Moral Personhood in the Context of Abortion: an Examination of Mary Anne Warren‟s Perspective

Abstract

Abortion remains one of the most controversial issues in the world today. On the one hand, the pro-life school of thought holds that the practice is morally wrong because it entails killing a foetus, who is a person, as life begins at conception. On the other hand, some pro-choice advocates hold that abortion is justified because a foetus is not a person. According to the pro-choice scholars, such as Mary Anne Warren, a foetus cannot be granted personhood because it does not meet the criterion of being a moral person, whereby a being of this nature must be conscious, rational, able to engage in a self- motivated activity, have a capacity to communicate, and have a sense of self concepts and self-awareness. Against this backdrop, Warren concludes that a foetus is not a moral person, and hence the unborn children do not have moral personhood. Thus, she insisted that the right to life of a foetus does not outweigh the right to liberty of a pregnant mother. Therefore, to address the problem, I engaged in a library research with the objectives of examining whether a foetus is a person, in the sense of having ethical standing and rights. The study also sought to establish the truth value of Warren‟s claims that a foetus does not have the psychological traits of moral personhood. Thereafter, the relevance of Warren‟s position on foetal personhood in addressing controversies in abortion was examined with the aim of coming up with practical recommendations that could inform abortion decisions around the world. The study's findings revealed that Warren was wrong to argue that foetuses lack the psychological traits of personhood. After reviewing available literatures on foetal personhood, it was concluded that late gestation foetuses have sentience, possess vital communication body organs, and experience brain waves and electrical impulses that signal the development of brain functions. Therefore, it was recommended that abortion should not be allowed unless in the case of rape, incest, foetal impairment, or when the life or the health of a mother is in danger, or when a foetus has not reached viability.