Note: The ethical judgments on this page refer exclusively to the action — never to the person who performs it. Every person possesses inalienable dignity, regardless of what they do or have done. Cf. Note on ethical judgments (German).
Abortion is the intentional killing of the human person in the prenatal phase. The person exists from conception onward — grounded in the second basal relation (bR2) and the First Dimension of personhood. Abortion is therefore directed against a being that is already, in the full sense, someone and not merely something.
The personal-ontological assessment of abortion follows from several fundamental insights of the dissertation. First, personhood is not a supervening property bound to particular developmental stages. It is the autonomous essence of the human being itself. The embryo is not a “becoming person,” but a person who is developing. The principle agere sequitur esse states: acting follows being, not the reverse.
Second, abortion violates the right to biological life. This right belongs to the person as a person and does not depend on recognition by others.
Abortion is a form of practical oblivion of the person. It overlooks or denies the personhood of the unborn human being. Consciously or unconsciously, it presupposes an empirical-functionalist concept of person that ties personhood to particular faculties or a particular developmental stage. From the perspective of the substance-ontological concept of person, this presupposition is untenable. The person is substance, not function.
As an intrinsically evil act (intrinsece malum), abortion cannot be justified by circumstances or intentions. This does not mean that the subjective guilt of the acting persons is being judged. The ontology distinguishes strictly between the moral assessment of the action and the inviolable dignity of the acting person. The Personalist Norm holds for all involved: for the unborn child as well as for the mother and all other persons involved.
The connection with artificial fertilization is ontologically significant. Procedures of reproductive medicine frequently produce supernumerary embryos, which are discarded or cryopreserved. Both are actions that fail to recognize the personhood of the embryo.
Ontological classification
Superordinate concepts: Intrinsically Evil Act, Practical Oblivion of the Person
Ontological relations:
- violates: Personalist Norm, right to life
- fails to recognize: personhood of the embryo
- presupposes (implicitly): empirical-functionalist concept of person
Chapter assignment: Chapter 5: Oblivion of the Person (German)
Sources: Generated by querying the Personhood ontology.
Further sources:
- Singer, Peter (1979/1993): Practical Ethics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press (advocates the functionalist concept of person that justifies abortion — critically discussed in the dissertation).