Criteria of Personhood
In response to whether fetuses can be said to be persons, Warren suggested the following criteria:
- Consciousness (of objects and events external and/or internal to the being), and in particular the capacity to feel pain;
- Reasoning (the developed capacity to solve new and relatively complex problems);
- Self-motivated activity (activity which is relatively independent of either genetic or direct external control);
- The capacity to communicate, by whatever means, messages of an indefinite variety of types, that is, not just with an indefinite number of possible contents, but on indefinitely many possible topics;
- The presence of self-concepts, and self-awareness, either individual or racial, or both.
She stated that these at least some of these are necessary, if not sufficient criteria for personhood. She argued that fetuses don't meet any of these criteria, therefore they cannot be persons (and hence abortion is acceptable).
Read more about this topic: Mary Anne Warren
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