Judith Jarvis Thomson (October 4, 1929 – November 20, 2020) was an American philosopher who studied and worked on ethics and metaphysics. She is credited with naming, developing, and initiating the extensive literature on the trolley problem first posed by Philippa Foot.[1] She was elected a member of the American Philosophical Society in 2019.
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Thomson's main areas of research were moral philosophy and metaphysics.[12] In moral philosophy she has made significant contributions to meta-ethics, normative ethics, and applied ethics.
"A Defense of Abortion" (1971) introduces one thought experiment for which Thomson is especially well known. The paper asks the reader to imagine that her circulatory system has, without her consent, been connected to that of a famous violinist whose life she must sustain for nine months. The hypothetical posed by Thomspon notably redirects philosophical attention from the rights of the fetus to those of the pregnant woman.[13]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judith_Jarvis_Thomson"A Defense of Abortion" is a moral philosophy essay by Judith Jarvis Thomson first published in Philosophy & Public Affairs in 1971. Granting for the sake of argument that the fetus has a right to life, Thomson uses thought experiments to argue that the fetus's right to life does not override the pregnant woman's right to have jurisdiction over her body, and that induced abortion is therefore not morally impermissible. Thomson's argument has many critics on both sides of the abortion debate,[1] yet it continues to receive defense.[2] Thomson's imaginative examples and controversial conclusions have made "A Defense of Abortion" perhaps "the most widely reprinted essay in all of contemporary philosophy".[3]
The Violinist
In "A Defense of Abortion", Thomson grants for the sake of argument that the fetus has a right to life, but defends the permissibility of abortion by appealing to a thought experiment:
You wake up in the morning and find yourself back to back in bed with an unconscious violinist. A famous unconscious violinist. He has been found to have a fatal kidney ailment, and the Society of Music Lovers has canvassed all the available medical records and found that you alone have the right blood type to help. They have therefore kidnapped you, and last night the violinist's circulatory system was plugged into yours, so that your kidneys can be used to extract poisons from his blood as well as your own. [If he is unplugged from you now, he will die; but] in nine months he will have recovered from his ailment, and can safely be unplugged from you.[4]
Thomson argues that one can now permissibly unplug themself from the violinist even though this will cause his death: this is due to limits on the right to life, which does not include the right to use another person's body, and so by unplugging the violinist, one does not violate his right to life but merely deprives him of something—the use of someone else's body—to which he has no right. "[I f you do allow him to go on using your kidneys, this is a kindness on your part, and not something he can claim from you as his due."[5]
For the same reason, Thomson says, abortion does not violate the fetus's legitimate right to life, but merely deprives the fetus of something—the non-consensual use of the pregnant woman's body and life-supporting functions—to which it has no right. Thus, by choosing to terminate her pregnancy, Thomson concludes that a pregnant woman does not normally violate the fetus's right to life, but merely withdraws its use of her own body, which usually causes the fetus to die.[6]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Defense_of_Abortion
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Thanks!