Essay about Is Abortion Morally Permissible or Not?

In this paper I am going to critically evaluate “A Defense of Abortion” by Judith Thompson, a moral philosopher and metaphysician, who argues that is morally okay to abort a fetus even if the fetus is considered a person and contrast it to another moral philosopher and utilitarian, Peter Singer who deems her argument to be flawed.

Don Marquis agrees with anti-abortionists that abortion is morally wrong, but finds that they are not making the right arguments to justify this. There is much debate over what comprises a human being or when a fetus becomes a person, and if only a human life is of great value, so I will use the general term “X” to present Marquis’s overall argument. If X has a future like ours which has great value, then depriving X of that future is immoral. X has a future like ours, thereby making it immoral to kill X. Obviously, this is a broad argument defending the anti-abortionist viewpoint. In this case, X is a fetus, so the argument becomes much more specific. If a fetus has a future like ours which has great value, depriving a fetus of this future is morally wrong. A fetus has a future like ours, so killing the fetus is morally wrong.

The fetus has a valuable future, just as we consider children, the retarded or mentally ill to have valuable futures, thus killing a fetus is not morally permissible. Another pro-choice argument is that the fetus has no desire to live and consequently there is no wrongness in killing. Marquis criticizes this viewpoint, as society believes it is morally wrong to kill those who have no desire to live, and those who are unconscious or suicidal (Gedge & Waluchow, 2012, p220).

This essay will look at Marquis’s “future like ours” argument and challenge the premises and implications of his conclusion. I will not be considering exceptional circumstances, such as rape or major health implications, as Marquis’ focus was on general deliberate abortions. I will argue that the ideas of personhood, future-directed preferences and bodily autonomy establish a great moral difference between killing an adult and killing a foetus. In disproving Marquis’s conclusion and his counter-examples to criticisms, I will draw upon utilitarian and rights-based theories.

In his essay "Why Abortion is Immoral," Don Marquis argues against the morality of abortion on the premise that the value of a fetus' future is so great that it is immoral to take that potential future away from it. Essentially, he contends, abortion is tantamount to murder: killing an individual is prima facie wrong because the loss of the goods of one's future is the worst loss a human can suffer. He calls this potential future a "future-like-ours," which is the basis for his contentions. In the next few pages I will delineate the general progression of his argument, and later, will evaluate the plausibility of said argument. Though Marquis makes both logical and compelling claims, there are

Using a new and intriguing approach, Don Marquis refutes many of pro-choice claims, including the likes of Thomson and Warren, by not arguing whether a fetus is a person or if it has moral rights, but rather justifying the fact that the unborn child has a future and it would be immoral of us to deprive the child of it. Marquis makes it very clear to the readers that he in no way shape or form is for abortion, and is only okay with it under certain circumstances. Subsequent to distinctly stating his position, he explains beliefs that both pro-lifers and pro-choicers differ on which are whether a fetus is a person from the moment it is conceived and whether it obtaining more human characteristics has an effect on the decision. After carefully dissecting both sides argument logically he concludes that one side is way too broad with their statements and the other is just way too vague to make a final decision, so he looks into another aspect overall, whether the action of aborting is considered murder if at all.

The debate about abortion focuses on two issues; 1.) Whether the human fetus has the right to life, and, if so, 2.) Whether the rights of the mother override the rights of the fetus. The two ethicists who present strong arguments for their position, and who I am further going to discuss are that of Don Marquis and Judith Thomson. Marquis' "Future Like Ours" (FLO) theory represents his main argument, whereas, Thomson uses analogies to influence the reader of her point of view. Each argument contains strengths and weaknesses, and the point of this paper is to show you that Marquis presents a more sound argument against abortion than Thomson presents for it. An in depth overview of both arguments will be

Don Marquis starts off his essay stating that most anti-abortion arguments are often thought of as of “irrational religious dogma or a conclusion generated by seriously confused philosophical argument.” (Marquis, p 183). He goes on to say that his essay will show abortion is seriously immoral and in the same moral category as killing an innocent adult human. Marquis then deconstructs typical arguments made both for and against abortion. He disagrees with the common arguments made by the anti-abortionist because the moral principles they use are often too broad in scope. Marquis draws parallels between the typical anti-abortionist arguments and the standard pro-choice arguments. For example, he notes the anti-abortionist will often make the claim that life is present at conception or the fetus looks like a baby and therefore it is a human being with a right to life. Regarding the pro-choice arguments Marquis notices similar arguments in the other direction. For example, the pro-choicer will claim the fetuses are not persons. Marquis notices there is too much ambiguity in the arguments of both sides. Marquis says that the moral claims made by each party do not do a good job touching the essence of the matter. Marquis then goes on to state that in order to understand why abortion is wrong we must first find out why it is wrong to kill us. He arrives at the conclusion that it is wrong to kill us because it deprives us our future. Marquis argues that since a standard fetus has a future just like a child or an adult

