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Analysis Of A Defense On Abortion By Judith Thomson

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Judith Thompson on a Defense on Abortion

Is abortion a morally permissible act? Some people’s radical point of view vary from the abortion being “murder of innocents” to “there’s nothing wrong with it” while other believe that depending on the stage of the pregnancy or the circumstances the woman got pregnant, abortion may be morally permissible. Judith Thomson in her essay “A Defense on Abortion” provides an essay that explains with particular examples when an abortion is morally permissible. Thomson believes that opponents of abortion had been so busy defending the rights of the fetus that they had forgotten to take on account the body that is harvesting the fetus. However, to make her argument more effective, Thomson decides to grant that the fetus is a human being in order to argue that in extraordinary cases like rape or life risk for the mother, abortion is morally …show more content…
Thomson decided to grant that the fetus is a human being to prove that even in that situation, it could be morally permissible to abort. First, she set the example of the violinist to explain that abortion due to rape is morally permissible. Then, she added the kidney failure to the violinist example to corroborate that abortion to avoid death of mother was morally permissible. Then she specified that a pregnancy due to neglect or change of mind was not morally permissible. At last she said that abortion due to failure of contraceptives is morally permissible. She explain her point of view by saying is no one’s fault if a thief enters a home by a well locked window, so it would not be wrong if the mother decided to abort after an accidental pregnancy. At last a modified example of the violinist was provided to prove that the original violinist example was not applicable to justify abortion in cases of pregnancy due to

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