December 2, 2009 • 19 mins
In this episode of Stuff Mom Never Told You, Molly and Cristen ponder baby technology of the future -- from designer babies to robot children.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.
It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff mom never told you?
From house Stuff works dot Com. Hey, welco to the podcast.
This is Molly and I'm Kristen. Kristen. Lots of my
friends are having babies these days. Fine too, And I
(00:23):
go and visit the babies and they're cute, they're fun kind.
I'm not really they can't talk to you, and I'm
a very verbal person and I don't know what to
do when something can't talk back to me, which I
think is one way I know that I am not
ready to have a child. Yeah, clearly, I think children
are little robots sent to destroy us, and that just
(00:44):
is a good sign that I'm not ready for motherhood.
Whoa Molly, before we start getting in a lot of
hate mail for your AUNTI baby ways. I'm not an
anti baby for other people, just for myself. But that
doesn't mean in the future I won't change my mind. Yeah.
And you know what, Molly, if you hold out long
enough in the future, you're gonna have some zaney ways
of making babies. I know this was um. I researched
(01:06):
all the ways in which people might have children in
the future, and it made me feel a lot better
about being sort of anti baby for myself right now. Yeah,
because what because basically science is going to figure out
how women can have and men can have exactly the
kind of baby they want, exactly when they want it.
It's gonna be like burger King. Basically, Yeah, it wasn't
(01:28):
there a woman I want to say, in Slovenia, oh
In I think two thousand five, gave birth to a
child at sixty six. I want to say, highly controversial, right,
but I think in the future, in the future, it
will be less controversial because there's just gonna be so
much science, so much science. Well, science and babies really
(01:51):
got off to a great start in uh in nineteen
seventy eight when Louise Brown a k a. The first
test tube baby was warm and she basically she was
the first child born via and vit your fertilization, and
now vit your fertilization keeps moving forward to the point
that we have something called octomom and the culture now
(02:13):
and Suleiman I prefer to call her octo mom um,
a woman who I think it recently came out that
basically she was storing embryos. She didn't want to pay
anymore for the storage, so she basically just said, we'll
put him in me and let's see what happens. Um.
That's according to The New York Times. I don't want
to I'm not trying to make a judgment on octo mom,
(02:33):
but I think that the judgment that our society puts
on her shows that the advances that will discuss in
this article mean that, Um, you know, there are a
lot of questions to be asked about fertility, about woman's
right to have a child, a man's right to have
a child, and how far science should be allowed to
be involved in that process. Yeah, it comes down to
(02:54):
this little list question that that often pops up in
science and technology of are we playing God with with
with all of this this fertility technology. And and the
first thing I think we should talk about is something
called preimplantation genetic diagnosis. And this has been around in
some fertility clinics since the nineteen nineties, but it might
(03:14):
become a lot more common in the future. And this
is also known as embryo screening, and basically it takes
a three day embryo and pulls out one of its
cells to test for genetic markers of disease. So basically
you can pre screen the six silled embryo to see
whether or not it's UH, it has the potential to
develop life threatening diseases down the road. Right there was
(03:38):
maybe more recently that they called the first breast cancer
free baby because they knew that it didn't have the markers,
the genetic markers for breast cancer. Now already you can
start to ask questions about um environmental factors and whether
that's already to plan to this child's life. But I
think that it's hard not to argue with parents who
want to make sure that the best of their ability,
(03:58):
that their children will never have to face some awful
genetic disease. And right now, while it is legal in
the US, I think we should also note that UH
that this embryo screening is still illegal in the UK,
India and China. UM. But the thing about preimplantation genetic diagnosis, well,
it seems like a good idea. You are pre screening
the child for UH, for sickness and disease. No one
(04:21):
wants their child to develop cancer or something terrible like that.
But is this the first step towards what is commonly
referred to as designer babies, right, because once you figure
out how to check for the genetic disease is you
can start to check for anything that's controlled by genetics.
