Although I’m surprised by many of these, the 37% who believe “A being becomes a person at birth” surprises me quite a lot. I can see how this could be an instinctive position to much of the general population, but I am genuinely interested in what the arguments are for this position. I understand arguments for fertilisation, sentience and viability being important junctures but I don’t understand birth.
Speaking only for myself, not co-authors: I think the concept of personhood has become highly politicized in the US, due largely to abortion laws that attempt to limit reproductive rights by conferring legal personhood on fetuses. Medical organizations have come out strongly against this, e.g.:
The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) opposes any proposals, laws, or policies that attempt to confer “personhood” to a fertilized egg, embryo, or fetus. These laws and policies are used to limit, restrict, or outright prohibit access to care for women and people seeking reproductive health care, including those who are pregnant, those who are trying to prevent pregnancy, and those who are trying to become pregnant, and they have been used as the basis of surveillance and prosecution of pregnant people.
Our results suggest that US bioethicists overwhelmingly believe that abortion is ethically permissible, and it’s thus possible that their responses to the “A being becomes a person...” question were influenced by their views on the permissibility of abortion and wariness about how concepts of personhood are being used to restrict access to reproductive care.
(Separately, you may also be interested in this recent paper.)
Thanks for the reply Leah! That’s interesting and your may will be right, although it doesn’t directly address the ethical reasoning. I would hope though bioethicists would look beyond this kind of approach you suggest might be happeninh
“it’s thus possible that their responses to the “A being becomes a person...” question were influenced by their views on the permissibility of abortion and wariness about how concepts of personhood are being used to restrict access to reproductive care.
Surely ethics as a field is better built from the ground up based on their take on the biology and philosophy here, not retrofitted to address a practical question like abortion rights?
One argument is that birth is a practical, unambiguously observable cutoff that approximates some more slippery criterion like self-awareness. Even if you believe that self-awareness is the morally relevant threshold on a theoretical level, you might say birth as your answer because you think that’s the best cutoff for society to use in practice.
Well, maybe less of an approximation and more of a safe lower bound. If I’m confident that the metaphysical criterion I’m concerned about begins sometime after birth but I’m not sure exactly when, I might suggest a legal threshold of birth to be on the safe side, as it might be infeasible and morally risky to evaluate individual infants on a case-by-case basis.
That makes sense. As a bit of a side question (feel free to ignore), if you were 99% sure that your metaphysical criterion was after birth, would that count as “on the safe side” enough to suggest a legal threshold of birth (and not before at all) for you? How confident would you have to be?
Although I’m surprised by many of these, the 37% who believe “A being becomes a person at birth” surprises me quite a lot. I can see how this could be an instinctive position to much of the general population, but I am genuinely interested in what the arguments are for this position. I understand arguments for fertilisation, sentience and viability being important junctures but I don’t understand birth.
Can anyone shed any light on this?
Speaking only for myself, not co-authors: I think the concept of personhood has become highly politicized in the US, due largely to abortion laws that attempt to limit reproductive rights by conferring legal personhood on fetuses. Medical organizations have come out strongly against this, e.g.:
Our results suggest that US bioethicists overwhelmingly believe that abortion is ethically permissible, and it’s thus possible that their responses to the “A being becomes a person...” question were influenced by their views on the permissibility of abortion and wariness about how concepts of personhood are being used to restrict access to reproductive care.
(Separately, you may also be interested in this recent paper.)
Thanks for the reply Leah! That’s interesting and your may will be right, although it doesn’t directly address the ethical reasoning. I would hope though bioethicists would look beyond this kind of approach you suggest might be happeninh
“it’s thus possible that their responses to the “A being becomes a person...” question were influenced by their views on the permissibility of abortion and wariness about how concepts of personhood are being used to restrict access to reproductive care.
Surely ethics as a field is better built from the ground up based on their take on the biology and philosophy here, not retrofitted to address a practical question like abortion rights?
One argument is that birth is a practical, unambiguously observable cutoff that approximates some more slippery criterion like self-awareness. Even if you believe that self-awareness is the morally relevant threshold on a theoretical level, you might say birth as your answer because you think that’s the best cutoff for society to use in practice.
Thanks CC that makes some sense, if “personhood” is interpreted legally or “practically” rather than as morally or metaphysically (which I prefer).
I don’t really agree though hat it “approximates” slippery criterion. I’m not sure why “birth” would be any kind of proxy for self-awareness.
Well, maybe less of an approximation and more of a safe lower bound. If I’m confident that the metaphysical criterion I’m concerned about begins sometime after birth but I’m not sure exactly when, I might suggest a legal threshold of birth to be on the safe side, as it might be infeasible and morally risky to evaluate individual infants on a case-by-case basis.
That makes sense. As a bit of a side question (feel free to ignore), if you were 99% sure that your metaphysical criterion was after birth, would that count as “on the safe side” enough to suggest a legal threshold of birth (and not before at all) for you? How confident would you have to be?