According to Rosalind Hursthouse, an action is right (from a Virtue Ethical perspective) if and only if it is what the virtuous agent would do in the same circumstances.
Now, let us consider the case of pregnancy. When considering if one should abort or keep their child, and, under the guise of the above mentioned framework, when would abortion be the “right action” when compared to alternative actions? If one thinks that the fetus is not deserving of moral consideration or does not have any moral worth that’s one thing and a very different sort of debate, but, if we make the assumption that Judith Jarvis Thompson does in her seminal work “A Defense of Abortion” and assume the fetus is a person, or that the fetus ought to be morally considered (for the sake of argument) then when can the Virtue Ethicist claim that aborting the fetus is the right action when other options like adoption or parenting the child yourself are available? What Virtues would be adhered to in order to claim that abortion is the right choose when compared to competing alternatives?
I don’t think the Virtue Ethicist will have the option to abort (at least in most cases), and, even if we argue that the Hursthouse definition of right action as stated above (I’ve argued elsewhere that we should) is faulty, I do not see how the Virtue Ethicist could claim that abortion is the right action (only when starting with the assumption that the fetus has moral value, or is a person). Thoughts?
–Justin
A Philosopher's Take 
Mike
May 24, 2012
I’m an old school virtue ethicist guy when it comes to virtue, seeing it from the perspective of Aristotle, the ancient greeks, and rest of antiquity (not because i am into virtues per se, I just think the ancient greeks are kind of cool). They did not have any problem with killing people and virtue. The hoplites, the Spartans, the macedonian phalanxes, the roman centurions of the legions…all were founded on virtue or seen retrospectively and ideally as being inspirations of virtue. In an ancient greek view killing a fetus may be a requirement of character in terms of justice or courage or even sincerity or civility. The Spartans certainly thought this.
Of course, by the time of Aquinas virtues had become christian virtues of things like faith and love and mercy and charity…etc. These virtues obviously have a more critical view of abortion. However, it could be argued that christian virtues are really either vices of deficiency or excess when seen through Aristotle, who is after all the father of virtue ethics and ethics in general (that is big of me to say because I am a big Plato fanboy). Ancient greeks might then see the anti abortion position based on vices that are counter productive to building a strong character (Paging Mr. Nietzsche, Mr. Nietzsche…white courtesy phone please).
My point is that there are multiple points of view on exactly what is a virtue through time and that makes it easy to pick and choose a virtue stance that supports or denies abortion. The definition of virtue changes and is in flux, and there is no real reason to privilege one time periods definition of virtue of another. I think the civilizations of antiquity and ancient greece in particular would not see any disconnect here between virtue and abortion.
I don’t think then that the virtue ethicists are wrong here as much as I just think that virtue ethics is more slippery, contextual, and pluralistic than many think it is.
But I am not really a virtue lover in a big way…I like it, but it’s not my favorite.
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Justin Caouette
May 24, 2012
Hey Mike, I appreciate the reply. I’m also an old school Virtue Ethicist which is why I used Hursthouse as my starting point. She is working from the Aristotelian tradition and I find that to be the most coherent form of VE that I’ve come across in my research. With that said, I’ll have to disagree that the definition of virtues have changed that much. I agree that virtues are context sensitive and pluralistic in how they can be applied (which is why a 2200 yr old ethical theory can still be applied today) but VE doesn’t collapse into some sort of relativism. Below, I’ll try to articulate what I take the project of VE to be doing.
Each action that we intentionally perform is aimed at a particular goal. Each goal is part of a bigger whole, the human life, or to borrow a quote from Alasdair Macintyre “our individual narrative” (After Virtue 1984). According to Macintyre, and I think he’s right here: intentions and reasons for actions are part of a person’s narrative. Each narrative is connected with other narratives and other narratives play a part in how we make decisions. Therefore, our actions can directly affect the narratives of others and vice versa. (Intuitively, this seems like a plausible story)
According to the virtue ethics tradition, in order to perform these actions in a way that could allow us to flourish we must possess certain dispositions or character traits. These dispositions to act well are called virtues. According to Aristotle:
Virtue- is (a) a state that decides, (b) consisting in a mean between extreme choices or vices, (c) the mean relative to us, (d) which is defined by reference to reason, (e) i.e, to the reason by reference to which the intelligent person would define it. It is a mean between two vices, one of excess and one of deficiency. (NE 1107a-0-5)
So, if we take the above definitions of virtue as a starting point we can see that virtue ethics, as opposed to deontology or utilitarianism, is an approach that focuses on motives and moral character (virtue) and is concerned with living well in order to flourish. Embodying virtues is, at least partially, constitutive of flourishing. In other words, flourishing is defined in terms of embodying the virtues. A person that embodies dispositions to certain emotions and actions (virtues) that are consistent with a picture of human flourishing that is made up at least in part with those virtues can be considered to be living a virtuous life, or, a flourishing life. This conception is wholly Aristotelian in it’s roots.
