Response to Marquis

In his arguments against abortion, Marquis neglects to take into account the way children are produced in the context he describes.  Producing a living person in the way Marquis describes does not happen in a lab, but rather requires the woman to carry a child inside her body.  Marquis does mention that if the mother’s life is at risk during the pregnancy, he finds it acceptable to terminate the pregnancy, but provides no further mention of the mother in the context of pregnancy, an essential step before prescribing what she must do with her body.

In addition, he stumbles when he makes comparisons to abortion. It is not an appropriate analogy to compare abortion being wrong to it being “wrong to kill us.”  In no way is it the same to have an abortion and to murder a living breathing human being.  He attempts to justify this claim by establishing that fetuses have potential to have a “valuable future” (263).  Marquis definitely oversimplifies pregnancy for the reason mentioned in the previous paragraph.  A “valuable future” is not enough of a link between the case of abortion and killing a living person.  They are different in many ways.  Marquis may be correct in arguing that though one might not be able to comprehend value or positively value life, it does not make their existence trivial.  However, he does not establish an acknowledgement that the “valuable future” of a child depends on so many factors. 

Not all of those who approve of abortion misunderstand the importance of life and the potential for life.  I am not making the argument that the potential mothers are more (or less) important than the potential child.  I am saying that Marquis’ argument does not account for the complexity of pregnancy as it pertains to a woman carrying a child in her body, and the way it affects all living people who are affected by the pregnancy.  Though it may be true that “embryos can be victims” (265), it is also true that the “valuable future” of each person affected by the pregnancy-some of which Marquis neglects to address-is influenced by the decision to have a child.  The potential future of the potential child must be considered, but the mother and father’s futures must also be considered.  The families of the potential mother and father are affected as well.  The child’s future is not necessarily ignored or trivialized in the choice to terminate a pregnancy.  Marquis argues that no one has the right to take way the potentially “valuable future,” but does not predict or refute the counterargument that certain situations exist that provide a child very little possibilities to have a “valuable future.”  It is not enough to say that the small amount of potential for a "valuable future" is enough because he does not consider these factors. If Marquis wanted to have a strong argument against abortion, he would have to take a step back, and acknowledge the numerous factors he neglects to account for in his argument.