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Recommended: Judith jarvis thomson, a defense of abortion summary

“A Defense of Abortion” by Judith Jarvis Thomson gives several different scenarios of abortion for her reader to examine. All of her arguments agree, for arguments sake, upon the fact that the fetus has a right to life from the moment of conception. However; the mother has as equal right to life and the mother’s right to decide what happens to and in her body could possibly be taken into consideration to outweigh the fetus’ right to life. Although, she makes it decently clear she doesn’t whole heartedly agree that the fetus has an equal right to life. Thomson takes the abortion debate passed just simply establishing that the fetus is a person, and since all people have a right to life, abortion is immoral. She also changes the argument by not using the go to defense of abortion by trying to define a timeline of when the fetus actually becomes a person. I agree with Thomson in almost all of her arguments and think she gives sound reasoning and her position is easily defended but I believe that she has one idea that cannot be morally justified with the reasoning that she provides, if it can be justified with any amount of reasoning.
The first scenario given in “A Defense of Abortion” is pregnancy due to rape. Thomson gives us the example of being kidnapped and unwillingly attached to the violinist to be his own personal life support system. Basically, the violinist has in a way become your Siamese twin and needs to stay attached to your body in order to survive. Likewise, a fetus needs to stay inside, attached, to the mother’s body in order to grow. Most people would agree that there would be no moral obligation to compromise your quality of life for the violinist who did not have your consent to use your body. What about the unb...

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... or until the child is old enough to leave home and fend for itself. The problem of stabbing the serial killer versus aborting the fetus to save the mother’s life is another scenario where I can see opposition. The serial killer knew he was committing and evil act and meant to do harm while the fetus is innocent and intended to hurt no one.
Thomson presents solid arguments in her violinist scenario and in the killing verses letting die debate and her opinions are easily backed. While I disagree with her on the moral responsibilities we have to justify the circumstances our actions create I believe I have presented a clear case as to why. Throughout her arguments she assumed that the fetus had an equal right to life from the moment of conception. I believe that she showed in some situations abortion is still permissible even when this statement is taken as fact.

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