Virtue ethics like many other ethical theories, tries to answer the questions: (A) How should one live? (B) What sorts of considerations should influence actions that will promote the answer to (A)? And; (C) How does the act in question relate to (A) and/or (B) ? A consequentialist attitude toward ethics deals with the same above mentioned questions but approach them in a completely different way. Generally speaking, consequentialism is focused on evaluating the outcomes of actions or states of affairs rather than distinctively moral evaluations of agency or character which is the focus of VE. This is why I find VE to be superior to other leading theories. Because it is contextual, but not relativistic. Because it focuses on one’s character, why they chose to perform the action, and doesn’t focus primarily on the outcome of that action (consequentialism) or some arbitrary rule (deontology).
I guess I’m not seeing how a decision not to abort could be a vice (as you mentioned it could). I think, as I stated in my initial post, the Virtue Ethicist will have a hard time telling that sort of story, and, I don’t think that story would adhere to the traditional Aristotelian notion of eudamonia or a flourishing life. I’ve considered the virtue of humility and a few others when I was researching this as part of my M.A thesis. It seems to me that at least most run-of-the-mill abortions would be seen as wrong in the eyes of the Virtue Ethicist.
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Justin Caouette
May 25, 2012
After conversing with a fellow colleague about some of what is mentioned here (I appreciated that quick discussion earlier this morning) I’d like to clarify my position a bit.
I was a bit insensitive when making my “most run-of-the-mill abortions would be seen as wrong in the eyes of the virtue ethicist” claim. First, there really is no such thing as a “run-of-the-mill” abortion. Each decision to abort is surrounded by a different set of circumstances and many of those circumstances are important, especially to the virtue ethicist, when deciding what one ought to do. Now, in a longer philosophical project, for my M.A thesis, I did take a look at lots of different cases. Cases including unprotected, uncoerced sex, cases involving rape, cases involving protected sex, and cases involving both married and single women.
But here, I was admittedly vague, and my question to start was a bit malformed so here is my attempt to be a bit more clear. A case in which the child does not have a terrible disease, the woman did not take any precautions (birth control pill), has the means to care for a child, was not coerced into sex and calls herself a virtue ethicist will be hard pressed to claim that her ethical view would call her decision to abort (when other options are available) the “right act” (Let’s call this case A1). Again, I think that the virtue ethicist would be hard-pressed for most other cases as well (A2, A3, A4,…) but my target here was (A1). Again, (A1) is incomplete as well. For instance, does the baby have a I thought these cases weren’t rare, but I guess that’s an open question empirical question, and to assume that they are in fact representative of a larger portion is an assumption that I should have been a bit more clear on.
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pretensesoup
June 4, 2012
I think the argument that the foetus has some kind of moral weight or deserves ethical consideration is made more complicated by the fact that it isn’t the same over the entire nine months. It would be relatively easy to construct a case saying that a foetus of 36 weeks’ gestation is deserving of moral consideration–after all, it’s practically full-term and would likely survive if the woman gave birth prematurely. On the other hand, a foetus at eight weeks is a rapidly growing clump of cells no bigger than a kidney bean, unlikely to have an “I” thought. To give it moral weight at that stage might invite giving moral weight to, at the least, animals like fish or tadpoles. So I’m not convinced this argument carries the same weight throughout the pregnancy. (I feel like I should add I’m not a virtue ethicist. 🙂 )
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Justin Caouette
June 4, 2012
Thanks for the reply, pretense.
I agree that the development of the fetus over the nine months makes things tricky. I haven’t argued for any biological basis to ground our moral considerations here, I was working with Judith Jarvis Thomson’s starting place and wondering how the virtue ethicist could motivate the decision to abort, or, consider the decision to abort to be the “right” decision from her starting place. If we assume that the fetus is a person, or has moral value from conception (which Thomson does for the sake of argument), then I think the virtue ethicist will have a tough time saying that abortion is the “right” act all things considered.
If we conclude that a fetus does not have moral value then I don’t think any ethicist, including a virtue ethicist, will have a tough time saying that it is morally permissible to have an abortion or that an abortion is the “right” decision.
With that said, I’m not convinced by the clump of cells line of argument. Aren’t we a clump of cells? Are you referring to the size of the clump? Aren’t we just a larger version? Further, the “I” thought doesn’t occur in babies either but we would think that they have moral value. Regardless, this line of questioning and these types of considerations bring us into a completely different sort of argument, one I hope to address in the coming weeks, dealing with the value of life, particularly how we ought to value the life of a fetus. However, this particular post is trying to uncover what the Virtue Ethicist could say if in fact the fetus had moral value, and to that end I don’t think they could say that killing an innocent life (if the life has value) is the best act or the right act in most cases(cases where the mother’s life is at risk aside), if not all.
I’d love to hear some of your thoughts when I post on abortion more generally. So please feel free to chime in then as well.
