Helping in an emergency is obligatory, whether or not someone does it. As for refusing aid, I would not allow someone to bleed to death because he was an ass.
The entire justification for government is pursuit of the common good. Partly, that entails the use of government as a more effective provider of emergency aid, when society is affluent enough to make such arrangements, for example, by providing a fire department, a Coast Guard which at least in part comes to the rescue of disabled vehicles, and other such institutions.
I specified the kind of situation where one could not be said to be thinking clearly, such as in a very feverish state, where coercive aid makes perfectly good sense, and then extended it.
As I said, the rebuttable presumption favors a finding of sanity, and even someone who is "tetched" may not be severely enough to institutionalize. Only someone severely impaired in his ability to look after his own interests would be liable to be brought before a judge for a competency hearing anyway........ |
