PHLB09H3 Lecture Notes - Lecture 10: Prima Facie, Abortion-Rights Movements, Chic
Document Summary
The moral arguments: permissble, spectrum of positions on the moral permissibility of abortion (moral status of the fetus), conservative: always (or almost always impermissible, ex. Marquis: moderate: permissible in some, but not all, cases, ex. Thomson: liberal: always (or almost always) permissible, ex. A conservative argument: don marquis" argument: whether abortion is morally permissible stands or falls on whether or not the fetus is the sort of being whose life it is seriously wrong to end. Is abortion an unresolvable issue: there is certain standoff between the typical anti abortion and pro choice positions and a symmetry in their arguments, careful consideration. The missing (or implicit) premise: in both arguments, there is a missing premise. Needs to a premise in order to make the argument valid: a more general moral principle to tie the relevant characteristic of the fetus to having (or not having) the right to life, 1. The fetus is a human life: 2.
