Category: ethics
Associated thinker(s): Judith Jarvis Thomson
Original publication or approximate period: A Defense of Abortion (1971)
Difficulty: Intermediate
Themes: bodily autonomy, rights, obligation
Related experiments: drowning-child, transplant
Kind: thought experiment
Research checked: 2026-10-30
You wake up connected to a celebrated unconscious violinist. A group has kidnapped you because only your kidneys can support him. Disconnecting now would end his life; after nine months he will recover and no longer need you. You did not agree to the connection. Thomson asks us to grant, for argument’s sake, that the dependent individual has a right to life, then examine what follows about his entitlement to use another person’s body.
Does a right to life automatically include a right to another person’s bodily support?
The scenario separates moral status from the content and limits of rights. It also separates actions that are generous from actions that others may demand. Its role in an abortion argument depends on an analogy, so identifying morally relevant similarities and differences is part of the reasoning.
A useful analysis distinguishes three propositions: the violinist’s life matters; continuing support would benefit him; he is entitled to require it. The first two do not logically entail the third without an additional principle about obligations. Conversely, rejecting an entitlement does not mean that withdrawing support is admirable in every circumstance. Specify both what the dependent person can demand and what the supporting person has reason to offer voluntarily. This keeps the argument from sliding between the language of rights, duties, kindness, and overall moral assessment as if they meant the same thing.
Thomson argues that a person may lack an enforceable right to bodily support even when support is necessary to remain alive. Critics question whether parental responsibilities, voluntary risk-taking, or the difference between killing and withdrawing aid make pregnancy importantly different. Those objections address distinct versions of the analogy.
Thomson does not conclude that every abortion is permissible or that dependents have no moral claims. The kidnapping premise is especially relevant to nonconsensual dependence. This philosophical case is not clinical or legal advice about any actual pregnancy.
Thomson also discusses people-seeds, the expanding child, and very short periods of assistance. These variations examine responsibility, self-defense, and minimal decency; they should not be collapsed into the kidnapping case.
Historical association: A Defense of Abortion (1971). The sources above support the scenario and its intellectual context. Where an original work was not retrieved in full, its account is mediated by the named academic reference; no claim of full primary-source verification is made. The explanation and reflection questions here are original editorial prose.