If you want, uh, blonde hair, blue eyed baby, you
can look at the genetic markers for that. You can
(04:43):
look at the genetic markers for gender. Which is one
reason why pg D has been outlawed as you're mentioning
in the United Kingdom, Indian China, because people think that
it's not right that you can walk into a fortellity
clinic and say, find me an embryo that's gonna look
like this and behave like this. Well, and also there
is a chance of losing genetic diversity because if everybody
starts going in and wearing the same types of perfect
(05:05):
little babies, then uh, the diversity is going to fade
out over time. And then there's also the issue of
something called negative enhancement, which would be if a parents
selected for um a trait such as dwarfism or um
what we might consider more of a of a negative
trait genetic traite, right, And that's another one of these
big ethics questions that people have to grapple with when
(05:27):
you think about jowing of the futures. Who's going to
decide what's a negative enhancement or what's a perfectly reasonable
thing to ask for. Because let's say to deaf people
who are married walk into a fertility clinic and say
that they want a deaf child because they know that
being deaf has this sort of cultural legacy. They want
the child to be able to communicate within their culture
and their social circle. Who's going to be the one
(05:49):
that says, you know, deafness isn't something we're gonna select.
I mean, who are we to say it's a handicap?
So that's an issue that's going to come up um
And there was a survey recently conducted by the New
York University School of met us in which shows that
right now in the United States, people are generally on
board with using it to avoid things that you know,
we can pretty much say are bad, like retardation, cancer,
(06:10):
other mitochondrial diseases. But now ten percent of people think
that it's acceptable to figure out, um if your baby
will have any athletic ability in the future. People think
it's okay to see if you can have the embryo
with improved intelligence, and ten percent want to make sure
they can have, you know, a nice tall child in
the future. So maybe short people who are slightly dumb
and can't play basketball, they'll they won't exist in the future. Yeah,
(06:33):
I think it's gonna be really I wish I could
look into a little uh, look into a crystal ball
and see, you know, twenty years from now, how far
this you know quote designer baby trend will have gone,
and how the laws are going to change, because like
you said, I mean, is there how could you ever
legislate against, you know, selecting for certain traits, because that
(06:55):
just seems inherently wrong. Um. But Molly. One other actor
or with reproductive technology has to do with with age,
with whether or not like women can get pregnant if
they have um if their their wombs are up to
the task, either because of biological problems or because of
age limitations with things like amnopoles um. But there might
(07:17):
come a day when children can be borne from artificial
wounds that are hooked up to something called a placent
a machine. Right, and you know it sounds very science fiction,
But there's a woman named hun Chin Lieu of Cornell University,
who essentially has grown artificial wombs using human tissue. Yeah,
(07:39):
she basically began growing sheets of endometrial tissue and UH,
and then she was able from that to construct a
freestanding uterus UH. And then when she implanted the donated
human embryos into I guess the placenta machine, they began
growing in the tissue, much like they would have in
a woman's womb. But because of UH ethics laws, the
(08:01):
embryos had to be removed before they could come to term, right,
so she turned to mice because no one really seems
to care about mice. Unfortunately, UM put mouse embrios in
this artificial boom and they almost made it to full term,
except they were deformed. So I'm not trying We're not
trying to suggest that any of these technologies are right
around the corner, but it's definitely something that ethicis are
(08:21):
already grappling with. Another thing that has been UH scientifically
and artificially made sperm and eggs. Yeah. In two thousand nine,
researchers from Newcastle University in England and now so they
had created human sperm cells from embryonic tissue um and
while the fake sperm looked like the real deal in
terms of looks and actions, scientists think that sperm actually
(08:44):
needs a fifteen year time in some tests to develop
to become viable to fertilize and egg right, and manufactured
eggs may also be on the way. UM also entire embryos.
You know, you want to talk about a hilarious romantic
comedy movie, how about an embryo with three parents. Hey,
I'm gonna sell that screenplay soon, but it's really Paltrow.
