Chaffer Tomer Jordi
Division of Experimental Medicine, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada.
Bioethics. 2023 May;37(4):367-373. doi: 10.1111/bioe.13137. Epub 2023 Feb 11.
Don Marquis' future-like-ours account is regarded as the best secular anti-abortion position because he frames abortion as a wrongful killing via deprivation of a valuable future. Marquis objects to the reductio ad absurdum of contraception as being immoral because it is too difficult to identify an individual that is deprived of a future. To demonstrate why Marquis' treatment of the contraception reductio is flawed by his own future-like-ours line of reasoning, I offer an argument for why there is indeed a candidate for harm-the ovum-for it can be viewed as providing the functional foundation for a new life through (1) mitochondrial DNA inheritance, (2) paternal histone restructuring during fertilization, and (3) ability to initiate parthenogenesis. As evidenced by these distinct and natural features of ova, candidate (2) "some ovum or other" should be morally prioritized as the direct candidate for harm in the contraception reductio. By assessing the philosophical inconsistencies in Marquis' future-like-ours argument, this paper provides strong metaphysical grounds for rejecting the best secular anti-abortion position.
唐·马奎斯的“未来像我们的”观点被视为最佳的世俗反堕胎立场，因为他将堕胎视为通过剥夺有价值的未来而进行的错误杀戮。马奎斯反对将避孕归为不道德的归谬法，因为很难确定一个被剥夺未来的个体。为了证明为什么马奎斯对避孕归谬法的处理因他自己的“未来像我们的”推理思路而存在缺陷，我提出一个论点，即为什么确实存在一个可能受到伤害的对象——卵子——因为它可以被视为通过以下方式为新生命提供功能基础：（1）线粒体DNA遗传，（2）受精过程中父本组蛋白重组，以及（3）启动孤雌生殖的能力。卵子的这些独特而自然的特征表明，在避孕归谬法中，候选对象（2）“某个卵子或其他卵子”应在道德上被优先视为直接的伤害候选对象。通过评估马奎斯“未来像我们的”论点中的哲学不一致性，本文为拒绝最佳的世俗反堕胎立场提供了强有力的形而上学依据。
