Created January 19, 2018 Value of a Human Life

What determines the value of someone, and how does one calculate that value?

People in general, or should I say in the abstract, insist there is value in every human life. A picture of a little boy dead on the beach after drowning during an ill-fated emigration attempt brought tears and wails to the Western world, and money to the man who snapped the photo. What was his life worth? Was it not worth more dead than alive? Alive, there would have been no tears and all wailing would be reserved for the financial inconvenience that that boy’s life would cause for the society to which he had hoped to escape. Dead, he was no longer a financial burden to anyone, his picture sold papers, and he was a catalyst for bringing the attention of the world to an issue that was already visible. So, in this case, clearly worth more dead than alive.

Long obituaries abound with the attributes of the deceased, usually demonstrating that the value placed on that life was measured by some sort of productivity. The person created something lasting beyond their own life, they were successful in business, they fought for their country, they devoted themselves to a cause or an enterprise that benefited society in some way, they produced children who then produced other children. So, valuable in life, certainly, and in death, celebrated by someone, somewhere.

What is the value of the life of a person whose obituary will consist of a mere name and date? Perhaps even a few words recounting long-ago achievements of no lasting impact? Of course, they have value when they are dead. The funeral industry, the tax man, the estate liquidator – all will receive a benefit from that person’s death. If anything is left over, there may be someone obvious to inherit, or some obscure heir will be found somewhere to receive the scraps, or the state will benefit if none are found. Did such persons have any more than minimal value before death?

Those corpses for which no obituaries are written are unceremoniously dumped into the ground. Perhaps they get a marker. Perhaps it will be a name, perhaps only a number correlative to the records kept by some government minion. Did these innumerable uncelebrated people have any value, dead or alive? Dead, apparently not. But alive? What was their value then? To those who reverently claim per se value in each human life, one must ask: what was the value of these unknown paupers?

Does each and every human life have intrinsic value? If one is to objectively view statistics, the answer is no. No value can be found in poor people, people living within the shifting boundaries of what is then identified as “enemy” territory, or people whose very existence is inconvenient to whatever powers that may be in “control” at any given time.

Why am I suddenly obsessed in the puzzle of intrinsic value? Because if a person’s value is based on productivity, I have no real value beyond employing others.

I desperately need someone, anyone, to tell me I am worthwhile, that I have intrinsic value. That my life is worth something intrinsically, with no weight given to the extrinsic measure of productivity, this measure seemingly the ultimate in establishing value. Does the quest to just be happy constitute being productive, and therefore giving me the imprimatur of value? If not, then the question still remains: is there value in merely being alive?