(09:08):
Let's say there's two parents who both have this genetic
marker for mitochondrial disease like cancer. What they can do
is take the parts from both of them, take out
that DNA that would cause a disease like that, and
put it into an embryo that will basically grow the
child's DNA four or the genetic markers for it. So
it's like you're outsourcing your mitochondrial production and Molly in
(09:32):
the future. I wonder how many time the future. In
the future, it might be possible for two men to
have a baby together without the help of a surrogate
because eggs can be made from male cells. How about that, right,
Because they've got both X and the Y chromosome, but
unfortunately sperm requires Y chromosome, so lesbian couple would still
(09:56):
have to rely on the help from male tissue. Right,
So the thinking goes that in the future, you could
have let's say, two men who get the DNA I'll
put together to make the artificial sperm and egg. They
put it in the artificial womb, grows it for nine months,
all of a sudden we got a baby. Now no
one knows, of course at this point what health problems
(10:19):
the baby could be at risk for by not coming
out the old fashioned way, but it does seem by
reading some of this stuff that having a baby um
just by having sex kind of would be on the
way out because you wouldn't be able to do any
of that genetic determination. And you know, you've got to
wonder if some people would want to carry a baby
when they can put it in the artificial bomb. So
(10:41):
the question really is, Molly for this episode is not
how we have children, but will sex become passe in
the future. I don't think sex wat would become past,
but sex to have a baby maybe, But whether this
baby technology pans out or not, Molly the fact of
the matter is the family dynamics in our society really
(11:01):
are changing in general, because take for instance, the fact
that from the birth rate for women forty five and over,
according to the CDC, more than doubled. Right, there's been
this big trend towards um older parenting in general. Basically
people waiting until later in life, once they're more financially secure,
(11:21):
a little more you know, emotionally and professionally stable, they
were really committed for the long haul, then going about
having children instead of doing it early in life. Right.
I think that no matter what happens in the future,
our vision of what a family looks like, it is
already changing. And there have been a few studies about
the effects of having children later in life. We found
two books, ones called Last Chance Children, which looks at
(11:43):
twenty two children who were raised by older parents UM
and interviewed them when they were adults, and of those adults,
only two of the two would want to have their
own children later in life, and the rest of them
basically just complained a lot about how their parents didn't
have the energy to play with them. Yeah, there's just
the whole argument of well, if you have a child
when you are, say forty five fifty years old, then
(12:06):
you know, if your child is in your teens and
you're getting older, is your child gonna end up having
to basically parent you and take care of you and
you're in your old age and basically robbed those children
of their young, carefree adolescent years. But really, is there
any adolescent that that lifest their parents? Well? Yeah, I
(12:27):
mean I did. Yeah, I mean I think yeah, with
the point you're trying to make is the teen years
are going to be probably a little rocky at some
point for any any family, no member, no matter the
age of the parents. Um. But the other book that
we mentioned that we found was Children of Parents Over
thirty five. Andrew el Yarrow had a much bigger pool,
six or fifty people who who answered questionnaires about what
(12:47):
it meant to grow up with older parents, And some
of them were bitter about it the way that the
other ones were. Some of them just talked about how
great it was to have, you know, a parent who
wasn't hovering, was was more emotionally mature, can provide that stability.
So I don't think that there's any right or wrong
way to do it, but I think that one interesting
thing we're finding is that we tend to think that
(13:08):
men are just these all powerful beings that can have
babies whenever they want. They don't have this biological clock
that ticks, and it's really women who benefit from these
advances in reproductive technology. But it's important to note, fellows,
that you too have a bit of a biological clock. Yeah,
sperm have have their own shelf life as well, it seems.
And this was from an article that we found in
(13:31):
a in the New York New York Times magazine from
earlier this year, and it said that researchers from the
University of Queensland found that children born to older fathers
have on average lower scores on testsa intelligence than those
born to younger dads. And that was from a pool
of thirty three thousand American children. And in addition, British
(13:51):
and Swedish researchers have also calculated that risk that the
risk of schizophrenia begins to rise for those whose fathers
were over thirty when their babies were born. Another Swedish
study has also found at the risk of bipolar disorder
and children begins to increase when fathers are older than
twenty nine and it's highest if they're older than five.
