A Defense Of Abortion By Judith Jarvis Thomson

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The topic of abortion has been one of the most controversial in bioethics, revolving around the issue of whether a fetus has the right to life and when a fetus is considered a person. In Judith Jarvis Thomson’s article, “A Defense of Abortion”, she presents the belief that the fetus is granted with the right to life and is considered a person upon contraception. Throughout the article, Thomson attempts to argue that abortion is not always considered murder under specific cases. She uses analogical reasoning to explain her reasoning for abortion; in this case, she uses the metaphor of a sick violinist and relates it to a mother and fetus. Thomson begins her argument by agreeing that every person, even a fetus, has the right to life. With the use of analogical reasoning, Thomson creates a scenario where the reader has been kidnapped and plugged to an unconscious violinist; if …show more content…

The creation of artificial cases cannot be as useful as real cases; in artificial cases, the creator makes the fantasied situations and uses that to judge. Noonan plays by Thomson’s analogy and changes the scenario by giving the violinist prior knowledge of the victim’s kidnapping. Thus, the violinist remains innocent, giving him a right to life (6, Noonan, CC 2015 p. 349). Noonan proposes good Samaritan ethics to save the violinist. No matter his reasoning, Thomson can respond by proving that good Samaritan obligations are limited to very few cases. The decisions made by these ethics depend on how great the sacrifice. Many things can be sacrificed, whether it may be her status, economic situation, or even her identity. What if the mother was not responsible for her pregnancy? What if she was raped and forced against her will? Thomson can continue by arguing that a woman should not be forced to carry out with having a baby if it is not her

