Jaký život je hoden žití?

What can philosophy gain from becoming more perceptive to the experiences of people with disabilities? Barbara Schmitz poses this question both as a philosopher and as a mother of a daughter who has struggled with physical and mental disabilities since birth. Neither does she deal with the question of suicide, another major topic of the book, from a purely theoretical point of view, but as a person who had to come to terms with the suicide of both her father and also her sister. In this case also, she asks what role is played by philosophy in the way in which suicide is perceived by the wider society. Is it not the case that philosophers often have a tendency to describe suicide as a heroic departure from life, and do they not thereby obscure the fact that it is most often a case of a pure act of despair? Though her questioning, the author arrives at the conviction that the experiences of ill people and those who come to terms with their limitations can help every person to live a life worth living.