Arguing The Ethics Of Abortion Philosophy Essay

Arguing The Ethics Of Abortion Philosophy Essay According to Don Marquis, the majority of abortions are seriously immoral and should fall under the same moral category as killing innocent human adults. His central argument revolves around the idea that it is prima facie wrong to kill adult humans because doing so results in the victim’s loss of the value of its future. He concludes that it is therefore prima facie wrong to kill fetuses because it also results in a loss of a valuable â€Å"future life like ours.† However, Judith Thompson and Margaret Little are able to provide more reasonable arguments for what should be considered the most important factor in deciding how to deal with abortion. They may be more open-minded to abortion but do not feel as though abortion should always be permissible. After considering each argument, I have found that a woman’s right to have an abortion is determined by each situation and is simply a choice-which should not be taken lightly-that should be made solely by a pregna nt woman. Marquis simply fails to recognize that a woman has rights that can make abortion morally permissible upon declining to continue the extremely intimate period of gestation. Unlike Marquis, I believe abortion is not impermissible yet not always permissible either. Upon thorough inspection, I have found some flaws in Marquis’ argument. Marquis tries to argue that â€Å"personhood† is not the moral category in question with regards to the moral permissibility of abortion. But he claims that someone (the fetus) has a future like ours and therefore should not be deprived of such future. If personhood is irrelevant, then it is unclear that there actually is someone (a person) who can be deprived of such things. At one point Marquis even says that morally permissible abortions would be rare under his argument-unless they occurred early enough in pregnancy when a fetus is not yet a definite â€Å"individual.† So, is personhood important to him or not? What does he mean by â€Å"individual†? Further complications ensue from his argument. In addition to assuming that a fetus is not a person yet still has a right to life because with their death comes a deprivation of a future like ours, people who use Marquis’ argument could then argue that it is wrong to â€Å"kill† fertilized, but not yet implanted, eggs. Is it then wrong to use contraceptives because possible egg and sperm pairs (zygotes) are prevented from having a future like ours? Marquis says that the immorality of contraception cannot be argued for with his â€Å"future-like-ours† analysis because there is no identifiable subject that can suffer this loss. However, neither the potential person (fetus with a future-like-ours) or the possible person (zygote prevented by contraception) actually exist. Because of this, it becomes difficult to understand how a potential person can be a subject of harm anymore than a possible person can. Therefore, the question of existence is being asked here because it seems as if potential persons (and their futures alike) are only possible things, not actual existing things. If this is so, then is there really a subject of harm?