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Aaron
June 6, 2012
Here’s a thought which doesn’t belong to me which might make it more coherent (I think it was ‘Hilzoy’ who used to blog at ‘Obsidian Wings’ who said this):
Compare the question to “when is it OK to dig up and mutilate a corpse?” We would agree in general it’s not a good thing to do, and we would justify this position on the grounds of respect for human dignity or something similar, most of us without feeling the need to reduce this sentiment any further.
However there are presumably cases where this is acceptable – to solve a murder case, retrieve something especially valuable from the grave etc. But we would not do it frivolously.
The value in this comparison is it makes it clear a person of average maturity and moral competence should be able to figure out when it’s permissible and when it’s not. That is, minimal phronesis will guide us on a case by case basis.
However I would say, and if I remember correctly Hursthouse says, virtue ethics doesn’t really deal in the technicalities of defining exactly what life consists in. In fact I think a virtue ethicist could justify eschewing such analysis all together.
Here is a second consideration, especially relevant since I know Hursthouse has an aversion to dealing in abstract or isolated moral scenarios (I am an ex student): any case of pregnancy has its circumstances which a person or two people with certain character constitutions are responsible for. The abortion itself is not within a moral vacuum. A virtuous person might be said to avoid the circumstances and situations which lead to unwanted pregnancies.
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Justin Caouette
June 6, 2012
Aaron, thanks for the reply. I’ll offer a response and try to keep it as brief as possible .
With regards to the mutilation of a corpse – (Prima facie) I’m not seeing what’s morally abhorrent about this? Life has value dead things? I’m thinking, not so much. Also, an appeal to what most people would do does not seem to be a good way to go about what we ought to do. (Slavery as an acceptable practice in certain cultures as a case and point). I think you’re right that “minimal phronesis will guide us on a case by case basis”, but it won’t guide us correctly (necessarily).
With regards to the virtue ethicist defining “what life consists in”, I guess I’m not sure exactly what you’re getting at here. An Aristotelian teleological account will surely care about the telos of the living thing in order for us to gauge how we should treat and act toward it. A failure to analyze the technicalities of life is a failure to see one’s true telos. It also seems irresponsible to not care what is alive and what isn’t…
With regards to your last suggestion – I think that it would be a knock against virtue ethics if they would appealed to your suggestion as a way around dealing with the decision to abort. An ethical theory should be able to guide action, to tell us what we ought to do given our particular circumstances. Hursthouse herself wrote on abortion (See Virtue Theory and Abortion 1991), and though she may be against talking about the more general cases I so think it’s important to consider particular cases. When we do look at the particular cases I think the VEthicist is hard pressed to find justification to abort rather than other available options,
Sure, a virtuous person MIGHT be said to avoid circumstances and situations which lead to unwanted pregnancies (though, it’s tough to say that a virtuous person can avoid rape, etc.), but a virtue ethicist, or a virtue theory, should be able to offer guidance to someone not yet completely virtuous (nearly all of us). This is why I find Hursthouse’s theory of right action “whatever the virtuous person would do” to be inadequate. That’s not to say I think Virtue Ethics can’t offer guidance, I think it can, but the guidance that they would offer to nearly all (if not all) pregnant women would be to keep the child and not abort (I’ve yet to hear or read an argument that suggests otherwise, especially in cases not having to deal with weighing the life of the mother) . To act against this, (and assuming the fetus is a person as Thomson does for the sake of argument) would be to not act virtuously. What virtue would be appealed to to say it was the right action (assuming other options are viable)?
Again, thanks for your comments. For a more developed account on this see my book http://www.amazon.ca/Right-Action-Virtue-Justin-Caouette/dp/3847340336
It’s titled “Right Action and Virtue”. I give a much more detailed account/rebuttal of most of what you’ve suggested as well as most of the arguments and suggestions made by other commentators as well.
I hope this made things a bit more clear (though I understand if I only made things more abstract as this is a multilayered and difficult topic).
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Aaron
June 7, 2012
Won’t respond to all of it for the sake of brevity, just the parts I can think of replies to right now:
With regards to the mutilation of a corpse – (Prima facie) I’m not seeing what’s morally abhorrent about this?
Imagine it’s the corpse of a loved one and it might seem worse. Perhaps not grounds for imprisonment or anything like that, but you would think the perpetrator was far from virtuous.
The comparison is valuable in that it’s an in-between case, like a fetus: most would probably agree it has more moral value than a lump of indeterminate matter and some kind of human sanctity (on “sanctity”: http://aaronsholymountain.wordpress.com/2012/03/26/on-an-argument-for-conservatism/) worthy of respect, but less than a fully formed, sentient person. (One issue here is obviously that I’m very reluctant to grant it is a full life even just for the sake of argument.)
Also, an appeal to what most people would do does not seem to be a good way to go about what we ought to do.
It’s not an appeal to what most would do, it’s an appeal to what a practically wise person would do. I like to compare it to artistic appreciation (think of Hume’s Of the Standard of Taste). A seasoned critic just will be more likely to make evaluations which are more in line with what is the ultimate judge – history. Similarly, a seasoned moral agent will make moral evaluations more likely to accord with the verdict of history.
