Don Marquis, a philosophical journalist, wrote a paper on the morality of abortion. Most importantly, his paper was not an argument on whether or not a fetus was a human; Marquis’ approach was more specific and unique. In his argument, Marquis criticized the conflicting sides of being too ambiguous or too explicit. However, his argument allowed for serious and credible objections. On the other hand, Judith Jarvis Thomson, another moral philosopher, spoke about abortion and the many exceptions that most people agree with. Marquis holds that: if it is a morally impermissible to kill and deprive someone of a “future-like-ours”, then it is wrong to abort and deprive a fetus of a “future-like-ours”. It is morally impermissible to kill and deprive …show more content…
One popular objection is: if it is immoral to deprive someone of a future, or a “future-like-ours”, then it is immoral to deprive a sperm or egg of a “future-like-ours”. Because it is immoral to deprive someone of a future, one must conclude that it is immoral to deprive a sperm or egg of a “future-like-ours”. This objection is in reference to different modes of contraception, such as condoms and birth control. Nevertheless, the biggest problem with Marquis’ argument that allowed for this objection was its indecisiveness and improbability to draw a definitive line. Marquis criticized the pro-lifers and pro-choicers for being unable to have a definitive definition and made the same mistake in his own argument. One could object to his argument by merely questioning where the decision would end; are we to believe that one is depriving a sperm or an egg a future when we use contraception? Another important note is the idea that a “future-like-ours” is even an even more ambiguous term than a “person” or “human being”. It is impossible for the average individual to know which of his sperm or her eggs carries a genetic abnormality that may cause their child to not have a
...ument irrelevant in his argument. I am personally pro- life and do not agree with abortion unless a women was raped and there were extenuating circumstances if the mother’s life was threatened. Marquis FLO argument isn’t valid enough to conduce to his entire theory. Marquis cannot see into the future and determine if a fetus will have a great future. If the pregnancy goes well and the fetus is born, then yes they are entitled to a future, but whether it will be like “ours” is unpredictable making Marquis point of FLO an invalid argument. Abortion is depriving a fetus of a future life in general. If Marquis would have said this instead I would be more willing to agree with his theory. Abortion is morally impermissible because at the end of the day, it is murder. A fetus will grow to be a human with organs and a brain and have some type of future whether good or bad.
Marquis’ argues that like adult humans, fetuses have the ability to experience a future and by preventing them from experiencing that future through abortion is the same as killing an adult human.
Judith Thomson’s “A Defense of Abortion” is an essay where Thomson argues that abortion is not impermissible. To be even more precise, she argues for abortion should also be sometimes permissible, but she also grants that there are certain situations in which getting an abortion would be immoral. “Most opposition to abortion relies on the premise that the fetus is a human being, a person, from the moment of conception.” (Thomson, 48). She uses the rhetorical triangle to help her achieve her argument about abortion. Which uses ethos, pathos, and logos to influence her providing the argument surrounding abortion.
Melanson, Glen. “How the Contractualist Account of Preconception Negligence Undermines Prenatal Reproductive Autonomy.” Journal of Medicine and Philosophy 38.4 (Aug. 2013): 420-425. Health Reference Center Academic. Web. 09 Feb. 2014.
In this essay, I will hold that the strongest argument in defence of abortion was provided by Judith Jarvis Thompson. She argued that abortion is still morally permissible, regardless if one accepts the premise that the foetus is a person from the moment of conception. In what follows, I agree that abortion is permissible in the ‘extreme case’ whereby the woman’s life is threatened by the foetus. Furthermore, I agree that abortion is permissible to prevent future pain and suffering to the child. However, I do not agree that the ‘violinist’ analogy is reliable when attempting to defend abortion involving involuntary conception cases such as rape, whereby the foetus does not threaten the woman’s health. To achieve this, I will highlight the distinction
Thirdly, Marquis concludes from the last two premises and says that if you kill a fetus then it is prima facie seriously morally wrong of you. By killing off a human being’s potential values, it is cruel, especially to children because they are defenseless. Then, Marquis asserts that if fetuses and adults are in the same moral categories then the fetus can only be aborted if there is a serious moral concern. In the beginning, Marquis proclaims that there are special cases like rape and the mom’s life being threatened that would override the “moral wrongness” of abortion.