In Marquis’s Why Abortion is Immoral, Marquis presents his argument against abortion. The basic idea behind the argument is that, abortion is seriously morally wrong because it is the act of killing a human being with the right to live life. Additionally, abortion is seriously morally wrong in Marquis’s claim because it deprives a being of its future – a future that has the potential to be as worthy and as great as that of an human being – while he explains that the wrongfulness of murdering a fetus is superior to any excuse with a few exceptions. My aim in this paper is to show that the argument fails. In section I, I present the argument and explain the motive, reasoning, and purpose behind the various premises of Marquis. In section II, I present my further evaluation and critique of Marquis’s argument. Lastly, in section III, I will address the several objections that may be brought upon against my thoughts and criticisms.

What are the ethics of Abortion? I believe ethics of abortion is a controversial topic, in which it involves the act of removing a fetus from the womb of a woman’s body. This bioethical issue has been an ongoing debate for over forty years now. For many people, abortion is a moral issue, concerning the rights of a fetus and a woman’s right over her own body. What are your moral beliefs about abortion and a woman’s right to having one? I am a Pro-Choice supporter. I believe a woman has the right to make the ultimate decision on what she wants to do with her own body-safe and legally. However, I don’t believe that abortion should be used as a form of birth control or contraception. Society today, approaches discussions about abortion with caution; for many in society today, believe that it’s an act of murder and against all Godly ways. On the contrary, others like myself believe that under certain livelihood circumstances, the right to terminate an unwanted pregnancy should be a

Based on the view that the fetus is already a small baby, some extreme anti-abortionists would maintain that abortion is impermissible even to save the mothers life. The rationale behind this view would be that the child is innocent, and killing the child would be active, on the other hand, letting the mother die would be passive. This introduces two new concepts, the first being the mother’s rights in competition to those of the fetus and the second being the question of innocence and how we would define this (Langley).

When faced with the choice of life or death, most people would choose to live. In fact, most would not want someone else making that decision for them. They would claim that as a living and independent entity it is solely their choice as to whether they continue to live or not. While this concept may seem fairly straightforward, there seems to be some great debate when it is applied to abortion. For many, they will maintain that the fetus has the right to life no matter the situation. There are some who will argue that abortion is morally permissible in specific circumstances and there are even those that will claim that abortion is always permissible. Why is there such a great divide? A major factor that plays a part in this is whether abortion involves more than one life. Because determining the beginning point of life is such a complex and emotional debate, there will be the same allowance in this paper as there was in Judith Jarvis Thomson’s “A Defense of Abortion”. As she eloquently put it “I propose then, that we grant that the fetus is a person from the moment of conception” (p. 721). This will allow for a look into the moral debate of abortion from a more grounded stage. As discussed early in Thomson’s paper, most of the debate on abortion rests on whether the fetus is alive or not. Whereas the focus should be on the many other aspects of pregnancies that may lead to a mother wanting an abortion.

“On the Moral and Legal Status of Abortion”, an essay written by Mary Anne Warren, defend abortion in any stage of a woman’s pregnancy (pg 468). Warren argues that the potential to become a human being is not the same as being human and deserving the same right to life (pg. 468-472). This essay asserts that in order to be human, one must possess five particular traits (pg. 470). These trait are consciousness, reasoning, self-motivated activity, the ability to communicate, and awareness of oneself (pg. 470). Warren claims that since a fetus has not yet acquired all of the traits, then that fetus is not human and therefore does not have the right to life (pg. 470).

The topic of abortion has been highly controversial in the American consciousness for many decades. The main topic of debate has been about whether a fetus deserves the same moral consideration as a physical human being and thus a moral right to not be killed. The answer to this question usually devolves into an argument about whether or when a fetus is a person. This type of argument has not been able to resolve the difference between ideologies throughout the decades. It is for this reason that Don Marquis in his article “Why Abortion is Immoral” aims to take a different perspective on the controversy by discussing why he believes that killing is wrong in general and applying that logic to a fetus. However, Marquis’s argument that abortion is prima facie wrong is unsound, because through the application of his moral evaluation of killing, he makes problematic implications concerning the value of life and also undermines his own argument through inconsistent logic within the paper.

My argument begins with explaining the concept of personhood. I will argue that the fetus is not a person. I will then explain why this lack of personhood grants the woman the opportunity of choosing whether to have an abortion or not. My paper will then go to explain why prohibiting abortion will violate a woman’s rights. I will provide examples to develop this violation of rights. The paper will then focus on respecting the fetus and showing how the support of abortion rights does not involve the dehumanization of the human fetus. I will end by tackling the potential objections of my argument.