On The Non-Alchemist: Is Abortion Wrong? - With Dr. Nathan Nobis

 

Abortion Ethics Blog Post Archive

Here is an archive of the blog posts written after the publication of Thinking Critically About Abortion. Many of these posts are inspired by observations about how people often engage the issues, other posts discuss further arguments, and other posts recommend other readings and resources. 

Please click on the link for the current version of this document!

James Rachels' The Elements of Moral Philosophy Chapter 1 notes

Here some notes on James Rachels' The Elements of Moral Philosophy, chapter 1, "What is morality?"

Here's a video overview (not by me):

I think this chapter would have been better called What is it to ‘Think Morally’ or 'Reason Morally'?

“Morality is …” is kinda abstract. This is less abstract: Someone is “thinking morally” or engaged in “moral thinking” when:

(1) one is guiding one’s thought by reasons – the best reasons – and
(2) one gives equal weight to each individual who is affected by one’s actions.

Re. (1): reasons include (scientific, empirical) facts and moral principles.

FACTS

+ 

MORAL PRINCIPLES

=

WHAT TO DO 

Note: the premises below all must be interpreted--what do they mean? What are they saying?--so they can be evaluated as true or false. This page does not provide that interpretation: the chapter does though.

Case 1: Baby Theresa (Google for images and stories) 

• · What’s her situation?
• · What did her parents want to do? What were their reasons?

The parents' argument:

(3) If we can (a) benefit someone without (b) harming anyone by doing action X, then action X is morally permissible.
(4) By kill Theresa and taking her organs we can (a) benefit others and (b) not harm anyone.
(5) So, killing Teresa and taking her organs is morally permissible.

The argument is valid, in that the premises lead to the conclusion. Is this argument sound or not? 

What did “the critics” say” (p. 2)

(6) “It’s too horrifying to use people as means to other people’s ends.”
(7) “It’s unethical to kill in order to save, unethical to kill person A to save person B.”
(8) “The parents are saying we should kill the baby to use the organs. That’s horrendous!

These remarks are the basis of arguments. Are these arguments sound or not? If any of them are, then argument (3)-(5) is not sound. Let's present these remarks as logically valid arguments. 

Re. Remark (6):

(A) If someone is used as a mere means to another’s end, then that is wrong.
(B) Taking Teresa’s organs would be to use her as a mere means.
(C) So, it would be wrong to take her organs.

Is the argument valid? Are the premises true? (Are they somehow ambiguous or imprecise? What does it mean, according to Kant, to use someone as a mere means?)

Re. Remark (7):

(D) If person A is killed to save person B, then that’s wrong.
(E) To kill Teresa would be to kill her to save others.
(F) Therefore, it’s wrong to kill Teresa.

Is the argument valid? Are the premises true? (Are they somehow ambiguous or imprecise, e.g., does D claim it's always wrong to do this, or just sometimes?)

Re. Remark (8): is that even an argument?

Case 2: Jodie and Mary (Google for images and stories) 

What’s their situation? What did her parents want to do? What did the hospital want to do? What were their reasons?

Some might throw up their hands and ask “Whose to decide?!” Asking this kind of question is often a way to avoid thinking about which arguments are best. (Also, it’s often unwise to ask rhetorical questions, since there might be good answers to them).

An argument:

(G) If we have a choice between saving one infant and letting both die, we should save one.
(H) We have such a choice.
(I) So we should save one.

Is the argument valid? Are the premises true?

Some critics say:

(J) If someone is an ‘innocent human life’, then they should never be killed.
(K) Mary is an innocent human life.
(L) Therefore, Mary should not be killed.

Is the argument valid? Are the premises true?

3rd Case: Tracy Latimer (Google for images and stories) 

• · What’s her situation? (We need to think about the details..)
• · What did her parents want to do? What were their reasons?
• · What did their critics say?

