Summary Of Judith Jarvis Thomson: A Defense Against Abortion

Rosalind Hursthouse has a very different opinion on abortion and does not relate it to the murder of children or the rights of women. Instead, she justifies it through what a virtuous person would do. In the case study with the Thompson’s, Hursthouse would relate it to the relevance of the familiar biological facts and how pregnancy is a known result of sexual intercourse. The fact that Linda’s fetus is four months old would not be of relevance in Hursthouse’s opinion as clear lines are not visible as to when the fetus is attached and developed. The main focus of Hursthouse would be to question whether the abortion would be a result of a person acting “virtuously or viciously or neither” (Hursthouse 474).

Thompson believes abortion in only acceptable in very rare circumstances; such as rape. Thompson states, “I am arguing for the permissibility of abortion in some cases, I am not arguing for the right to secure the death of the unborn child” (335). In a famous scenario of Thompson, she refers to a woman being forced to provide nutrients and support to a famous violinist for nine months as they are connected by a tube. At the end of the nine months, she can go back to her normal life. Thompson refers to this scenario in support of abortion in cases of rape because the women is being forced to care

Introduction In his paper “Why Abortion Is Immoral”, Don Marquis attempts to put forward and defend his argument of why abortion is morally equivalent to the killing of a human. Using the deprivation account of the wrongness of death, he is able to apply the same immorality of killing a human to killing a fetus, even if it is not classified as a human, by claiming that both subjects have the capacity for a future like ours. Yet, Marquis fails in explaining why having a future like ours starts when an embryo becomes a fetus and not earlier in the developmental process, leading to absurd outcomes from his logic that causes his argument to fall apart. In this essay, I posit that the use of the deprivation of account on a fetus leads to logically absurd outcomes, and therefore nullifies Marquis’ the claim that abortion is prima facie wrong.

In A Defense of Abortion Thompson presents an argument against the morality of abortion by showing the superiority of women’s rights through several different analogous cases. The case of focus will be case eight, “ A Selfless Brother’s Box of Chocolates.” In scenario one, Thompson argues that an older brother has a box of chocolates while his younger brother has nothing; the question of appeal is does the younger brother automatically have a right to these chocolates? The box of chocolates represents a woman’s body while the younger brother represents the fetus. Although it would be nice for the older brother (mother) to share his box of chocolates (mothers body) he is not obligated to share them with anyone even if he is perceived as a selfish, greedy, or a stingy person.

Abortion is killing a fetus, a fetus is a person, all person has a right to life, killing someone with a right to life is always wrong. In Thompsons article, she portrays that this statement isn’t always true by making arguments in certain situations that abortion is okay. However, many might disagree with her arguments about abortion but, to which I see to be perfectly thought-out and, explained. A person is not morally bounded to do something for someone else such as to save their life.

With this burglary example the person having their house broken into purchased the best bars money can buy but the burglar still gets in through a defect in the bars. Similar to a defect in birth control, rare but still happens, is how the author gets her point across to show just how unjust this treatment is to any individual having an unfortunate event like this becoming a moral responsibility. Then the author stretches the hypothetical situation even more by introducing an example where people seeds exist and one can fly into ones house at anytime taking root in their carpet. This is similar to the burglary example except now that person would have to care for the child after no action of theirs caused this unfortunate event. What Thomson is trying to persuade the reader of is that abortion is sometimes permissible in certain situations and says a law that would prohibit “a sick and desperately frightened fourteen-year-old schoolgirl, pregnant due to rape, may of course choose abortion, and that any law which rules this out is an insane

Judith Thompson in her analogy of abortion gives a scenario, of someone waking up one morning only to find that they have been plugged into a violinist that has a kidney failure, they are told by doctors that they will have to be plugged into the “famous” violinist for nine months, if they unplug, the violinist dies, if they stay plugged in, the violinist after the nine months recover however that person suffers their right to what happens to their body. The question posed following this analogy is, should the person unplug? There are different aspects to look at it from, let me give my scenario, suppose a lady decides to have sex unprotected because she gains more pleasure from it and in the morning forgets to take her early morning pills and in total forgets to take birth control pills and becomes pregnant. She is the sole cause of the pregnancy and should take responsibility for it; the person plugged into the violinist in Judith Thompson’s analogy isn’t the cause of the failure of the kidney of the violinist so why should they have to take responsibility for it.

One of the most famous arguments against the pro-life position is Judith Thomson’s “Violinist Analogy,” in which you, the reader are attached, against your will, to a famous unconscious violinist in order to prevent his dying from a kidney ailment. There have been many articles written about the Violinist Analogy. In her 1971 essay, “A Defense of Abortion” Thomson makes several other arguments against the pro-life position. In this paper, I will look at the entirety of her essay and suggest reasons why it may not stand up to scrutiny today.

The analogy breaks down because the violinist is an adult. This is because the violinist has a say in what happens to him if he were to wake up. He could choose to disconnect himself from the woman out of pity or guilt, but he has a say. In the case of abortion, the final say is in general completely up to the mother. The child has no say because it can not speak.

Siegel, Reva. " Reasoning from the Body: A Historical Perspective on Abortion Regulation and Questions of Equal Protection. " Stanford law review 44.2 (1992): 261-381.

In this story, a person wakes up in a hospital with a famous violinist attached to their kidneys, and is told that the violinist will need the use of their kidneys for nine months or he will die. Thomson then asks the reader, whether or not detaching from the violinist is immoral? Thomson answers this question by showing that it is morally permissible to detach from the violinist since the

Written Assignment Thomson 1. Personhood in the role of ethics would mean something with a natural born right to life. This fits into the role of abortion because many people argue if a fetus has the right to life. Thomson for the sake of argument gives that a fetus is a person, which is the argument many individuals against abortion start their claims with. Well if a fetus is a person and all people all the right to life, then the fetus therefore would have a right to life.

(67). Me, your child, your creation, is a burden that you have to bear and take responsibility for. To add further grievance to this burden, I have been designed with a countenance that is displeasing to the rest of humanity, and you must bear this as well. Addressing the opposing argument: “One perspective argues that abortion is a uniquely traumatic experience because it involves a human death experience, specifically, the intentional destruction of one’s unborn child and the witnessing of a violent death, as well as a violation of parental instinct and responsibility…” (Brenda Major

In contrast, I think that in order to survive and experience life’s capacity you must be able to walk outside. This dire need is strong enough to make it okay to deny permission to the violinist. Life would not be worth living if walking outside was avoided. Life would still be worth living without consensual sex because life’s other pleasures would still remain that wouldn’t possibly result in depriving someone else’s the ability to live. All in all, walking outside is unavoidable and necessary making it morally okay to repeatedly take a chance getting attached to a violinist and denying permission every time-

It is possible that a person would have thought that having the right to life means that one has the right to do whatever it takes to sustain their life. Thomson thinks that this must be a mistake, the example of the violinist case shows this. Similarly, a person might think that having the right to life means that one has the right not to be killed. But, Thomson again thinks that the violinist case shows this to be false. Someone could easily unplug themselves from the violinist even though it will kill the person.