The central moral issue of abortion is a single question: When is abortion morally permissible?
This question leads to many others, all of which comprise a complex
network of difficult issues with conceptual links. For example, if we take an approach emphasizing individual moral rights, we must ask what is a person?
What are moral rights? What kinds of entities can have moral rights?
What are the limits of a woman's right to control her body? Does her right include the right to end a pregnancy? Can
an embryo/fetus have a right to life and what are its limits? Other approaches often raise parallel issues. What kind of a being can bear the image of God? When does the embryo/fetus begin to bear that image? When is the embryo/fetus ensouled? How can we be sure? What if we are uncertain?
These and many other questions arise that may seem baffling. In
working toward an answer to the primary question, you must consider
many of the others.
All the major positions on the moral issues connected with abortion
have serious critics and pose serious problems. For example:
- Those who consider all or nearly all abortions to be immoral must
reply to those who point out that embryos have none of the mental
attributes found in the clear cut cases of persons or bearers
of rights. Some conservative arguments place great emphasis on
the potential of the embryo; but we do not usually value potential
as much as fully developed qualities. Indeed, in most cases, the
potential to become something confers none of the status or benefits
or rights associated with actually being that thing.
- Those who regard abortions as permissible if they occur prior
to some point (or phase) in pregnancy must offer a reason to prohibit
abortion after that point and show why that point (or phase) is
morally significant. How does the fetus (or its relationship to its mother) change and why does the
change matter? Furthermore, why does the potential that
the embryo/fetus has before that point (or phase) mean so little?
- Those who regard all or nearly all abortions as permissible
because of a narrow definition of personhood must ask whether
their position implies that infanticide does not violate the rights
(or at least the right to life) of an infant. Nearly everyone
in our culture regards infanticide as morally wrong, and they
usually believe that it is wrong because it harms the infant rather
than because of other consequences.
These are only a sample of the difficult questions that arise. Each of us must consider these carefully in order to arrive at a reasoned position.
Reference: For some interesting comments along these lines,
see Joel Feinberg's introduction to his anthology The
Problem of Abortion. Feinberg believes that coming to a conclusion
about abortion involves rejecting at least one of three propositions,
each of which has a basis in common sense.