Conclusions: Overall, we need to take note of:

• · Feelings
• · Require reasons
• · Getting one’s (non-moral) facts straight: checking up on the empirical / scientific evidence
• · Impartiality: differences in treatment are justified only by relevant differences in the person/being and in light of general moral principles; otherwise these are unjustified prejudices.

Review of PRINCIPLES OF ANIMAL RESEARCH ETHICS

PRINCIPLES OF ANIMAL RESEARCH ETHICS

Tom L. Beauchamp and David DeGrazia.

Oxford University Press. New York. 2020. 176 pp. ISBN 9780190939120. US$34.95 (Hardback).

(This review is out in the journal Bioethics.) [final version]

Is Your Opinion on Abortion Wrong? Critical Thinking and Abortion

Kristina Grob, Philosophy, University of South Carolina Sumter, and Nathan Nobis, Philosophy, Morehouse College, Atlanta, GA.

Also posted at Science and Philosophy, Medium’s centre for scientifically-informed content. 

People with "thought bubbles" over their heads, suggestive of opinions.

For the past few years in the United States, almost daily there’s a headline about new proposed abortions restrictions. Conservatives cheer, liberals despair.

But who is right here? Should abortion be generally legal or should it be banned? Is it usually immoral or is it usually not wrong at all? These same questions, of course, are asked in other countries.

To many people, answers to these questions seem obvious, and people with different or contrary answers are, well, just wrong.

But how can we know? In particular, could anyone know that abortion is not wrong and should be legal? If so, how? And how would anyone effectively, persuasively, communicate that knowledge?

One important set of answers depends on this idea: critical thinking. Critical thinking can help people know, not merely believe or feel, that their perspectives on issues are true or correct, and it can help them persuade others to understand and accept that knowledge.

We are philosophy professors who teach courses in critical thinking and its applications to ethical, political, scientific, and legal issues. In our 2019 open-access book, Thinking Critically About Abortion: Why Most Abortions Aren’t Wrong & Why All Abortions Should be Legal, we apply well-confirmed methods of critical thinking to the most discussed arguments about abortion.

"Thinking Critically About Abortion" book cover.

Critical thinking can be operationalized as skills. Three key critical thinking skills involve defining words, identifying the structures of arguments, and evaluating explanations. Understanding these and other critical thinking skills can only help improve conversations and advocacy about abortion. Let’s see them in action.

"Impossible Conversations"

Here is another attempt for the "Impossible Conversations" project or competition; click on the title for the link to the letters:

On 

Abortion & Ethics

Luke Krell and Nathan Nobis

STARTED 28 DEC '19

"Impossible Conversations"

We have a series of letters here in progress for the "Impossible Conversations" competition:

On

Abortion & Ethics

Nathan Nobis and Lauren Enriquez

4 LETTERS

•

7 SUBSCRIBERS

•

UPDATED 22 OCT '19

Abortion and Soundbites: Why Pro-Choice Arguments Are Harder to Make

New! "Abortion and Soundbites: Why Pro-Choice Arguments Are Harder to Make" in Areo Magazine!

Areo has unfortunately closed; the text of this article is below. 

"Soundbites," argue @NathanNobis and Kristina Grob, "make many pro-life arguments seem stronger than they really are, while the complexities of pro-choice arguments can't be readily reduced to soundbites."https://t.co/cry2DlKtyt

— Areo (@AreoMagazine) July 23, 2019

Abortion and Soundbites: Why Pro-Choice Arguments Are Harder to Make

https://areomagazine.com/2019/07/23/abortion-and-soundbites-why-pro-choice-arguments-are-harder-to-make/

Posted on July 23, 2019
7 minute read
By Nathan Nobis and Kristina Grob

Arguments are nowadays often presented as soundbites: as slogans, tweets, memes and even gifs. Arguments developed in detail often meet the response TL;DR (Too Long, Didn’t Read). This is unfortunate—especially when tackling the topic of abortion. Soundbites make many pro-life arguments seem stronger than they really are, while the complexities of pro-choice arguments can’t be readily reduced to soundbites.

