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.”
This view may be problematic if we consider that life does not necessarily imply personhood. We may claim that the foetus is a human being but this merely implies that it is a member of our species, and not that of another. Yet it is at least true to say that a foetus, even in the earliest stages of pregnancy has the potential to be a person. This is slightly differe...
In order for the pro-life argument to be valid, it must have both a true premise and true conclusion. It falls short of validity by assuming that a fetus up to 22 weeks old is a person, and has its own rights independent of its host, or what we often refer to as its mother. First we must recognize the subtle, yet extremely important distinction between a human being and a person. It is obvious that a fetus is a member of the human ...
Abortion is an ethical issue because there are many differing views on if it morally right to terminate a pregnancy before normal childbirth. Some people believe that abortion is acceptable, others completely disagree with the practice and other believe it is acceptable under some circumstances. This is an ethical issue because there is the ‘Pro Life’ argument, where there is the belief that abortion is murder, and the unborn child has the right to live as anyone else does, there is also the ‘Pro Choice’ argument, where there is the belief that the woman has ‘reproductive rights’ and can choose what she does with her body, because it is her body. There are also views of abortion that come from religion. People base their views on their values,
In Dan Marquis’ article, “Why Abortion is Immoral”, he argues that aborting a fetus is like killing a human being already been born and it deprives them of their future. Marquis leaves out the possible exceptions of abortion that includes: a threat to the mom’s life, contraceptives, and pregnancy by rape. First, I will explain Marquis’ pro-life argument in detail about his statements of why abortion is morally wrong. Like in many societies, killing an innocent human being is considered morally wrong just like in the United States. Second, I will state my objection to Marquis’ argument through examining the difference between a human being already born future compared to a potential fetus’s future. Thus, Marquis’ argument for his pro-life
...vacy, bodily integrity, and self-determination until the child is brought forth from the woman 's body” (ACLU). Until a fetus is brought forth from a woman’s body it is only a potential person, and thus has no rights whatsoever.
During the past quarter century, abortion has joined race and war as one of the most debatable subject of controversy in the United States. It discusses human interaction where ethics, emotions and law come together. There are many points of view toward abortion but the only two fine distinctions are "pro-choice" and "pro-life". A pro-choicer would feel that the decision to abort a pregnancy is that of the mothers and the state has no right to interfere. A pro-lifer would hold that from the moment of conception, the embryo or fetus is alive, but others approve of abortion because they believe that a fetus is not human until birth.
position that abortion is morally wrong. Therefore, if you kill a fetus, then (prima facie)
The standard argument against abortion claims that the fetus is a person and therefore has a right to life. Thomson shows why this standard argument against abortion is a somewhat inadequate account of the morality of abortion.
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.
For the past couple of decades, the issue of abortion has been the most heated topic debated in the United States. When considering this topic, one must look at three things: ethics, emotions and the law; for all of these are important to this issue. Like any debate, there are two sides to this issue: pro-choice and pro-life. The people who are pro- abortion say that the mother is the ultimate person to decide to abort a pregnancy and that the government should not get involved. On the other hand, a person against abortion would state that from the time of conception, the embryo/fetus is considered a human being. By aborting one is committing murder and taking away that human being’s life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness as stated in the United States Constitution. When investigating the topic of abortion many questions come up. Can abortion be morally justified? What about in the case of therapeutic abortion or rape?
In contrast, many argue that abortion can never be rationalized, as it is truly immoral to kill an unborn child, as it is an innocent
It is said that a foetus is not really a person but is only an appendage to the mother. Therefore, she has the right to remove this foetus just as she would a tumor. According to this argument, the infant’s body does not receive a human life until sometime shortly before birth or just after birth; which in both cases is a murder.
Issues pertaining to abortion have always been contentious in both, the contemporary and traditional human society. Indeed, so emotive has the issue been that it has become one of the topics that have to be and are discussed in politics. Abortion is often defined as the deliberate termination of a pregnancy prior to its attainment of full term and with no intention whatsoever of keeping the fetus. In essence, it always results in the death of the unborn child, which explains why there has been all-ranging controversy. Questions have often been raised about the legality of abortion with different sides making assertions on why it should or should not be legal. While there are varying opinions on the subject, abortion should remain legal in the United States.
When does the fetus because a person, Conception or birth? Do woman have the right to decide if they are going to carry a baby to term or not? These are the most commonly argumentative questions that come up in this specific topic. The moral status of the fetus is in much of the debate in regard to abortion. If the fetus is a person, then they have the right to be kept to term. Some philosophers like Judith Thomson and Jane English had made arguments that even if the fetus is a person, abortion may be morally justified. They dispute the truth of the premise, “It is wrong to end the life of an innocent person.” The question then becomes again when is a fetus a person? Some say it happens at the moment of conception, others say it happens when the heart beat starts, and others feel life doesn’t start until birth. According to Dr. Jack Willke, the president of the National Right to Life Committee, an embryo is a human being from the moment of conception. His definition of a human depends upon the forty- six chromosomes. The embryo exists beyond our understanding. The fertilized egg contains all the DNA necessary for the embryo to develop. Half the DNA is supplied by the egg and the other half by the sperm. It makes a unique combination that can’t be duplicated, which entitles a unique individual. Although, arguments have been made contradicting Dr. Willke’s