Argument by analogy is a powerful moral reasoning technique where our judgments about something clear are applied to something less clear, yet relevantly similar. Half asleep in bed this past Tuesday night, I was struck by a connection between lottery tickets and UDHs.
Oftentimes in the abortion debate, generally pro-choice authors emphasize how Unborn Developing Humans (or UDHs) are merely potential persons, rather than actual persons. They then quickly conclude that UDHs have very little value, and that abortions for most any reason are completely permissible. Sometimes they’ll invoke the language of rights, declaring, “Since UDHs aren’t persons, they have no right to life. And since UDH’s have no right to life, abortion is permissible — end of story.”
I’ve always found this puzzling. For one, honest ethicists arguing in good faith know full well sweeping rights claims are too coarse for the intricacies of real-life. But also because UDHs are the only thing that can grow into full persons, and often (if not usually) will become full persons if allowed.
That something with the potential to develop extremely high moral value (a person) already has very high moral value is intuitively compelling to me, but not everyone. However, he’s a basic analogy that helps clarify my thinking, and might inform and enrich yours.
The directions at Poweball.com read: “Select five numbers from 1 to 69 for the white balls; then select one number from 1 to 26 for the red Powerball.” Matching 1 or more of the first 5 numbers to the randomly drawn numbers entitles you to some money. But matching all five plus the Powerball wins the jackpot, which as of this writing sits at $181 million.
Imagine that you buy a ticket. Before the numbers are called, it’s probably worth less than the purchase price in light of the extremely low probability you’ll win (this is why many people call lotto paying your “idiot tax”). But imagine matching not only the first three numbers, not only the first four numbers, but all five white numbers. Whatever money you’d be entitled to for getting that far, you’d now have a 1 in 26 chance of winning $181 million. Whether you’re a greedy glutton or dream of philanthropy, that’s a LOT of money, and could fund a whole lot of ethics bowl expansion!
Would you say that since the ticket is merely a potential jackpot winner (with a 1 in 26 chance), rather than an actual jackpot winner, it’s therefore completely worthless?
Of course not. You’d guard it carefully, and with good reason. Even matching two numbers would get your attention. But three? Four? All five?
And so assuming conceived UDHs have a 1 in 26 chance (or greater) of growing into full persons (if genetically normal and in a healthy womb, they do), and assuming the value of a person exceeds or is somewhere in the ballpark of a Powerball jackpot, you should agree that UDHs can’t be casually dismissed as valueless clumps of cells.
Of course, this doesn’t imply abortions are never permissible — doesn’t mean that the high value of a UDH can’t be overridden. All it means is that the reasons needed to justify an abortion must be weighty enough to destroy something with already substantial value, and that anyone desiring to dismiss UDHs because they’re “merely” potential persons is probably a crummy Powerball player.