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ing being a continuum rather than a moment in time 38 individuation edit philosophers such as aquinas use the concept of individuation they say abortion is not permissible from the point at which individual human identity is realized citation needed according to anthony kenny this can be derived from everyday beliefs and language and one can say if my mother had an abortion six months into her pregnancy she would have killed me then one can reasonably infer at six months the me in question would have been an existing person with a valid claim to life because division of the zygote into twins through the process of monozygotic twinning can occur until the fourteenth day of pregnancy kenny says individual identity is obtained at this point and thus abortion is not permissible after two weeks 39 quickening edit quickening is the moment the pregnant woman starts to feel the fetus s movement in the uterus 40 the word quick originally meant alive 41 and quicken means to grant life 42 women who have previously given birth have more relaxed uterine muscles that are more sensitive to fetal motion during subsequent pregnancies for them fetal motion can sometimes be felt as early as 14 weeks 43 although it is usually around 18 weeks a woman who has not previously given birth typically feels fetal movements at about 20 21 weeks 44 some early abortion laws were based around this standard although not commonly in use today the quickening standard for personhood was historically used in england 45 and other jurisdictions that based their legal systems on the english legal system like the u s states of connecticut and new york 46 47 adulthood edit historically children were not always seen as people infanticide was practiced in many historical cultures 48 until the mid 19th century u s law was ambiguous about the personhood of children under 18 49 philosophical and religious perspectives edit ideas about the beginnings of human life and personhood have varied among social contexts and have changed with shifts in ethical and religious beliefs sometimes as a result of advances in scientific knowledge in general they have developed in parallel with attitudes to abortion 50 and the use of infanticide for reproductive control because human development is continuous identifying a time at which a human is a person could lead to an instance of the sorites paradox also known as the paradox of the heap 51 according to neil postman in pre modern societies the lives of children were not regarded as unique or valuable in the same way as they are in modern societies in part as a result of high infant mortality when childhood began to develop its own distinctive features including graded schools to teach literacy other skills and cultural knowledge this view changed according to postman the custom of celebrating a child s birthday did not exist in america throughout most of the eighteenth century and in fact the precise marking of a child s age in any way is a relatively recent cultural habit no more than two hundred years old 52 ancient writers held diverse views on the beginning of personhood which they understood as the soul s entry into or development in the human body in panpsychism in the west david skrbina noted the kinds of soul the early greeks envisioned 53 aristotle developed a theory of progressive ensoulment in his text on the generation of animals he said the soul first develops a vegetative soul then animal and finally human adding abortions were permissible early in pregnancy before certain biological processes began he believed the female substance was passive the male substance was active and that time was required for the male substance to animate the whole 54 according to hinduism today vedic literature states the soul enters the body at conception 55 according to the jewish talmud all life is precious but a fetus is not a person in the sense of termination of pregnancy being considered murder if a woman s life is endangered by a pregnancy an abortion is permitted but if the greater part of the fetus has emerged from the womb then its life may not be taken even to save the mother because you cannot choose between one human life and another 56 according to some medieval christian theologians ensoulment occurs when a baby takes its first breath of air they cite among other passages genesis 2 7 which reads and the lord god formed man of the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and man became a living soul 57 the early church held various views on the subject mostly either that ensoulment occurs at conception or one of delayed hominization tertullian held the view the soul is derived from the parents and generated in parallel with the physical body this view which is known as traducianism was later rejected by augustine of hippo because it did not account for original sin basing himself on the septuagint version of exodus 21 22 augustine affirmed the aristotelian view of delayed hominization citation needed thomas aquinas and augustine of hippo held the view fetuses were animated aristotle s term for ensoulment near the 40th day after conception 50 both held abortion is always gravely wrong because it involves the medical termination of a developing person in development 58 59 60 in general the soul was viewed as some kind of animating principle and the human soul was referred to as the rational soul some followers of jainism promoted the idea sperm cells contain life jivas and thus harming them opposes the principle of non violence ahimsa celibacy or abstinence from sex bramacharya can be practiced to avoid releasing sperm but this is unrelated to the broader practice of celibacy in jainism 61 the roman catholic church considers fertilization as the beginning of an individual s existence its pontifical academy for life said the moment that marks the beginning of the existence of a new human being is constituted by the penetration of sperm into the oocyte fertilization promotes a series of linked events and transforms the egg cell into a zygote 62 the congregation for the doctrine of the faith also has stated from the time that the ovum is fertilized a new life is begun which is neither that of the father nor of the mother it is rather the life of a new human being with his own growth b 63 ethical perspectives edit the distinction in ethical value between existing persons and potential future persons has been questioned 64 it has been argued contraception and the decision not to procreate could be regarded as immoral on a similar basis to abortion 65 any marker of the beginning of human personhood does not necessarily mark the moment where assistance or intervention are ethically correct or incorrect in a consequentialistic point of view an assisting or intervening action may be regarded as equivalent whether it is performed before during or after the creation of a human being because the result would be the same that is the existence or non existence of a human being in a view holding the value of the bringing into existence of potential persons it has been argued the abortion of an unintended pregnancy in favor for conceiving a new child later in better conditions is justified 66 personhood in law edit ecclesiastical courts edit following the decline of the western roman empire and the adoption of christianity as the roman state religion ecclesiastical courts held wide jurisdiction throughout europe according to