Abortion and the Sanctity of Human Life: A Philosophical View

Probably no ethical issue generates more simplistic dogmatism today than abortion. Few dogmatists seem to take the time or even show the concern about identifying "the what" about which they are dogmatic. Baruch Brody's analysis of the subject is anything but simplistic. Formerly a faculty member at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Professor Brody is presently Chairman of the Department of Philosophy at Rice University. In the best tradition of philosophical distinction-making, he attempts to show how his own position on abortion issues has changed from assuming that "opposition to abortion is based solely upon dubious theological claims" to the judgment that "abortion has never been morally justifiable." Few readers can fail to appreciate Professor Brody's rational clarity, but many clinicians will fault that presumption of philosophical method which disregards the phenomena of propriety, propinquity, and prejudice, which so often turn rational principle into its dogmatic opposite in the clinical context.