So it's kind of added an interesting dimension to this
(14:13):
whole how old is to hold the old who have
a baby question? Because a lot of times we immediately
think of women, but it does appear that that men
now have an impact as well. So it seems that
they're always risks, is what I'm learning from this christ
And as that, um, you know, it doesn't seem like
there's any perfect asia have a baby, and I think
that will only continue to change in the future. That
(14:35):
doesn't mean the ethicis don't want to figure out how
to draw the line in the sand, because I mean,
we are talking about older parents, but it's perfectly conceivable
that if there was an artificial womb technology that some
ten year old wouldn't march into of fertility clinic and
be like, well, I want a baby too. I think
I think the concern is towards the other end of
the spectrum. Like with that I said Slovenian, it's actually
(14:58):
Romanian woman who who had the child by ivf at
A at sixty six. Right so right now, I think
the American society reproductive medicine would like clinics to turn
away people who are past menopause, because they say that
if your body can no longer do it, then perhaps
you shouldn't be helped along by science. Yeah, but like
(15:18):
we were talking at the being in the podcast, there's
so much science out there. Yeah, we're living longer, that's right. So,
how we have children in the future. Maybe it'll be
placenta machines. Maybe it will be artificial eggs made from
males cells. Maybe it will be from rainbows. Maybe we
really will have robot children. And I won't just think
(15:41):
that babies are like robots. You seem a little comforted
by that thought, Molly, A little bit that I can
understand that I write my head around. Well, guys, I
could programmed to do what I want. Sorry, I don't
mean to call babies. It's that you're never babysitting for me, Molly.
I think I just decided if I ever had a child. Uh, well,
you guys, if you have anything, it's about children of
(16:01):
the future. How old is too old to have a
baby and all that good stuff. Please send us an
email at mom stuff at how stuff works dot com.
And speaking of which, I think we got a little
bit of listener mail Molly, and this listener mail comes
from the episode we did on what is the difference
(16:22):
between marriage and civil union? And this first email I
have comes from Virginia and she says, I have to
say it really irritates me when people use the slippery
slope argument, i e. People who want to marry children, horses, cars,
et cetera. Now I'm not a lawyer, but I think
people who use that argument are forgetting one very important thing,
(16:43):
the ability to give consent. Can a child consent to
marriage legally? No? Can a horse consent to marriage no?
Can a car consent to marriage no? Therefore, it's an
entirely ridiculous argument. My personal opinion is that if people,
regardless of their sexuality you want to get married, they
should all be REQUI are to have a civil ceremony,
even the religious people, which would grant all the essential
(17:04):
rights of marriage as we understand it. Then if people
want to have a religious ceremony in addition to the
civil ceremony, then that's their decision. If people decide not
to have a religious ceremony on top of their civil ceremony,
then they still have all the rights that come with
being married. Thanks for putting the information out there. And
thank you Virginia for writing in and I would like
to an email from Jillian. She writes, we started the
(17:27):
podcast talking about main selection and the state decision to
appeal same sex marriage. While this saddens me, I'm a
little irritated with the mass media's response to this. Mains
election has been a lead story, with many news anchor
stating same sex marriage has been denied by every state
in which it was brought to a vote. However, what
these networks from neglecting to mention is the passing of
Referendum seventy one in Washington State. People have been calling
it that everything but marriage law. As a Seattle citizen,
(17:50):
I was very happy that ref some do I passed,
but just may that it has not been receiving any
response in the press. It's a pretty close fight, but
the voters of Washington State did not beat it down.
I feel it as a step in the right direct action.
Referendum se many one is about more than just same
sex partnership. Well so it cures rights for same sex couples,
it also provides rights to domestic partners for all types,
including senior citizens. Anyway, I feel like referendum somebody wants
(18:11):
a great stepping stone to equal rights for all and
perhaps of other states. But this kind of legislation on
a ballot citizens would have an easier time accepting domestic
partnerships of all stripes. Well. And to wrap things up,
I've got an email from Ryan from Chicago. He says,
I feel you may have missed some important facts over
why the LBGT community does not just settle for civil
(18:34):
unions and or domestic partnerships. While many believe these to
be equal with regards to write and benefits to marriage,
the facts simply do not support that in most states.
While getting my BA, I remember hearing one of my
professors speak on the difficulties of him and his partner
um in obtaining his status, including psychological evaluations, mounds of
paperwork and weak slash, months of verification, etcetera. It's also
(18:56):
been pretty well researched. The marriage, while being a religious institution,
still provide it's many more benefits than evil even a
civil union, and unfortunately, um why those rights sometimes fail.
