Transcript Abortion I - College of Charleston

Contraception and Abortion
standard arguments
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Conservative
CP1) Fetus is a person.
CC) Abortion is morally wrong.
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Liberal
LP1) Fetus is not a person.
LC) Abortion is morally acceptable.
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These standard arguments are invalid.

To make them valid, we need to add more premises –
thereby exposing the underlying assumptions.
standard arguments

Conservative
CP1) Fetus is a person.
CP2) Abortion = killing a fetus.
CP3) If x is a person, then killing x is morally wrong.
CC) Abortion is morally wrong.
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Liberal
LP1) Fetus is not a person.
LP2) Abortion = killing a fetus.
LP3) If x is not a person, then killing x is morally acceptable.
LC) Abortion is morally acceptable.
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Two assumptions:
1. Abortion = killing a fetus.
2. Killing a person is always wrong.
If these assumptions are correct, then the key issue is personhood: the
acceptability of abortion depends on whether the fetus is a person.
Are these assumptions correct?
problem 1: the wrongness of killing
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Conservatives: Is killing a person always morally wrong?
What about:
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killing a person in self-defense…
killing a person in a just war…
Liberals: Is killing a non-person always morally
acceptable?
What about:
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wantonly killing horses “just for kicks”…
blowing up a cat in a microwave “just for kicks”…
problem 2: personhood
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Imagine that aliens arrive on earth. They’re trying to
determine whether we are persons or a food source.
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What should they look for?
What are the essential characteristics of
personhood?
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What is to be a person?
what makes x a person?
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Viability: to be a person is to be capable of living as an independent
entity
Problems:
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cats, dogs, and spiders are all viable
artificial incubation makes a fetus of any age viable
viability varies from infant to infant, culture, race
Rational thought: to be a person is to be capable of rational thought
Problems:
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what about infants and young children?
what about the chronically comatose and severely mentally handicapped?
what makes x a person?
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Parental bonding: to be a person is to be emotionally connected to
one’s parents
Problems:
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penguins, whales, and chimpanzees all experience parental bonding
what about parents who don’t bond with child?
what about children without parents?
Social membership: to be a person is to be able to communicate
and function as a member of social group
Problems:
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elephants, wolves, and antelope all have social membership
what about people who are alienated or dehumanized?
what makes x a person?
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A future like ours: to be a person is to be such that if one does not
die prematurely, then one will have a future like ours
Problems:
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being a potential x doesn’t make something an x
what about the chronically comatose and severely mentally handicapped?
A soul: to be a person is to have a soul
Problems:
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souls are more controversial than the premises of the standard arguments
which creatures have souls?
how are we to tell if the fetus has a soul?
what makes x a person?
Human DNA: to be a person is to have human DNA
In argument form:
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P1) If x has human DNA, then x is a person
P2) The fetus has human DNA.
C) Therefore, the fetus is a person.
Problem:
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dead skin cells have human DNA (so P1 is false)
Revising the argument:
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P1) If x is a person, then x has human DNA.
P2) The fetus has human DNA.
C) Therefore, the fetus is a person.
Problem:
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the revised argument commits the fallacy of affirming the consequent
Let’s take a
BREAK!
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shifting the debate
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We have seen that the appeal to personhood is misguided:
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It is irrelevant (b/c some person-killings are acceptable and some nonperson-killings are still wrong).
It is unhelpful (b/c it is not clear what personhood is and whether fetuses
have it).
Thomson urges us to accept, for the sake of argument, that the fetus is
a person from the moment of conception:
“…it seems to me to be of great interest to ask what happens if, for the sake of
argument, we allow [that the fetus is a person]. How, precisely, are we supposed to
get from there to the conclusion that abortion is morally impermissible?” (Thomson,
A Defense of Abortion)
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Answer: typically, via an appeal to a right to life.
the right to life argument
P1) A fetus is a person.
P2) A person has a right to life, which is stronger and more stringent
than one’s right to decide what happens in and to one’s body.
