Abortion

Mary Anne Warren, in her defense for the permissibility of abortion mainly attacks the
argument of the essence being a human being and the potentiality of infants to be a human
being. She presented a set of characteristics on which a human being is capable of. Namely:
Sentience: the capacity to feel pain,
Emotion/Communication: The ability to convey message to others,
Reasoning: To ability to prove logically,
Self-awareness: the ability to do something independently in direct control and
Moral Agency: The ability to distinguish right or wrong.
She argues that any being who lacks at least 1 of the characteristic is not a human being, she
also added that although late term fetuses satisfies some criteria such as feeling of pain, such
that we consider fetuses some sort of moral consideration but it still doesnt imply them as a
person. And finally, she argues that although fetuses has a potential to have a life like ours, it
doesnt outweigh the right of the mother to choose aborting the fetus since the rights of a
person already outweighs the potential person (derived from Thomsons argument in which the
fetus asks the mothers permission to grow in the womb).
Starting from her first argument and basing it from her criteria of personhood, there are a lot of
cases where it will fail to even satisfy one characteristic. One such case is for retarded persons,
on which they fail to resemble at least 1 characteristic of personhood. There will also be cases
where none of those characteristics are even satisfied for them, they wont react to pain,
doesnt show any skill to communicate. Another example would be patients who are in deep
coma or as well people just sleeping. While we are asleep, we dont actually display any signs or
capabilities to control our bodies and react to pain, but that one is debatable but it is true for
deep coma patients. If we apply this argument to fetuses, is it permissible to abort when
fetuses hasnt started feeling pain yet? According to some researches and article, fetus
perception of pain starts at 24 weeks after conception although the time frame varies from
various researchers and sources. Another criticism to her argument is the potential of those
fetuses to be a human being. According to Marquis, killing fetuses who has potential to be
human beings is the same as killing a human being. When a fetus or a human being is killed, he
is deprived to all value of his future. Since every human being are treated equal, the value
deprived to a fetus vs. an adult has the same value, thus killing a fetus is immoral.
But lets assume that Warrens argument is correct. If what shes saying is true, then objections
such as infanticide will be permissible, another objection would be killing non-human (animals
or plants) beings would also be permissible. Warren responded saying that killing newborns is
virtually never justified because they are so very close to being persons that being persons that
to kill them requires a very strong moral justification-as does the killing of dolphins, whales,
chimpanzees, and other highly person like creatures. It is certainly wrong to kill such beings just
for the sake of convenience, or financial profit, or sport. Warren acknowledges that killing
infants is hardly justified at all except from some extreme cases in which the fetus has some
disease or illness that wont sustain life after being born, she also added that killing animals that
are personlike or sociable would require a strong justification to kill them.
Warrens rebuttal might satisfy the objection at first glance, but upon thinking about it for a
while, her statement isnt consistent. How about premature newborns? Are they any different
with the fetus still inside the mothers womb? This begs the question, is it permissible to abort
the fetus while in the womb, or is it permissible to kill premature babies? Warren added in to
the argument that killing fetuses or premature babies would be against the desires of people
who wanted to adopt babies instead. If the baby is already outside the mothers womb, the
argument of the womens right to her own body is completely devoid of meaning. And such
killing infants would be immoral not just because he is a person-like, but moreover against the
will of the adopters. Especially with advances on medicines today, premature babies can be
supported outside the mothers womb as early as 24 months after conception, they usually has
a 50% chance and survival rate increases as it is older.
In conclusion, Warrens argument are not sound enough to justify that it is morally permissible
to kill infants although it is virtually justified, thus killing infants would still be impermissible.
Warren, just like other pro-abortionist tries to find an argument on which the can present
extreme cases to justify infanticide or abortion to be permissible. Meanwhile anti-abortionist
tries to find a principle broad enough that they consider upon conception that it is already a
human being. This is the reason why the abortion debate hasnt fully been over.

Euthanasia
I would agree with Foot's argument using his appeal to rights reasoning.
She described that negative rights or rights of interference succeeds the positive rights which is
right of recipience. She argues that with active euthanasia, killing violates the negative right of a
person since the person is deprived of the experience that may happen with him in the future,
while letting die violates the person's positive right since we purposely fail to provide assistance
to prolong the victim's life. Comparing to Rachels tailor fitted analogy of Smith and Jones case,
It is very particular and circumstantial. She may have proven that killing or letting die is equal in
that scenario, but it is also important to note that they both have the intent to kill the cousin
making them both guilty to the prima facie duty to not act against the cousin wish, to not die.
Second her analogy doesn't quite hold up in a real case scenario of euthanasia since it contains
many factors plus the fact that in euthanasia, we are trying to do a good thing by alleviating pain
from the victim. For foot, Killing would still be much worse since it violates justice because it
violates the persons negative right. Contrast to letting die, failing to give aid would be against
charity because it violates the persons positive right.
Thus, Foots analogy is more sound compared to Rachels especially for terminally ill patients
because it can be applied to voluntary and involuntary euthanasia. She argues that we have no
right to administer active euthanasia without the permission of the victim itself. For involuntary
cases, we avoid choosing the wrong decision unsure if performing active euthanasia will be
against on what the victim wishes.
To show an example: Suppose an army of soldiers needs to retreat even though it means that
leaving wounded or exhausted soldiers to die either from starvation, or be captured by the
enemy and die by torture. It has been a practice for the soldiers to shoot a merciful bullet to deal
with the situation. If the downed soldier has specifically stated that he should be left alone, then
we have no right to kill but it also means that we have no obligation to enable him to live longer.
What it gives is the right to be left alone (Applying ethics, pg. 252) In this situation, letting die
isnt equal with killing since we are not the agent of death, other factors may have played.
Second, if we just let someone die, then we are not the agent of death and someone else could
have possibly saved his life. We can also apply the same analogy with other countries that we
are failing to give aid. We are less responsible just because we failed to give and other may
have saved their lives in the first place.
In conclusion, Rachel's tailor fitted analogy of Smith and Jones case is very particular and
circumstantial. She may have proven that killing or letting die is equal in that scenario, but it is
also important to note that they both have the intent to kill the cousin making them both guilty to
the prima facie duty to not act against the cousin wish, to not die. Second her analogy doesn't
quite hold up in a real case scenario of euthanasia since it contains many factors plus the fact
that in euthanasia, we are trying to do a good thing by alleviating pain from the victim.