Thomson’s Philosophy on Abortion

Thomson’s Philosophy on Abortion
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Thomson’s Philosophy on Abortion
Thomson compares a newly fertilized ovum to the acorn of an oak tree. A fertilized ovum cannot be considered a human person, the same way an acorn cannot be considered an oak tree (Thomson, 435). Thomson also notes that the opponents of abortion spend too much time trying to argue that human life starts at conception. However, they fail to draw the nexus between the start of life at conception and the impermissibility of abortion. Thomson provides some fundamental questions that one must ask when considering the permissibility of abortion. First, assuming that life begins at conception, one must ask what exactly the right to life means (Thomson, 437). If we take the right of life to mean the provision of the bare minimum requirements for sustenance, then another question arises. The question is, what if a person does not have the right to the bare minimum required for their survival?
At the same time, Thomson questions whether a woman should be obligated to carry a pregnancy in cases where it occurred against their wish, rape, for instance. Also, would abortion not be permissible when it is necessary to save the mother's life? Through offering a step-by-step analysis of the case of abortion, Thomson deconstructs the pop...