ABSTRACT
Most opposition to abortion relies on the premise that the fetus is a human being, a person, from the moment of conception. Many of those who defend abortion rely on the premise that the fetus is not a person, but only a bit of tissue that will become a person at birth. Moreover, in killing the child, one would be killing an innocent person, for the child has committed no crime, and is not aiming at his mother’s death. There are a variety of ways in which this might be continued. Opponents of abortion commonly spend most of their time establishing that the fetus is a person, and hardly any time explaining the step from there to the impermissibility of abortion. The main focus of attention in writings on abortion has been on what a third party may or may not do in answer to a request from a woman for an abortion.