C1) Therefore, a fetus has a right to life, which is stronger and more stringent
than one’s right to decide what happens in and to one’s body.
P3) If x has a right to life, which is stronger and more stringent than
one’s right to decide what happens in and to one’s body, then killing x
is always wrong.
C2) Therefore, killing a fetus is always wrong.
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Is a right to life always stronger and more stringent than
one’s right to decide what happens in and to one’s body?
the right to life
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Consider the violinist:
“Imagine that you wake up in the morning and find yourself back
to back in bed with an unconscious (famous) violinist. The
violinist has a fatal kidney ailment, and so the Society for Music
Lovers, upon discovering that you are the only person with
exactly the right blood type, kidnapped you in order to have his
circulatory system plugged into yours, so that your kidneys can be
used to extract poisons from his blood as well as your own. You
are told that everyone is very sorry, but it’s done – the violinist is
now plugged into you. To unplug him would be to kill him. But,
they say, it’s only for nine months (he needs that much time to
recover).” (Thomson, A Defense of Abortion)
the right to life
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Question:
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If the answer to any of these questions is “no”, then that shows that the
right to life does not always trump one’s right to decide what
happens in and to one’s body.
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“Do you have a moral obligation to stay plugged into the violinist? What if the violinist
needs you to stay plugged in for nine years? Or, the rest of your life?”
Accordingly, (P2) is false and the argument is unsound.
Relevant similarities between the violinist case and cases of pregnancy
due to rape:
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S1: Person stands to die.
S2: Involuntary (no consent).
the right to life
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Thomson is using an argument from analogy.
Violinist:
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x (is a person), y (needs use of your body), z (you did
not consent)  you have no moral obligation to
keep person alive
Abortion (rape case):
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x (is a person), y (needs use of your body), z (you did
not consent)  so, you have no moral obligation to
keep person alive in this case as well
the right to life
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The point:
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The right to life consists not in the right not to be killed, but in the right
not to be killed unjustly.
The upshot:
“It is by no means enough to show that the fetus is a person, and to remind
us that all persons have a right to life – we need to be shown also that
killing the fetus violates its right to life, i.e., that abortion is unjust killing.
And is it? …[The violinist case shows] that in a case of pregnancy due to
rape the mother [has the right to “unplug” herself, so to speak].”
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What about the moral acceptability/wrongness of abortion in
cases of pregnancy that are not due to rape?
Consider the following revised version of the right to life
argument:
the invitation argument
P1) A fetus is a person.
P2) A person has a right to life, which is the right not to be
killed unjustly.
C1) Therefore, a fetus has a right to life, which is the right not to
be killed unjustly.
P3) If x has a right to life, which is the right not to be killed
unjustly, then if y issues an invitation to x for x to use y’s
body, then y’s killing x is morally wrong.
C2) Therefore, if y issues an invitation to x for x to use y’s body,
then y’s killing x is morally wrong.
invitations
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Let us assume that an invitation entails obligation.
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This would explain why abortion in the case of pregnancy due to rape is
morally acceptable: there is no such invitation.
But, Thomson asks,
“In what pregnancy could it be supposed that the mother has given the
unborn person [a right to the use of her body for food and shelter]? It is not
as if there are unborn persons drifting about the world, to whom a woman
who wants a child says, ‘I invite you in.’”
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One might object that if a woman voluntarily engages in intercourse,
undertaken in full knowledge of the chance a pregnancy might result
from it, and then she does become pregnant, she is partly
responsible for the presence of the unborn child inside her, and so
has a moral obligation to “stay plugged in”, so to speak.
the revised invitation argument
P1) A fetus is a person.
P2) A person has a right to life, which is the right not to be killed unjustly.
C1) Therefore, a fetus has a right to life, which is the right not to be killed unjustly.