Pro-Life Soundbites

Abortion is wrong because:

• fetuses are human or human beings.
• human beings have rights.
• human rights protect all humans.
• we should advocate for equality, including equality for unborn human beings.
• abortion ends a life.
• abortion is killing.

These soundbites can sound good because human beings are generally wrong to kill; human rights do protect human beings; human rights apply to all humans; equality is a good thing; and ending lives and killing are often wrong. Denying these things often results in silly assertions: that fetuses in human women aren’t human or aren’t alive, or that abortion doesn’t involve killing, etc.

That these soundbites are based on what seems to be common sense can make these simple cases against abortion seem strong.

Pro-Choice Presentations

Presentations of pro-choice perspectives often begin with abstractions:

• What does human mean? Does everything human have rights?
• Why do human beings have rights? What makes humans have rights?
• Do human rights really protect everything and everyone that is human, or all human beings?
• Do basic human rights include a right to someone else’s body? How could someone gain that right? What kind of rights to assistance do human rights entail?
• Denying equality among human beings is very bad, but is equality sometimes inappropriate or even wrong? What does equality mean?
• When is killing not wrong? Does killing ever raise few, if any, moral issues whatsoever?

Since pro-choice positions depend on more precise and complex theoretical thinking, they are harder to effectively communicate—especially when audiences and discussion partners will not—or cannot—seek to understand more deeply and carefully.

Pro-Choice Soundbites

Consider some common pro-choice soundbites:

• My body, my choice.
• A woman can do whatever she wants with her own body.
• People who oppose abortion just want to control women.
• If you’re against abortion, don’t have one.
• Abortion is just a medical procedure.
• Abortion is a personal choice.
• Every child a wanted child.
• Abortion is not up for debate.

The problems with these soundbites are obvious to anyone who doesn’t already accept them.

• No. You cannot choose to use your body to murder someone.
• No. You cannot do everything you want with your own body: you cannot murder someone.
• No. If women are doing something that should be illegal, they should be controlled, just as anyone else should.
• No. You wouldn’t say Against child abuse? Then don’t abuse children! so this response is foolish.
• No. If abortion is wrong, it’s not a mere medical procedure.
• No. We can’t or shouldn’t make certain personal choices, if those choices are profoundly wrong.
• No. That a child is unwanted wouldn’t entitle anyone to kill that child.
• No, abortion is up for debate. What do you think we are doing in talking about it?

Not every pro-choice soundbite generates these reactions, but many do. Pro-choice soundbites just don’t have the same initial plausibility as pro-life soundbites.

Critiques of Pro-Life Soundbites

Pro-choice critics don’t argue that pro-life soundbites are completely wrong. Pro-choicers argue that, if we look at the details, their initial plausibility fades: thinking them through reveals that the ideas don’t have the implications their advocates think they do.

• If human means biologically human, that means that random human cells and tissues have rights, which they don’t. So just because fetuses are biologically human doesn’t mean they have rights.
• We can ask why human beings have rights: why do rocks and vegetables not have rights? A long-influential family of theories of rights proposes that we have rights because we are conscious and feeling beings. This theory suggests that pre-conscious embryos and early fetuses don’t have rights.
• While people say that all human beings have rights, they don’t. Human corpses don’t have rights. Brain-dead human beings do not have the rights we have: letting their bodies die would be wrong if they had, say, the right to life. Babies born missing most of their brains seem to not have the rights that regular babies have: it’s hard to see why letting them die, even when they could be kept alive, would be wrong, since being alive does them no good. Not all human beings have features that rights are supposed to protect, so it seems that not all human beings have rights. So just because fetuses are human beings doesn’t, in itself, mean they have rights.
• The right to life is not a right to everything someone needs to live—especially someone else’s body. Explaining if, how and why a fetus would have a right to a pregnant woman’s body is a challenge.
• Denying equality among humans is very bad. But advocating for equality between human beings and, say, isolated human cells or organs (or plants or bacteria) would be wrong. And what does equal mean? Not everything is equal: there is such a thing as justified, reasonable discrimination: there might be good reasons to deny that human embryos and early fetuses are equal to us.
• Killing random cells, bacteria, plants, etc. is often not wrong at all. There is killing that’s wrong and killing that isn’t wrong: just because abortion is killing doesn’t mean it’s wrong.

