Mary Anne Warren Abortion Summary

Personhood status and its consequences In the article, On the legal and moral status of abortion, Mary Anne Warren (1973) states that biological humanity is irrelevant, to achieve satisfactory evaluation on the moral permissibility of abortion we need to consider the personhood status of fetus. Through her criteria of personhood she determines that fetus is not a person; therefore, abortion is morally permissible. Her argument is certainly deductively valid; however, it is unsound because personhood criteria is ambiguous. It effectively disproves personhood status of the fetus (in early terms of pregnancy), but not applicable in terms of proving the personhood status. The argument also commits the fallacy of proving too much. In this essay,
In one premise it is being used in a moral sense, but in other premise is being used in biological sense. By providing a charitable interpretation to the premises she arrives at the conclusion that if human is used in biological sense, then the traditional argument becomes deductively valid. The central question remains, “Can it be established that genetic humanity is sufficient for moral humanity?”. Warren’s answer is no, humanity is an inadequate means to determine the legal and moral status of abortion. Instead she further suggests to “the concept of personhood” (Warren 1973, 54). Personhood status does not appeal to the notion of biological or genetic humanity; therefore, we should establish whether a fetus is a person. She fashions a standard requirements for individuals to qualify as a person. A person should have the following abilities:
(1) consciousness – having the capacity to feel
She does mentions “We needn't suppose that an entity must have all of these attributes to be properly considered a person; (1) and (2) alone may well be sufficient for personhood, and quite probably (1) - (3) are sufficient” (Warren 1973, 55) but there is no definite answer. Nonetheless, it is necessary to know which qualifications are sufficient for the personhood status. With this uncertainty is one allowed to select from the requirements? If that is the case then, many contradictory examples can be provide that where an obvious person is not considered a person. Some situations that will refute Warren’s argument are: patients vegetative state, patients with altered mental capacity, individuals in non-REM deep state sleep and individuals in comatose state. Does this indicate it that is morally acceptable to take their lives? No, because the personhood status of individuals in above given situation can be disputed because there can exist other factors that can make their live valuable and possibly grant them moral humanity. A clear definition of personhood is necessary to soundly determine the moral permissibility of