that there is actually not much to say, or even that the initial direction is wrong. However, even to determine this, some research needs to be done.
If you are interested to persue a task, I would appreciate that you let me know at ed9999 @ husmail.com .
Contents
| 1) | Technical Projects |
| 1.1) | Backup (Phoenix) |
| 1.2) | Ashdot |
| 2) | Pro-Choice Advocacy |
| 3) | Methods |
| 4) | Survivors |
Information is the most important asset which we have in cyberspace. Therefore, we should do all we can to protect it and preserve it. This should be done both for information which is on ash-related web sites, and for "External" web sites which are not under our control but contain information of interest to us.
I suggest the name Phoenix. The Phoenix is a legendary bird held to live for centuries and then to burn itself to death and rise fresh and young from its ashes. The idea is that information which is destroyed could always be "resurrected" from backups.
As for ash-related sites, we should back them up every once in a while. For extreme caution, the backups should be made on a cd-rom, and sent to other ashers, so even if one asher disappears for some reason, the data can still be restored by other ashers.
As for external sites, it is even more crucial to make backups, since sites which have important information may disappear without warning. So first, we have to keep track of the web and detect what information is of importance to us. Then we should create a backup whenever this information changes. If the external site goes down then it is questionable whether we are allowed to republish it due to copyright considerations, however, at least it should be made available for other ashers which wish to perform research about that specific topic. So these backups will only be available to a small circle of ashers who write new articles for ash.
The following is a bogus announcement for Ashdot: an interactive web site. It explains what the site looks like:
Ashdot ( http : // www.ashdot.blabla ) is a new service for ashers. It is named after "Slashdot", an interactive web site devoted to discussion about computers and open software. The aims of Ashdot are similar, but Ashdot includes a little more: a collaborative environment, group discussion, anonymity, and a filtered version of alt.suicide.holiday.
A major part of Ashdot is dedicated to an information repository, based on the ash site on geocities and on other web resources. The repository contains small, focuses articles. Collaboration takes place on many levels.
Volunteer editors can edit and add articles to the repository. In order to keep these articles well organized and researched, only the editors of an article may update it, however, anybody can add additional comments or even web links at the end of the article.
The comments form a small forum for exchange of ideas about the article. After a period of time has passed, the editors might go over the comments and include them inside the article, in order to integrate the new information in a way which readers may find most useful.
Finally, all members can publish any article they want in their own private web space (limited to 1 Megabyte pre member), without pop-ups or annoying adds, and then provide a link from the repository to their article.
There are several forums for discussion. The "Collaboration" forum is about maintenance of the information repository. The "Personal" forum is about personal stories. In addition, mailing lists may be gated to Ashdot, if there is demand, and agreement from the owner of the mailing list.
Discussion about practical issues such as methods is generally limited to the information repository, in order to improve the organized information available to the community.
Ashdot also provides a filtered version of alt.suicide.holiday. Members of the Ashdot community grade various articles from ash. Articles with low grades will not be displayed. In addition, specific posters can be kill-filed.
The machine which hosts Ashdot also runs a public news server which has the filtered version of alt.suicide.holiday, so anybody outside Ashdot can read a troll-free version of ash.
In order to participate in discussions, users are required to register. However, you need not disclose your personal details or email addresses. In fact, you are encouraged not to do so. For communication between members of the community there is an internal email system (which cannot send or receive mails from outside). This way, anonymity is automatic and easy. One has to make special efforts in order not to be anonymous, by providing identifying details using the internal mail.
1.2.4) Organization of the site
The main sections of the site are: the information repository, discussion forums, chat, internal mail, and managing your web space.
The main page displays last updated contents from various parts of the site. The page is split to many sections which display recently received emails, recently updated articles, recently made comments about articles, recent messages in forums, and general news about the site.
2) Pro-Choice Advocacy Projects
2.1) Suicide and Existentialism:
I don't know much about existentialism. Does it support suicide as a valid option. How? What is the place of existentialism in philosophy in general. Of course, this is only worth writing if existentialism does help view suicide as a valid option.
