Shneour on Abortion

In response to “Life Doesn’t Begin, It Continues,” by Elie Shneour, Op-Ed Page, Jan. 29:

Shneour’s column is replete with faulty argumentation. I want to say that I also support a woman’s choice to have an abortion in the first trimester, but my reasons for my position are, I hope, more compelling than those offered by Shneour.

Within his eight paragraphs, he makes three egregious mistakes.

First, he argues that since a spermatozoon and an egg are both living cells, then there are millions of abortions for every ejaculation. But no one that I know of is going to hold that a spermatozoon or an egg is the beginning of human life. And hence a dead spermatozoon does not a human abortion make. The spermatozoon and the egg are indeed necessary conditions for human life, but only the fertilized egg is a sufficient condition. Or at least this could be plausibly argued.

Second, he reasons by analogy that since we would not consider a person who burns a blueprint of a house an arsonist, we should not consider the destruction of an embryo as being tantamount to murder. He fails to add that an embryo is not merely a blueprint; it is also a house under construction. And we do consider a person who burns a house under construction an arsonist. This analogy could very well be used by anti-abortionists.

Third, he writes that it is uncertain when or if an embryo becomes human, for during its evolution it looks like a fish, a reptile, and a bird. If it be the case that we are simply aborting fishes, reptiles, and birds, then of course no humans are being killed. Is abortion perhaps an animal rights’ issue? Should a woman see a zoologist for the early months of pregnancy?

Abortion is a very serious issue. There are good minds, and good hearts, on both sides. And the problem is much more complex than Elie Shneour thinks it is. Much more complex.

CHRIS M. JACKSON

Riverside