Identifying these problems requires showing that things are more complicated than they seem. It requires seeing that some common ways of understanding aren’t quite correct and might even be harmful.

There are, of course, more sophisticated arguments against abortion. These often appeal to claims about human embryos and fetuses’ essence or essential properties, their rational natures and their being the same kind of beings that we are. These abstract claims and arguments are harder to evaluate. However, close critical examination reveals that these abstract arguments do not succeed: they raise more questions than they answer.

Critical Thinking and Abortion

Developing strong critical thinking skills requires training and practice.

In our recent short, introductory, open-access book on abortion, Thinking Critically About Abortion: Why Most Abortions Aren’t Wrong & Why All Abortions Should be Legal, we review a lot of bad arguments and ways of understanding abortion, from all sides. Our main positive arguments for pro-choice perspectives, briefly stated, are these.

• It is wrong to kill adults, children and babies because they are conscious, aware and have feelings. Since early fetuses entirely lack these characteristics, it is not inherently wrong to kill them, so most abortions are not morally wrong, since most abortions are done early in pregnancy, before consciousness and feeling develop in the fetus.
• Furthermore, since the right to life does not include the right to someone else’s body, a fetus might not have the right to the pregnant woman’s body—therefore she has the right to not allow the fetus use of her body. This further justifies abortion, at least until technology allows for the removal of fetuses to other wombs. Since morally permissible actions should be legal, abortions should be legal: it is an injustice to criminalize actions that are not wrong.

These arguments are not new, but they are new to most people, since most people are not familiar with the philosophical literature on abortion. Versions of these are likely to be the best arguments for pro-choice perspectives out there.

Soundbite-Free Advocacy

So, what can a pro-choice advocate do? Here are some ideas:

• Don’t provide soundbites. You’re better off saying nothing than giving what sounds like a bad argument—perhaps because it is a bad argument.
• Very clever and creative people could develop good pro-choice soundbites. These are likely to be based on abstract and theoretical considerations. But developing any such soundbites in an echo-chamber, with little reflection on how they would be received by the outside world, is a strategy for failure.
• Denying that the issues can be reduced to soundbites might do some good: acknowledging complexity can help.
• We’d all like to engage and persuade everyone, but it might be best to focus on people who are able and willing to engage complexity: judges and legal officials are generally able and willing to do that; elected politicians are less likely to. Focusing on audiences willing to listen and productively discuss would reduce discouragement and frustration. Many people are well-meaning and willing to engage the issues in serious, respectful and responsible ways. But these discussions aren’t likely to be fruitful if they appeal to soundbites.

This isn’t about persuasion in the sense of manipulation, public relations or anything that could be called sophistry. We want to move people towards reasonable, justified messages.

While pro-life soundbites often move people, they do not seem to move people towards views that are ultimately justified by strong evidence and arguments: we believe this can be demonstrated by reasoning rigorously, patiently and critically about those arguments. Our book’s subtitle is Why Most Abortions Aren’t Wrong & Why All Abortions Should be Legal because we believe that critical thinking reveals that this view is supported by better arguments than its opposite. Soundbites don’t help show that, to most people. We need to find out what will.

 

Nathan Nobis

Nathan Nobis is is an Associate Professor of Philosophy at Morehouse College, in Atlanta, Georgia, USA. He has authored and co-authored many articles, essays, reviews and a few books on topics in ethics and philosophy.

Kristina Grob

Kristina Grob is an Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the University of South Carolina Sumter. Each semester she shows students that philosophy can be a way of life, no matter their day jobs. 

Open Access (OER) Ethics Textbook

Here's a new open-access ethics textbook with three essays by, me and me and a co-author, in it.

