Any objections to Artificial Wombs?

[manualman]

You don’t need to look further than C-Sections to see how that approach would turn out. C-Section IS a good and valid option in emergencies and has saved the lives of thousands. It only eliminates a tiny little piece of the motherhood experience and holds the potential to save lives. But even there, we’ve seen absurd abuse of the technology. Study after study is showing that OBGYN’s are performing far more C-Sections than are medically indicated in spite of the fact that the recovery time and complication factors for C-Section are WORSE than for natural delivery (in healthy women).

I think it’s safe to say that such an available technology as artificial wombs would be used for harmful rather than beneficial purposes in the great majority of cases.

 

[Listener]

Read “Brave New World” by Aldous Huxley!

Yes, I thought of this book when I started reading this thread. I read it years ago, and it seems like the babies in that book were produced in baby “hatcheries” of some sort.

I agree that an artificial womb would just be some kind of life support system where you put babies who are born too early or who were removed because the mother was dying. The process of caring for very premature babies will probably continue to improve, and eventually someone will probably invent something that qualifies as an artificial womb. This would not be any more immoral than inventing an artificial heart, but it would be immoral to remove a baby from a healthy uterus and put it in an artificial uterus for no good reason. It would also be immoral to remove a healthy person’s heart and substitute an artificial heart for no good reason.

 

[Lost_Wanderer]

Yes and no. First you have to parse out the fact that several popular “contraception” methods are also at times abortifacient. But that people who use them wish to gloss over that, or they just plain don’t give a ---- they’re going to use it anyway.

Not to mention the comparison is pre versus post. Contraception, by its very nature, was seen as to prevent the pregnancy which precedes abortion. That’s how its proponents hope to reduce abortion through it.

On the other hand, artificial wombs takes up the exact same step where abortion could have taken place in the case of unwanted pregnancy. To say this is exactly a product of contraception mentality isn’t very accurate. It may very well take away an essential aspect of humanity but it’s not the same level of evil as robbing a newly conceived human being of its own future and freedom.

 

[3DOCTORS]

Remember that one case a couple of years ago where a Catholic hospital allowed an abortion to be performed because the mother had pulmonary hypertension? What if that baby could have been saved - this is one example of possible positives I’m thinking of.

 

[weller2]

I don’t see how this is going to solve the abortion crisis.

It will remove the need for abortions, by ending natural reproduction.

The problem with natural reproduction is that (a) it is very taxing on woman’s body and (b) it takes the woman off the job market for at least one year at the time.

When the artificial womb technology becomes cheap enough, then the logical thing for a woman to do will be to freeze her eggs and undergo sterilization at the age of 20 or so. When she will want to have children, she will have an egg unfreezed, fertilized in-vitro, transferred to the artificial womb and then she will just have to pick up the baby 9 months later. No more unwanted children, because you will have to pay for the whole thing…

Yes, it will completely reshape the human society.

 

[weller2]

it could provide the “life support” and a refuge for a child that the mother wants to be rid of

If the technology becomes widespread, the natural final price point is 6-12 months of woman’s earnings… And the technology will be more expensive initially… So, who will pay?

and maybe rescue some “snowflake” embryos from their frozen limbo.

Ensoulment-at-conception has never been an official doctrine of the Church, and by the time frame we are talking about (at least mid-2100s, more like 2200s) it may well be officially declared a heresy… It just leads to too many absurdities.

 

[3DOCTORS]

If the technology becomes widespread, the natural final price point is 6-12 months of woman’s earnings… And the technology will be more expensive initially… So, who will pay?

Ensoulment-at-conception has never been an official doctrine of the Church, and by the time frame we are talking about (at least mid-2100s, more like 2200s) it may well be officially declared a heresy… It just leads to too many absurdities.

I believe you’re mistaken here:

Human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception. From the first moment of his existence, a human being must be recognized as having the rights of a person - among which is the inviolable right of every innocent being to life. - CCC 2270

I doubt it would be declared a heresy, either.

 

[BornInMarch]

I believe you’re mistaken here:

Human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception. From the first moment of his existence, a human being must be recognized as having the rights of a person - among which is the inviolable right of every innocent being to life. - CCC 2270

I doubt it would be declared a heresy, either.

That is very true, and the fact about life beginning at conception is not a new belief for Catholicism; it can be traced not only back to the Church Fathers but also to the Old Testament.

 

[3DOCTORS]

Moving right along, I can sort of envision a scenario where, if people weren’t wanting this for selfish reasons or to change the fundamental face of childbearing, it might simply be seen as a very advanced incubator. However, I guess we have to conclude that in today’s society, there’s no way it wouldn’t be fraught with ethical dilemmas. Even the abortion thing - essentially you’d have a woman saying “Take the risk of taking this baby out of me and putting it into an artificial womb, or I’ll have it killed outright.” It’s a threat. The high-risk pregnancy when all other options are not feasible, that might be the only really justifiable use. It’s all above my pay grade to parse all the morality of it.

