Should Abortion be Illegal? Daniel James Hole v.s Lawrence Coomber

Yesterday I had the privilege of witnessing my good friend Daniel James Hole debate the president of the Southampton University Labour Society, Lawrence Coomber, on whether abortion should be illegal. Daniel, a conservative Reformed Christian, has been instrumental in my own journey—though, of course, our disagreements run deep indeed—and this was only his second ever debate, the first being on the nature of morality a few months prior against atheist Jordon Beeney. It was also a pleasure to meet Lawrence who was willing to have a discussion on this extremely sensitive issue. The link to the debate is here for anyone who wishes to watch it. 

I must preface this review by mentioning the disruption we experienced prior to the debate. Shortly before it was due to commence, security came and locked the lecture hall where we were meant to be hosted. They claimed that a health and safety form had not been properly completed and thus the debate had been cancelled, alleging that it was a "high risk debate." In the end, we found a separate location and were able to go ahead with the event only slightly delayed. I will not comment as to whether this sudden revocation of the debate hall was an underhanded gesture on the university's part that sought to shut down the debate. Nevertheless, in the current political climate regarding this topic, anything is possible. 

Opening Statements

In any case, the debate itself was excellent. Daniel's opening statement consisted of standard presuppositionalist argumentation: that belief in the triune God of the Bible is the necessary precondition for reason and knowledge and that any contrary position is inconsistent. Thus, the moral foundation for declaring the illegality of abortion lies solely in the Christian perspective (Job 31:15; Psalm 106:38, 139:13; Luke 1:41-44). For Daniel, a comparison of starting points and worldviews is absolutely necessary. 

Lawrence's opening statement argued from a worldview of biological materialism and hedonism where lived experience of the world around us informs our understanding of what we ought to do. Lawrence defined "lived experience" as "sensory inputs that are put into judgements." He opened with the classic burning house analogy: would you rescue a 3-year-old or a dish of 10 fertilised embryos from a blazing inferno? He insisted that this is a natural instinct decision based upon our lived experience with family and friends as opposed to abstract, impersonal theorising.

This perspective informs the rest of his case that abortion improves the quality of life. He attacks the anti-abortion perspective of the right to life only to end up living in abject poverty. Furthermore, he insists that development in the womb is different to development outside of the womb; that the physical dependence of the foetus on the mother is categorically different from natural dependence post-birth.

Lawrence further argued that bodily autonomy is informed by lived experience. Against the analogies to slavery and abolitionism presented by anti-abortion advocates (including Daniel), he insists that the "commonly accepted moral goods" were not contributing factors to slavery, but were instead products of laws developed against the natural discourse. It was not lived experience but oppressive power structures that led to slavery. As the majority of people do not follow through with extremes such as randomly killing people because it becomes a "consensus opinion," he rejects the analogies outright. Lawrence concludes his opening with an attack on the religious adherence to doctrine letter-to-letter which, in his view, leads to the aforementioned oppressive power structures.

Overall, both opening statements were solid, with Lawrence taking the offensive early on and Daniel contrastingly building his defence first. Lawrence's arguments are not unheard of and Daniel was undoubtedly prepared to respond to them. I am also concerned that Lawrence's case that abortion improves the quality of life is guilty of a correlation/causation fallacy: that just because we see a trend associating two factors does not necessarily prove a causal link between them. 

In regards to Daniel's opening, I was surprised when he cited embryologists such as Stephen Andrew Jacobs in support of his position. These counters to scientific and logical arguments for abortion—such as size, level of development, environment, degree of dependency—have always been convincing to me even as a non-Christian, though I never would have expected Daniel to cite anything other than the Bible in his bibliography. A surprise to be sure, but a welcome one. 

I was, however, somewhat disappointed when Daniel appealed to scientific authorities when citing the consensus of experts in embryology against Lawrence. Was this just a rhetorical point to try and nudge the secular audience closer to his side? If it was, that is the only effect it would have—and a surface-level one at that. What about the "consensus" of experts on evolution, something which Daniel denies? Is the presuppositionalist at liberty to be selective with scientific "consensuses" and just pan any other authorities simply because they don't align with their theological precommitments? This remains, in my mind, one of the more disturbing aspects of presuppositionalism.

Rebuttals and Cross-Examinations

Both debaters did well in challenging each other, with Daniel emerging less scathed. He attacked Lawrence's "lived experience" foundation on the grounds that abortion prevents one from attaining lived experience in the first place. Regarding the burning house analogy, he argued that the decision does not determine what is morally correct, regardless of what choice one makes, and that the analogy is flawed anyways as it conflates saving and killing. Furthermore, he attacks the financial and economic arguments which he sees as justification for the killing of living poor people.

Lawrence made the push to see if Daniel believed that abortion was still impermissible even if the mother’s life is threatened. Daniel, surprisingly, produced a double effect response: in the situation of serious risk to a mother (often in the case of ectopic pregnancies), the foetus is usually dead anyways and would thus not count as the taking of an innocent human life. Thus, objections such as unintentional termination via chemotheraphy are irrelevant due to the lack of intention to kill an innocent human life. I reckon the audience, even the pro-abortion advocates, were satisfied with his response.

