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On the moral and legal status of abortion mary anne warren
On the moral and legal status of abortion mary anne warren
On the moral and legal status of abortion mary anne warren
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Mary Anne Warren’s “On the Moral and Legal Status of Abortion” describes her justification that abortion is not a fundamentally wrong action for a mother to undertake. By forming a distinction between being genetically human and being a fully developed “person” and member of the “moral community” that encompasses humanity, Warren argues that it must be proven that fetuses are human beings in the morally relevant sense in order for their termination to be considered morally wrong. Warren’s rationale of defining moral personhood as showcasing a combination of five qualities such as “consciousness, reasoning, self-motivated activity, capacity of communication, and self-awareness” forms the basis of her argument that a fetus displays none of these elements that would justify its classification as a person and member of the morally relevant community (Timmons 386). Warren begins her argument by explicitly defining a human person as someone who is a “full-fledged member of the moral community” (Timmons 385). Warren believes that this community consists of all and only people that possess the ability to express the five qualities that were previously mentioned as opposed to all human beings that possess the genetic code of humanity. Being a member of this community entitles a person to have full moral rights, including the rights of life and happiness, which must be respected. Warren justifies that the five qualities are sufficient criteria of determining the apparent “personhood” of a being by stating that such principles of humanity would be used when attempting to study alien life forms on distant planets. Despite discernable differences in physiological and (potentially) cultural development, these alien beings may demonstrate enoug... ... middle of paper ... ... in terms of living or dying. By this logic, people in vegetative states should also have rights analogous to that of an infant at least. Many people practice or research medicine for the altruistic reasons and derive pleasure and a purpose in life by restoring the injured and sick to proper health. If a potential treatment can be developed by doctors and researchers to restore people in vegetative states to normal cognitive levels, it would be considered wrong to allow such a person to die because, like an infant, there exists the chance for them to develop an ability to function as long as research is continued to find a way to reverse such a condition. Works Cited Mill, John S. The Basic Writings of John Stuart Mill. New York, New York: Modern Library, 2002. Print. Timmons, Mark. Disputed Moral Issues. New York, New York: Oxford University Press, 2011. Print.
Warren argues against a fetus being a human in the moral sense. She states we can say a fetus has moral sense to be a human but not in the genetic sense. In order for a fetus to be human in the moral sense it has to be a being in the genetic sense. Warren thinks a fetus does not have full moral status because they are not persons. To be a person you have to have equal moral rights. Warren feels a fetus at any stage will not resemble a person or have significant right to life. A fetus does not have the ability to make decisions or have memories, therefore making them have no right to life. Warren states that a fetus is not a person and should not have morally rights. Warren stated in Potential Personhood and The Right to Life that a fetus does not resemble a person in anyway. She asks about the potential that could develop if the fetus is given the chance to become a person. “It is hard to deny that the fact that an entity is a potential person is a strong prima facie reason for not destroying it; but we need not conclude from this that a potential person has a right to life, by virtue of that potential”(Warren, p.472). After analyzing the concept of a person Warren has come to the conclusion that a fetus at any stage of development does not resemble a person enough to have right to life or potential for being a
The topic of my paper is abortion. In Judith Jarvis Thomson's paper, “A Defense of Abortion,” she presented a typical anti-abortion argument and tried to prove it false. I believe there is good reason to agree that the argument is sound and Thompson's criticisms of it are false.
In her essay, “A Defense of Abortion,” Judith Jarvis Thompson outlines the most common arguments that people defend, and explains her views regarding each of these. She shares numerous examples and situations that she believes will support her views. One of her most prominent arguments is that of whether or not a fetus has moral standing as a “person.” She highlights the so-called “battle” between an innocent life, the fetus, and the bodily rights of the mother. Within this argument, Judith outlines for us several situations which can provide people with a different outlook regarding abortion.
According to St. Thomas Aquinas, Catholic priest and philosopher, a fetus is not a human being because it does not possess language or articulated thought - one of the defining aspects of human nature (qtd. in Eco 51). Theoretically speaking, a fetus is not a human until it can think and talk. With that being clarified, the rest of the essay will first include arguments for, and then arguments against, abortion. Karen Pazol, et al.
Abstract: This essay written over the controversial issue of abortion, in order to shed some light on whether if it is a morally right decision for an individual to abort a child when there is no life threatening issue at any stage in a pregnancy. Thus, this essay is written in directly for the avocation against the killing of innocent and unborn child. First, this essay argues against the idea of a fetus being considered less than human are evaluated and criticized. The secondly, it presents strong support for why the life of a fetus moral rights has to be taking into consideration equally as a matured human .Thus, this essay focus on the reasoning behind the decision for abortion, then coming to the conclusion is that an abortion is only
”[23]Furthermore, they turned to the required qualifications of being defined as a “person.” Clearly, this can refuse personhood to someone unable to commit a crime, for instance, a child who has not yet arrived at the door of reason. Fr. Clifford Stevens recognizes this denial as a threat to the dignity of the human person and draws from the words of President Lincoln’s rebuttal of Dred Scott to point out that the purposes for abortion are very similar to the motives behind slavery.
