Abortion - a Controversial Issue

Abortion - a Controversial Issue

  • Submitted By: etsugrl1
  • Date Submitted: 04/12/2010 10:18 PM
  • Category: Philosophy
  • Words: 1107
  • Page: 5
  • Views: 1179

In our time, abortion has been one of the most controversial and talked about issues. Over the past forty years it has become such an issue that it is discussed in a wide range of places. Many people have many different views on abortion. Some people are completely against abortion, while others support the choice of abortion. One of the main questions relating to abortion is what are the criteria to be a person? In this paper I am going to show you two different views on what it is to be a person, and whether abortion is permissible or not.
John T. Noonan Jr. begins his argument by asking, “How do you determine the humanity of a being?” (CMP, ph.99) To answer this question he brings up many valuable thoughts to support his view on this topic. He talks about viability of a fetus. The idea of the fetus being a person when it can survive outside of the mother’s womb is rejected by Noonan. He points out that “indeed a child of one or three or even five years of age is absolutely dependent on another’s care for existence.” (CMP, pg. 99) He then goes on to talk about experience. He rejects that one who is capable of experience and developing memories is more human than one who does not have these capabilities. His third rejection is sentiment. He does not believe that if a fetus dies, the grief of the parents is not as the same as the grief they would have if a living child were to die. His final two rejections are feeling and social recognition. “What can be neither seen nor felt is different from what is tangible. If the fetus cannot be seen or touched at all, it cannot be perceived as man.” (CMP, pg. 100) He explains that social recognition does not determine humanity. Noonan states that “anyone conceived by a man and a woman is human.”
At conception this new being is given a genetic code. “It is this genetic information which determines his characteristics, which is the biological carrier of the possibility of human wisdom, which makes him a...

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