First Trimester Foetus Research Paper

Abortion is a controversial topic that has caused much disagreement for philosophers and people alike. Whether it should be morally permissible for the mother to have control over her body and the future of the first-trimester foetus is a question that has moral, legal and religious implications. In regards to the ethical concerns, there are various factors to be considered when determining the morality of abortion. Abortion, (permitting a competent mother to terminate a pregnancy) is already a fixed moral and legal right in 75% of the world’s countries. It will be argued that abortion of a first-trimester foetus is morally permissible due to the mother’s right to her own body, the problems associated with the potentiality argument as well

Mary Anne Warren argues that human beings have a special criterion of which foetuses lack . In the biological sense a foetus is a human but any further sense of being human is lacking; consequently, in the moral sense a first trimester foetus is not human. As Warren goes on to argue, as foetuses are not sentient, rational and do not have a conception of themselves; they are therefore not a human being in the full moral sense, but instead only genetically human. As a foetus is not capable to be apart of a moral community, the foetus is therefore not a human and therefore makes abortion morally permissible. It has been argued that until the foetus is sentient, it has no moral status and has no psychological connection with their potential future; therefore they are owed very little in the way of moral protection. This is highlighted by the Supreme Court’s decision of Roe v. Wade. This case separated personhood from humanity as the judge agreed that a foetus was a member of the Homo sapiens but not a person in a moral sense. It could therefore be argued that a foetus is not a human in a full moral status and hence has no moral status. Indeed, this allows the permissibility of

Additionally, rational women should have the right to decide if they want to keep or abort the child, as she is the best person to judge whether the child is a price that can be paid. Advances in abortion cases today support this argument, with young girls who are too immature to be fully supporting mothers, the decision to abort is more rational. This freedom of choice reflects the mother’s moral right, who has a fully developed consciousness regarding abortion. Thus, in my opinion, due to the lack of the foetus’s moral status is more important. The first-trimester foetus is shown to lack moral status, as it is not able to function in a moral community; it is instead only genetically human, making it morally permissible to have an abortion. Therefore, it is evident that abortion remains an extensively disputed topic, and the question of whether a mother should be morally permitted to request an abortion has no clear