P3) If x has a right to life, which is the right not to be killed unjustly, then if y
voluntarily A-s in full knowledge of the chance that A-ing might result in
there being some x that needs to use y’s body in order to live, then if y’s A-ing
results in there being some x that needs to use y’s body in order to live y’s
killing x is morally wrong.
C2) Therefore, if y voluntarily A-s in full knowledge of the chance that A-ing might
result in there being some x that needs to use y’s body in order to live, then if y’s A-ing
results in there being some x that needs to use y’s body in order to live y’s killing x is
morally wrong.
invitations
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Consider the burglar:
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Question:
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Imagine that your room is stuffy.You open a window to air it (knowing that
there is a 1% chance a burglar might be around), and a burglar climbs in.
Do you have a moral obligation to allow the burglar to stay?
In this scenario, you opened the window voluntarily, with full
knowledge of what burglars are and do. But, still, despite that, you
have no obligation to allow the burglar to stay. It would be absurd to
claim otherwise.
The upshot:
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It cannot be true that voluntary action undertaken with full knowledge of the
possible (though unlikely and undesired) consequences entails an obligation to
accept those consequences.
Accordingly, (P3) is false and the revised invitation argument is unsound.
invitations
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This is another argument from analogy.
Burglar:
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Abortion (contraception case):
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x (is a person), y (needs to stay), z (was able to enter because of an action
which you voluntarily engaged in with full knowledge of the possible
consequences)  you have no moral obligation to keep person alive
x (is a person), y (needs to stay), z (was able to enter because of an action
which you voluntarily engaged in with full knowledge of the possible
consequences)  so, you have no moral obligation to keep person alive in
this case as well
One might object that the burglar is not innocent, whereas
the fetus is.
the doubly revised invitation argument
P1) A fetus is a person.
P2) A person has a right to life, which is the right not to be killed unjustly.
C1) Therefore, a fetus has a right to life, which is the right not to be killed unjustly.
P3) If x has a right to life, which is the right not to be killed unjustly, then if y
voluntarily A-s in full knowledge of the chance that A-ing might result in there
being some innocent x that needs to use y’s body in order to live, then if y’s Aing results in there being some innocent x that needs to use y’s body in order
to live y’s killing x is morally wrong.
C2) Therefore, if y voluntarily A-s in full knowledge of the chance that A-ing might
result in there being some innocent x that needs to use y’s body in order to live, then if y’s
A-ing results in there being some innocent x that needs to use y’s body in order to live y’s
killing x is morally wrong.
invitations
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Consider the homeless person:
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Question:
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Imagine that it is not a burglar who climbs in, but a wandering, innocent,
homeless person who falls in.
Do you have an obligation to allow the homeless person to stay?
In this scenario, we can assume that you opened the window voluntarily,
with full knowledge of what wandering, innocent, homeless people are and
do. But, still, despite that, you have no obligation to allow the homeless
person to stay. It would be absurd to claim otherwise.
The upshot:
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It cannot be true that voluntary action undertaken with full knowledge of the
possible (though unlikely and undesired) consequences entails an obligation to
accept those consequences, even in the case where the person affected is
innocent.
Accordingly, (P3) is false and the doubly revised invitation argument is
unsound.
invitations
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Consider the people seeds:
“Imagine that there were such things as “people seeds”,
and they drift about in the air like pollen, and if you
open your windows, one may drift in and take root in
your carpets and upholstery. You don’t want children,
so you fix up your windows with mesh screens, the very
best you can buy. But, as it happens, one of the screens
in a window is defective, and a seed drifts in and takes
root, and begins to develop.”
invitations
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In this case, you knowingly keep carpets and upholstered
furniture, and you know that the screens are sometimes defective.
You could live without furniture and with bare floors, or with
sealed windows and doors, but you don’t.
But the fact that you do these things voluntarily, with full
knowledge of the potential consequences, does not seem to make
it so that you have a moral obligation to allow the people-plants
to develop in your house.