When we do look at the particular cases I think the VEthicist is hard pressed to find justification to abort rather than other available options.
If you’re allowed to add “other available options” to the argument, then I’m allowed to add, let’s say, “prior available options” – such as minimizing the chances of getting pregnant if one’s not in a good position to have a child.
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Justin Caouette
June 7, 2012
Here are some brief remarks.
(1) Imagine it’s the corpse of a loved one and it might seem worse.
I’m not seeing it. I guess I see it as similar to mutilating or destroying an old suit that you locked up in a box in the ground. Sometimes it may be important and you might get pissed, other times… not so much. With regards to the perpetrator being virtuous or not, I guess it would depend on hy he was engaging in the action.
(2) One issue here is obviously that I’m very reluctant to grant it is a full life even just for the sake of argument.
Judith Jarvis Thomson does for the sake of argument and my purpose was to engage with those that argue on those grounds. Though, I think it’s quite clear that it is a “life” (I haven’t argued for any of that here). Biologists say that it’s a life and most pro-lifers and pro-choicers usually agree that it is a life as well. They usually argue whether or not it’s the sort of life that warrants moral consideration. Whether it’s a person or a ife deserving of moral consideration are much different arguments and not arguments I was trying to have when I initially posted. (stay tuned though, in the next few weeks I’ll be taking on abortion more generally)
(3)If you’re allowed to add “other available options” to the argument, then I’m allowed to add, let’s say, “prior available options” – such as minimizing the chances of getting pregnant if one’s not in a good position to have a child.
What about cases of rape? Further, what about the person who needs guidance if they engaged in actions that brought about less than ideal circumstances. Are you suggesting that Virtue Ethics can’t offer guidance in those cases? Im not adding anything, I’m trying to discuss REAL cases. In most cases the woman does have available options other than abortion. I’m not thinking about cases where a woman has a gun to her head.
Also, shouldn’t an ethical theory give guidance in all situations? So, to answer how one should act when pregnant by saying they shouldn’t have had sex is not very helpful at all.
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Aaron
June 7, 2012
I’ll just comment on this part because I feel we’re just getting closer to an impasse – haha.
Also, shouldn’t an ethical theory give guidance in all situations? So, to answer how one should act when pregnant by saying they shouldn’t have had sex is not very helpful at all.
Hursthouse might here bring up the concept of “moral remainder” or even see this particular case – especially if you want to talk of the extreme case of rape – as a “tragic dilemma.” But I have a feeling you won’t be sympathetic to these ideas!
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Justin Caouette
June 7, 2012
Fair enough.
I’ll only say that you’re right, I’m not sympathetic to it (maybe somewhat sympathetic, though).
A woman who becomes pregnant as a result of a rape is in a truly tragic and difficult situation. That, I can agree too!
I think we are at an impasse, though. I’m more concerned with cases not related to rape, and, since most of us are not virtuous, a practical virtue ethic should guide us when dealing with how we should act next when the results of our previous “free” actions that are not ideal or virtuous(finding yourself pregnant when you didn’t want to be or something like that).
Regardless, I enjoyed your comments. I enjoy engaging even if both parties don’t always see eye to eye 😉
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Bob
June 9, 2012
A discussion of personhood might help with the abortion debate. Here is a review of a good book on the topic.
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Justin Caouette
June 9, 2012
Thanks, Bob.
I haven’t tackled the abortion debate head on with this post. It was a more specific argument that I targeted toward any Virtue Ethicist that argues for the moral permissibility of abortion (while using Thomson as a starting place as many do in the literature). Being a Virtue Ethicist, or at least identifying more closely with VE than to other ethical approaches, I’ve concluded that to choose an abortion over other courses of action (if you’re a Virtue Ethicist) is to make a wong decision. The decision to abort when other viable options are available cannot be supported by the theory, at least in most cases of abortion.
Now, personhood debates get a bit dicey. Whatever characteristics are needed for a thing to be a “person” never includes all of beings that many think have moral value, or, include far too many things. With that said, I’ve done a lot of research on different personhood arguments in the past but I haven’t come across the book you’ve linked. Thanks for the suggestion.
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Bob
June 10, 2012
Wasn’t personhood of fundamental importance for Aristotle, the father of Virtue Ethics? And the circle of persons for him was restricted to male, Greek, landowners…
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Justin Caouette
June 10, 2012
It may have been fundamental, though I’m not an ancient scholar and can’t confirm. Yes, Aristotle did not think highly of women, but one need not adopt his entire ethical view in order to take on his fundamental concepts and virtues as a starting place for an ethical theory. His conception of a flourishing life and the virtue model is just as easily applied to women as to men, even if HE couldn’t see that. Aristotle was clearly wrong with regards to women and lots of other stuff..
