Judith Thomason view on the issue of Abortion

Essay by ante14221College, Undergraduate March 2003

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Judith Thomason is a pro-abortionist. . She allows for the sake of argument that fetus a full-fledged from the movement of conception. She agrees to identify fetus as a person, but she tries to disapprove of this concept

She thinks that a new-born infant is a person, has a full right to life, among other things. But a new-born infant is very different from a fetus at the beginning of the ninth month.........

"Every person has a right to life; the fetus is a person hence has a right to life. The mother has a right to control her body, but the right to life is stronger right. Therefore, an abortion may not be performed." This anti-abortionist argument deals with particular case of abortion by reasoning from more general principle: if we have a choice between respecting someone's right to life and respecting someone's right to control their body, the right to life should always win out.

That's what anti-abortionist seems to be saying. So if anti-abortionist is right, we can't kill the person whose life is in the balance in these cases. Thomason uses the violinist example to undermine this argument. In this example, Thomason asks you imagine that you find yourself hooked up to a famous unconscious violinist. If he can't use your kidney for nine months, he will die. You are in this position not because of you agreed to be but the Society of Music Lovers kidnapped you. All in the same, the violinist himself is perfectly innocent; he had no part in creating your predicament .Thomason thinks that this argument produces the wrong result when we apply it to the violinist case. Therefore we can doubt that it produces the right result in the abortion case.

The anti-abortionist can modify their position slightly and say...