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The ethics concerns of this should be put right up there with genetic modification.
by Ancalagon 6y ago
The ethics concerns of this should be put right up there with genetic modification.
- tombert 6y agoYou're not wrong, but I do see a lot of positives. There are a lot of people who want to have kids, but for a variety of medical, personal, or social reasons cannot have one. It would be really cool to be able to open the door to parenthood to more people that want it.
- krastanov 6y agoTechnologically, I am excited. But the idea of using in-vitro fertilization or mechanical wombs when at the same time there are many orphans in need of a family is very unpleasant, borderline immoral to me. I know some people feel the need to have kids that share their own DNA, but I personally do not have much respect for people wanting kids but at the same time imposing such a constraint on themselves.
- silicon2401 6y agoThe beauty of a free society is that people can live life according to their values. You can adopt instead of having kids since you care so much about orphans, and people who care about the DNA thing can have their own kids. Forcing people to adopt would be as bad as forcing you to have kids via copulation.
- krastanov 6y agoI completely agree, please do not use phrasing suggesting otherwise. There are plenty of behaviors I am judgemental of, that does not mean I would try to infringe on people's ability to perform those behaviors. I was just trying to explain why people like me would be disappointed by certain development.
- silicon2401 6y agoUnderstood, in that case it's nice to see some people can still have their strong preferences while respecting others' freedom to choose differently.
- konjin 6y agoNo one is stopping you from adopting if you have such a problem with it.
- krastanov 6y agoI think you are reading too much in my message. Me disapproving of someone's life choices does not mean I do not think they have the right to make those choices. Neither have I shared anything about my parenting plans. A knee-jerk negative quip does not help in such a conversation.
- hoseja 6y agoYeah, into a dumpster. These taboos will blindside us sooner or later.
- Sporktacular 6y agoIt's not like animals can feel suffering right.
- wcoenen 6y agoI see some concerns with using humans to incubate babies as well. During her 2 pregnancies, my wife permanently lost most of her sense of smell, had a lower leg clot, and apparently a clot in her hip. That last one was only discovered a few years later when it turned out that the cartilage in her left hip joint was completely gone and she needed a hip replacement at a young age.
- staticman2 6y agoArtificial wombs would be great if they work well, but what are the odds that the initial designs will work well when actually tested on humans?
- amanaplanacanal 6y agoIf it works well with other large mammals, what do you think would be the problem with humans? We aren’t that different.
- Sporktacular 6y agoThat we aren't that different is why there's an ethical problem.
- staticman2 6y agoUnless the prenatal environment for a human is the same as say, for a gorilla, so that a gorilla could be a surrogate parent for a human, I wouldn't expect the animal testing to be an acceptable way to know how a human baby would turn out. I also imagine it's pretty difficult to do mental health screening on a gorilla, let alone extrapolate to whether a human baby would turn out physically okay but mentally not so great.
- konjin 6y agoWho cares? We abort babies for no reason at all today if they are in a woman. We should be able to do the same if they are not in a woman.
- cblconfederate 6y agoIndeed, we should start warming up to both, because we see what's happening when every other technology is accelerating and creating a dangerously overconnected world while biotech has not caught up.