Responding to Arguments for Same Sex Marriage: An Interview with Dr. Michael Brown

Should the unborn be given the benefit of the doubt?

Among Embryologists and other scientific specialists with no vested interest in abortion there is no controversy about when human life begins, it is unanimously at conception. Some critics argue that the unborn are not human beings whilst others grant their humanity but argue that the unborn ought to only be granted human rights when they acquire a particular function. That may be the ability to feel pain, experience self-awareness or any number of different abilities. The problem with this is that every acquired characteristic is just a subjective line in the sand, and it could just as persuasively be argued that a working renal system or eyes are the points at which we grant the unborn human rights. There is no particular function that suddenly bestows value upon the unborn, and to present this as the case is not an argument but rather an assertion. Moral consistency dictates that either we have human rights in virtue of being human beings or we don’t, not because of an acquired function at some arbitrary moment. This means that if the unborn are humans then they warrant the human right to not be intentionally killed. If the unborn isn’t human then we are left with a strange question. How exactly can human parents produce offspring that isn’t human but later becomes so?