It still misses the entire point of my initial post though. I’ll re-post here to remind you of the purpose; “If one thinks that the fetus is not deserving of moral consideration or does not have any moral worth that’s one thing and a very different sort of debate, but, if we make the assumption that Judith Jarvis Thompson does in her seminal work “A Defense of Abortion” and assume the fetus is a person, or that the fetus ought to be morally considered (for the sake of argument) then when can the Virtue Ethicist claim that aborting the fetus is the right action when other options like adoption or parenting the child yourself are available? What Virtues would be adhered to in order to claim that abortion is the right choose when compared to competing alternatives?”
So, sure, you can bring in Aristotle’s warped conception of what it means to be a person and I’ll deny that on grounds that it doesn’t capture all of the cases where we think one has moral value. This isn’t, however, a denial of Arstotle’s Virtue Ethics per say, only an argument against his concept of a person. SO, as it stands, we’re back to the initial question. How can a virtue ethicist of TODAY who doesn’t adopt Aristotle’s nonsensical concept of a person (only men, etc.) deal with the case of abortion when other viable options are available? To this end, I don’t think a discussion of person hood will help ESPECIALLY WHEN WE’VE STIPULATED THOMSON’S POSITION that they are…
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Bob
June 10, 2012
“Yes, Aristotle thought highly of only women…” – you must be having me on here. Women, slaves, barbarians (=non-Greeks) were not in the set of moral agents for Aristotle. In fact that moral blindness is such a sad comment on his moral theory. It seems to me that personhood is the best way to draw the parameters of the set of moral agents. Women are in! Non-Greeks are in! Zygotes are not!
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Justin Caouette
June 10, 2012
I meant Aristotle didn’t think highly of women.
Yes, I’m aware of who is not and who is in HIS set of moral agents. But, I’d love to hear an argument for why I cannot deny that he is wrong about who counts as a moral agent while still accepting his moral theory? How am I forced to accept his views on moral agents if I adopt his virtue framework? I’ll answer for you – I’m not! I can easily account for women, non-greeks, etc. while adhering to his virtue framework. So, I’m not sure what you’re getting at here.
If personhood is the “best way to draw the parameters of the set of moral agents” then prove it, or at least give an argument for it. Simply stating your opinion doesn’t suffice to show why it’s the “best way” to draw parameters. Again, I’ve researched such arguments and don’t find any of them compelling–at all. Enlighten me.
Since you claimed personhood is the best approach, let’s discuss it. What is a person? Let’s read your criteria. I think that you’ll be forced to grant that a majority of animals are people or that babies aren’t. This is somewhat off topic from the initial post but I guess I should expect things to get off topic quickly when discussing abortion. So, let’s switch gears. What is a person?
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simian
June 15, 2012
Interesting discussion, much of which relies on perspective and assumption. I don’t think that the picture is complete without taking into account a spiritual and multicultural perspective. Once one goes deep enough, man made laws can only really be viewed as subjective and nothing more than agreements and consensus. The question is who has the right to decide? The only appropriate answer is ‘no one’.
The other issue is when does a soul enter into a body? and does an inanimate body constitute a person? What about karmic blueprints and sacred contracts?
It is impossible to rationalise this subject from a human perspective because we do not have all the answers. I recommend a book by Chinua Achebe called “Things Fall Apart”.
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Justin Caouette
June 15, 2012
Thanks for the response, simian.
I haven’t considered the legal aspect of things here. That’s a tough one.
Also, thanks for the lit suggestion.
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John Woodard: Crazy Like A Fox
June 29, 2012
Man… I must admit my ignorance and say I am lost. Metaethics must have shifted. What you are are calling “Virtue ethicists” I would have called a “Situation ethicist.” My understanding of Virtue Ethics was first based on a definable action that was, in itself, virtuous despite the circumstance.
If I am just too stupid to talk to, just tell me to leave. LOL
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John Woodard: Crazy Like A Fox
June 29, 2012
I do, agree, though, that what I would call a Virtue ethicist does not have the option of abortion after having acknowledged personhood.
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larryzb
July 6, 2012
Hey Justin,
Not much of a philosopher here, but more of a social critic.
The Aristotlean view of human reproduction (erroneously) postulated that there was a fully formed human being in the seminal fluid. We now know how human reproduction really works. The egg is fertilized by a sperm cell and conception takes place.
Modern science informs us that human life begins at conception. Abortion is a terrible tragedy, and I know that many women are under emotional stress and even under pressure to abort during a crisis pregnancy. But, a human life is snuffed out in each abortion.
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Justin Caouette
November 20, 2012
That all depends on what you mean by “fully formed human being”. I am sympathetic to most critiques of Aristotle’s science and his views on woman and slaves. However, is a baby a fully formed human being? How about a Toddler?
Regardless, I agree that human life is snuffed out each time an abortion is done. But, I don’t think that all human life has equal value. With that said, I do think nearly all human life has enough value that we ought to prevent practices like abortion from occurring, to a degree.
Thanks for chiming in.
