Resolved: Abortion should stay legal in the U.S.A.

However, I am pleased that he has read the Journal of Philosophy. As have I, and I will refute his first contention by refuting the whole of Marquis's case. Refutation 1First off, Marquis explicitly makes the assumption that 'whether or not abortion is morally permissible stands or falls on whether or not a fetus is the sort of being whose life it is wrong to end'. There are two issues that arise from his claim:1. Is as fetus the sort of thing that has rights or obligations?2. Are the rights or obligations prima facie or absolute? Marquis's claims conflate the two, and assumes they both are absolute. However, this assumption is presented without argument and is both philosophically and politically irresponsible. It is as if the fetus is growing on a tree, and the question of abortion is whether or not to allow it to come to fruition. The question of abortion involves at least two lives and a quite compelling amount of rights on the woman carrying the fetus, whatever we decide about the status of the fetus. In which, to ignore these rights would be about the same as considering the moral permissibility of killing an adult human without considering the justification of self-defense. If no other moral considerations or countervailing rights were allowed to be figured into moral judgment, then the criterion on which Marquis claimed that abortion is impermissible, since having a 'future like ours' would also rule out killing in self-defense. He makes no exceptions, therefore it would be consistent with his logic to say that killing in the name of self-defense is immoral. Next i'll move on with his list of authors. The claims he made their arguments are false. They all take the rights of the pregnant women into consideration, and find cases where abortion is morally permissible. For example lets take a quote by Marry Ann Warren:"The immorality of abortion is no more demonstrated by the humanity of the fetus, in itself, than the immorality of killing in self-defense is demonstrated by the fact that the assailant is a human being" [1]. The authors that Marquis listed can be put into two groups:1. Those who argue that abortions are permissible because the fetus is not a sort of being whose life it is wrong to end.2. Those who argue that abortions are impermissible in most (but not all) cases because the fetus is such a being. Obviously there is a logical mistake to infer from: (A) Since it isn't wrong to end it, then abortion is permissible. (B) being the opposite of (A). The writers in the first group hold (A), but they make no claims like (B). That is, these writers merely claim that the fetus's lack of personhood is a sufficient, though not necessary, condition for abortion to be morally permissible. Marquis's phrase 'stands or falls' requires it to be both a necessary and sufficient condition on the permissibility of abortion. While in the second group, both deny (A) but still say it is permissible in cases where the woman's life is in danger and in cases of rape. Even if we might ultimately agree that the fetus is the sort of thing whose killing is so morally wrong as to overwhelm completely a woman's rights to privacy, health, medical care, and even life, the point surely needs argument. Nothing that has been said in the abortion debate to date has come close to settling this issue against the woman. So at most Marquis can claim to have shown "Why Abortion is Killing a Being-Like-Us. " When one recalls that persons may legitimately be killed for many reasons, this title has not the same moral urgency of Marquis's. (This argument was argued by Ann E. Cudd of the University of Kansas) [2]Refutation 2As for my opponents second contention, I will refute it with three realities:1. The first being a woman's right to self-ownership (meaning she has full dominion over her body).2. The second being that my opponent's argument like his first does not consider the rights of the woman.3. The fetus is not innocent. My opponent is committing what is often refered to as the 'fetus focus fallacy'. While, the fetus may be human, a person, or have the potental, the mother still has soul dominion over her body so if she does not want something whether it is a human fetus or adult, she has the right to remove it. Furthermore, I will state that if the fetus is in woman's womb without consent and is causing her to get sick, and is causing her to lose her job and respect, then the fetus is not innocent, it is a parasite. Refutation 3I have supplied numerious reasons keep abortion legal. Therefore, it is up to my opponent and I to rebuttal are cases and settle it now. I will argue further in the next round, but until then I thank my opponent and the voters for reading. I will now hand it over to con. [1]"On the Moral and Legal Status of Abortion by Mary Ann Warren,"The Monist, LVII, 1(1973): 43-61 (46). [2] . http://kuscholarworks.ku.edu...