We’ve all heard the joke about how medical breakthroughs in medical genetics and reproductive technology will eventually make either men or women (depending on who’s telling the story) obsolete. Funny most of the time – until you hear about how they have now successfully created sperm cells that were grown outside of a male body, implanted into a female, and produced viable offspring. Suddenly the term artificial insemination takes on a totally new meaning.
In all honesty I’m sure not everyone is surprised about this. It really is the next step, and a preliminary one at that. The offspring suffered, with one dying before reaching adulthood. As the article notes:
“There are currently many things we don’t know about how sperm are formed let alone why it sometimes goes wrong and leads to infertility in some men.
But he added: “It is more difficult to say whether artificial sperm produced this way could ultimately be used as a new treatment for male infertility. There are many technical, ethical and safety issues to be confronted before this could even be considered.”
At this point in reading the article I stopped and mentally noted that not a single person voiced the first question that came to my mind: Should we? Certainly they make all sorts of sabre-rattling efforts, claiming that various aspects of ethical, cultural and societal impacts need to be assessed along the way. I can hear the white-mustached man clearing his throat, lowering his bushy white eyebrows and declaring that analysis needs to be done. Hrumph, harumph, we’ll do this right!
And yet, I believe we need to look at things a little differently. Just because we can, doesn’t necessarily mean we should. That’s my personal belief.
Many people decry that we are messing with God’s work here, creating life in a way that should never be done. I think these people often follow this experiment to its natural conclusion: same-sex couples being able to have biological children together. Then the scientists step in and say that God’s desire is to have humans grow and stretch ourselves – that if s/he hadn’t meant us to do this we wouldn’t be able to do it.
I find these arguments rather pointless, as beliefs are not universal and really can’t be used as a cultural solution. But I do think we should ask ourselves why this is needed in today’s world, what the ramifications will be, and whether we really do need to follow this path to its completion. These questions may result in ‘yes’ – who can say? Nobody’s really ever figured it out.
Another example of science leading society down a road it may not even be aware of, let alone be thinking about critically. What does that road means to the culture, society, and people on the trip? Do we even care anymore? Is it progress for progress’s sake?