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T.M. Mulligan
November 19, 2012
While I am by no means an ethicist or philosopher, I do think I’m a thinker, not a linear thinker, but rather a pandemic thinker. Your initial post weighed in quite heavily for the fetus and questioned its termination based upon differing philosophical arguments. Ethical and philosophical discussions certainly hold importance as they may lead to a new conclusion which can be dispersed to others embroiled in a similar quandry. But to a pandemic thinker the issue insists on the inclusion of others: mother, father, religious leader, doctor, clinician, social worker, gossip columnist, etc. In my opinion, if you cordon off the arguments of those impacted by the dilemma, you’re asking an academic question and will receive humanly emotional academic answers. Similar to a board game. If you substitute mother for fetus and ask the same question I think you’ll receive wholly humanistic answers; the question is about choice and reasoning when posed to the mother; when posed to the fetus who lacks reasoning, choice and speech then others (tinted by their humanly emotional opinion) respond on behalf of, or because they believe in, which skews your initial question entirely. I was told that what makes us human and different than, say, dogs or animals, is that we possess reasoning. If indeed that is true, then a fetus can’t be human. Alive? Maybe. Human? Maybe not.
P.S. Thanks for checking out my blog (becomingnotbecame.org). You’ve got a wonderfully intelligent blog.
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Justin Caouette
November 20, 2012
Thanks for the kinds words, Mulligan.
The great thing about these topics is that being a philosopher or ethicist is not a prerequisite to have a take on the issue. I only have a brief response.
I was not aiming to take on the question of whether abortion was moral or immoral generally speaking. I was focused on a particular argument and one particular ethical stance; the argument by Judith Jarvis Thompson and a virtue ethical stance. I did that because she claims that abortion is permissible EVEN IF the fetus is a person, and if we grant that point I wanted to consider how the virtue ethicist could respond. As I stated, I don’t think they could claim that abortion is permissible in most cases.
Now, the considerations you raise are very well connected to abortion in general but they are not salient for the specific argument I was giving. I was assuming a particular view of the fetus, mainly, that it is a person. I did this not because I necessarily think that it is, rather, I was trying to see if the virtue ethicist could allow for abortion if they took that as a given as Thompson did.
In other words, those that find Thompson’s argument persuasive could not be a virtue ethicist at the same time. My argument is focused on the scope of Thompson’s argument; which sorts of ethicists could adopt her claims without being inconsistent. It was not intended to be a deep discussion about the considerations that you have mentioned, as interesting as they are. That discussion will have to wait for a later post 🙂
Thanks again for chiming in. Feel free to dig in on any of my posts.
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Brett
November 19, 2012
An interesting post. I tend to agree with your argument. I’ll have to think about it more. I must admit, I’d need to read more about virtue ethics. Have a nice night.
Cheers,
Brett
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MandaPanda
March 8, 2013
What virtues would be considered as a means to allow or disallow abortion I think would be substantial here!! I do agree any virtuous person wouldn’t make abortion permissable, however the actual virtues are more important. I believe any virtuous person would assume the responsibility of their actions or would be responsible enough not to get into the situation in the first place… They would have to make some sacrafices and have compassion for the unborn child. Any further ideas as to what virtues to act by in this case are welcomed.
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Justin Caouette
June 7, 2013
The virtue at play in any decision will depend on the particular person involved as well as the particular circumstances.
Though, generally speaking, courage, humility, compassion, and prudence all seem like virtues that could be at play. Justice is also one that seems pertinent here, especially in cases that do not involve rape or if the mothers life is not in jeopardy.
Robert Roberts has done some excellent work on particular virtues and how to tell which ones are at play.
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cindie
June 6, 2013
so i got a question
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cindie
June 6, 2013
why hursthouse thinks that a virtue theorist will not be overly concerned with whether or not women have a right to an abortion ? why Hursthouse thinks that a virtue theorist will not emphasize the question of whether or not a fetus is a person?
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Justin Caouette
June 7, 2013
@ Cindie: Hursthouse doesn’t take a stand on whether or not the fetus is a person. I suppose a virtue theorist could say that it is not a person. I’m more concerned with the argument put forth by Judith Jarvis Thompson.
Judith Jarvis Thompson has argued that even if it is a person it is still morally permissible to have an abortion. So, I have tried to couch the discussion there under the assumptions made by Thompson. And, if we assume as Thompson does then I do not think the theory of right action put forth by Hursthouse, and most virtue ethicists, can claim that abortion is permissible. If they can claim it as a permissible option it will only be in very rare cases, if at all.
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Matt Bainbridge
November 6, 2013
I think you are right here Justin. It doesn’t seem that the VE can claim that a virtuous person would abort the baby if we have already accepted that the baby’s life is of significant moral value. But obviously the question of when the life actually becomes of moral value still matters and in cases) where the fetus could be aborted prior to conciousness (at least that’s where i draw my line the VE can still do so.
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Lage
September 29, 2015
“Now, let us consider the case of pregnancy. When considering if one should abort or keep their child, and, under the guise of the above mentioned framework, when would abortion be the “right action” when compared to alternative actions?”
