Natural Law: the issues arising from abortion

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  • Created by: gemshort
  • Created on: 26-04-18 19:09

One of the important issues surrounding abortion is the beginning of 'humanness'.

  • This is widely debated in philosophical, ethical and legal circles
  • Biologically speaking, the beginning of humanness is at conception; however, even the stage of conception is arguably vague

Changes in the law against abortion reflect the changes in attitude:

  • Abortion Act 1967: 'two doctors must agree that an abortion is necessary'
  • An abortion is deemed necessary if the woman's physical health is threatened by having the baby or any existing children would be harmed mentally or physically by the woman having the baby, or if there is a high risk the baby will be handicapped

Peter Singer raises the issue of personhood when he writes: 'To kill a human adult is murder and is unhesitatingly and universally condemned. Yet there is no obvious sharp line which marks the zygote…

Comments

JeffThorsen777

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Thanks for interesting post! I think it's useful to know.

Jak4Walton

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Thanks for the informative post. The problem of abortion is being raised in many countries. I wrote an essay on this topic. I decided to try this page to learn more about the risks and consequences of abortion. In my essay, I really wanted to show the attitude to this process in many countries.

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