Subhumans, human flourishing and abortion: a reply to Räsänen

J Med Ethics. 2023 Aug 22:jme-2023-109461. doi: 10.1136/jme-2023-109461. Online ahead of print.

Abstract

In a recent article, I argued that all humans are morally equal, and that this generates an argument against abortion. Here, I defend my argument against two objections from Räsänen: that it is possible to ground equal human value in the ability to flourish in a particular kind of way, and that being human is not, in fact, a binary property in the way needed for the argument to work. I show that this proposed criterion for grounding human value falls prey to my original argument, and that Räsänen's attempt to conceive of subhuman entities fails.

Keywords: Abortion - Induced; Embryos and Fetuses; Human Rights.