Daniel Kahneman, Israeli-American psychologist and Nobel Prize winner, died last year by assisted suicide: WSJ

Dubai: Israeli-American psychologist and Nobel Prize winner in economics Daniel Kahneman, who died last year, used doctor-assisted suicide to end his life in Switzerland, according to a Wall Street Journal report.

Kahneman flew to Switzerland a year ago to end his life and only let close friends and family know about his decision when he was en route to Europe in an email.

Kahneman decided to end his life on his own terms while he was still in relatively good health, instead of letting his physical condition deteriorate, the newspaper said.

In farewell letters sent to his closest friend, the psychologist wrote that his decision was motivated by a long-held belief that the suffering typically associated with living to old age was unnecessary.

Some of his friends and family reportedly still struggle to come to terms with his decision.

He was 90 at the time of his death, and was in relatively good mental and physical health.

Some of Kahneman’s friends think what he did was consistent with his own research, according to the WSJ report.

“Right to the end, he was a lot smarter than most of us,” Philip Tetlock, a psychologist at the University of Pennsylvania, was quoted as saying.

“But I am no mind reader. My best guess is he felt he was falling apart, cognitively and physically. And he really wanted to enjoy life and expected life to become decreasingly enjoyable. I suspect he worked out a hedonic calculus of when the burdens of life would begin to outweigh the benefits – and he probably foresaw a very steep decline in his early 90s.”

Tetlock added, “I have never seen a better-planned death than the one Danny designed.”

In Kahneman’s email, he wrote, “I have believed since I was a teenager that the miseries and indignities of the last years of life are superfluous, and I am acting on that belief.

“I am still active, enjoying many things in life (except the daily news) and will die a happy man,” he said. “But my kidneys are on their last legs, the frequency of mental lapses is increasing, and I am ninety years old. It is time to go.”

According to the WSJ report by Jason Zweig, Kahneman was not on dialysis at the time. He had been working on several research papers that week.

“Not surprisingly, some of those who love me would have preferred for me to wait until it is obvious that my life is not worth extending. But I made my decision precisely because I wanted to avoid that state, so it had to appear premature. I am grateful to the few with whom I shared early, who all reluctantly came round to support me,” his email continued.