Here are some additional pointers on the topic:
In general, for Advocacy, the most useful philosophers are the Greek and Roman Stoics. (Epictet, Seneca). They were all pro-choice suicide. In particular, Seneca was the most passionate and consistent advocate of the freedom to commit suicide. (Does ASh have a Stoic moral?)
Another, more difficult way to argue is to research some philosophers' moral views (Schopenhauer, Sartre, Camus) who were anti-suicide and to prove that their system implies the right to die.
I suspect Existentialism implies the right to suicide, although the existentialists were explicitly opposed to suicide. The explanation could be: they were afraid of being accused of promoting suicide and did not draw the logical consequence of their system; their opposition to suicide makes their system inconsistent. But much research could be done on this.
A special case is that of Heidegger, who wrote a lot about death and freedom but, surprisingly, nothing about suicide.
This is also related to "living as an asher". An asher who chooses to live life with Death as a familiar thing. Death is a part of life. There is much to be said here. Heidegger is specific about Death as a part of life. We die every moment - since whenever we choose an option, we cannot undo what we did. Life's end is not important.
The idea is to counter the media constraints on suicide coverage, where the reporting is usually biased and extremely negative. What could be done is to write several articles about famous people who committed suicide. I am not talking about making a mind-numbing list of everybody who has committed suicide. This has been done in the past, but I dont think this has any use.
Instead I think it is best to concentrate on a small number of people and expand their cases. We should aspire to choose famous scientists, artists, politicians, etc. which were well known for their wisdom. Also, avoid covering cases of Euthanasia, martyrdom , or cases where young children were left behind (e.g., Kurt Cobain). Emphasis should be put on the contribution these people made to society, and the circumstances which led them to commit suicide. We want to show that these were clever responsible people, who made a rational decision to exit. Turing is a good example IMO.
2.3) Contrasting the Motivations of the Rights for Life and Liberty:
Another project is more complex, and I am not sure it will succeed. The idea is to try to resolve the conflict between the values of life and individual freedom, which are at the core of the debate between pro-choice and pro-life advocates. The ash FAQ does not explain why individual freedom should take precedence over the sanctity of life. The FAQ only explains that we believe so, and then the last part of the FAQ provides counter arguments to pro-life claims. I would like something stronger which explains why individual freedom should take precedence.
One approach would be to appeal to the rationale behind each of these values. No doubt that philosophers have dealt with each of the values and provided some reasoning of why they should be upheld. The idea then would be to examine the rationale for the case of suicide. I am not very optimistic, but my hope is that some of the motivation for the value of life disintegrates when considering suicide.
2.4) Fetch Paragraphs by Argument Classification:
There is a problem in that many articles which are pro-choice repeat the same argument. Of course, each article uses slightly different wording, and argumentation. It would be interesting to see how a single argument is addressed by different writers.
To do this, we could take all the arguments online and tag them somehow. We should try to classify all the possible arguments in such a way that each is assigned a unique key. Paragraphs which support a specific argument will be tagged by this key.
The last stage is to write some cgi-bin program. The program accepts a key as input, and then scans all the articles and extracts the portions which are tagged with that key.
So, for example, you could ask for everything written (online in the ash web site) about counter arguments of "life is a gift of god". And the program will output all the relevant portions of texts, from all the articles (Ingersoll, Hume, the ash FAQ, etc).
Philosophers such as Heidegger, Nietzsche, and John Stewart Mill talked about Authenticity. One definition is that authenticity is when thoughts, feelings, capabilities and action are compatible. Intuitively, what I would like to do is to extend some notion of authenticity to society. My claim would then be that the attitude of society towards suicide in inauthentic, and this in turn, causes suicidal individuals to become inauthentic.
The result is that suicidal people cannot talk about their thoughts and feelings. This causes rash suicide attempts, and unnecessary suffering.
2.6) Contrasting pro-choice-suicide and Euthanasia.
There is a lot of material for and against Euthanasia. We could show how the pro-choice-suicide position answers anti-Euthanasia arguments better than Euthanasia can.
The Romans accepted suicide. Many of the claims about the negative effects that suicide legitemization might have can be tested by reading about Roman times and anlyzing their society.
