David William Goodall AM (4 April 1914 – 10 May 2018) was an English-born Australian botanist and ecologist. 

Cause of death - Assisted suicide.

He was influential in the early development of numerical methods in ecology, particularly the study of vegetation.

Education

Goodall completed his Bachelor of Science degree in 1935 followed by a Doctor of Philosophy degree in 1941, both at the University of London(Imperial College of Science and Technology). His PhD research was conducted at East Malling Research Station in Kent on assimilation in the tomato plant.

Research and career

In 1948, he moved to Australia to become senior lecturer of botany at the University of Melbourne. 1952-1954, he served as reader in botany at the then University College of the Gold Coast (now University of Ghana). He received a Doctor of Science degree from the University of Melbourne in 1953. He then returned to England to take the position as professor of agricultural botany at the University of Reading 1954–1956. From 1956 to 1967, he was a research scientist at various Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) divisions in Australia, then professor of biology at the University of California, USA, 1967–1968, and professor of systems ecology at Utah State University, USA 1968–1974. For the rest of his career, he was affiliated with CSIRO again, and retired in 1979.

In December 2016, it was reported that Goodall was still active as an honorary research associate at the Centre for Ecosystem Management at Edith Cowan University and Editor-in-Chief of the series Ecosystems of the World. At that time, he was thought to be the oldest scientist still working in Australia.

Selected publications

• "A probabilistic similarity index"
• "Some considerations in the use of point quadrats for the analysis of vegetation"
• "Classification, probability, and utility"
• "Hypothesis-testing in classification"
• "Numerical taxonomy of bacteria – some published data re-examined"
• "The distribution of the matching coefficient"
• Ecosystems of the World, 36 volumes published in the series 1974 to date by Elsevier, Amsterdam) with Goodall as Editor-in-Chief. He also co-authored two of the volumes, Mediterranean-type Shrublands[12] and Hot Deserts and Arid Shrublands.
• "Identification of unknowns within a probabilistic system: The diagnostic value of attributes" 

Awards and honours

Goodall was promoted to doctor honoris causa at the Università degli Studí di Trieste, Italy, in 1990.

Goodall became a centenarian in April 2014. In the 2016 Australia Day Honours list Goodall was made a Member of the Order of Australia.

Personal life

Goodall has advocated for the legalization of voluntary euthanasia, being a member of Exit International for over twenty years.[18] On 30 April 2018, Goodall announced his planned euthanization in May of that year to occur in Switzerland. His quality of life deteriorating, he publicly expressed regret for surviving to such an advanced age.

Goodall traveled to Liestal, Switzerland, where two doctors cleared him to proceed with his assisted dying. The A$ 20,000 cost of his travel was supported by Exit International. "I don't want to go to Switzerland, though it's a nice country. But I have to do that in order to get the opportunity of suicide which the Australian system does not permit. I feel very resentful." "[Family] realise how unsatisfactory my life here is, unsatisfactory in almost every respect. The sooner it comes to an end the better." "My feeling is that an old person like myself should have full citizenship rights including the right of assisted suicide," he said.

In May 2018, Goodall travelled to Basel, Switzerland, where he was euthanized by lethal injection on 10 May.