Thomson's Arguments And Summary

Thomas begins her argument by asking the reader to imagine a situation in which a famous violinist will die unless he is connected to them in order to gain use of your kidneys. In this scenario, the Society of Music Lovers for this task has also kidnapped them against their will. Because after checking all the medical documents, they were the perfect match for the operation. While they were unconscious, the violinist's circulatory system was "plugged into them, so that their kidneys can be used to extract poisons from his blood as well as their own". Now they have two choices, either unplug themselves from the violinist, which results in his death; or wait nine months until he is recovered and can be unplugged safely. Thomson likens the plight

Hence, the violinist has a kidney condition, which he can only survive if he is attached to our body, we are kidnapped and attached to the violinist without consent and we have to lie in bed for nine months. Thus Thomson's reasoning is it that a person may now permissibly unplug them self from the violinist even though this will cause his death. The right to life, Thomson says, does not demand the right to use another person's body, and so by unplugging the violinist you do not violate his right to life but merely deprive him of the use of your body to which he has no right. If a person allows the violinist to use their kidneys, it is look upon as an act of kindness rather than an obligation. For the same reason, Thomson says, abortion does not violate the fetus's right to life but merely deprives the fetus the use of the pregnant woman's body to which it has no right. Thus, it is not that by terminating her pregnancy a woman violates her moral obligations, but rather that a woman who carries the fetus to term is a 'Good Samaritan' who goes beyond her

We have the Good Samaritan who stopped and helped the injured man. However, the priest and the Levite were not even “minimally decent” Samaritans. She is not clear on how little a person has to do to be downgraded from Good to Minimally Decent. Nevertheless, Thomson does try to argue for it in the example of Kitty Genovese who was murdered while thirty-eight people watched, and did nothing to help her. She argues that a Minimally Decent Samaritan would have at least called the police, and a Good, or perhaps Splendid, Samaritan would have intervened. Thomson mentions that Jesus afterward said “Go and do thou likewise.” She says that he may have been saying that we are morally obligated to be the Good Samaritan. She does not seem sure, but from the context of the passage she quotes, it is obvious that Jesus was actually saying that we have a duty to be the Good Samaritan. This does not necessarily entail that we must put ourselves in harm’s way to help someone in need, but we need to “love our neighbor as ourselves,” which was the whole point of Jesus telling the story of the good