Abortion and Morality

The thesis of this paper is that abortion is the killing of a human being, and it is morally wrong. Don Marquis, in his paper Why Abortion is Immoral sets about an eloquent argument that performing an abortion is in the same moral category as killing another human being (Marquis 183, 189-198, 201-202). He begins by explaining why he believes it is wrong to kill: first he says that it is wrong because it brutalizes the one who kills, and also that it deprives others of the individual's presence. However, He goes on to argue that these are not the major consequences of killing someone. The major consequences, he believes are that killing a person "deprives them of all the experiences, activities, projects, and enjoyments that would otherwise have constituted one's future" (Marquis 189-198( This, Marquis argues, makes killing wrong because the killing "inflicts one of the greatest possible losses on the victim" (Marquis 189-198).

What makes this worse, argues Marquis, is not that the victim is deprived of the activities, projects, experiences, and enjoyments of his future life which he enjoys now, but that there are also things which he may not enjoy now, but would have enjoyed in the future, and he is deprived of these, too (Marquis, 189-198). Killing, then, is wrong because it deprives an individual of their future. Carrying this theory forward, it means that it would be wrong to kill any species, not just human species, because it is possible there are species on

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did have a future, even though they could not see it at a particular moment in time. Likewise, a fetus could have a very satisfying and productive future ahead of it without being aware of it. In closing, Marquis sums up his argument eloquently by saying, "Since a fetus possesses a property, the possession of which in adult human beings is sufficient to make killing an adult human being wrong, abortion is wrong" (Marquis 189-198). It is difficult to argue with marquis's logic. The Intellectual Viewpoint gives a strong argument against abortion (Intellectual). While they agree that there are many reasons a woman may not wish to bear a child - teenagers who are not prepared for child raising, career obligations, women who feel that now is not the right time to have a child, etc. - they argue that a woman has other options. The viewpoint taken is that life begins at conception, when the process of development begins, for "Without development in the womb, a fetus would never come to term" (Intellectual) Consequently to end a life prior to birth or after birth is murder. Life is seen as a developmental process from conception to death. The Intellectual Viewpoint is that if a woman engages in sexual activity while not

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