I love the podcast and applaud you for bringing up
I just hope that you will mention some of these
things as well, since many people don't realize the inequalities
of marriage versus other types of unions, and why the
(19:17):
LGBT community shouldn't have to settle for separate but equal.
Thank you, Ryan, So. If you've got an opinion, it's
mom stuff at how stuff works dot com. You can
also check out our blog it's called how to stuff
and as always, if you want to learn about anything
we talk about, including shield or Not the future and
head on over to how stuff works dot com for
(19:40):
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com home page. Brought to you by the reinvented two
thousand twelve camera. It's ready, are you
Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.
It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff mom never told you?
From house Stuff works dot Com. Hey, welco to the podcast.
This is Molly and I'm Kristen. Kristen. Lots of my
friends are having babies these days. Fine too, And I
(00:23):
go and visit the babies and they're cute, they're fun kind.
I'm not really they can't talk to you, and I'm
a very verbal person and I don't know what to
do when something can't talk back to me, which I
think is one way I know that I am not
ready to have a child. Yeah, clearly, I think children
are little robots sent to destroy us, and that just
(00:44):
is a good sign that I'm not ready for motherhood.
Whoa Molly, before we start getting in a lot of
hate mail for your AUNTI baby ways. I'm not an
anti baby for other people, just for myself. But that
doesn't mean in the future I won't change my mind. Yeah.
And you know what, Molly, if you hold out long
enough in the future, you're gonna have some zaney ways
of making babies. I know this was um. I researched
(01:06):
all the ways in which people might have children in
the future, and it made me feel a lot better
about being sort of anti baby for myself right now. Yeah,
because what because basically science is going to figure out
how women can have and men can have exactly the
kind of baby they want, exactly when they want it.
It's gonna be like burger King. Basically, Yeah, it wasn't
(01:28):
there a woman I want to say, in Slovenia, oh
In I think two thousand five, gave birth to a
child at sixty six. I want to say, highly controversial, right,
but I think in the future, in the future, it
will be less controversial because there's just gonna be so
much science, so much science. Well, science and babies really
(01:51):
got off to a great start in uh in nineteen
seventy eight when Louise Brown a k a. The first
test tube baby was warm and she basically she was
the first child born via and vit your fertilization, and
now vit your fertilization keeps moving forward to the point
that we have something called octomom and the culture now
(02:13):
and Suleiman I prefer to call her octo mom um,
a woman who I think it recently came out that
basically she was storing embryos. She didn't want to pay
anymore for the storage, so she basically just said, we'll
put him in me and let's see what happens. Um.
That's according to The New York Times. I don't want
to I'm not trying to make a judgment on octo mom,
(02:33):
but I think that the judgment that our society puts
on her shows that the advances that will discuss in
this article mean that, Um, you know, there are a
lot of questions to be asked about fertility, about woman's
right to have a child, a man's right to have
a child, and how far science should be allowed to
be involved in that process. Yeah, it comes down to
(02:54):
this little list question that that often pops up in
science and technology of are we playing God with with
with all of this this fertility technology. And and the
first thing I think we should talk about is something
called preimplantation genetic diagnosis. And this has been around in
some fertility clinics since the nineteen nineties, but it might
(03:14):
become a lot more common in the future. And this
is also known as embryo screening, and basically it takes
a three day embryo and pulls out one of its
cells to test for genetic markers of disease. So basically
you can pre screen the six silled embryo to see
whether or not it's UH, it has the potential to
develop life threatening diseases down the road. Right there was
(03:38):
maybe more recently that they called the first breast cancer
free baby because they knew that it didn't have the markers,
the genetic markers for breast cancer. Now already you can
start to ask questions about um environmental factors and whether
that's already to plan to this child's life. But I
think that it's hard not to argue with parents who
want to make sure that the best of their ability,
(03:58):
that their children will never have to face some awful
genetic disease. And right now, while it is legal in
the US, I think we should also note that UH
that this embryo screening is still illegal in the UK,
India and China. UM. But the thing about preimplantation genetic diagnosis, well,
it seems like a good idea. You are pre screening
the child for UH, for sickness and disease. No one
(04:21):
wants their child to develop cancer or something terrible like that.