One theological conundrum that the discussion of miscarriages in the debate created for me was the issue that half of all fertilised human embryos are lost due to a failure of development. Early embryo mortality is high, perhaps even as high as 75%. Thus, from a Christian perspective, I wonder as to what happens to the souls of all these babies. As a Protestant, I would imagine that Daniel would say that they all go to heaven. But that's a lot of unborn babies. Do the unborn outnumber the born in heaven? It seems to be a bizarre situation that makes the Christian perspective on this an untenable and ad hoc take on the process of human development and death. Either way, both Lawrence and Daniel made little use of their rebuttal times.

Lawrence's strongest moment in the debate was when they were discussing if you could derive an "ought" from an "is," which is another standard accusation against non-Christians made by presuppositionalists. Lawrence was correct to point out that Daniel was also simply pointing out that "God," in Daniel's worldview is a fact of the universe and thus Daniel was also deriving and "ought from an is." Daniel attempted to respond by pointing out that you need a "will" from a person in order to get a moral ought, thus the character of God. 

But why could this not lead to general theism or a different kind of monotheistic religion? This was a question I asked myself after the morality debate with Jordon: why can a Muslim or a Jew not make the same case as Daniel that their god is the moral lawgiver? I have yet to see a presuppositionalist provide a satisfying answer to this conundrum. 

Lawrence insists that interpersonal relationships are in fact the lawgiver. This was a very interesting response: from a history of religions perspective, it would perhaps posit that the best possible person seen in the idealistic character of God is simply a projection of the characteristics of a perceptively moral being made by humans onto a non-existent deity and that is where the "will" of the lawgiver comes. This goes down the rabbit-hole of the origins of monotheism, but is certainly a valid question to ask.

Concluding Remarks

In conclusion, the debate was a resounding success despite the attempted cancellation by the university. Lawrence was a stronger opponent than Daniel's previous interlocutor but still found it difficult to get past Daniel's wall of argumentation. As one of my friends pointed out after the debate, Daniel was consistent and prepared but his actual philosophy that undergirds everything showed itself to be occasionally flawed. Like when he answered the burning house analogy by saying that he would rescue the embryos. This appears to be consequentialist reasoning: is it simply the quantity of human life that decided Daniel's answer? If so, does the double effect mentioned earlier absolve any kind of negative responsibility that one would have for letting the 3-year-old die? These spin-offs of the trolley problem are inherently limited, of course, but perhaps they reveal the extent of Christian moral responsibility and its (im)practical application in the case of abortion.

There are a number of observations I would like to conclude this review with. First of all, it is clear to me that, like the previous debate on morality between Daniel and Jordon, both debaters seemed to be talking past each other. Daniel's case focused on metaethics whilst both Jordon and Lawrence focused on applied ethics. This worked better for Daniel in the morality debate because the subject matter was metaethical in focus, whilst it worked better for Lawrence in the abortion debate because the subject was whether it should be illegal—this is undoubtedly applied ethics. Sadly there can be no conclusive "winner" of this debate as the two debaters failed to address what the other said in full.

Nevertheless, Daniel appeared to be the stronger debater due to his emphasis on moral foundations. When Lawrence assumed moral relativism (an affirmation that emerged only during the Q&A) and Daniel explicitly declared allegiance to moral realism, it became apparent that we had two people arguing about two different things. Without challenging Daniel's foundation, Lawrence's criticisms simply went through one ear and out the other. Did he even understand what it was that Daniel was arguing for? If not, perhaps that is Daniel's fault for not fleshing out his philosophy further. Similar to conspiracy theories, whose adherents blame their critics for "not understanding" whichever theory they hold to, it is the job of those who promote the hypothesis to elucidate it. This is not to compare Daniel to a flat-earther or followers of Graham Hancock. Yet it is clearly not the fault of the audience or the opponent that few people really understand the nuts and bolts of what Daniel was even arguing.

Furthermore, contrary to both Daniel and Lawrence, I think a case for a secular anti-abortion worldview can be made. I found Daniel's logical argumentation to be rigorous and consistent, only for it to be truncated by his intermittent preaching about the eternal hellfire that awaits anyone who disagrees with him. His epilogue was characterised by standard evangelical quips that paint everyone in the audience as "running off a cliff" with Daniel being the only voice of reason in the room. As long as the anti-abortion movement remains anchored to these kinds of militaristic religious perspectives it will never achieve the impact that it seeks to have in the modern world. 

Overall, I find that Daniel came out on top. When he wasn't preaching to the audience, I found most of his arguments to be sound and logical. His body language and demeanour exuded confidence that gave him a psychological edge over Lawrence (it is also helped by being nearly 7ft, but I digress). Lawrence, unfortunately, fell victim to a constant appeal to extreme examples to justify a general rule: a problem that many pro-abortion advocates have in their argumentation. He also seemed to not understand many basic elements of Christian theology. Daniel's opponents underestimate him at their own risk.

That being said, it does not necessarily mean that Daniel is correct. An ardent theonomist, Daniel not only believes that abortion should be outlawed but that people who have abortions should receive the death penalty. It is consistent with his worldview but disturbing in application, both to Christians and seculars. I cannot image what the church of the third century, many of whom were martyred by an autocratic Roman superpower that used its religious practices to justify the suppression of the faith, would say to such a proposal.

Luckily for Daniel, the question of executing post-abortive mothers did not arise in the debate. It does not take much imagination, however, to see that it would likely have evaporated any support he would have had amongst the audience. That is why I cannot in good faith say that Daniel "won" this debate.