As light can exist as both a particle and a wave, an abortion provider can honor birth and fight for a person’s right to give birth when it’s right for them
The ways people conceptualize and discuss abortion will become more important in coming years. The Supreme Court’s upcoming ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health could overturn 50 years of national precedent establishing abortion as a fundamental right of individuals prior to fetal viability.
Generally attributed to Carl Jung, “holding the tension of opposites” is how psychologists describe the ability of the human brain to accept seemingly contradictory concepts. My favorite example is the nature of light: is light a particle or a wave? Quantum mechanics, a discipline within physics, has demonstrated that both are true Sometimes light acts like a particle, sometimes a wave.
I admit to being taken aback because it never occurred to me that anyone would see these two seemingly unrelated facts as being in direct opposition to each other. I thought that most people—or at least fellow physicians and scientists—understood that despite all the rhetoric, those of us providing abortions and advocating for the right to have them were not beset by moral decrepitude and a callous disregard for human life.