Psychiatrists identify different abnormal conditions in suicidal patients. Perhaps these symptoms are caused by the fear of the suicide attempt, or other reasons derived from social intolerance of suicide (and suicidal ideation). A deeper analysis of this may uncover how society and the mental health establishment are actually part of the problem rather part of the solution. Furthermore, claims of suiciders being "irrational" are much exaggerated.
This article should first identify the common conditions with which suicidal people are diagnosed. Next, the pressures society puts on a suicidal individual should be analyzed. Finally, it is to be seen whether the diagnosis could be caused or at least enhanced by such pressures.
Write something about John Donne's Biathanatos. John Donne was the first defender of suicide in modern Europe. Donne was a Christian clergyman - this is important, since nowadays the main source of the opposition to suicide is the Christian Church.
Some argue that suicide must be prevented by force because most would-be suiciders will be grateful for the coercion exerted (they will enjoy life). This is questionable. Imagine that I am in love with a girl and want to have sex with her. She refuses, although I insist that she will enjoy this. Finally, I rape her. Years later, she indeed enjoys sex with me and is grateful. Does this mean raping her was good? Of course not. She had the right to refuse sex with me, even if this led her to a less pleasant state. Perhaps a different example should be found (since in reality a rape victim having sex with the attacker seems rare).
The same with suicide. Suicide cannot be prevented by force with the argument "the attempter will probably be happy afterwards". Preventing a suicide attempt by force is similar to rape: rape is condemned as intrusion in someone's body against her will. The same happens with pumping the stomach of a suicide attempter to "save" him/her).
More specifically, for the question "Does society have a right to prevent people from suicide?", Perhaps the following article could be used: Savulescu, Julian. The Trouble with Do-Gooders: The Example of Suicide. Journal of Medical Ethics 23(2): 108-115, April 1997.
There are some additional articles about Kant and suicide:
- Seidler, Michael. "Kant and the Stoics on Suicide," Journal of the History of Ideas 44 (1983): 429-54.
- Nelson, Hilde Lindemann. Death with Kantian dignity. Journal of Clinical Ethics. 1996 Fall; 7(3): 215-221.
- Donnelly and R.M.Hare also discusses Kant.
- In German, Hector Wittwer, "Uber Kants Verbot der Selbsttotung", in the journal "Kant Studien" Band 92 Heft 2 (2001). p 180.
- In French: Vl'eschauwer, H. J. de. "La Doctrine du suicide dans l'ethique de Kant," Kant-Studien 57 (1966): 251-65.
These should be read and incorporated into kant.html.
3.1) Datura FAQ. Datura is a plant from which a poison can
be extracted. It was used in France (and I think also in India).
Its supposed to be both effective and pain-free.
3.2) Improve the Method Calculator
There is still much work to be done on selecting criteria, subcriteria, and assigning grades to each of them for each method.
3.3) Go over Geo Stone's comments on Google groups
Geo Stone, the author of an important book on suicide methods, has discussed various methods on alt.suicide.holiday and alt.suicide.methods. Some of this information is not available in his book, and will never be published. This additional information can be summarized and published.
3.4) Additional FAQs for Specific Methods
There are some methods which do not yet have good FAQs. We need to evaluate what are the most important methods and research them.
What characteristics of groups make groups more successful? Is it possible to devise exercises, or a process which will help groups acquire such characteristics? How can groups be formed and get organized. What is the optimal size of such a group
Techniques for reducing fear before exiting.
3.7) The moral issues regarding publishing methods.
The term "Survivers" refers to family and friends of one who exited.
Closure is noted as one of the possible goals of a suicide note. However, no definition is provided for Closure. Perhaps it is not a good word. Anyway, I thought of something like closure meaning:
Accepting things as the are and as they are not, without hope or dispair.
Somebody who is in closure about an issue, may think about it from now and then, but when it comes up, no negative feelings arise.
So, I would like a defintion, and a disucssion about the meaning of this. Perhaps closure actually includes other goals. Explaing why one is exiting is just a means of helping survivors reach closure.
4.2) Write something aimed at Survivors.
To help them overcome their grief. We could interview people from grief forums and check out their reactions.
