Response to Judith Jarvis Thomson's A Defense for Abortion Judith Jarvis Thomson, in "A Defense of Abortion", argues that even if we grant that fetuses have a fundamental right to life, in many cases the rights of the mother override the rights of a fetus. For the sake of argument, Thomson grants the initial contention that the fetus has a right to life at the moment of conception. However, Thomson explains, it is not self-evident that the fetus's right to life will always outweigh the mother's right to determine what goes on in her body. Thomson also contends that just because a woman voluntarily had intercourse, it does not follow that the fetus acquires special rights against the mother. Therefore, abortion is permissible even if the mother knows the risks of having sex. She makes her points with the following illustration. Imagine that you wake up one morning and find that you have been kidnapped, taken to a hospital, and a famous violist has been attached to your circulatory system. You are told that the violinist was ill and you were selected to be the host, in which the violinist will recover in nine months, but will die if disconnected from you before then. Clearly, Thomson argues, you are not morally required to continue being the host. In her essay she answers the question: what is the standard one has to have in order to be granted a right to life? She reflects on two prospects whether the right to life is being given the bare minimum to sustain life or ir the right to life is merely the right not to be killed. Thomson states that if the violinist has more of a right to life then you do, then someone should make you stay hooked up to the violinist with no exceptions. If not, then you should be free to go at a... ... middle of paper ... ...ofeminists and pacifist feminists take to be characteristically masculine; it shows a willingness to use violence in order to take control. The fetus is destroyed by being pulled apart by suction, cut in pieces, or poisoned." Wolf-Devine goes on to point out that "in terms of social thought . . . it is the masculine models which are most frequently employed in thinking about abortion. If masculine thought is naturally hierarchical and oriented toward power and control, then the interests of the fetus (who has no power) would naturally be suppressed in favor of the interests of the mother. But to the extent that feminist social thought is egalitarian, the question must be raised of why the mother's interests should prevail over the child's . . . . Feminist thought about abortion has . . . been deeply pervaded by the individualism which they so ardently criticize."32
In the article, “Killing and Letting Die” by Philippa Foot she argues that Thomson’s argument is invalid. Thomson argues that abortion is sometimes justified because no one has the right to another person’s body and therefore the mother can detach herself from the baby. To highlight on this analogy she presents an example with a violinist. The violinist is in critical condition and in order to be saved he must be attached to a random person. That person is then obligated to be attached to the violinist for if they detach the violinist will surely die. It is true that in both situation there is someone’s life at stake. On violinist case the violinist is simply let die while the abortion case the fetus is killed by the mother. Therefore, I will
Judith Jarvis Thomson makes an interesting argument on the defense of abortion. She uses a libertarian framework believing in the doctrine of free will on a rights based account that a women and the fetus that she carries have equal rights. She makes clear, that “the fetus is a human being, a person, from the moment of conception.” In her specific argument she believes that every person has a right to life, and our obligation to one another as human beings is to not interfere with the rights of others and are not obligated to intervene past that. Her specific argument is convincing.
Both Thomson and Warren have permissive views on the abortion. Thomson claims that the abortion is morally permissible in a very early stage of the pregnancy because an unborn fetus is not a person early on the pregnancy. Especially, in the case of pregnant due to rape, she is inclined to allow the abortion. According to Warren, she insists that the abortion is permissible if an unwanted or defective infant is born into a society that cannot afford to raise a child (Timmons, 2014, p. 437). She states that a woman’s rights to freedom, happiness, and self-determination are violated due to an unwanted pregnancy (Timmons, 2014, p. 441).
Thomson’s main idea is to show why Pro-Life Activists are wrong in their beliefs. She also wants to show that even if the fetus inside a women’s body had the right to life (as argued by Pro – Lifers), this right does not entail the fetus to have whatever it needs to survive – including usage of the woman’s body to stay alive.
