The law does not permit abortion on demand, but since half of abortions are not carried out by the NHS and it is rare for anyone to able to be pay to be refused an abortion, it could be said to exist on demand. If you can pay and want an abortion there is no problem of access to abortion. Martha Nussbaum believed that it is men who like to invent elaborate abstract formal ‘systems’ which they then try to impose on the messier world of human beings and their moral problems. This in turn suggests that men are subject to not thinking what women really want. With this in mind it is hard t see how we can collectively make laws on what constitutes a legal abortion.
“A person is a being that is conscious, in the sense of having the capacity for conscious, thought and experience, but not only that it must have the capacity for reflective consciousness and self-consciousness”.
This quote when analysed shows that a foetus is not a person as it has no characteristics of a being. The foetus has no sense of conscious or experience except that of life inside the womb. The foetus can have no concept of thought or conscious of what is going on around on him/her so he/she can not reflect on life till him/her enters the really world, again because the foetus is still in the womb.
Michael Lockwood considers two arguments to show that you and I came in to existence at the moment of conception and on the contrary that we came into existence much later, probably subsequent to birth.
“You and I are human organisms; a human organism comes into existence at the moment of conception; therefore we came into existence at the moment of conception”
“You and I are persons; but a foetus is not a person; indeed, it seems likely that several months have to elapse before the new-born baby acquires any capacity for reflective consciousness or self-consciousness; therefore, it seems likely that we did not come into existence until some time after birth”
This quote is very accurate as your first memories for most people are not usually until we are about 2 or 3. This suggests that we did could not have come into existence until after birth. Although we do not seem to view our memories until later ages, this could just mean that our brain is not developed enough o be able to remember things thus showing that we could be regarded as being a human before birth. Christians traditionally believed that the possession of a soul was what made man, different from the rest of the animal creation. Until ensoulment, the embryo is less than human. Man must recognise that all life is created and owned by God. This argument can not be proved and is argue for and against on what the person’s views and believes are.
The next factor of abortion is that of human rights. The foetus has a right to life and the woman has the right to choose. The word right implies that something is due to people, something which ought properly to be theirs and which it is morally wrong for anyone to take away. In addition to a right and liberty, people claim a right to happiness, property and social benefits. But where do our rights come from? Today’s society seems to have granted us with our society as people automatically give people what they wish without really thinking about showing that it is built into us. Christians ground their discussion of rights on their doctrine of man, made in the image of God.
Judith Jarvis Thompson’s feminist view argues that the foetus is a person at the moment of conception and that every person has a right to life. The mother has the right to decide what happens to her body and mostly everyone would grant this. The argument against this is that surely the foetus’s right to life is stronger and more stringent than the mothers right to decide what happens in and to her body, if people think this they will conclude that the foetus may not be killed therefore an abortion may not be performed. British Archbishops accept that women have rights in respect of their own bodies but point out that no rights are unlimited and go on to say that the unborn child has the right “not to be made the object of attack by any procedure or technique… adopted… with the intention of preventing the continuation of the child’s development before birth.” This includes in that things such as the morning after pill. Her example against the action of abortion which first appeared in 1971 in the Journal of Philosophy and Public affairs is a situation as follows:
“A famous unconscious violinist has been found to have fatal kidney aliment, and the society of music lovers has canvassed all the available medical records and found that you alone have the right blood type to help………. The director of the hospital now tells you, “Look, we’re sorry the society of music lovers did this to you. We would have never have permitted if It we had known……To unplug you would kill him. But never mind, it’s only for nine months. By then he will have recovered from his ailment and can safely be unplugged from you”.
What this passage tells us is the woman finds her life changed, not at her request and there is moral pressure on her no to ‘unhitch’ the violinist. The violinist did not ask permission and he has no right to expect her to allow him to use her body. This relates passage only really links to rape as the violinist did not ask to use her kidneys as a rapist would not ask to have sexual intercourse. Although this does not directly represent the ideology of abortion it does has the same principles.
Another question that is linked from this and is generally asked is who has the right to take the life or the future life of the foetus? If the foetus is seen as a living human being is it right to kill it? There are no specific biblical texts condoning or accepting abortion. Abortion was widespread throughout the Graeco-Roman world. The Romans believed that human life began after birth thus making it acceptable to have abortions. The only problem then was the potential of the foetus on future society. This could not be seen thus it depended on people’s background as to what would happen to the foetus. The Judaeo-Christians believed what is still about today, Human life is sacred and must be protected (Gen 9.6). This included the foetus, created by God (Ps 139). Although this was not absolute the Mishnah believed that the foetus may be destroyed in order to protect the foetus.
“God gives life and only God can take it away”
God created you and therefore created the foetus, why should others have the right to take/destroy the life of one of Gods creations.
“The lord says remember who formed you in the womb”
“It was you who created my inmost self and put me together in my mother’s womb”
You should respect and protect God’s creations not destroy the creations. This is a Deontological or other wise known as an absolutist approach meaning the action taken is never permissible or good. Jesus was certainly no absolutist e.g. he stops an adulteress being stoned to death.
