The Ethics of Killing: Problems at the Margins of Life by Jeff McMahan

Author:Jeff McMahan [McMahan, Jeff]
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Tags: philosophy, Ethics & Moral Philosophy
ISBN: 9780195079982
Google: 9gsJMztLvQoC
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: 2002-11-15T00:29:36.488551+00:00

4

Beginnings

1. EARLY ABORTION

The Embodied Mind Account of Identity has immediate implications for the morality of abortion. For, according to that account, we do not begin to exist until our organisms develop the capacity to generate consciousness. Only then is there someone present rather than merely something. Let us define an early abortion as an abortion that is performed prior to that point—that is, the point at which the fetal brain acquires the capacity to support consciousness and at which one of us consequently begins to exist in association with the fetal organism. If the Embodied Mind Account is right, there is no one to be affected for better or worse by an early abortion other than the pregnant woman, her partner, and anyone else who might care about her or her possible progeny. An early abortion does not kill anyone; it merely prevents someone from coming into existence. In this respect, it is relevantly like contraception and wholly unlike the killing of a person. For there is, again, no one there to be killed.

It is not known with certainty at what point during gestation the fetal brain develops the capacity to generate consciousness. Most neurologists accept that the earliest point at which consciousness is possible is around the twentieth week of pregnancy, which is when synaptic connections begin to form among the cortical neurons. It is, however, unlikely that consciousness becomes possible until after at least another month—that is, until around the sixth month. Neurologist Julius Korein offers a representative sketch of the relevant aspects of fetal brain development:

Neurons in the cortical plate first begin to form cortical synapses at about 20 weeks. These neurons then form synaptic connections between other intracerebral structures such as the thalamus and the brain stem, resulting in sensory reception and more patterned spontaneous and induced motor activity. Cortical EEG activity can be first recorded at about 21–22 weeks after fertilization; the blink-startle response, with eyes opening, to auditory stimuli can be demonstrated at 24 weeks; and cortical sensory evoked potentials appear at about 25–27 weeks. . . . Major components of cerebral function including aspects of consciousness (sentience) are unequivocally present in the fetus after 28 weeks of fetal age. The onset of the fundamental core of brain function . . . can be identified between the limits of about 20 to 28 weeks.1

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