But is this the first step towards what is commonly
referred to as designer babies, right, because once you figure
out how to check for the genetic disease is you
can start to check for anything that's controlled by genetics.
If you want, uh, blonde hair, blue eyed baby, you
can look at the genetic markers for that. You can
(04:43):
look at the genetic markers for gender. Which is one
reason why pg D has been outlawed as you're mentioning
in the United Kingdom, Indian China, because people think that
it's not right that you can walk into a fortellity
clinic and say, find me an embryo that's gonna look
like this and behave like this. Well, and also there
is a chance of losing genetic diversity because if everybody
starts going in and wearing the same types of perfect
(05:05):
little babies, then uh, the diversity is going to fade
out over time. And then there's also the issue of
something called negative enhancement, which would be if a parents
selected for um a trait such as dwarfism or um
what we might consider more of a of a negative
trait genetic traite, right, And that's another one of these
big ethics questions that people have to grapple with when
(05:27):
you think about jowing of the futures. Who's going to
decide what's a negative enhancement or what's a perfectly reasonable
thing to ask for. Because let's say to deaf people
who are married walk into a fertility clinic and say
that they want a deaf child because they know that
being deaf has this sort of cultural legacy. They want
the child to be able to communicate within their culture
and their social circle. Who's going to be the one
(05:49):
that says, you know, deafness isn't something we're gonna select.
I mean, who are we to say it's a handicap?
So that's an issue that's going to come up um
And there was a survey recently conducted by the New
York University School of met us in which shows that
right now in the United States, people are generally on
board with using it to avoid things that you know,
we can pretty much say are bad, like retardation, cancer,
(06:10):
other mitochondrial diseases. But now ten percent of people think
that it's acceptable to figure out, um if your baby
will have any athletic ability in the future. People think
it's okay to see if you can have the embryo
with improved intelligence, and ten percent want to make sure
they can have, you know, a nice tall child in
the future. So maybe short people who are slightly dumb
and can't play basketball, they'll they won't exist in the future. Yeah,
(06:33):
I think it's gonna be really I wish I could
look into a little uh, look into a crystal ball
and see, you know, twenty years from now, how far
this you know quote designer baby trend will have gone,
and how the laws are going to change, because like
you said, I mean, is there how could you ever
legislate against, you know, selecting for certain traits, because that
(06:55):
just seems inherently wrong. Um. But Molly. One other actor
or with reproductive technology has to do with with age,
with whether or not like women can get pregnant if
they have um if their their wombs are up to
the task, either because of biological problems or because of
age limitations with things like amnopoles um. But there might
(07:17):
come a day when children can be borne from artificial
wounds that are hooked up to something called a placent
a machine. Right, and you know it sounds very science fiction,
But there's a woman named hun Chin Lieu of Cornell University,
who essentially has grown artificial wombs using human tissue. Yeah,
(07:39):
she basically began growing sheets of endometrial tissue and UH,
and then she was able from that to construct a
freestanding uterus UH. And then when she implanted the donated
human embryos into I guess the placenta machine, they began
growing in the tissue, much like they would have in
a woman's womb. But because of UH ethics laws, the
(08:01):
embryos had to be removed before they could come to term, right,
so she turned to mice because no one really seems
to care about mice. Unfortunately, UM put mouse embrios in
this artificial boom and they almost made it to full term,
except they were deformed. So I'm not trying We're not
trying to suggest that any of these technologies are right
around the corner, but it's definitely something that ethicis are
(08:21):
already grappling with. Another thing that has been UH scientifically
and artificially made sperm and eggs. Yeah. In two thousand nine,
researchers from Newcastle University in England and now so they
had created human sperm cells from embryonic tissue um and
while the fake sperm looked like the real deal in
terms of looks and actions, scientists think that sperm actually
(08:44):
needs a fifteen year time in some tests to develop
to become viable to fertilize and egg right, and manufactured
eggs may also be on the way. UM also entire embryos.