Thou should not kill” a rule given to Moses by God states no one should kill what ever the situation may be.
“The fine imposed for causing a miscarriage”
What the quotation tells us is that a foetus is not as high status as a person. As the foetus should as stated “Eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth”.
Professor Oliver O’Donovan raises an interesting argument- How do we meet the claim of individuated human beings? Take the case of the pregnant mother with a serious heart condition or cancer of the cervix. If the mother goes into the final stages of pregnancy the baby and she are very likely to die. In these cases the doctor will see he has two patients not one he is the arbitrator of a conflict of lives, both patients having a claim to his help in different ways. Just because we recognise them both as human does not mean that we cannot decide between them in a crisis. The sense that priority belongs to the weak and young and that risk should be borne by the stronger members of our species, is balanced and overruled in the minds of most people by the sense that the mother’s humanity demands more attention than that of the foetus. The mother has an established pattern of relationships, the foetus is cataleptic and will if it dies, never know that it has lost what it never knew it possessed.
The death of the mother as a long term consequence of allowing a pregnancy to go to term is a distinct possibility. Within the context of ‘equal human regard’, priorities can be acknowledged which allow uneven weighting to the life of the mother, even where it is not directly threatened in the sort term.
Here O’Donovan raises the idea of Human rights. O’Donovan asks the question whether human mental life is a value equal to human physical life. If it is this still allows us to weigh the claims of life on an equal basis. This policy would permit us to kill the senile mother of the pregnant woman, where the pregnant women’s mental health is threatened by looking after her mother. It is hard to accept that mental or physical health or any social good is a value equal to human life.
Today we are able to see, through scans and other tests, whether the baby is likely to be deformed. If we see this going to happen then questions are asked what the genetic risk would be if they survive to reproduce and how much of a strain they would be on the public and the patience of their parents. In the case of an encephalic it is hard to justify the reasoning in continuing through with giving birth as the baby is not going stands little chance of survival outside the womb. When these cases come to light, we see abortion as compassion for the baby as we cannot see any sort of bright future for the foetus. This though can be viewed as immoral as we do not equate life and freedom form suffering. Depending on our view of when the foetus becomes a human, by committing ourselves to abortion, it can be classified as euthanasia, which is not permitted in this country.
If the subject has been raped, the law could decide not to regulate abortion after rape because there are some moral duties which cannot be forced on others by those who have never had to face them.
Also responsibility for taking the life of the foetus rests to a particular degree with the mother. It is her decision and she must answer for it before God. Our law states that we cannot abandon a foetus, but we must protect it. The mother is the one who will be responsible for the baby when it grows up. This means she must be able to look at herself and see if she can really give the baby the best opportunity in life.
The conclusion to this is that there is no right or wrong answer to this complicated argument of abortion. There are believes and pros and cons of the abortion which have there own argument which are liked by some and disliked by others. As there are no real biblical references linked directly to abortion as was not on demand as it is now as times have changed, the bible does not offer much contribution to the argument leaving it to the theologians.
With present technology doctors can deliver babies earlier than twenty four weeks. This is younger than that of the latest date that abortion can legally be performed. Doctors can perform this by taking the baby out through the stomach. With this in mind more ethical and moral dilemmas come into play. Therefore I can conclude by saying that the personhood of the foetus can only really be contemplated by the mother of the foetus. It is her choice thus under the right circumstances I believe that we as a society can vent our feelings about abortion but the mother is the only person who can truly decide whether in her circumstances abortion is right or not. I thus believe that with all the research that has gone into abortion, the Abortion Act must have good reasoning behind it thus it should be right to follow it.
“Where there is doubt, it may be right to err on side of life and favour the less selfish position and, therefore, to oppose abortion except in the most exceptional circumstances – but in a way the definition of what are and what are not exceptional circumstances is what the whole debate is about”
Bibliography
Ethical Studies – Robert A Bowie (Cheltenham, 2001)
Examining Philosophy and Ethics – Patrick J Clarke (Cheltenham, 2002)
The Puzzle of Ethics – Peter Vardy (London, Revised Edition 1999)
Unstringing the Violinist – Judith Jarvis Thompson (1991)
When Does Life Begin? – Michael Lockwood (Oxford Press, 1989)
The Bible
www.church-of-england.org./view/medical.html
http://bostonreview.mit.edu/BR20.3/thomson/html
www.priestsforlife.org
Abortion could occur naturally if the foetus does not develop probably or the mother has injuries or a disorder of some kind which could prevent the carrying the pregnancy, this is a spontaneous abortion most frequently called a miscarriage.
Michael Lockwood “When does life begin” Pg.11
Michael Lockwood “When does life begin” Pg.11
Judith Jarvis Thompson “Unstringing the violinist” p.47
Judith Jarvis Thompson “Unstringing the violinist” p.47
Peter Vardy ‘The Puzzle of Ethics’