 

[Mintaka]

Ah, so it’s a Lois McMaster Bujold thread…

The problem is that a lot of abortions are really not about the abortion per se.

If it’s a forced or coerced abortion, that wouldn’t generally suit the forcer at all. An adult boyfriend or pedophile covering up statutory rape, or a father covering up incest, doesn’t want the baby to be alive in a little artificial womb somewhere. The baby is evidence.

If the father just states doesn’t want the baby, a frantic attempt to keep the father by abortion might be turned into putting the kid into an artificial womb. But I kind of wonder.

If it’s a case where a woman actually wants an abortion, it is very seldom a matter of calculation. Money and time may be involved, but it’s usually more about self-image, despair and self-hatred, or confused/hateful feelings about the father.

If it was just money and time, they’d be giving the kid up for adoption.

 

[BornInMarch]

Ah, so it’s a Lois McMaster Bujold thread…

The problem is that a lot of abortions are really not about the abortion per se.

If it’s a forced or coerced abortion, that wouldn’t generally suit the forcer at all. An adult boyfriend or pedophile covering up statutory rape, or a father covering up incest, doesn’t want the baby to be alive in a little artificial womb somewhere. The baby is evidence.

If the father just states doesn’t want the baby, a frantic attempt to keep the father by abortion might be turned into putting the kid into an artificial womb. But I kind of wonder.

If it’s a case where a woman actually wants an abortion, it is very seldom a matter of calculation. Money and time may be involved, but it’s usually more about self-image, despair and self-hatred, or confused/hateful feelings about the father.

If it was just money and time, they’d be giving the kid up for adoption.

Everyone seems to be assuming that it will be a choice between Artificial wombs OR Abortion, when in fact the existence of the former will sooner or later result in the I criminalization of the latter.

 

[Scottgun]

Everyone seems to be assuming that it will be a choice between Artificial wombs OR Abortion, when in fact the existence of the former will sooner or later result in the I criminalization of the latter.

I don’t see this at happening at all in such a situation. Abortion isn’t just about avoiding inconvenience, future financial hardships, or health problems; it’s about asserting (granted, often at an unconscious level), the absolute sovereignty of Man rather than God. As such, even with artificial wombs, champions of ripping unborn children apart with forceps will fight tooth and nail to preserve this “right”, and likely win in the modern state.

 

[weller2]

That is very true, and the fact about life beginning at conception is not a new belief for Catholicism; it can be traced not only back to the Church Fathers but also to the Old Testament.

Ensoulment-at-conception is an old belief but it was never the consesus position. See catholiceducation.org/articles/medical_ethics/me0116.htm

Observe that CCC #2270 says nothing about souls. In fact, if you read Catholic doctrine on embryos, souls are never mentioned. Instead, the argument is that since zygote progressively develops into an adult, there is no obvious boundary between a proto-human and human, and so there is no ontological difference between the two. Ensoulment-at-conception is now indeed widely believed, but it is as a sort of ex post rationalization: if adults are ensouled, and adults are ontologically the same as embryos, then human embryos must be ensouled, because they are, well, human. And they are human because they have human DNA. Thus human DNA = soul. Soul is infused when the sperm fertilizes ovum and new human DNA is created.

Except…

There is more than one way to make a human. For example, in cloning, you take an ovum, remove its DNA, then you take somatic DNA from an adult, and put that into the ovum. There is no magical moment when new DNA is created. Or, you can synthesize the human DNA sequence in the lab and put that into an ovum (bonus points for also synthesizing the ovum). Again, no fertilization to speak of, so no ensoulment. Or just try human-animal hybrids and designer genes.

While you can rationalize that ensoulment somehow happens in these scenarios, you can also rationalize that ensoulment doesn’t happen, so the end product is not ensouled, ergo not human. In right (or wrong, depending on your POV) socio-econo-political conditions the second argument may prevail, opening the door to mass-production of “unensouled” clones. For what happens next, see Blade Runner or Cloud Atlas.

If you say that it’s impossible for millions of Catholics to fall into such gross moral error well… It should have been impossible for millions of German and Austrian Catholics to fall into the gross moral error of supporting the Nazi party and perpetrating the Holocaust… But they did, because Nazi ideology was rooted in some elements of Catholicism… One man only saw through this – Franz Jägerstätter – and he died abandoned by his Church.

Ensoulment-at-conception today → Holocaust of the clones in 50 (100? 200?) years.

