Doctrine of double effect

The doctrine of double effect is a principle for judging actions that produce both good and harmful effects. It can permit foreseen harm when the harm is not intended as an end or a means and other conditions are met.

Intention: A mental state in which an agent aims at an outcome or adopts it as a means. The doctrine turns on whether harm is intended, not merely foreseen.
Thomas Aquinas: A thirteenth-century Dominican theologian and philosopher whose works shaped medieval Christian thought. His discussion of self-defense supplied the doctrine's foundational example.
Palliative sedation: The monitored use of medication to reduce consciousness and relieve otherwise refractory suffering near the end of life. Debates ask whether reduced consciousness is intended relief or a foreseen effect that may shorten life.
Consequentialism: A family of ethical theories that evaluates actions by the value of their consequences. Unlike the doctrine, it generally does not treat intended and foreseen harms as morally distinct.
Foreseen side effect: An outcome anticipated as a consequence of an action but not chosen as its end or means. This is the harmful outcome the doctrine may permit.
Summa Theologiae: Thomas Aquinas's systematic theological work, composed in the thirteenth century. Its treatment of self-defense is the doctrine's best-known early formulation.
Opioid use in palliative care: The use of opioid medicines to relieve pain and breathlessness in serious illness. The doctrine is often invoked when symptom relief may foreseeably affect survival.
Deontology: A family of ethical theories that judges actions by duties, rules, or constraints rather than consequences alone. The doctrine shares constraints on action but also assesses expected effects and proportionality.
Proportionality: A principle requiring that a measure's expected benefits be proportionate to its burdens or harms. Permitting harm requires a sufficiently weighty good effect.
Just war theory: A tradition of moral reasoning that sets conditions for resorting to war and conducting it. The doctrine became a way to assess civilian deaths foreseen during military attacks.

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