Not long ago, I wrote a post titled “Why I Became a Pro-Choice Advocate” (https://lagevondissen.wordpress.com/2015/08/10/why-i-became-a-pro-choice-advocate/), so this topic sparked my attention and I felt like commenting on this older post of yours. I would argue that within Virtue Ethics, abortion could be seen as the right action for a number of reasons. First, if we consider and grant the argument from bodily autonomy, then it is clear that a woman would have the right to abort her pregnancy since she has no obligation to donate her body to another human being. That is, this allows us to grant equal rights to all human beings, rather than granting special rights to fetuses such that they alone can violate their mother’s right to bodily autonomy. So protecting equal rights for all human beings could be seen as a virtue in itself (which requires work and isn’t by any means going to be the easiest approach, nor is it a position that would inevitably result from consequentialism). One could argue that a woman’s right to choose is supported by and an execution of the virtues of compassion and reasonableness (to name a few), since that woman may realize that the circumstances she is in and the resources she has available will not provide a happy and satisfying life for the unwanted child. Will the environment the child is raised in, if the woman isn’t allowed to abort, be an environment that is conducive to fostering the child’s own virtues? This is sort of a meta-virtue-ethicist argument. Also, one can’t divorce the issue from consequentialism since both come into play here, but nevertheless, there seem to be virtues involved in many of these instances.
“If one thinks that the fetus is not deserving of moral consideration or does not have any moral worth that’s one thing and a very different sort of debate…What Virtues would be adhered to in order to claim that abortion is the right choose when compared to competing alternatives”
Though I don’t think it is reasonable to grant a fetus the status of personhood since they don’t have a personality or conscious experience to value yet (that is, not until at least 4 or 5+ months in gestation, when consciousness forms via a cerebral cortex, the thalamo-cortical complex, etc.), but even if we grant that personhood status was legitimate and that the fetus has moral worth, the argument for bodily autonomy would still apply and protect equal rights to both the mother and fetus, thus allowing the mother to refuse to donate her body to that fetus. The virtues of compassion and reasonableness could incline the mother to abort the pregnancy.
Though similar to a consequentialist viewpoint which would determine whether a pregnancy should proceed or not based on the knowledge of the consequences of such actions (to the mother, the fetus, society, etc.), thus producing some number of abortions and some pregnancies carried to term, the virtue ethicist framework would approach the issue of the being or character of the person doing the behavior. In this case, a person may be exercising honesty by aborting the pregnancy since they don’t want to carry the child to term, even though it may be in their best interest to lie and tell others that they really want to have the child and then not abort to accommodate such a lie. As stated before, a person may be compassionate for the hypothetical feelings/experiences of the future child thus inclining them to abort, with this virtue being a mean between cruelty (aborting just for the hell of it) and complete self-sacrifice (carrying the baby to term no matter if it destroys the mother’s life entirely). A person may be exercising virtues such as courage and wisdom by aborting despite their fear of the stigma or social rejection of others by doing so and/or despite their emotional attachment or disposition to the fetus — thus overcoming the impetus of one’s own emotional reactions by implementing reason instead.
Obviously this comes to down to what we define as virtues and their interplay with consequentialism and/or the knowledge of the consequences of our actions (which is integrally required for the virtue of wisdom to even be a possibility for example), etc. An interesting topic!
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Spurge
November 23, 2015
Doing a case study for my class….wanted to know if it made sense or I’m on the wrong path.
If there is a 20 year old, in college, on a scholarship, got violently raped. Went to the doctor and was told that she is pregnant, but has a lot of trauma, so if she were to have this child, there is a 90% chance that this child would have permanent health issues and she may be at risk giving birth to the child.
She decides to have an abortion based on the fact that she does not want to cause her child to suffer if she gives birth to it.
now i’m thinking with the notion that VE does not look particularly at the duty or rules, consequences or whether the person’s intention is “right”, but it looks at if the person is acting with good character or moral virtues.
(ou on a limb with this idea, so can you guys let me know if I am correct with my thinking, or if I need to scratch it completely.)
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amflux
November 20, 2016
Hey Spurge,
Been a year since your comment but I guess time is relative lol so I’ll feel free and pitch in a response to your post.
Aristotle is pro-abortion. In book VII of the Politics, he writes:
“As to exposing or rearing the children born, let there be a law that no deformed child shall be reared; but on the ground of number of children, if the regular customs hinder any of those born being exposed, there must be a limit fixed to the procreation of offspring, and if any people have a child as a result of intercourse in contravention of these regulations, abortion must be practised on it before it has developed sensation and life; for the line between lawful and unlawful abortion will be marked by the fact of having sensation and being alive.”
That’s it.
Although VE does not consider what virtue is to be found in abortion, we can infer based on Aristotle’s view that somewhere along the lines he would find a justification, be it that the mean is relative to the doctor, or the mother, or the child. Hope that helps.
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redapemusic
November 9, 2016
Hi Lage,
I noticed that no one has responded to you yet so I thought that I would try.
