Helen Evans

The ethics of abortion

Before discussing the issue of abortion, a definition of what is actually meant by the term ‘abortion’ must first be decided upon.  For the purpose of this essay, Mary Anne Warren’s definition will be referred to.  She describes abortion as ‘the act a woman performs in deliberately terminating her pregnancy before it comes to term, or in allowing another person to terminate it’ (Warren, M A, 1997, p.72).

The ethical issues surrounded by the issue of abortion have been debated for many years, with society seemingly split into those who advocate pro life, those who advocate pro choice and those who are undecided.  Pro-life campaigners claim that abortion is immoral, except in a few cases, as they believe the fetus is a human being from conception.  On the other hand, pro choice campaigners claim that women must have the right to choose what happens to their body, and can choose to have an abortion if they decide that it is the best option for them.

Those people who believe abortion is morally acceptable usually base their argument around the fact that a woman should be free to choose what happens to her own body.  Freedom of choice is considered by many people as a basic human right and nobody should have this right denied.  One philosopher who believes that abortion is morally permissible is Mary Anne Warren. She argues that prohibiting abortion can lead to tragic consequences itself, with hundreds of thousands of women, worldwide, dying from illegal abortions or suffering complications which may lead to infertility.  Thus prohibiting abortion may itself be morally unjust.

Helen Evans

However, objections to her argument are strong and anti-abortion protesters argue that having the right to control your own body does not mean you have the right to destroy a fetus, as all human beings have the right to life.  Warren challenges this argument, using the basis of Judith Jarvis Thomson’s claim that even if all human beings have a right to life, and a fetus is considered a human being, than a woman may still be morally entitled to have an abortion.  They both state that no human being has a ‘duty to keep another human being alive at great personal cost, unless one has somehow contracted a special obligation toward that individual’ (Warren, 1997, p74).  A pregnant woman may not have done anything that morally obliges her to make the sacrifices needed to preserve the life of the fetus.  Therefore, according to Warren and Thomson, the woman is then morally entitled to have an abortion.

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The anti-abortion argument is based mainly on the value that it is wrong to kill another human being, and usually describe abortion as murder.  ‘They believe that a fertilised egg is a human being, which possesses a soul from the moment of conception, and has a right to life under all circumstances’ (.

John Noonan claims that fetuses are human beings in the moral sense.  However, not everyone shares Noonan’s belief that fetuses are human beings and Warren proposes six characteristics she considers are central to the concept of person-hood.  The first characteristic is sentience, which is the ...

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