Peter Singer's Theory About Abortion

Abortion is one of the most controversial questions in life ethics .Firstly it involves the understanding of human life' essence and value :Is a human fetus a human being?what is the moral status of a human fetus ?Secondly there are two different views of abortion in West traditional culture:one view from religion is that human life begins at the moment of pregnant,abortion disobeys God's will,so it is wrong to abort;The other view is that since the Enlightenment, "nature right" has deeply influenced people's concept ,The feminist argue that a woman has a right to choose whether to abort or not ,they are favor of abortion.Besides,law has also joined in the discussion of abortion ,the question of abortion becomes more and more complex and controversial.There are many discussions to the topic of abortion,Singer is also very interested in this topic and he has his own unique opinion of it.He firstly criticizs many arguments about abortion,such as the opposition of abortion :" the sanctity of human life" and "potential life",the support of abortion: the feminism and the consequenlism.He points out that all of them are dubitable and obvious unreasonable.Based on these above,Singer starts to put forward a new viewpoint about abortion and give an explicit answer to this "ethical difficulity" just as many people think.His theory about abortion is based on the principle of equality and utilitarianism.He thinks "member of the species homo sapiens"differs from "person"."member of the species homo sapiens" can be determined scientifically,by an examination of the nature of the choromosomes in the cells of living organisms."person" is a being who has rationality and can self-control.He proves that when a human fetus doesn't have any sentience,there is not any ethical evidence of which abortion is wrong;when a human fetus has had sentience,it should be taken into consideration,but this consideration is as the same as people'consideration into animals;human fetus is not a person,so abortion is not as serious as murder .In a word ,Singer is favor of abortion .His theory about abortion is rationalism,utilitarianism and is not anthropocentrism.As soon as Singer raises his argument,many people begin to criticize it :the basis of Singer's theory about abortion is skeptical and his theory tramps on human's dignity. Singer has refuted these criticisms,which defends his theory well.Singer's theory about abortion is very helpful for us to ponder Chinese abortion.Now Chinese population policy is family planning,abortion is a means as remedial treatment when people are failed to contracept .But a lot of people are against this policy ,they think family planning infringes poeple's basic rights and makes light of people's life .Singer's theory just refutes these viewpoints and it can provide proof for the rationality of Chinese family planning from ethical angle. Above all,we can profit a lot from Singer's theory about abortion when we are pondering the question of abortion.