donald demarco 67 the church treated the killing of an unformed or unanimated fetus as a matter of anticipated homicide with a corresponding lesser penance required according to the catechism of the catholic church human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception from the first moment of his existence a human being must be recognized as having the rights of a person among which is the inviolable right of every innocent being to life 68 common law edit abortion in the united kingdom was traditionally dealt with in the ecclesiastical courts but from 1115 english common law addressed the issue beginning with first mention in leges henrici primi in this treatise abortion even that of a formed fetus was a quasi homicide carrying a penalty of 10 years penance a much lesser penalty than would accrue to full homicide with the exception of bracton later writers said killing a fetus is great misprision and no murder as formulated by sir edward coke in his institutes of the lawes of england coke noted the murder victim must have been a reasonable creature in rerum natura in accordance with the standards of murder in english law sir william blackstone repeated this formulation in england and in bouvier s law dictionary in the united states the reasonableness of the creature is of considerable weight in the legal conception of personhood children are not considered full persons under the law until they reach the age of majority children have been treated as persons with respect to bodily offences beginning with offences against the person act 1828 although this protection did not prevent parents from selling their children as in the eliza armstrong case long after the slave trade had been abolished in england in addition common law regarded a child en ventre sa mere in utero as in being or as born when ensuring wills and trusts did not run afoul of the rule against perpetuities nine or sometimes ten months of gestation were allotted for this purpose 69 legal perspectives edit australia edit in 2013 the parliament of new south wales considered a bill known as zoe s law which was widely perceived as recognizing a fetus of 20 weeks as a legal person the bill was introduced in response to the experience of brodie donegan eight months pregnant whose unborn daughter named zoe was killed in a road accident and who was distraught the law did not consider zoe a victim of the crime in her own right rather than as an aspect of her mother s injuries opponents of the bill said it threatened the legality of abortion supporters of the bill said this concern was unjustified because its text excluded abortion from its scope donegan identifies as pro choice 70 while the nsw legislative assembly passed the bill 71 it failed to pass in the upper house the legislative council and the bill in that form was abandoned in november 2014 72 73 in november 2021 the nsw government introduced a new version of zoe s law that criminalized the causing of the death of a fetus of at least 20 weeks gestation or at least 400 g 14 oz if the gestational age could not be determined by criminally killing or injuring the mother 74 that bill was passed later that month 75 as the crimes legislation amendment loss of foetus act 2021 76 the law entered into force on 29 march 2022 77 ireland edit main articles eighth amendment of the constitution of ireland and abortion in the republic of ireland the 1983 eighth amendment granted the full right to life and personhood to any unborn abortion was banned in nearly all cases except to save the life of the mother this law was repealed on 25 may 2018 by a 66 voting margin and abortion became legal on 1 january 2019 78 79 united states edit in its 1885 decision mcarthur v scott the supreme court of the united states affirmed the common law principle that a child in its mother s womb can be regarded as in being for the purpose of resolving a dispute about wills and trusts 80 in 1973 harry blackmun wrote the court opinion for roe v wade addressing the issue of human personhood in relation to abortion rights the court said we need not resolve the difficult question of when life begins when those trained in the respective disciplines of medicine philosophy and theology are unable to arrive at any consensus the judiciary at this point in the development of man s knowledge is not in a position to speculate citation needed the court also stated the word person as used in the fourteenth amendment does not include the unborn citation needed several attempts were made to pass a human life amendment in congress some versions defined the word person in the fifth and fourteenth amendments to apply to all human beings starting at conception 81 82 some states have amended or attempted to amend their state constitutions to define personhood as starting at conception 83 84 in 2002 the born alive infants protection act was enacted which ensures the legal concepts of person baby infant and child include those that have been born alive in the course of a miscarriage or abortion regardless of development gestational age or whether the placenta and umbilical cord are still attached this law makes no comment on personhood in utero but ensures no person after birth is characterized as not a person 85 86 in 2003 the partial birth abortion ban act prohibits an abortion if either the entire baby s head is outside the body of the mother or any part of the baby s trunk past the navel is outside the body of the mother was enacted 87 in 2004 president george w bush signed the unborn victims of violence act into law 88 the law extends personhood status to a child in utero at any stage of development who is carried in the womb 89 if they are targeted injured or killed during the commission of any of over 60 listed violent crimes the law also prohibits the prosecutions of any person for conduct relating to a legally consented to abortion since then 38 u s states legally recognized a human fetus or unborn child as a crime victim for the purpose of homicide or feticide laws 90 according to progressive media watchdog media matters for america further a prenatal personhood measure might subject a woman who suffers a pregnancy related complication or a miscarriage to criminal investigations and possibly jail time for homicide manslaughter or reckless endangerment and because so many laws use the terms persons or people a prenatal personhood measure could affect large numbers of a state s laws changing the application of thousands of laws and resulting in unforeseeable unintended and absurd consequences 91 the 1992 supreme court case of planned parenthood v casey held a law cannot place legal restrictions imposing an undue burden for the purpose or effect of placing a substantial obstacle in the path of a woman seeking an abortion of a nonviable fetus 92 this standard was upheld in the supreme court case of whole woman s health v hellerstedt 2016 in which several texas restrictions were struck down 93 it was overturned in 2022 by dobbs v jackson women s health organization holding there was no constitutional right to an abortion in 2024 the alabama supreme court ruled frozen embryos were extrauterine children 94 and thus were legally children in the state of alabama 95 96 in a concurring opinion alabama chief justice tom parker discussed the issue theologically human life cannot be wrongfully destroyed without incurring the wrath of a holy god because even before birth all human beings bear the image of go...