This essay examines and critiques Judith Jarvis Thomson’s, A Defense of Abortion (1971). Thomson sets out to show that the foetus does not have a right to the mother’s body and that it would not be unjust to perform an abortion when the mother’s life is not threatened. For the sake of the argument, Thomson adopts the conservative view that the foetus is a person from the moment of conception. The conservative argument asserts that every person has a right to life. The foetus has a right to life.
Despite that anti-abortionists believe that that a fetus is human, Marry Anne Warren makes a very good distinction between being human and being a person. Not all humans are people and not all people are humans and only people can be considered members of the moral community. Thus if only people can be considered members of the moral community then only people can be ascribed full moral rights. A human according to John Noonan is someone who has full genetic code and the potential capacity for rational thought. Warren defines a person as someone who has the following traits, consciousness, capacity to feel pain, ability to reason, communicate, can perform self-motivated activity, and has the presence of self-concepts/self-awareness. A fetus has none of the above traits so it cannot be considered a person rather it is a potential person. Therefore a fetus is a human being, which is not yet a person and thus cannot be granted full moral rights that a person is entitled to.
Patrick Lee and Robert P. George’s, “The Wrong of Abortion” is a contentious composition that argues the choice of abortion is objectively unethical. Throughout their composition, Lee and George use credibility and reason to appeal the immorality of abortions. The use of these two methods of persuasion are effective and compels the reader to consider the ethical significance. Lee and George construct their argument by disputing different theories that would justify abortions. They challenge the ontological and evaluation theories of the fetus, as well as the unintentional killing theory. This article was obtained through Google, in the form of a PDF file that is associated with Iowa State University.
Why Abortion is Immoral by Don Marquis is an essay that claims that abortion is morally wrong, and uses one argument in particular to explain why. He argues that many of us would agree that it is wrong to kill a human, and if you believe that then you should also have that view on abortions. If you think killing is wrong then you think all killing is wrong and the persons biological state, whether it is when a person is a fetus, one years old, or thirty years old, makes no difference. He then explains that killing is wrong not only because it is immoral, but wrong because it deprives the victim of life and the enjoyments one would have otherwise experienced; which Marquis believes is the greatest lost one can suffer (Marquis, 189). Given certain circumstances Marquis agrees there are cases where killing is acceptable, but nonetheless it is immoral.
Thomson starts off her paper by explaining the general premises that a fetus is a person at conception and all persons have the right to life. One of the main premises that Thomson focuses on is the idea that a fetus’ right to life is greater than the mother’s use of her body. Although she believes these premises are arguable, she allows the premises to further her explanation of why abortion could be morally permissible. People would find it more understanding and more willing to help someone who is a relative.
In the article 'A Defense of Abortion' Judith Jarvis Thomson argues that abortion is morally permissible even if the fetus is considered a person. In this paper I will give a fairly detailed description of Thomson main arguments for abortion. In particular I will take a close look at her famous 'violinist' argument. Following will be objections to the argumentative story focused on the reasoning that one person's right to life outweighs another person's right to autonomy. Then appropriate responses to these objections. Concluding the paper I will argue that Thomson's 'violinist' argument supporting the idea of a mother's right to autonomy outweighing a fetus' right to life does not make abortion permissible.
In Thomson’s article, “A Defense of Abortion,” Thomson argues that abortion is not impermis-sible because she agrees with the fact that fetus has already become a human person well before birth, from the moment of conception (Thomson, 268 & 269). Besides that, she also claims that every person has a right to live, does so a fetus, because a fetus is a person who has a right to live.
Mary Anne Warren contends that abortion is morally permissible on the grounds that a fetus is not a person. In her eyes, although, fetuses are genetically distinct humans they are not people because they do not have the necessary characteristics for personhood: sentience, reasoning, emotionality, the capacity to communicate, self-awareness, and moral agency. For her, the lack of these characteristics do not necessarily allude that a fetus is not a person only that it belittles the confidence that they are a person- or in other words creates doubt of their personhood. In this essay, I shall argue when it comes to emotionality Warren sets the bar too high and indoingso runs the risk of wrongly overlooking different types of emotionality, which
“On the Moral and Legal Status of Abortion” by Mary Anne Warren is an in depth analysis of what, in Warren’s opinion, is exactly what defines a person and human being, the moral community, fetal development and the right to life, potential personhood and the right to life, and infanticide. Warren believes that emotion and morality should be entirely separate, and that abortion should be legal for all women, as denial would strip women of basic human rights, the rights that a woman holds over an unborn fetus. I personally agree with her arguments on these topics as I agree that women should be allowed to have abortions on their own terms, without subjection of authority or society telling her what she can and cannot do, as well as I agree for the most part on her view of what a person is, potential personhood not outweighing the choice of abortion, and her reasoning on what defines a person in the moral community. Warren insists that the “moral” sense of human and “genetic” sense of human must be kept separate in this observation. As she defines the two, she goes on to say that the confusion of the two “results in a slide of meaning, which serves to conceal the fallaciousness of the traditional argument that since (1) it is wrong to kill innocent human beings, and (2) fetuses are innocent human beings, then (3) it is wrong to kill fetuses.