You know, you want to talk about a hilarious romantic
comedy movie, how about an embryo with three parents. Hey,
I'm gonna sell that screenplay soon, but it's really Paltrow.
(09:08):
Let's say there's two parents who both have this genetic
marker for mitochondrial disease like cancer. What they can do
is take the parts from both of them, take out
that DNA that would cause a disease like that, and
put it into an embryo that will basically grow the
child's DNA four or the genetic markers for it. So
it's like you're outsourcing your mitochondrial production and Molly in
(09:32):
the future. I wonder how many time the future. In
the future, it might be possible for two men to
have a baby together without the help of a surrogate
because eggs can be made from male cells. How about that, right,
Because they've got both X and the Y chromosome, but
unfortunately sperm requires Y chromosome, so lesbian couple would still
(09:56):
have to rely on the help from male tissue. Right,
So the thinking goes that in the future, you could
have let's say, two men who get the DNA I'll
put together to make the artificial sperm and egg. They
put it in the artificial womb, grows it for nine months,
all of a sudden we got a baby. Now no
one knows, of course at this point what health problems
(10:19):
the baby could be at risk for by not coming
out the old fashioned way, but it does seem by
reading some of this stuff that having a baby um
just by having sex kind of would be on the
way out because you wouldn't be able to do any
of that genetic determination. And you know, you've got to
wonder if some people would want to carry a baby
when they can put it in the artificial bomb. So
(10:41):
the question really is, Molly for this episode is not
how we have children, but will sex become passe in
the future. I don't think sex wat would become past,
but sex to have a baby maybe, But whether this
baby technology pans out or not, Molly the fact of
the matter is the family dynamics in our society really
(11:01):
are changing in general, because take for instance, the fact
that from the birth rate for women forty five and over,
according to the CDC, more than doubled. Right, there's been
this big trend towards um older parenting in general. Basically
people waiting until later in life, once they're more financially secure,
(11:21):
a little more you know, emotionally and professionally stable, they
were really committed for the long haul, then going about
having children instead of doing it early in life. Right.
I think that no matter what happens in the future,
our vision of what a family looks like, it is
already changing. And there have been a few studies about
the effects of having children later in life. We found
two books, ones called Last Chance Children, which looks at
(11:43):
twenty two children who were raised by older parents UM
and interviewed them when they were adults, and of those adults,
only two of the two would want to have their
own children later in life, and the rest of them
basically just complained a lot about how their parents didn't
have the energy to play with them. Yeah, there's just
the whole argument of well, if you have a child
when you are, say forty five fifty years old, then
(12:06):
you know, if your child is in your teens and
you're getting older, is your child gonna end up having
to basically parent you and take care of you and
you're in your old age and basically robbed those children
of their young, carefree adolescent years. But really, is there
any adolescent that that lifest their parents? Well? Yeah, I
(12:27):
mean I did. Yeah, I mean I think yeah, with
the point you're trying to make is the teen years
are going to be probably a little rocky at some
point for any any family, no member, no matter the
age of the parents. Um. But the other book that
we mentioned that we found was Children of Parents Over
thirty five. Andrew el Yarrow had a much bigger pool,
six or fifty people who who answered questionnaires about what
(12:47):
it meant to grow up with older parents, And some
of them were bitter about it the way that the
other ones were. Some of them just talked about how
great it was to have, you know, a parent who
wasn't hovering, was was more emotionally mature, can provide that stability.
So I don't think that there's any right or wrong
way to do it, but I think that one interesting
thing we're finding is that we tend to think that
(13:08):
men are just these all powerful beings that can have
babies whenever they want. They don't have this biological clock
that ticks, and it's really women who benefit from these
advances in reproductive technology. But it's important to note, fellows,
that you too have a bit of a biological clock. Yeah,
sperm have have their own shelf life as well, it seems.
And this was from an article that we found in
(13:31):
a in the New York New York Times magazine from
earlier this year, and it said that researchers from the
University of Queensland found that children born to older fathers
have on average lower scores on testsa intelligence than those
born to younger dads. And that was from a pool
of thirty three thousand American children. And in addition, British
(13:51):
and Swedish researchers have also calculated that risk that the
risk of schizophrenia begins to rise for those whose fathers
were over thirty when their babies were born. Another Swedish
study has also found at the risk of bipolar disorder
and children begins to increase when fathers are older than
twenty nine and it's highest if they're older than five.
