Introduction
The moral status of the embryo and fetus is the primary ethical question in the abortion debate. From the notion that a fetus is a human person with full moral standing and rights and to the conception to the belief that a fetus has no rights, even if it is human in a biological sense, there are many different points of view. The majority of Americans hold views that are somewhere in the middle (The Hasting Center). Moral philosophers from a variety of backgrounds offer sophisticated analyses of the abortion debate that go beyond the usual political divisions. Pro-life activists are more likely to regard embryos as human life at the time of conception, whereas pro-choice advocates tend to consider the embryo as a potential human life that develops into personhood at some point after conception.
Abortion should be legal
Liberals, like Mary Anne Warren, do not dispute that the fetus is biologically human (The Hasting Center). However, Warren does not believe that biological humanity is either necessary or sufficient for personhood and the right to life. She believes that the conservative has made a logical error by conflating biological humans and individuals. She maintains that species membership is an arbitrary basis for moral standing and that killing people, rather than humans, is evil. Persons are beings who possess specific psychological characteristics such as sentience, consciousness, the ability to reason, and the ability to communicate. There may be some nonhuman individuals (for example, some animals) and biological humans who are not persons, such as early gestation embryos who lack person-making features (The Hasting Center). Fetuses are presumably conscious by the end of the second trimester, yet even late-gestation fetuses are less personlike than most mammals. As a result, if killing animals is legal, so is abortion during pregnancy.
Many women believe it is insulting to human life to bring a kid into the world if they are unable to care for it. According to Little, the main reason women choose abortion is that they believe it would be wrong to have a child if they are incapable of becoming decent moms (The Hasting Center). Pro-choice supporters advocate that embryos have no moral status and should not be protected in any way (Mohamed). This is because embryos do not have consciousness and develop
Abortion should be illegal
Efforts to restrict abortion access have expanded to include “personhood” legislation, which would define the beginning of human life as the fertilization of an embryo. Proposals like these have been made in dozens of states around the country, as well as at the national level. For example, U.S. House Representative Jody Hice (R-GA) reintroduced federal legislation (H.R. 586) in January 2017 that states that “human life should be recognized to begin at fertilization“ (Mohamed). On the contrary, even if a fetus is not a person, it is unethical to murder because it has a future similar to ours.
Hendricks explains that if giving a fetus fetal alcohol syndrome is immoral, then killing the fetus should be immoral too. Here, he impairs killing the fetus by giving it fetal alcohol syndrome. Fetal alcohol syndrome occurs when a mother consumes alcohol during pregnancy, causing serious illnesses for her future child. It is immoral for a pregnant woman to drink alcohol because it harms a fetus, therefore, it is also unethical to do an abortion.
Moral Compass
The components of my moral compass have changed since week three. Now I have more information regarding abortion and my environment consists of people with a liberal mindset and independent media that reinforce liberal values like freedom and body positivity. Due to these new components, my position regarding abortion is that abortion should be legal. On the other hand, there are factors, such as emotions and beliefs that suggest the immorality of abortion for me, the fetus is a human being, and killing it is murder. However, the new knowledge which I have obtained convinced me that abortion should be legal.
Conclusion
We sometimes need to take a step back and apply a passion for calm, cool, analytical thinking when emotions are running high. This allows us to better comprehend the viewpoints and arguments of those who disagree with us, as well as our viewpoints and arguments. And we can use critical thinking abilities to try to figure out which positions are best in terms of being supported by strong arguments: after all, we may have a lot to learn from other people, and our perspectives may change for the better as a result. Because the right to life does not include the right to another’s body, fetuses may not have the right to the pregnant woman’s body, which she does, and she has the right to refuse the fetus access to her body. This justifies abortion even more, at least until technology permits fetuses to be transferred to other wombs. Abortions should be lawful because morally justifiable activities should be legal: it is an injustice to punish behaviors that are not bad.
References
Hendricks, Perry. “Even if the fetus is not a person, abortion is Immoral: the impairment argument.” Bioethics 33.2 (2019): 245-253.
Mohamed, Heather Silber. “Embryonic politics: Attitudes about abortion, stem cell research, and IVF.” Politics and Religion 11.3 (2018): 459-497.
The Hastings Center. “Abortion.” The Hastings Center, 2022.