Limits on Abortion

Not only that, in a few years we may start to see heart transplants of artificially grown hearts. They are already transplanting artificially grown bladders to people and are trying to improve the procedure to include more vital organs. For the sake of argument, let us suppose that one day it will be possible to transplant out a fetus in such an easy and fast manner that it is prefered over current abortion techniques.But the possibility of being able to remove and transplant a fetus into another woman (or man...) presents a particular dilemma... actually, several dilemmas.So far, the woman have the right to remove the unborn fetus from her body. What I am wondering is does the right extend to having it killed as well?Say that transplanting fetuses become a typical surgical procedure and fundamentalists like myself volunteer on masse to take in those fetuses. What if there are women who would rather have the fetus killed than give it up to another person? Does the right of abortion extend to actively killing the fetus?The reason I am thinking about this, of course, is because while I am pro-choice I also consider the fetus a human being. I consider human life begins at the point of conception. There's a long explanation burried somewhere underneath all these debates.

I'd have to fall back on the "uninvited visitor" analogy: she would be expected to call the authorites and have the trespasser removed. If the trespasser presented a danger to somebody's life, the trespasser might be killed in the process of being removed. I don't think so. To me, a woman's control of her own body would be limited to parts of her body that can not be sustained as a separate body. As soon as the fetus can be (hypothetically) removed alive and sustained to birth, it is no longer (technically) a part of her body.

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Somehow, I have a feeling that when indeed fetuses can be transplanted out and and in to people's bodies some people will argue their right to property of the said fetuses.

Fetuses can definitely be implanted into people's bodies; that's how in vitro fertilization techniques work. And, indeed, a number of legal issues involving ownership of fetuses stored but not yet implanted have arisen. In Britain two women were denied the ability to implant embryos created with their ex-partners after the males who provided the sperm refused permission.So clearly parents have some control over the disposition of the product of their gametes. It seems to me that a woman could deny an embryo transfer to another woman on the basis of her control over the products of her gametes, and order the embryo be destroyed. Another situation would be a man denying the transfer, feeling that if the first woman (perhaps his wife) didn't want to bear his child, no other woman should be allowed to. Or perhaps he wants to avoid being legally ruled that child's father, and being forced to pay child support to another family. That would leave only the option of destroying the embryo.I don't think it's nearly as simple as you describe.

No, I guess not.