In her article Thomson starts off by giving antiabortionists the benefit of the doubt that fetuses are human persons. She adds that all persons have the right to life and that it is wrong to kill any person. Also she states that someone?s right to life is stronger than another person?s autonomy and that the only conflict with a fetuses right to life is a mother?s right to autonomy. Thus the premises make abortion impermissible. Then Thomson precedes to attacks the premise that one?s right to autonomy can be more important to another?s right to life in certain situations. She uses quite an imaginative story to display her point of view. Basically there is a hypothetical situation in which a very famous violinist is dying. Apparently the only way for the violinist to survive is to be ?plugged? into a particular woman, in which he could use her kidneys to continue living. The catch is that the Society of Music Lovers kidnapped this woman in the middle of the night in order to obtain the use of her kidneys. She then woke up and found herself connected to an unconscious violinist. This obviously very closely resembles an unwanted pregnancy. It is assumed that the woman unplugging herself is permissible even though it would kill the violinist. Leading to her point of person?s right to life is not always stronger than another person?s right to have control over their own body. She then reconstructs the initial argument to state that it is morally impermissible to abort a fetus if it has the right to life and has the right to the mother?s body. The fetus has the right to life but only has the right to a ...
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.
Judith Thomson argues, it is morally permissible to unplug yourself from a violinist. You are permitted to do so because you did not consent to attach the violinist to your body and he has no right to use your body. The question becomes: how could a violinist (even a famous one) explain the permissibility of aborting a fetus, particularly in cases of rape? There is a
...e open to all women at any point of pregnancy, and that the woman reserves the right as a fully conscious member of the moral community to choose to carry the child or not. She argues that fetuses are not persons or members of the moral community because they don’t fulfill the five qualities of personhood she has fashioned. Warren’s arguments are valid, mostly sound, and cover just about all aspects of the overall topic. However much she was inconsistent on the topic of infanticide, her overall writing was well done and consistent. Warren rejects emotional appeal in a very Vulcan like manner; devout to reason and logic and in doing so has created a well-written paper based solely on this rational mindset.
Thomson believes that the abortion issue cannot be decided strictly by determining whether or not the fetus has a right to life. She argues that even if we grant that the fetus is a moral person (has the right to life), it is not always the case that abortion is morally impermissible (S. Morris ThomsonHO). She understands that even if a fetus has a right to life, that does not necessarily outweigh the mother's right to do with her body as she sees fit. Therefore, the fetus' right to life is not absolute. Thomson uses the example that in order to save the mother's life due to a cardiac condition, she will die if she carries the baby to term. The fetus, being a person, has a right to life, but as the mother is a person too, so has she a right to life. An argument for this case is by having an abortion, you are directly killing the fetus, whereas if the mother were to die by giving birth, she is not being directly killed, just simply letting her die. If the mother were to perform the abortion on herself in order to save her own life, it would not be considered a murder (Thomson p41-42). "Everyone has a right to life, so the unborn person has a right to life" (Thomson p43). In certain cases (rape) she indeed believes that it is permissible to abort the fetus, but not always. If it is
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
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.
Judith Jarvis Thomson's controversial essay: A Defense of Abortion, takes an imaginative approach to the debate of abortion being impermissible, making her paper one of the most reprinted essays of philosophy. Thomson uses atypical examples to combat the most common reason for abortion being unjust: the fetus being human and the mother having responsibility for it. It has been said to be the best possible defense of abortion, however, is Thomson’s argument unbreakable and not open to criticism? Thomas initially seemingly strengthens her argument by accepting the most common criticism of abortion and uses absurd radical analogies unseen of before. Does Thomson’s imaginative way of reasoning, specifically her acorn and violinist thought experiments,
Through a string of metaphors and well-thought-out arguments, Judith Jarvis Thomson, in her writing of "A Defense of Abortion," was able to delineate her position on whether all abortion is morally permissible in particular cases. She would like to make it clear that she does not feel like it should be permissible for you to do the action if it does not have the correct reasonings behind it.
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
Thomson criticizes the “right to life” argument using several thought experiments such as the violinist thought experiment in which a person has been kidnapped by the crazy fans of a violinist who is dying from a failing kidney. The person is expected to stay connected to the violinist for approximately nine months, or longer if required. According to the “right to life” argument, the violinist is a person and deserves to have a life; therefore, regardless of the fact that the person that is hooked up to him is a victim and unwilling, it is that persons’ obligation to stay hooked up and save the life of the violinist. Thomson argues that a person, regardless of circumstance, has the right to control what goes on with their body. She argues that if the person decides to stay connected to the violinist they are within their rights and if they decide to disconnect and the violinist dies, they are in their rights as well.