Why Don Marquis's Essay 'Why Abortion Is Immoral'
803 Words | 2 Pages
Thomson provides the example of being hooked up for nine months to provide dialysis to an ailing violinist to expose how a fetus’s right to life does not supersede a mother’s right to make medical decisions about her body (48-49). I find that this thought experiment especially helpful in understanding how even though a fetus does have a right to life, because the continuation of their life hinges on the consent of their mother to use her body, it falls to the mother to choose whether or not to allow the fetus to develop to term.
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A Defense Of Abortion By Judith Jarvis Thomson
1303 Words | 3 Pages
...r (directly killing the baby in the womb or slitting the throat of the violinist). I believe the difference is very clear and therefore refutes Thompson's case of the unconscious violinist. This means that premise 4 still stands true.
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Analysis of Thompson's Article, A Defense of Abortion
1773 Words | 4 Pages
In Judith Jarvis Thompson’s article “A Defense of Abortion” she explores the different arguments against abortion presented by Pro –Life activists, and then attempts to refute these notions using different analogies or made up “for instances” to help argue her point that women do have the right to get an abortion. She explains why abortion is morally permissible using different circumstances of becoming pregnant, such as rape or unplanned pregnancy.
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The Samaritan Arguments Analysis
1468 Words | 3 Pages
The “Samaritan Argument” Thomson points out two Samaritan; the Good Samaritan and the Minimally Decent Samaritan. She gave a story about these two Samaritans; one day a man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and was attacked by thieves that left him half dead. The Minimally Decent Samaritan (priest and Levite) looked at the man and walked pass the man, while, the Good Samaritan helped the man; took care of him in a hotel. She gives another example that a girl was being murder while peoples just watched and did nothing. The people who did nothing did not get charged, so mothers who want an abortion is not a crime. The Good Samaritan would’ve came and tried to stop the act of killing, however, she said it’s not the Good Samaritan, but the Splendid Samaritan; risk his life for the girl (Luper and Brown, p. 604). Thomson says that God wants everyone to be the Good Samaritan. However, according to the law, no one is required to sacrifice their life for anyone else (a stranger) nor become a Good Samaritan. She uses the “violinist argument” to prove this that the person’s attached to the violinist can extricate themselves and it is no injustice to the violinist (Luper and Brown, p.605). Thomson says that a Good Samaritan would not refuse and take responsibility of a stranger, or a Splendid Samaritan would sacrifice his life for a stranger. She gives an example of a Minimally Decent Samaritan; a fourteen-year-old girl became pregnant due to rape and chooses to abort it. She says that is indecent if the mother requests an abortion, and the doctor agrees to perform
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Analysis Of A Defence Of Abortion By Thomson
1159 Words | 3 Pages
Thomson concludes that there are no cases where the person pregnant does not have the right to chose an abortion. Thomson considers the right to life of the pregnant person by presenting the case of a pregnant person dying as a result from their pregnancy. In this case, the right of the pregnant person to decide what happens to their body outweighs both the fetus and the pregnant person 's right to life. The right to life of the fetus is not the same as the pregnant person having to die, so as not to infringe on the right of the fetus. In the case of the violinist, their necessity for your body for life is not the same as their right over the use of your body. Thomson argues that having the right to life is not equal to having the right to use the body of another person. They argue that this is also the case, even if the the pregnant person knowingly participated in intercourse and knew of the possibility of pregnancy. In this case it would seem that abortion would not be permissible since the pregnancy was not by force. However, we are reverted back to the case of rape. If a fetus conceived voluntarily has the right not to be aborted due to how it was conceived, then the fetus conceived from rape should also have that same right. Instead of creating a distinction of cases where the fetus has a right to use the body of a pregnant person, Thomson instead makes a distinction of when abortion would be morally
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Mary Anne Warren's On the Moral and Legal Status of Abortion
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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).
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Why Abortion is Immoral by Don Marquis
1273 Words | 3 Pages
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.
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The Two Sides Of Abortion
1088 Words | 3 Pages
Abortion may be one of the most controversial topics in America today. Abortion is defined as “the termination of a pregnancy after, accompanied by, resulting in, or closely followed by the death of the embryo or fetus” (cite dictionary). There are really only two sides on people’s opinion on abortion; pro-life which means abortion should be outlawed and pro-choice which means a woman should be able to decide whether she wants to keep her baby. Thousands of protests and riots have begun due to the fact pro-life activists believe abortion should become illegal. Both sides bring valid points to support their decision that could sway any person’s thoughts. The Roe v. Wade law has allowed abortion to be legal in the U.S since 1973 (Chittom & Newton, 2015). The law “gives women total control over first trimester abortions and grants state legislative control over second and third trimester abortions” (Chittom & Newton, 2015). Ever since the law was put in place, millions of people have tried to overturn it and still
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Compare And Contrast Don Marquis Views On Abortion
1193 Words | 3 Pages
Abortion is an important and rather popular topic in the philosophical world. On one side of the argument, pro choice, Judith Jarvis Thomson argues that abortion is permissible because the pregnancy might not have been voluntary or the mother’s life is at risk if she continues on with the pregnancy. On the opposing side of the argument, Don Marquis argues that abortion is wrong because it takes away all the potential things a fetus could value in their future life. In this paper, I will argue against Don Marquis view of abortion. I will begin by explaining that Marquis does not take into consideration the effect the pregnancy may have on the mother, and I will talk about how Thomson does take the mother into consideration. Next, I will criticize
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The Debate Of The Permissibility Of Abortion
1114 Words | 3 Pages
The permissibility of abortion has been a crucial topic for debates for many years. People have yet to agree upon a stance on whether abortion is morally just. This country is divided into two groups, believers in a woman’s choice to have an abortion and those who stand for the fetus’s right to live. More commonly these stances are labeled as pro-choice and pro-life. The traditional argument for each side is based upon whether a fetus has a right to life. Complications occur because the qualifications of what gives something a right to life is not agreed upon. The pro-choice argument asserts that only people, not fetuses, have a right to life. The pro-life argument claims that fetuses are human beings and therefore they have a right to life. Philosopher, Judith Jarvis Thomson, rejects this traditional reasoning because the right of the mother is not brought into consideration. Thomson prepares two theses to explain her reasoning for being pro-choice; “A right to life does not entail the right to use your body to stay alive” and “In the majority of cases it is not morally required that you carry a fetus to term.”
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Summary Of A Defense Of Abortion By Judith Jarvis Thomson
1559 Words | 4 Pages
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.
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Abortion Diana Brown Summary
494 Words | 1 Pages
She claims that half of the abortions performed each year are medically unsafe, and result in about eighty thousand mothers dying. She inserts these statistics in order to appeal to the logic of the reader that abortions need to remain legal in order to prevent mothers from trying unsafe methods to terminate their pregnancy. She also refers to a baby as a “fetus” to demonstrate that the child’s rights should not supercede the mother’s because it is merely a “fetus.” The term fetus carries a different connotation than the terms baby or child. Using this scientific diction dehumanizes the baby that is being aborted, and it looks at the medical procedure through a more objective
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A Defense of Abortion by Judith Jarvis Thomson
1081 Words | 3 Pages
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.
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A Critique of On the Moral and Legal Status of Abortion, by Mary Anne Warren
1015 Words | 3 Pages
“On the Moral and Legal Status of Abortion” by Mary Anne Warren is an in depth analysis of what, in Warren’s opinion, it is exactly that 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 be stripping 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 of the moral community.
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A Critique of Judith Thomson’s A Defense of Abortion
1883 Words | 4 Pages
In A Defense of Abortion (Cahn and Markie), Judith Thomson presents an argument that abortion can be morally permissible even if the fetus is considered to be a person. Her primary reason for presenting an argument of this nature is that the abortion argument at the time had effectively come to a standstill. The typical anti-abortion argument was based on the idea that a fetus is a person and since killing a person is wrong, abortion is wrong. The pro-abortion adopts the opposite view: namely, that a fetus is not a person and is thus not entitled to the rights of people and so killing it couldn’t possibly be wrong.
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A Defense Of Abortion By Judith Jarvis Thomson

Why Don Marquis's Essay 'Why Abortion Is Immoral'