Abortion, the Golden Rule, and the Indeterminacy of Potential Persons

Abstract

R.M. Hare and Harry Gensler have each argued that abortion is usually morally wrong because it violates a certain version of the golden rule. The appeal to the golden rule is intended to avoid difficult metaphysical issues such as whether or not a fetus is a person and the moral status of potential persons, any answers to which are likely to be question begging. By applying a certain version of the golden rule to the abortion issue it is hoped that we can come to some conclusion regarding the morality of abortion without dealing with such intractable questions. It also has strong intuitive appeal and is a popular device among anti-abortion activists. Some objections have been raised against this approach, but for the most part this argument has been unduly neglected. The golden rule approach can withstand the objections better than the critics realize and, properly interpreted, the golden rule presents a formidable challenge to the moral acceptability of abortion. Nevertheless, this golden rule argument fails. After considering a version of the golden rule argument against abortion and defending it against the most common objections, we will see why it ultimately fails. There are two important reasons why we should reconsider the golden rule approach to the abortion issue even though it ultimately fails. First, many of the objections raised against the golden rule approach to abortion are aimed at the golden rule itself and its adequacy in assessing or critiquing moral judgments. But the golden rule itself is not the problem and should not be rejected. The problem is with applying the golden rule to a potential person from the perspective of the actual person it is to become. The identity of the potential person is indeterminate. It is potentially a range of different actual future persons. This indeterminacy of potential persons is the second reason why it is important to re-examine the golden rule argument against abortion.