Whether we can speak of a difference between the human being and the human person

Abstract

One of the major issues intimately involved in any serious consideration of abortion concerns the humanity of the fetus: specifically, whether or not in abortion we are dealing with one human being (the mother) or with two (the mother and the fetus). In stricter terms, the problem involved is: (a) whether or not the fetus is as much a human being as the mother; b) consequently, with as much a right to life as the mother; and (c) in cases of conflict of tights (as are raised in most abortion cases), which right or set of rights may prevail. The problem is strictly a moral one but if a reasonably defensible solution is found on the moral level, then the problem of abortion as well as a number of related problems might conceivably become more amenable to a solution on the practical and legal levels.