Alexander Pham
Meredith Verrochi
RA 101 – 011
4 December 2021
Final Project
The Violinist Analogy
“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.” (pg. 48-49)
Violinist Analogy Reconstruction
1. The fetus is a person, has a right to life, is dependent on you for its survival, is innocent
(in the sense that it did not put itself inside your body), is there without consent.
2. The violinist is a person, has a right to life, is dependent on you for its survival, is
innocent (in the sense that he did not put himself inside your body), is there without
consent.
3. It is morally permissible to detach the violinist (even when that will kill him).
4. Therefore, it is morally permissible to abort in the case of rape.
Violinist Analogy Evaluation
This is a STRONG argument from analogy. The analogies between the two opposing objects, the
fetus and the violinist, are relevant to the conclusion. Despite the personhood and innocence of
the violinist, it is not immoral to detach him, so the conclusion can logically follow that the
personhood and innocence of the fetus are not any different. There is an important disanalogy
between the fetus and the violinist, but it actually strengthens the argument. The violinist, unlike
the fetus, is a famous person. This difference makes the argument stronger since it is not at all
relevant to the conclusion. Whether the violinist is famous or not, he should still be detached, so
the fetus’s lack of fame does not affect whether it is morally permissible to abort it. The
conclusion of the argument also builds its strength. It is not an incredibly strong conclusion,
which benefits the argument. Analogies with weaker conclusions make stronger arguments.
Since the conclusion does not refer to abortion in every single case, but rather only in cases of
rape, it is sufficiently weak enough to adequately strengthen the argument.
SUMMARY: This argument from analogy is STRONG overall.
1. The fetus and the violinist share several similarities that are both relevant and important
to the conclusion.
2. The most notable disanalogy between the fetus and the violinist is that the violinist is
famous while the fetus is not, which strengthens the whole argument because of its lack
of relevance or importance to the conclusion.
3. There is only one object that the fetus is being compared to, so this does not apply to the
violinist argument. The argument is not strengthened or weakened here.
4. The conclusion is sufficiently weak since it does not say that abortion is morally
permissible in all cases; it only addresses cases of rape.
The Rapidly Growing Child Analogy
“Suppose you find yourself trapped in a tiny house with a growing child. I mean a very tiny
