The Futurist

Reuters report that the Supreme Court in the US have decided that they will not stop Oregon laws applicable to physician assisted suicide law:

The Bush administration cannot stop doctors from helping terminally ill patients end their lives under the nation’s only physician-assisted suicide law, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled on Tuesday.

With more medical technologies enhancing our life spans it is possible that suicide will become a more acceptable solution. Partly because those who become ill face a much longer period of terminal illness and partly because life will perhaps even have to be ended by individuals to end at all.

This is at least the thesis of American futurist Ray Kurzweil, when he states that we will be able to live as long as we wish.

In the article “Stricter Nanotechnology Laws Are Urged” new laws for nanotechnology are suggested:

An independent report being released this morning concludes that current U.S. laws and regulations cannot adequately protect the public against the risks of nanotechnology — the rapidly growing science of making invisibly small particles and molecular devices

This urge to regulate nanotechnology is a worrying sign. New technologies typically are heavily influenced by laws introduced early on in the technology cycle. Witness the massive failure of the European Union to introduce electronic signatures. Proactive legislation may, in a worst case scenario like the EU one, both dampen and change the course of technical development.