Abortion and potentiality

According to a view on abortion I recently defended, it isn’t any more intrinsically wrong to end the life of a human fetus over that of a non-human animal fetus (e.g. a pig). Some will take this to be an outrageous thing to believe, and hence, a good reason to reject the view I defend. It can be argued—on solid grounds—that the likely futures of the two organisms are relevantly different. The fetal pig will grow up into an adult pig, capable of experiencing pleasure and establishing social bonds with other pigs. But the fetal human will grow up into a person, capable of self-awareness, rationality, and a conception of one’s self existing over time. While these differences do exist, I will argue that they are morally irrelevant with respect to the vast majority of abortions, and that for the most part, human and non-human fetuses possess equal moral standing. 

At a first pass, in order for some action to be morally objectionable, it must involve unjustifiable harm or a violation of rights. It may be argued that the fetal human has a potential right to life. But a potential right does not entail the possession of actual rights prior to eligibility. On one theory of rights, rights require there to be a conscious subject with certain interests and desires (rocks can’t have rights). The fetus is not eligible for the possession of any rights since fetuses do not have any conscious interests or desires. Hence, there are no rights violated in the case of killing the fetus. If there is no harm or violation of rights in the case of killing a human fetus, what is morally objectionable about the action?

One response is to say that, much like in the case of adults, the act of killing deprives the potential person of a good life that it would have otherwise had (Marquis 1988). I think this analysis might be plausible for later stage fetuses (for most species). But I take it that you aren’t depriving a zygote or a 12 week old fetus of a good life, as such organisms are incapable of possessing consciousness or self-awareness. In order for the early fetus and adult human to be considered different stages of the same ‘self’ existing at separate times, there would need to be a series of mental states linking the two (c.f. Tooley 1983). The fetus—at least in its earliest stages—does not have the capacity for mental states or experiences, providing no way of connecting it to the mental states of the future person. Therefore, there is no continued existence between the fetus and the future person in the relevant psychological sense. Hence, the fetus—at least in its early stages—is in fact not a potential person. There are those who would want to maintain that there is a psychological continuity between the fetus and the adult human, made possible by the existence of a God given soul. The soul of the fetus and future person is one and the same, therefore, the fetus and future person are psychologically linked together. If humans have souls, then my argument would not work. However, we have good reasons—both philosophical and scientific—to reject the existence of an immaterial mental substance.

But what about later stage fetuses (where on top of the capacities for consciousness, pain and pleasure, an 8-month old human fetus is also a potential person)? Would it then be morally worse to end the life of the 8-month old human fetus over a non-human fetus? First, it is not true that all human fetuses are potential people. Fetuses with severe brain abnormalities (e.g. anencephaly) will never have a mental life. Second, there may be non-human animals that are persons (e.g. chimpanzees, extraterrestrials), and thus, the fetal forms of such creatures would be potential persons as well. If we are to make a comparison of a late-stage fetal pig and a human fetus, I think it’s plausible to say that the human fetus has a higher degree of moral value. But the property of potential personhood does not give the fetus the same moral standing as an adult, or even a young child. Just as there is a clear difference between chopping down a tree and smashing an acorn, there is a clear moral difference between aborting a potential person and killing an actual person (Singer 2011).

Since most abortions occur before week 13, the vast majority of aborted fetuses are equal in moral worth to their non-human fetal equivalents. There are of course exceptions to the rule, but the claim that it isn't any more intrinsically wrong to end the life of a human fetus over that of a non-human animal fetus, is true much more often than not. 

References

Marquis, D. (1989). Why abortion is immoral. The Journal of Philosophy, 86(4), 183-202.

Singer, P. (2011). Practical ethics. Cambridge university press.

Tooley, M. (1983). Abortion and infanticide. Oxford University Press, USA.