Counterfactual Persons and the Wrongness of Abortion
Ryan Kulesa, PhD student and Alok Tiwari, PhD student, University of Missouri, Columbia
General accounts concerning the wrongness of killing surrounding the abortion debate seem to run afoul of either of the following two considerations:
EMBRYO: Ceteris paribus, an account of the wrongness of killing ought not entail the impermissibility of killing unplanted embryos.
INFANTICIDE: Ceteris paribus, an account of the wrongness of killing ought not entail the permissibility of killing infants.
Take EMBRYO. Many views (e.g., future-like-ours (Marquis 1989), actual future principle (Harman 2000) and substance views (Pruss 2011) entail that it is impermissible to kill human embryos in embryo rescues cases. The basic problem is a dilemma: who do you save, an embryo or an unconscious girl?
Take INFANTICIDE. Many other views about the wrongness of killing (McMahan 2001; Giubilini and Minerva 2014) cannot allow for the permissibility of abortion without the permissibility of infanticide.
In this paper, we argue that a satisfactory account concerning the wrongness of killing must avoid both these problems. We present an argument from counterfactual personhood which achieves just that. In short, what makes it wrong to kill someone is that they are a counterfactual person; a counterfactual person is an individual that, if killed by some external threat, had they not been killed, then they would have been persons. We supplement our view with truth conditions for counterfactuals using Lewis’ (1973) account.
We argue that this is the correct account of the wrongness of killing because of its explanatory power. Our view has the benefits of Marquis’ and Pruss’ view in that we can explain why it is wrong to kill current persons. Our view, further, avoids the pitfalls of embryo rescues cases and infanticide cases because infants are counterfactual people and embryos in the rescue scenarios are not. How? Because an infant is an individual such that, if he is killed, had he not been killed, he would have been a person. Infants, therefore, are what we call C-people. On the other hand, the embryos created through IVF are not c-people because, given Lewisian truth conditions for counterfactuals, it is false to say that, if they were killed, had they not been killed, they would have been persons.
EMBRYO: Ceteris paribus, an account of the wrongness of killing ought not entail the impermissibility of killing unplanted embryos.
INFANTICIDE: Ceteris paribus, an account of the wrongness of killing ought not entail the permissibility of killing infants.
Take EMBRYO. Many views (e.g., future-like-ours (Marquis 1989), actual future principle (Harman 2000) and substance views (Pruss 2011) entail that it is impermissible to kill human embryos in embryo rescues cases. The basic problem is a dilemma: who do you save, an embryo or an unconscious girl?
Take INFANTICIDE. Many other views about the wrongness of killing (McMahan 2001; Giubilini and Minerva 2014) cannot allow for the permissibility of abortion without the permissibility of infanticide.
In this paper, we argue that a satisfactory account concerning the wrongness of killing must avoid both these problems. We present an argument from counterfactual personhood which achieves just that. In short, what makes it wrong to kill someone is that they are a counterfactual person; a counterfactual person is an individual that, if killed by some external threat, had they not been killed, then they would have been persons. We supplement our view with truth conditions for counterfactuals using Lewis’ (1973) account.
We argue that this is the correct account of the wrongness of killing because of its explanatory power. Our view has the benefits of Marquis’ and Pruss’ view in that we can explain why it is wrong to kill current persons. Our view, further, avoids the pitfalls of embryo rescues cases and infanticide cases because infants are counterfactual people and embryos in the rescue scenarios are not. How? Because an infant is an individual such that, if he is killed, had he not been killed, he would have been a person. Infants, therefore, are what we call C-people. On the other hand, the embryos created through IVF are not c-people because, given Lewisian truth conditions for counterfactuals, it is false to say that, if they were killed, had they not been killed, they would have been persons.