First I wanted to respond to your argument for autonomy. I think that the concern for virtue ethicists, is not necessarily what rights someone has, but rather what they “should” do when confronted with certain situations? Someone might see a burning house. We might not think that they have any obligation to rush into the house and save its occupants; however, they might be virtuous for doing so. I do not think that many virtue ethicists speak of obligation and rights as fundamentally important, though a virtuous person in some instances might support the rights of another. It is not necessarily the case that they will always be concerned with acting on their own rights.
You mention that a virtuous person might care about protecting the rights of all human beings. Well, if we grant that the fetus is a human being, then the virtuous person would care about protecting its right to life. If that involves donating their time, even if for 9 months, then that person would do so.
One of the more controversial statements made by Aristotle might be that only certain individuals have even the option of being virtuous. He considers that there are certain environmental factors that come into play in whether an agent is virtuous. These include such things as education, wealth, free birth etc. Largely, this might be why he considered that only Greek male citizens could be virtuous. At this time, it was only these individuals that were considered capable of making free choices. Women were considered subject to father’s/husband’s authority. Same as with slaves. Non-Greeks were not allowed to participate in Greek politics and therefore were considered incapable of self rule as democracy is in a way a system of self governance. Self rule was considered necessary by Aristotle in order to be the author of one’s decisions.
Therefore, if the subject of whether or not to abort hinges on certain environmental factors relevant to the potential action, such as income and welfare of the parent, then Aristotle might not consider this agent to be self governing and therefore not free because their motivations are not solely the source of their judgments.
Now granted, we would not want to say that the poor lack freedom of choice which might be implicated by the above theory. However, if we compare the choices of a person who does not have extremely influential financial concerns, and another whose choices are free of these same concerns, it might seem that this other person does possess a certain degree of freedom that the other lacks. Therefore, the question of whether a virtuous person would terminate a pregnancy out of fear that she would not be able to provide a certain form of life might mean that this person is not virtuous. But this is solely due to the fact that the person is not capable of acting virtuously.
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soleilcrispin
December 12, 2016
Virtue ethics focuses on the virtuous characteristics of a person, and how these characteristics make a person virtuous. A virtuous characteristic, when looking at the case of abortion, is incontrovertibly complex. Rosalind Hurshouse argues in “Virtue Theory and Abortion” that the status of the fetus, as well as the rights of the woman who is pregnant, is irrelevant, which is ironic seeming abortion is usually revolved around these two exact topics. But she holds that the moral status of the fetus is not the question, it is whether or not a woman chooses to have an abortion is an action a virtuous person would commit. This is apparently the reason why rights of the woman is also irrelevant- in exercising rights, one can still act from vice.
So yes, while, if a woman is 6 months pregnant, and she decides to get an abortion, then she is essentially preventing a child from potentially being born. But does this entail that a vice is being committed by simply using ones right? This only furthers Hurthouse’s point that rights are irrelevant to whether or not having an abortion makes someone virtuous, and although I disagree, I will stay on track here with Justin’s main discussion question: Is having an abortion, simply by choice of not wanting to give potential birth to a baby, a vice? If I get pregnant, and get an abortion in a few months, am I not acting as a virtuous person would act? This is where I disagrees with Hurtshouse that the status of the fetus is irrelevant.
She claims that there is no place for technical knowledge in virtue ethics, but this is implausible. Pregnancy and abortion is, if anything, based on science, and it would obviously make more sense to understand as much as one could on the technical details that initially instigate these issues. Clearly, if abortion is what so many people seem to relate it to, that is the killing of a person, then there would be no argument. Abortion would, by definition, be a vice, like murder of an innocent person. This is why the moral status of the fetus is in fact relevant, and why science is essential to the issue. By using a thought experiment, we can perhaps defend that the idea of “life at conception” is mistaken. It goes like this: Imagine you dig a hole, and plant a tree seed. The next day you return to the hole and remove the seed. Did you cut down a tree, or did you stop the seeds’ potentiality of being a tree? Clearly not the first.
This very potentiality of life is not something that is rare with pregnancy- attachment and detachment of the egg (once it is fertilized) happens all the time. Removing the seed once it has touched the soil is not the same as cutting down a tree. Like the egg, removing it on purpose once it has attached to the wall is not the same as committing an immoral act of murder. Perhaps then, asking whether or not a virtuous person would get an abortion is not the right question. If getting an abortion is not the same as murdering an innocent person, thus not a vice, then must it be a virtue? Additionally, if getting an abortion does not make someone virtuous, does it necessarily follow that they are not virtuous?
Although a tree and a human are not at all the same, they both possess the aspect of potentiality, and this is where the evaluation of virtuous character comes in. Naturally, our bodies reject fertilized eggs all the time. Life does not happen at conception, just as a tree does not sprout the moment it is watered. This is also where virtue ethics, in my opinion, fails. Abortion is a choice the mind makes for the body when the body is unable to naturally make this decision. Potentiality is constantly being refrained inside of women after intercourse, so to say that it is a vice in rationally instigating this prevention is ultimately counterproductive.
When it comes to abortion, we should not listen to the virtue ethicist. We must consider what is fact and what is conception, and in many cases, misconception.
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