 

[BornInMarch]

Ensoulment-at-conception is an old belief but it was never the consesus position. See catholiceducation.org/articles/medical_ethics/me0116.htm

Observe that CCC #2270 says nothing about souls. In fact, if you read Catholic doctrine on embryos, souls are never mentioned. Instead, the argument is that since zygote progressively develops into an adult, there is no obvious boundary between a proto-human and human, and so there is no ontological difference between the two. Ensoulment-at-conception is now indeed widely believed, but it is as a sort of ex post rationalization: if adults are ensouled, and adults are ontologically the same as embryos, then human embryos must be ensouled, because they are, well, human. And they are human because they have human DNA. Thus human DNA = soul. Soul is infused when the sperm fertilizes ovum and new human DNA is created.

Except…

There is more than one way to make a human. For example, in cloning, you take an ovum, remove its DNA, then you take somatic DNA from an adult, and put that into the ovum. There is no magical moment when new DNA is created. Or, you can synthesize the human DNA sequence in the lab and put that into an ovum (bonus points for also synthesizing the ovum). Again, no fertilization to speak of, so no ensoulment. Or just try human-animal hybrids and designer genes.

While you can rationalize that ensoulment somehow happens in these scenarios, you can also rationalize that ensoulment doesn’t happen, so the end product is not ensouled, ergo not human. In right (or wrong, depending on your POV) socio-econo-political conditions the second argument may prevail, opening the door to mass-production of “unensouled” clones. For what happens next, see Blade Runner or Cloud Atlas.

If you say that it’s impossible for millions of Catholics to fall into such gross moral error well… It should have been impossible for millions of German and Austrian Catholics to fall into the gross moral error of supporting the Nazi party and perpetrating the Holocaust… But they did, because Nazi ideology was rooted in some elements of Catholicism… One man only saw through this – Franz Jägerstätter – and he died abandoned by his Church.

Ensoulment-at-conception today → Holocaust of the clones in 50 (100? 200?) years.

First of all, the Church is in agreement that life begins at conception.

priestsforlife.org/magisterium/bishops/provost-pelosi.htm

Secondly, identical twins (which form when a zygote splits in half early on [this is why they share DNA]) have separate souls so it is foolish to think cloned humans would not as well.

Thirdly, the Catholic Church did NOT support the holocaust. Pope Pius XII actively worked behind the scenes to help jews escape from Europe (some even hid in his summer home). There is also the fact that he gave permission for monastic orders to shelter refugees (thus letting jews hide in monasteries).

And Pope Pius XII was not alone in this either; Fr. Maximilian Kolbe not only sheltered jews during the holocaust, but when he was found out he was sent to a concentration camp himself. He died taking the place of someone else who was about to be executed.

Seriously, check your facts.

 

[weller2]

First of all, the Church is in agreement that life begins at conception.

But that’s not the point. The point is that the current doctrine so inconsistent, that you can claim that clones or IVF babies, while being alive have no soul, and remain within the limits of orthodoxy (a lesser claim but with same social impact is that they have no original sin).

There is no explicit CDF statetement to the effect that IVF babies and/or clone have souls and original sin – and there won’t be, because accepting this means throwing out Augustine and everything after him. Augustine has tied together sex, conception, and original sin. IVF/cloning means you can have one without the other. Throw in artificial wombs, and “flesh-from-flesh” is no longer true. Take an IVF baby growing in an artificial womb. Humani generis says that original sin is transmitted by “natural generation”, but here, nothing is natural – there is no possible mechanism by which original sin could be transmitted, unless the soul infused by God is already tainted with the original sin. Oh wait, that’s heresy.

As ususal when someting comes up which threatens the doctrinal fundamentals, there is a temptation to respond by saying that it doesn’t exist (and outlaw it just in case it really does – I mean, if it’s illegal, nobody will have it, and since nobody has it, you can pretend that it doesn’t exist). That’s what originally happened with geocentrism and evolution. That’s what’s happening now with transsexualism, which the Church declares to be a mental disorder in spite of scientific evidence, because it is inconceivable that God would create a male (body) / female (soul) crossover.

A combination of IVF, cloning, and artificial wombs threatens the doctrinal fundamentals. In countries with strong Catholic influence, there will first be attempts to outlaw the technology, ostensibly for objective moral reasons (cf. the Catholic Church is now making a strong push in Poland to outlaw IVF). When that fails, the doctrinal problem caused by widespread existence of the impossible will have to be faced. There will be a temptation to respond in the simplest way by saying that these people have no souls.

At this point, all you need is a deep economic crisis. That invariably leads to a rise of a right-wing authoritarian government, which the Church will support, as it invariably does everywhere in the world, as it is itself a right-wing authoritarian organization. The government will soon realize that it cannot really fix the problems, so it must invent a scapegoat to stay in power. The enemy should be widespread, blended with the society, and threatening its existence by corrupting it from within. Yup, you’ve guessed it – the widespread theological controversy, even without the final decision, will provide the scapegoat.

