The genuine identity of the human in the womb sits at the center of the abortion debate. If the unborn are understood to be people, then abortion is unjustified. If, however, the unborn are not people, then it may be reasonable to procure an abortion — but contrary to the common assumption, not necessarily reasonable. Certain actions toward non-persons, but living organisms, are unjustified. For example, killing someone’s non-threatening dog that you see passing on the street. If we were to grant that human fetuses are non-persons, it would be inconsistent to assume that killing them is per se justified on account of a lack of personhood, in the same way we shouldn’t assume killing dogs would be per se justified because they are not people. That said, sufficiently defending a fetus’ classification as a non-person will naturally make the case to justify abortion more attainable, as it reduces the relevant moral standard. After all, the standard required to justly kill a non-person being is generally less restrictive than it is to kill a person; we might consider that murdering a dog is wrong, but it’s not as severely wrong as murdering a toddler. Thus, there is good reason for those discussing abortion to seriously consider whether the unborn are people.
A popular approach in understanding personhood is to ground it, in some sense, in the potential for rationality, as this is the chief distinction between us (people) and the lower creatures (non-people). Generally, this is a very agreeable attitude. A dog will never be a person, one might say, because it has no potential to be rational. On the other hand, a toddler is a person because it does have the potential to be rational, not inasmuch as it might deploy such activity in this exact moment, but that it might do so in the future — it will tend to do so would be a more complete statement, although I will not emphasize such language here. Nevertheless, in this way, the toddler and the dog are fundamentally different.
Continuing, what might we say about the unborn child? — Would she be a person? It seems to me that the unborn child and the toddler share the same potential to be rational in the future. From that, using the reasoning introduced so far, it’s only sensible to conclude that the unborn child must also be a person, at least in the same sense as the toddler, because she has the same potential. Unfortunately, most pro-choicers don’t arrive at this conclusion.
Instead, pro-choicers argue that some unborn children — those without brains — are not people, because they don’t really have the same potential that the toddler has. As it goes, the brain is the sole facilitator of rationality. If one has a brain, then one has the potential to exercise rationality, if not now, then at some point in the future, because the necessary material structure is present. However, some unborn humans don’t have brains. Therefore, some unborn children (the brainless) don’t really have the potential to be rational in the future, as was said about the toddler, and by consequence, are not people. A more formal formulation of this argument is as follows:
Rational powers are entirely accounted for by the brain.
Therefore, only humans with brains have the potential for rationality.
But the standard for personhood is the potential for rationality.
Therefore, only humans with brains are people.
It’s worth noting that this is more organized than you will likely hear from pro-choicers. Generally, appertaining sentiments will share in the core assumptions that the brain houses the entirety of the mind, and that the mind is chiefly responsible for the pinnacle of human experience (rationality); special importance is assumed upon the creation of this supposed sole intellectual facilitator, the brain — and enough so that it necessarily dictates personhood. Furthermore, because one’s relation to rational experience guides the personhood debate, the general motivation here, inspired by materialism, might be to pinpoint the precise time at which that relation exists. For the materialist, that is the brain at its most incipient stage of development. Whatever the motivation, this argument is common and worth investigating.
This position has many gaps and plenty of room for critique that extends beyond our present scope. One major area worth investigating is the notion of potential, specifically, the potential a human being has qua human being. For the pro-lifer, pressing on this aspect of the conversation might be more beneficial in ultimately demonstrating the immorality of abortion. For those interested, read my article here. Instead of pulling on this thread, I will focus on the dead soil the argument is rooted in, what we might say is a more severe metaphysical sin: the false premise that rational powers are entirely accounted for by brain matter. Rationality requires concepts, and concepts are universal, and universals are immaterial. Thus, the brain cannot entirely account for rationality. By consequence, the very first premise of this pro-choice argument fails.
If one is to exercise rationality, one must have the power to conceptualize. Understanding even basic situations requires grasping concepts. Consider the basic proposition: James is a man. To understand what exactly James is, we must understand what a man is — the conceptual reality of man, what we might reasonably term the manness of the notion. At its core, this conception will capture everything essential to men, that is, everything an entity must possess to be a man. Only then can one understand what it means for James to be a man.
Grasping that James is a man means one can understand analogous situations where manness is also present. If one considers that Tom is a man or Frank is a man, he will understand, in a rudimentary way, what it means for them to be men, just as he understood it for James. This is not to say they are men in precisely the same way James is a man; men are variegated in nature by physiology, talents, virtue, and most generally, as distinct particulars. It is, however, to say that they are all of the same essential category (men) and one who grasps the essence (manness) has the potential to understand them as manifestations of the category. Furthermore, these are not the only men — an infinite number of these simple propositions could be imagined. If one understands manness or the concept of a man, one has the potential to understand what it means for any of the infinite number of men to be men, spotting manness wherever it may manifest. This is very generally what is meant by concepts being universal.
“A prime example is universals, which are multiply located in their instances across space and time. This multiplicity in reality contrasts with how the universal exists in the intellect, via abstraction from particulars (this is the ‘work on reality’ done by the mind).
