Many Religions

Many religions and other "pro-life" groups of people regard abortion as unethical, and in some cases, they regard it as murder. There are plenty of arguments from the religious perspective (for example the religion of Islam maintains abortion is "Haram", meaning "not permitted"). But, there are arguments to investigate which suggest we can find the answer independent from religion, such as looking at what the present society and law states. The fact is, there are many different issues to consider. To investigate if we should turn to religion for the answer in our contemporary society, it is necessary to investigate many different views and issues, such as the religious perspective, personhood, what the law and society states and even how a modern film such as "Vera Drake" can help us find the answer.

One of the initial things necessary to investigate, if we should turn to religion to resolve the argument, is based around the topic of "personhood". The term "personhood" refers to the quality or condition of being an individual person. Mary Anne Warren, a 20th century American philosopher maintains that the central question in the abortion debate is the state of the foetus itself. Is it a person in the moral sense or not? Granting the foetus's status as a person can only produce the most limited right to an abortion. However, she maintains that abortion on demand is justified, as the foetus isn't a full person. Mary Anne Warren believes there are 5 main characteristics of a human, consciousness, and the ability to feel pain. Reasoning, self-motivated activity, the capacity to communicate, and self-awareness. On the other hand, some of these characteristics are debatable, for example, it is extremely hard to say what is true self-awareness. The "embryological" view holds that human life begins