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The concept of personhood in moral philosophy (Part 2): Viability and the fetus as potential person argument

Information: This is Part 2 in a series of articles looking at the question of when a fetus becomes a person (or attains personhood), and the arguments moral philosophers use to justify or reject this. In this section we explore the issue of viability (the ability for the fetus to survive outside the womb), and the idea that the fetus is a potential person.

Personhood and fetal viability

No doubt most of us would say we know something of what makes a person, a Person. At the very least we would say a person is someone who is alive, which for some suggests attributing personhood to fetuses at the point they are capable of living outside the womb (also known as viability). However, viability is a notoriously fluid concept, particularly as it is often determined by the sophistication of medical technology, and how capable this is of keeping prematurely born fetuses alive:

'An ice-skating star's baby has been born two days after she collapsed and died from a brain haemorrhage, a hospital has confirmed. Doctors at Oxford's John Radcliffe hospital kept Jayne Soliman's heart beating until they had delivered her baby daughter Aya Jayne on Friday. Baby Aya was born 25 weeks prematurely by caesarean section.' (Baby girl born to dead skater, BBC News, January 12th 2008)

When medical technology was not as sophisticated as it is today, viability was deemed to be much later. However, this tends to make medical technology the arbiter of what is deemed morally and legally right in terms of abortion, which is clearly dubious. For to say that whatever technology is capable of doing should be the baseline for judging whether an act is morally or legally right, presents us with all manner of worrying (and ethically dubious) scenarios.

Something to think about: If it becomes medically possible to create a new species of being using a combination of both human and non-human genetic material, does the ability to do this make the act morally and legally right?

Despite these concerns there is no question that technology has played a significant part in shaping our moral landscape. For instance, in 1990 the UK government made it illegal for an abortion to be performed later than twenty-four weeks, which was a reduction from the earlier twenty-eight week limit, due to the increasing ability to keep prematurely born fetuses alive.

As medical technology advances, so it seems the ability to keep prematurely born fetuses alive will be possible even earlier point in its development, which in turn will affect our understanding of viability and the personhood of the fetus and may mean that a further revision to the law on abortion is required.

Baby in a incubator 10 minutes after birth

Baby in a incubator 10 minutes after birth (Copyright: baby.yeahbaby.com)

Although advances in medical technology may lead us to imagine that the normal limit for fetal viability could be even lower than twenty-four weeks, the fact of the matter is that for a prematurely born fetus to survive outside the womb it requires more than just sophisticated hospital equipment. It also requires the fetus to be physically capable of surviving outside the womb:

'”Viability”… depends in part on the ability to breathe. The lungs are simply not developed, and the fetus cannot breathe – no matter how advanced an artificial lung it might be placed in – until about the 24th week, near the start of the sixth month.' (Druyan A. & Sagan C., The Question on Abortion)

The fetus is normally unable to survive outside the womb prior to the twenty-fourth week, because it is physically unable to do so. This means (according to the viability argument), that the fetus is unable to be deemed a person prior to it having the ability to do this (which is clearly unsatisfactory for anti-abortionists). It also means that personhood is being defined by having certain physical characteristics (such lungs, the ability to breathe etc.), which as we discussed in part 1 of this series, is a dubious criteria on which to ground the notion of personhood.

Another problem with using viability as the standard for determining when a fetus becomes a person, is exactly we mean when we say something is 'viable':

'Just what does “viable” mean? Even a full-term newborn is not viable without a great deal of care and love' (Druyan A. & Sagan C., The Question on Abortion).

Unlike many other mammals, human infants are completely dependent on others to care for them when they are born. In fact, if we want to judge personhood according to the ability for something to live independently outside of the womb, then it would appear that when it is born, a foal or a infant gazelle is much more personlike than any human infant:

'A fetus, even a fully developed one, is considerably less personlike, than is the average mature mammal, indeed the average fish.' (Warren, M. A., On the Moral and Legal Status of Abortion)

So in light of all this, it would seem the viability test for personhood is somewhat dubious.

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The fetus as a potential person argument

Some anti-abortionists argue that we should always protect the life of a fetus, because it is a potential person. In other words, although it is difficult to state exactly when a fetus develops into a person, the fact of the matter is that one day it will. Summarising this anti-abortion argument, Judith Thompson writes:

'Most opposition to abortion relies on the premise that the fetus is a human being… We are asked to notice that the development of a human being from conception through birth into childhood is continuous; then it is said that to draw a line, to choose a point in this development and say ‘before this point the thing is not a person, after this point it is a person” is to make an arbitrary choice, and choice for which in the nature of things no good reason can be given.' (Thompson J., A Defense of Abortion)

Although there is no question that at various stages the human zygote, embryo and fetus is a potential persons, is this enough to justify giving them full moral and legal rights associated with personhood? In her essay On the Moral and Legal Status of Abortion (1973), Mary Anne Warren suggests that it is not, for the simple reason that the zygote/embryo/fetus is only a potential person, rather than an actual person:

'Even if a potential person does have some prima facie right to life, such a right could not possibly outweigh the right of the woman to obtain an abortion, since the rights of any actual person invariably outweigh those of any potential person, whenever the two conflict.'

As the mother is an actually existing person, her moral and legal rights supersede those of any potential (or yet-to-be-born) person.

What is interesting about the potential person argument is how it logically undermines itself, for it is grounded on a view of the nature of the fetus it ultimately denies. The argument starts by admitting that the fetus is not a person, but then goes on to ask us to give it full moral and legal rights associated with personhood. Yet this is surely begging the question. For to say that x is not something yet, is the same as saying x not that thing; and to say that x is potentially y, is not the same as saying x is y and deserves to be treated as though it were:

'A newly fertilised ovum, a newly implanted clump of cells, is no more a person than an acorn is an oak tree.' (Thompson J., A Defense of Abortion)

This is not an oak tree! (Source: www.wpclipart.com)

Would anyone trust a first year medical student to perform open-heart surgery on them because they have the potential to be a great heart-surgeon, rather than someone who is actually qualified and experienced to perform the procedure. And were a first year medical student to perform open-heart surgery on someone and kill them in the process, would a defense of, 'Well, one day I will be fully trained and able to perform this operation competently', stand up in court?

The concept of personhood in moral philosophy (Part 3): The person at birth argument

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