The hell will break loose.

 

[weller2]

Thirdly, the Catholic Church did NOT support the holocaust.

Did I say that? All I said is that millions of Catholics fell into the moral error of supporting, cooperating with, and directly executing the Holocaust. Did the Church do anything to correct them in their error?

Yes, there is no evidence that Vatican directly supported the Holocaust. But as you go to lower levels, things are becoming more muddy. For example:

• Catholic apologists usually try to link fascism with atheism. But the interesting thing is that fascist regimes originated in 3 countries in Europe – Italy, Spain, and Bavaria – and all 3 are Catholic. Then we have Slovakia, where the Nazi-collaborating government was headed by a Catholic priests (Jozef Tiso). And don’t even get me started on Croatia (I’ll just say that even SS officers could not stomach the exploits of Catholic clergy there). In contrast, the most atheist countries in Europe – France and Sweden – did not produce fascist regimes.
• Hitler was actually elected into power due to political machinations involving a Church-sponsored political party (Zentrum). He would have never been elected, if Zentrum voted against him. But it voted for him, because the Church was hoping for some short-term gains. Then, of course, Reichkonkordat – you cannot both claim that the government is illegitimate and sign treaties with them…
• Then the regime passes Nurnberg laws and starts compiling a master list of Jews for later extermination. Here’s a funny thing: the legal definition of Jew passed in Nurnberg is so complicated, that verifying someone’s Jewishness requires looking into baptismal records two generations back. So the government sends its operatives into churches, they trawl through baptismal and marriage records, and encode all that on punchcards. Then they run the punchcards through their brand new mechanical computer (bought from IBM) which prints out a list of people who should be rounded up and put into ghettos. Now, with Nurnberg laws in force, the priests and bishops responsible for the records must have realized that the government has no legitimate use for their data – but they gave it up anyway, instead of destroying it. Then of course is the rethorical questions how many Catholics were involved at this stage, first trawling through the records and then doing the rounding up.
• Yes, the Pope wrote an encyclical – did you read it? Because what is says is nowhere close to what Catholic apologists claim it says.
• Then the regime starts drafting millions of Catholic men into the army – none of them object, nor does the Church call for objectors. There’s ONE (!) man who declares that he cannot join Hitler’s army because he is Catholic – Franz Jaegerstaetter – and his priest tries to talk him into joining the army anyway, saying that a Catholic should obey his legitimate government.
• Then you have the immense logistics involved into loading people on the trains and sending them to Auschwitz etc. You really can’t claim that there were no Catholics involved in the operation – that’s statistically impossible. German Catholics were writing the timetables, dispatching the trains, driving the trains, maintaining the tracks, and issuing invoices to the government. Did the Church ask them to strike? Of course not. These trains were running on time until 1945.

More importantly however, none of this could have happened without 1000 years of prior Catholic anti-Semitism in Europe. It didn’t even require any bad will, just good old ignorance. I mean, assume that you are an uneducated peasant. You go to Mass every Sunady and your priest tells you that Jews have killed Jesus and they were persecuting Christians, and by the way, there is a Jewish-Masonic conspiracy to subvert Catholic Church by teaching Darwinism in schools (*). So, you really think that Jews are evil people. Now, your neighbor Moshe happens to be a Jew, and he seems to be OK, but, who knows, Jews are cunning people. And, Moshe happens to be running a money-lending business, and you happen to be in debt to him, so if Moshe suddenly… disappeared, well, that would not be really bad, would it… So, then this politican shows up and says that he’s going to solve the Jewish problem, and you’re thinking, why not vote for him…

(*) Direct paraphrase from a book written at the beginning of the 20th century by Jozef Pelczar, a Catholic bishop, later declared a saint

 

[3DOCTORS]

Now what was the original topic of this thread again?

 

[Paleocon]

Scientists are currently working on ways to develop artificial wombs, which would allow fetuses to develop outside of a woman’s body. There are many effects this would have?

The biggest effect is that it could potentially end all abortions. Woman get abortions because they don’t want to carry a child and are too impatient to wait until it is born and give it up for adoption. If Artificial Wombs were a reality, then unborn children who would otherwise be aborted could be simply relocated instead of murdered.

Apart from that, fetuses with deformities could have surgery preformed on them easier.

Are there any downsides to Artificial Wombs?

Such would seem to be licit in cases where a legitimate health need of a pregnant woman or an unborn child necessitated it. As a general rule, it would not be licit.

As far as whether it would be licit for a doctor to perform such a transfer in the case of a woman who would otherwise abort, I would think it would be licit as a form of defense of another.

Note: All of this ignores the practical reality that any such device would be inferior in quality to the real thing.