• "Euthanasia, or Mercy Killing" by Nathan Nobis 
• “Common Arguments about Abortion” and “Better (Philosophical) Arguments about Abortion,” by Nathan Nobis and Kristina Grob, [both chapters]. 

UNIT ONE: INTRODUCTION TO CONTEMPORARY ETHICS: TECHNOLOGY, AFFIRMATIVE ACTION, AND IMMIGRATION
1 The “Trolley Problem” and Self-Driving Cars: Your Car’s Moral Settings (Noah Levin)
2 What is Ethics and What Makes Something a Problem for Morality? (David Svolba)
3 Letter from the Birmingham City Jail (Martin Luther King, Jr)
4 A Defense of Affirmative Action (Noah Levin)
5 The Moral Issues of Immigration (B.M. Wooldridge)
6 The Ethics of our Digital Selves (Noah Levin)

UNIT TWO: TORTURE, DEATH, AND THE “GREATER GOOD”
7 The Ethics of Torture (Martine Berenpas)
8 What Moral Obligations do we have (or not have) to Impoverished Peoples? (B.M. Wooldridge)
9 Euthanasia, or Mercy Killing (Nathan Nobis)
10 An Argument Against Capital Punishment (Noah Levin)
11 Common Arguments about Abortion (Nathan Nobis & Kristina Grob)
12 Better (Philosophical) Arguments about Abortion (Nathan Nobis & Kristina Grob)

UNIT THREE: PERSONS, AUTONOMY, THE ENVIRONMENT, AND RIGHTS
13 Animal Rights (Eduardo Salazar)
14 John Rawls and the “Veil of Ignorance” (Ben Davies)
15 Environmental Ethics: Climate Change (Jonathan Spelman)
16 Rape, Date Rape, and the “Affirmative Consent” Law in California (Noah Levin)
17 The Ethics of Pornography: Deliberating on a Modern Harm (Eduardo Salazar)
18 The Social Contract (Thomas Hobbes)

UNIT FOUR: HAPPINESS
19 Is Pleasure all that Matters? Thoughts on the “Experience Machine” (Prabhpal Singh)
20 Utilitarianism (J.S. Mill)
21 Utilitarianism: Pros and Cons (B.M. Wooldridge)
22 Existentialism, Genetic Engineering, and the Meaning of Life: The Fifths (Noah Levin)
23 The Solitude of the Self (Elizabeth Cady Stanton)
24 Game Theory, the Nash Equilibrium, and the Prisoner’s Dilemma (Douglas E. Hill)

UNIT FIVE: RELIGION, LAW, AND ABSOLUTE MORALITY
25 The Myth of Gyges and The Crito (Plato)
26 God, Morality, and Religion (Kristin Seemuth Whaley)
27 The Categorical Imperative (Immanuel Kant)
28 The Virtues (Aristotle)
29 Beyond Good and Evil (Friedrich Nietzsche)
30 Other Moral Theories: Subjectivism, Relativism, Emotivism, Intuitionism, etc. (Jan F. Jacko)

https://www.ngefarpress.com/2019/05/introduction-to-ethics-open-educational.html  

Response to "Nathan Nobis' Summary of Pro-Choice Arguments"

Someone wrote a response to my 1000-Word Philosophy essay on abortion, entitled "Nathan Nobis' Summary of Pro-Choice Arguments." I wrote brief a reply and twice posted it on their blog, but it twice "disappeared" (. . but it might have returned, so I really don't know whether it's posted or not), so I post this reply here since I did take the time to write it up. 

See below the fold, please. 

A Letter to the Editor on Abortion

A letter to the editor: "Dear Decaturish - Thinking Critically About Abortion"

Two additional readings on the issues:

• An overview of many of the arguments: "Ethics and Abortion" at 1000-Word Philosophy: An Introductory Anthology. 
• An argumentative chapter for a forthcoming Oxford University Press textbook: "Early and Later Abortions: Ethics and Law" 

Question-Begging Arguments on Abortion

Many arguments about abortion are bad. Sometimes this is because they “beg the question,” or assume the argument’s conclusion as a premise. Question-begging arguments against abortion assume that abortion is wrong or that fetuses are wrong to kill; question-begging arguments in favor of abortion assume that abortions are not wrong or that fetuses are not wrong to kill. This is circular reasoning and must always be dismissed.

