"Unborn Children" and the Erasure of Pregnancy (2)
Is an embryo an unborn child?
My hypothetical friend Jane agrees that abortion should never be criminalized. She also believes it is usually wrong. Is she contradicting herself?
When Roe v. Wade was overturned, questions arose about interpreting the Constitution, about what laws should now be passed, and about whether abortion is wrong. They’re separate questions. I’ve written about the first two, and now I’ll take on the third. It’s the toughest.
For some, though, the issue is obvious: Aborting a pregnancy is like killing a baby in its crib: always wrong. Since a pregnant woman is not a piece of furniture, though, the analogy fails. Nor is the fetus a baby -- but in the natural course of things it will become one; it’s a stage in the development of another life. That makes the moral question complicated, personally hard and philosophically challenging.
Is a fertilized ovum an unborn child?
To begin at the beginning: In pregnancy a fertilized ovum (a zygote) changes, imperceptibly, day by day, until finally a baby is born. The development is gradual, much like a spectrum from white to black (or vice versa), a spectrum of shades of gray.
But some (people like Jane) argue that there are no moral shades of gray here; that from the moment of fertilization, the zygote has the moral status of a child. Since no clear point marks the transition from zygote to infant, choosing any point on the spectrum to mark the moral transition is arbitrary. The only rational option is to assign personhood at the moment of conception.
But that argument cuts both ways. Fertilization marks a clear transition point, but so does birth. Choosing birth as the moment the fetus reaches personhood would be equally rational – or, actually, irrational. Here’s an anology: Imagine a sheet of paper, completely black at one edge, pure white at the other, and in between a gradual transition from the faintest hint of gray to an almost imperceptible not-quite-black. It makes no sense to say that since there’s no single clear point of change, everything except that pure black edge should be called white (nor that everything short of pure white should be called black). Instead, what we have and cannot avoid is shades of gray.
Other arguments for calling an embryo a child
What about DNA? DNA is there from the beginning and significantly shapes the kind of person one becomes. But we are not our DNA: identical twins have the same genetic inheritance but are not the same people. A lot happens between fertilization and birth: cell nuclei are copied millions of times, and sometimes the copy is faulty. What happens in the pregnant body can affect which genes are expressed. In fact, although it’s quite rare, “identical” (monozygotic) twins can be of opposite sexes. DNA is a powerful beginning, but it is not who we are.
Jane might note that each of us began as a single fertilized cell, a zygote. True. But every oak tree began as an acorn. Most acorns don’t become trees, and many (probably most) zygotes don’t become babies. Many are never implanted in the uterus; many others die naturally during pregnancy.
So no, an embryo is not an unborn child. It is an incomplete child, like the first pages of a manuscript (and an outline of its plot) which may never be completed.
Later stages in fetal development
Insisting on shades of gray cuts both ways. I am not convinced that an embryo has the same rights as a newborn, but neither am I convinced that only at birth does a fetus have moral claims against us. As for what those claims are, and how they weigh against those of the pregnant woman, I don’t think any simple answer will do. The woman is not a crib, not even an incubator; what is happening changes and marks her body and her life. As the pregnancy advances, its burdens become heavier. New dangers can emerge: Severe hypertension, cancer, and other conditions can make continuing dangerous.
At this stage, too, unusual fetal problems can be identified. Some fetuses will not survive birth. Some will be so impaired that life would have neither meaning nor joy. But for some, the impairments will be lesser, a problem rather than a disaster; it can be hard to predict. Adding to the gravity of such decisions is that if the fetus is too large to be extracted, it must be dismembered.
Legally, the decision should remain that of the person undergoing the pregnancy, for all the reasons I’ve given before. Morally, the decision is grave, and it is correspondingly rare. (There would be fewer still if barriers to earlier abortions were lifted.) Ordinarily those terminations end a pregnancy that was fully, even desperately, wanted.
So I can agree with Jane to this extent: that although abortion should never be criminalized, in some cases it could be seriously wrong. I wouldn’t try to specify when; the variables are too many. instead, if asked for advice, I would try to foreground the many factors involved. Offer some reading. (Any academic’s deepest reflex.) And then support her, even if I don’t understand, in this most personal and often agonizing decision.
Reading
The Problem of Abortion, Joel Feinberg
Scarlet A: Ethics, Law, and Politics of Ordinary Abortion, Katie Watson
Ethical Issues in Women’s Health Care, Carolyn Ells
“Why Abortion is Immoral,” Don Marquis. The most powerful secular argument for the rights of a fetus. Originally published in The Journal of Philosophy, April 1989. Many discussions online.
“A Defense of Abortion,” Judith Jarvis Thomson. Classic defense of the right to end a pregnancy, even if full personhood is attributed to the fetus. Originally published in Philosophy and Public Affairs, 1971. Many discussions online.
“Abortion, Intimacy, and the Duty to Gestate,” Margaret Olivia Little. Holds that the unique enmeshment of pregnancy means that analysis in terms of conflicting rights is unhelpful. Originally published in Ethical Theory and Moral Practice, 1999. Many discussions online.