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Abortion and the Moral Significance of Merely Possible Persons

Part of the Philosophy and Medicine Book Series (volume 107)

DOI: 10.1007/978-90-481-3792-3

ISBN: 978-90-481-3791-6

Publisher: Springer Netherlands - Springer Journals

Feb 18, 2010

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Chapter 1Introduction

Roberts, Melinda A.

Pages: 1 –40

[1.1.1 I have two main goals in this book. The first is to give an account of the moral significance of merely possible persons – persons who, relative to a particular circumstance, or possible future or world, could but in fact never do exist. I call that account Variabilism. My second goal is...
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Chapter 2The Moral Significance of Merely Possible Persons

Roberts, Melinda A.

Pages: 41 –92

[2.1.1 It is a matter of dispute whether persons who count as existing or future, relative to a particular circumstance, or possible future or world, have a moral status that merely possible persons lack. Are persons who do or will exist the only persons who matter morally? Are they the only...
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Chapter 3The Abortion Paradox

Roberts, Melinda A.

Pages: 93 –119

[Jeff McMahan recently has argued that a comparison between the choice of abortion and the choice of prenatal injury followed by fetal survival, in combination with certain Pareto-inspired principles, leads to an interesting paradox. I will call it the Abortion Paradox.]
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Chapter 4Three More Arguments Against Early Abortion

Roberts, Melinda A.

Pages: 121 –143

[The main purpose of this chapter is to examine three arguments – from Hare, Marquis and Harman – that, whether by design or not, place the permissibility of the early abortion in doubt. Each of the three arguments is grounded in positions that seem to assign at least some moral significance to...
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Chapter 5Abortion and Variabilism

Roberts, Melinda A.

Pages: 145 –164

[In what follows, I argue for three claims. First, what I will call early abortion is ordinarily, and almost always in the case where it is what the pregnant woman wants, permissible. And that is so, whether she wants the early abortion for a good reason, a poor reason or no reason at all.]
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Chapter 6Conclusion

Roberts, Melinda A.

Pages: 165 –166

[Consider the choice not to bring a new person into existence. Suppose that choice creates additional wellbeing for some people but does not destroy wellbeing for any person who does or will exist. A plus for Variabilism is that it enables us to explain why that choice is permissible, or indeed...

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