Medical Investigations

Key Terms

• Abortion: the deliberate termination of a human pregnancy
• Teleological :concerned with the end/purpose of an action, rather than the action itself
• Deontological: values an action in and of itself (intrinsically) 
  
• Absolutist: An approach that is always right or wrong, regardless of the situation
• Relativist: Nothing is intrinsically right or wrong, it depends on the situation

Key Quotes

• Don Marquis: “the loss of one’s life is one of the greatest losses a man can suffer”
• Ellen Willis: "can it be moral under any circumstances to make a woman bear child against her will" 

Other

• currently legal in the UK up to 24 weeks due to the 1990 Human Fertilisation Embryology Act

Key Terms

• The Sanctity of Life is the belief that human life is sacred and should be conserved
• Deontological

Key Quotes

• Genesis 9:6 "Whoever sheds the blood of man by man's blood shall be shed, for in the image of God has God made man"
  
• The Decalogue: "commit murder"
• Albert Schweitzer: "reverence for life" (1915)
  
• Jonathan Glover: life should not be a "necessary vehicle of consciousness" Causing Death and Saving Lives (1977)

Other:

• Strong and Weak SoL
• Influences Catholicism

Key Terms:

• Instrumental value

Key Quotes:

• "It would be immoral to bring it into the world if you have the choice." (In regards to Down's Syndrome) 

Key Terms:

• Personhood
• Quickening

Different Attitudes;

• Catholics: moment of conception
• Some scientists: quickening occurs at 14 weeks
• Gloria Albrecht: moral issue not a scientific one
• Peter Singer: rationality and self-consciousness 
• Could justify infanticide 

Key Terms:

• Strong Sanctity of Life

Key Quotes:

• Pope benedict XIII: "be promoters of life from its beginning to its natural end"

Other:

• Influenced law in Ireland, where a 21-year-old was given a three-moth suspended sentence for two years due to the use of an abortion pill.

Key Quotes:

• "The Church of England combines strong opposition to abortion with a recognition that there can be- strictly limited- conditions under which it may be preferable to any available alternative"

Aquinas' Influence:

• Natural Law
• Double Effect
  

Key Terms:

• Agape
• Personalism
• Relativism

Key Quotes:

• Joseph Fletcher: "the morality of an action depends on the situation" 1966 'Situation Ethics: The New Morality'

Other:

• Mental health is important too

Key Terms:

• Hedonism

Key Quotes:

Bentham: "Nature has placed mankind under two sovereign masters, pain and pleasure, it is for them to decide what we must do"- The Principles of Morals and Legislation' 1789

General:

Act= completely situationalist

Mill= general rules deduced should not be broken (strong rule)

Criticisms:

• Peter Vardy- we may not be competent judges
• We should use a universal approach like Kantian Ethics

Key Quotes:

Peter Singer: “to pull out a sprouting acorn is not the same as cutting down a venerable oak"

The rights of the mother should be considered more highly than the rights of the foetus. 

'The right to life' can be open to interpretation (mother or foetus?)

JJ Thompson:

• 1971- A Defence of Abortion
• Violinist analogy
• Under no duty or obligation to save the violinist

Ellen Willis:

• Villiage Voice 1985
• "Can it be moral under any circumstances to make a woman bear a child against her will?"