 “…for by the same token anyone can avoid pregnancy due to
rape by having a hysterectomy, or anyway by never leaving
home without a (reliable!) army.”
invitations
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Thomson’s homeless person and people seeds cases are
intended to show that abortion is acceptable in at least
some cases of contraceptive failure.
Some relevant similarities amongst these cases:
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S1: Innocent person stands to die.
S2: Reasonable precautions taken.
S3: Defect in protection.
The argument is once again an argument from analogy…
invitations
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Homeless person and people seeds:
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v (is an innocent person), w (needs to stay), x (was able to enter because
of an action which you voluntarily engaged in with full knowledge of the
possible consequences), y (you took reasonable precautions to prevent y), z
(y resulted because of a defect in protection)  you have no moral
obligation to keep person alive
Abortion (contraceptive failure case):
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v (is an innocent person), w (needs to stay), x (was able to enter because
of an action which you voluntarily engaged in with full knowledge of the
possible consequences), y (you took reasonable precautions to prevent y), z
(y resulted because of a defect in protection)  so, you have no moral
obligation to keep person alive in this case as well
in-class activity
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Assess Thomson’s people-seeds analogy:
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Come up with what you think might be considered
a morally relevant disanalogy between the peopleseeds case and cases of abortion due to
contraceptive failure.
Explain (1) why it might be considered a
disanology and (2) why it might be considered
morally relevant.
risky behavior
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One might object that abortion is still morally wrong. For:
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if it is morally wrong to voluntarily do that which one knows may result in
killing a person, then, morally speaking, one must not voluntarily do that
act – to do that act is morally wrong.
Let’s see whether this objection is plausible:
P1) One must not voluntarily do that which one knows may
result in killing a person – to do so is morally wrong.
P2) Driving a car is a voluntary action that we know may
result in killing a person.
C) Therefore, one must not drive a car – to do so is morally
wrong!
risky behavior
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Of course, driving a car is not morally wrong.
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Even though driving may result in killing a person (and despite the fact that we
all know that this is so), it is clearly morally acceptable to drive.
We need not take the precaution here prescribed: namely, not driving.
So, we may conclude that there must be something wrong with the
claim that it is morally wrong to voluntarily do that which one knows
may result in killing a person.
Unless there is a relevant difference between these cases, we lack
reason to think that abortion is wrong in those cases in which a
woman voluntarily engages in contraceptive sex, undertaken in
full knowledge of the chance a pregnancy might result.
risky behavior
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Again, consider some of the relevant similarities between
having contraceptive sex and driving:
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S1: Voluntary (consent).
S2: Reasonable precautions taken.
S3: If there is an accident (a defect in protection), then a
person dies.
S4: Done anyways.
One might object that sex was “designed” to make babies,
whereas driving was not “designed” to kill someone
risky behavior
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But, consider the argument applied to shooting guns (which were designed to
kill):
P1) One must not voluntarily do that which one knows may result in
killing an innocent person – to do so is morally wrong.
P2) Shooting a gun is a voluntary action that we know may result in
killing an innocent person.
C) Therefore, one must not shoot guns – to do so is morally wrong!
Of course, shooting a gun isn’t wrong when you take the necessary
precautions. If, after taking such precautions your shooting the gun results in
someone’s death, due to a defect in protection, you are not doing anything
morally wrong by shooting the gun.
Applied to the case of abortion, this suggests that abortion isn’t wrong when
you take the necessary precautions. If, after taking such precautions your
sexual activity still results in someone’s death, due to a defect in protection,
you are not doing anything morally wrong by having an abortion.
sometimes...
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Thomson clearly does not think that it follows from her
argument that abortion is acceptable in all cases. She
maintains that there are many cases in which an abortion is
indeed morally wrong:
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e.g., if a woman wants an abortion during her seventh month simply
in order to avoid the nuisance of postponing a trip abroad, or if the
fetus could be removed from her body without killing it or harming
her, etc.
Question:
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People can be negligent in both sex and driving: what counts as
taking appropriate precautions?
When is our behavior appropriate and when is it negligent?