By critically examining Thomson’s (1971) three analogies; the Violinist, the Henry Fonda analogy and the People Seeds analogy, all three analogies fail to show that it is not unjust to deny the foetus the right to the mother’s body. Therefore, the foetus has a right to not be killed unjustly and have the use of the mother’s womb.
Over the course of the last century, abortion in the Western hemisphere has become a largely controversial topic that affects every human being. In the United States, at current rates, one in three women will have had an abortion by the time they reach the age of 45. The questions surrounding the laws are of moral, social, and medical dilemmas that rely upon the most fundamental principles of ethics and philosophy. At the center of the argument is the not so clear cut lines dictating what life is, or is not, and where a fetus finds itself amongst its meaning. In an effort to answer the question, lawmakers are establishing public policies dictating what a woman may or may not do with regard to her reproductive rights.
Don Marquis is a philosopher arguing that any form of abortion is immoral. His original thesis states: In the overwhelming majority of cases, deliberate abortions are seriously immoral. He begins by stating why killing is wrong in three statements. He states, “killing is wrong because it brutalizes the killer, it is a loss to others, and it robs the victim of all the experiences, activities, projects, and enjoyments that would otherwise have constituted one’s future” (68). The first two statements do not address the fetus, but the last statement is very arguable, so Marquis emphasizes his argument on this premise. Depriving anybody of their future has many consequences. Some parts of a person’s future are valued now and some parts could be valued later. Therefore, it is wrong to kill any adult human because it is a loss of future (which has value). He addresses the questions of personhood by stating that fetuses have the potential to be humans. Therefore, killing a fetus is depriving the fetus of having a
Marquis’s argument that it is immoral to kill, and abortion is wrong because it deprives one of a valuable future has a lot of problems in my eyes that does not make his view on anti-abortion solid. The lack of arguments that do not raise questions that seem to go unanswered make it hard to be persuaded to change a pro-abortionist mind or even be open to understanding where Marquis’s arguments lead. His “what if” argument leaves room for anyone opposing to “what if” in any direction which is not grounds for an effective argument and hurts Marquis’s because a lot of the questions go unanswered in his essay.
To conclude, Marquis’s argument that abortion is wrong is incorrect. Thomson gives many examples of why Marquis is wrong, including that the mother’s right to her body
In the Judith Jarvis Thomson’s paper, “A Defense of Abortion”, the author argues that even though the fetus has a right to life, there are morally permissible reasons to have an abortion. Of course there are impermissible reasons to have an abortion, but she points out her reasoning why an abortion would be morally permissible. She believes that a woman should have control of her body and what is inside of her body. A person and a fetus’ right to life have a strong role in whether an abortion would be okay. Thomson continuously uses the story of a violinist to get the reader to understand her point of view.
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.
When one contemplates the concept of eugenics, few think of modern contraception and abortion when in reality they are one in the same. The American Eugenics Society, founded in 1923, proudly proclaimed that men with incurable “conditions” should be sterilized. However these conditions were often none that could be helped, such as, one’s intelligence, race, and social class (Schweikart and Allen 529-532). The purpose of the society was to create the perfect class of men; elite in all ways. Likewise, Margaret Sanger’s feminist, contraceptive movement was not originally founded with this purpose. It was marketed as a way to control the population and be merciful to those yet to be born, again determined also by race and intelligence. The similarities in purpose actually brought the two organizations together to form a “liberating movement” to “aid women” known today as Planned Parenthood (Schweikart and Allen 529-532). The name may sound harmless, but the movement hid a darker purpose, to wean out the lower and less educated in order to create a perfect class.
According to Judith Thomson in her book “A Defense of Abortion”, a human embryo is a person who has a right to life. But, just because the human fetus has the right to life does not mean that the mother will be forced to carry it (Thomson, 48). Naturally, abortion may be seen as the deliberate termination of a pregnancy before the fetal viability. Though people have understood this, the topic of abortion has remained a controversial issue in the world. Individuals are divided into “Pro-choice” and “Pro-life” debaters depending on their opinion on the morality of the action. "Pro-life," the non-consequentialist side, is the belief that abortion is wrong, generally because it equates to killing. "Pro-choice," the consequentialist view, however,