Pro-Life Arguments Against Infanticide and Why they are Not Convincing

Abstract

Alberto Giubilini and Francesca Minerva's controversial article 'After-Birth Abortion: Why Should the Baby Live?' has received a lot of criticism since its publishing. Part of the recent criticism has been made by pro-life philosopher Christopher Kaczor, who argues against infanticide in his updated book 'Ethics of Abortion'. Kaczor makes four arguments to show where Giubilini and Minerva's argument for permitting infanticide goes wrong. In this article I argue that Kaczor's arguments, and some similar arguments presented by other philosophers, are mistaken and cannot show Giubilini and Minerva's view to be flawed. I claim that if one wants to reject the permissibility of infanticide, one must find better arguments for doing so.

Keywords: abortion; harm; infanticide; persons.