In the mind, the universal has total unity — no multiplicity. We grasp the universal redness; it gets into our mind not as so many ideas of multiple instances but as a single, abstracted form.”
— Oderberg, The Metaphysics of Good and Evil
It might be helpful to consider this in mathematical terms: imagine the concept in question being represented by the letter A, and varied instances being represented by a letter combination after a dash. For example, A-AA being a certain instance of A, A-BA being another, etc. Necessarily following from an understanding of A is the potential to grasp A-AB, A-BA, A-BAC, and any other infinite possible instances. Our concept A is universal because it is not limited to any of the particulars denoted by combinations after the dash, but extends into any of them , while not betraying the essence of A.
Remember our initial purpose: to examine whether the brain, qua material thing, can account for rationality, which was the most fundamental premise of this pro-choice argument. We are concerned with universals because rationality requires concepts, and concepts are universal. Thus, for the pro-choice argument to get off the ground, there must be serious reason to believe that universals can be accounted for materially, specifically within the brain. Let’s consider how the pro-choicer might go about this.
Concepts are abstract, unextended, and universal, whereas material things are concrete, extended, and particular. Some concepts are simple, but any remotely credible candidate material loci for them are composite. And the intellect can grasp a potential infinity of concepts, while no potentially infinite powers can be attributed to a material object like the brain.
— Feser, Immortal Souls
First, one might simply argue that the material representation is comprehensive enough to be universal. Returning to our mathematical language, this means our material representation of a concept, say A, can be a representation A-AB, A-ABC, or any other possible instance. That is, it would maintain every representational aspect of each instance while being a single, physical representation in the brain.
This view is generally understandable, but upon brief reflection, is completely untenable. To examine the possibility of this account, imagine the concept of an apple. How would a supposed universal material representation of such appear in the brain? For starters, it must manifest physically, and therefore, necessarily have certain dimensions. Of course, it would be unreasonable for the apple representation to be the same size as a real apple. Instead, assume that what matters representationally is the geometric proportions that dictate the apple’s shape. In other words, the ratio between each dimension of the apple representation in the brain will be equivalent to the same dimensional ratios of an actual apple.
The apple representation in the brain has particular proportions , and therefore won’t be any other set of proportions, nor will it be proportionless – such would violate the rules of materiality. Which is to say, if it is to be a material representation, it must have fixed dimensions. By consequence, our apple representation stored in the brain will not share the same proportions that govern all other possible apple instances. If the representation doesn’t represent every possible set of apple proportions, how could it be a universal representation? It can’t, as long as it has a specific size, which it must, as a physical entity. Of course, this isn’t the only quality of the representation where this could apply. Other traits could be examined, and the rules of the physical medium would force specificity in the same way they did for dimensions, making it impossible for them to be universals as purely material entities.
The materialist might push back on what might be called a representation problem and instead insist that the brain stores the conceptual content of the universal by virtue of storing all its possible material representations. This is to say, the brain storing the concept A materially entails the brain storing every possible representation of A, including A-AA, A-AB, A-AC, and all the remaining infinite possibilities. The materialist can account for the power of universal knowledge because the brain stores every possible instance of a concept that can be grasped. Importantly, because each representation is physical, each will take up some portion of brain matter, presumably at an incredibly small scale.
Recall that the potential to grasp an infinite number of instances is central to the notion of universals. Therefore, each stored concept would entail the storage of an infinite number of these brain-matter units to account for the infinite number of instances. However, the brain has a particular size, and by consequence, a limited amount of matter. If universals are accounted for by storing their infinite possible instances, then the brain cannot properly account for their storage because it does not have infinite brain matter. There is simply not enough room among the brain’s finite manifestation for the infinite quantity of these, albeit impressively small, representations. We might reasonably call this a storage problem for the brain.
These are only a few possible defenses of a materialist account of universals. Much more of this debate could be played out; I will not claim to have completely defeated their side. However, I hope this introduction gives, at a bare minimum, credence to the idea that universals are immaterial and that they are not easily explained by materialism, if at all. Those actively engaging in the abortion debate should be aware of the general weakness of this major philosophical tradition that undergirds many — maybe even most — pro-choice positions.
If universals are indeed immaterial, there is at least one major issue with the pro-choice argument we began with — the brain does not house the entirety of the mind, nor are rational powers entirely accounted for by the brain (the first premise of the argument). If the first premise of the argument fails, its conclusions do not necessarily follow. Meaning, this argument does not sufficiently demonstrate only humans with brains have the potential for rationality and most importantly, that only humans with brains are people.
To be clear, the emphasis on the potential for rationality (embedded in the first conclusion, following the first premise) isn’t in itself an egregious issue of this argument, but that its starting point is being misapplied; we must instead ascribe the ability and corresponding potential to an entity that can fully, in itself, be said to account for such. Thankfully, there is an entity, a composite of body and soul, that has that potential naturally. Of course, I am referring to you, or more generally, the human being, who comes into existence at the point of conception. A defense of that view is certainly worth pursuing in further detail, but for that, you will have to wait for a future article.