An Argument for “Passive” and “Active” Mercy Killing, or Euthanasia

An Argument for “Passive” and “Active” Mercy Killing, or Euthanasia

Nathan Nobis, Associate Professor of Philosophy, Morehouse College, Atlanta, GA

nathan.nobis@gmail.com www.NathanNobis.com

Written for this open-access ethics textbook.

Draft 2/7/19; Current: 3577 words; can easily be cut down to the sought 2500.

1. Introduction 1

2. Definitions 2

3. An Argument for Passive Euthanasia 5

4. An Argument for Active Euthanasia 7

5. Objections: Potentially Relevant Differences Between Active and Passive Euthanasia 7

6. Conclusions 10 

Reply to Christopher Tollefsen on Abortion

Reply to Christopher Tollefsen on Abortion, in Bob Fischer, ed., Ethics, Left and Right: The Moral Issues That Divide Us (Oxford University Press, 2019).

Abstract: Are you the same thing as your body? Did you begin at conception? Do you have a rational and free “nature” or “essence”? Some answer ‘yes’ to all and argue that this means that abortion is wrong: 

your "essence" is that of a free and rational being; that essence *makes* it wrong to kill you; you have always existed whenever your body existed; your body began at conception; and so you existed at conception and were wrong to kill; and the same is true for all other human fetuses. 

This argument is discussed here. 

Below is a response to Christopher Tollefsen’s essay on abortion, which is a perspective from “the Right.” Please see my contribution from a perspective from “the Left,” “Early and Later Abortions: Ethics and Law.”

Word count: 999

Moral Experts, Deference & Disagreement

I (we) have a chapter in this book "Moral Experts, Deference & Disagreement": 

Moral Expertise: New Essays from Theoretical and Clinical Bioethics

Editors: Watson, Jamie Carlin, Guidry-Grimes, Laura K. (Eds.)

• Contains all new essays that engage with a growing body of scholarly literature on moral expertise
• The first anthology on moral expertise since Lisa Rasmussen’s excellent 2005 collection, Ethics Expertise
• Brings together both academics and clinical ethicists on the contentious question of moral expertise

Early and Later Abortions: Ethics and Law

Early and Later Abortions: Ethics and Law

Early Abortions Are Not Wrong, Late Abortions Could Be Wrong,

but probably All Abortions Should Be Legal

Reply to Christopher Tollefsen on Abortion, in Bob Fischer, ed., Ethics, Left and Right: The Moral Issues That Divide Us (Oxford University Press, 2019).

For a reply to the "opposing side" essay, see my (9/26/18) "Reply to Christopher Tollefsen on Abortion"

Note: this chapter led to this short book: Thinking Critically About Abortion at www.AbortionArguments.com

Nathan Nobis; Philosophy, Morehouse College; nathan.nobis@gmail.com

Draft 7/31/18 ; Google doc; Also available at Academia.edu and Dropbox

Abstract

Most abortions occur early in pregnancy. I argue that these abortions, and so most abortions, are not morally wrong and that the best arguments given to think that these abortions are wrong are weak. I also argue that these abortions, and probably all abortions, should be legal.

I begin by observing that people sometimes respond to the issue by describing the circumstances of abortion, not offering reasons for their views about those circumstances; I then dismiss “question-begging” arguments about abortion that merely assume the conclusions they are given to support; most importantly, I evaluate many arguments: both common, often-heard arguments and arguments developed by philosophers.

My defense of abortion is based on facts about early fetuses’ not yet possessing consciousness or any mental life, awareness or feeling, as well as concerns about rights to one’s own body.