So it's kind of added an interesting dimension to this
(14:13):
whole how old is to hold the old who have
a baby question? Because a lot of times we immediately
think of women, but it does appear that that men
now have an impact as well. So it seems that
they're always risks, is what I'm learning from this christ
And as that, um, you know, it doesn't seem like
there's any perfect asia have a baby, and I think
that will only continue to change in the future. That
(14:35):
doesn't mean the ethicis don't want to figure out how
to draw the line in the sand, because I mean,
we are talking about older parents, but it's perfectly conceivable
that if there was an artificial womb technology that some
ten year old wouldn't march into of fertility clinic and
be like, well, I want a baby too. I think
I think the concern is towards the other end of
the spectrum. Like with that I said Slovenian, it's actually
(14:58):
Romanian woman who who had the child by ivf at
A at sixty six. Right so right now, I think
the American society reproductive medicine would like clinics to turn
away people who are past menopause, because they say that
if your body can no longer do it, then perhaps
you shouldn't be helped along by science. Yeah, but like
(15:18):
we were talking at the being in the podcast, there's
so much science out there. Yeah, we're living longer, that's right. So,
how we have children in the future. Maybe it'll be
placenta machines. Maybe it will be artificial eggs made from
males cells. Maybe it will be from rainbows. Maybe we
really will have robot children. And I won't just think
(15:41):
that babies are like robots. You seem a little comforted
by that thought, Molly, A little bit that I can
understand that I write my head around. Well, guys, I
could programmed to do what I want. Sorry, I don't
mean to call babies. It's that you're never babysitting for me, Molly.
I think I just decided if I ever had a child. Uh, well,
you guys, if you have anything, it's about children of
(16:01):
the future. How old is too old to have a
baby and all that good stuff. Please send us an
email at mom stuff at how stuff works dot com.
And speaking of which, I think we got a little
bit of listener mail Molly, and this listener mail comes
from the episode we did on what is the difference
(16:22):
between marriage and civil union? And this first email I
have comes from Virginia and she says, I have to
say it really irritates me when people use the slippery
slope argument, i e. People who want to marry children, horses, cars,
et cetera. Now I'm not a lawyer, but I think
people who use that argument are forgetting one very important thing,
(16:43):
the ability to give consent. Can a child consent to
marriage legally? No? Can a horse consent to marriage no?
Can a car consent to marriage no? Therefore, it's an
entirely ridiculous argument. My personal opinion is that if people,
regardless of their sexuality you want to get married, they
should all be REQUI are to have a civil ceremony,
even the religious people, which would grant all the essential
(17:04):
rights of marriage as we understand it. Then if people
want to have a religious ceremony in addition to the
civil ceremony, then that's their decision. If people decide not
to have a religious ceremony on top of their civil ceremony,
then they still have all the rights that come with
being married. Thanks for putting the information out there. And
thank you Virginia for writing in and I would like
to an email from Jillian. She writes, we started the
(17:27):
podcast talking about main selection and the state decision to
appeal same sex marriage. While this saddens me, I'm a
little irritated with the mass media's response to this. Mains
election has been a lead story, with many news anchor
stating same sex marriage has been denied by every state
in which it was brought to a vote. However, what
these networks from neglecting to mention is the passing of
Referendum seventy one in Washington State. People have been calling
it that everything but marriage law. As a Seattle citizen,
(17:50):
I was very happy that ref some do I passed,
but just may that it has not been receiving any
response in the press. It's a pretty close fight, but
the voters of Washington State did not beat it down.
I feel it as a step in the right direct action.
Referendum se many one is about more than just same
sex partnership. Well so it cures rights for same sex couples,
it also provides rights to domestic partners for all types,
including senior citizens. Anyway, I feel like referendum somebody wants
(18:11):
a great stepping stone to equal rights for all and
perhaps of other states. But this kind of legislation on
a ballot citizens would have an easier time accepting domestic
partnerships of all stripes. Well. And to wrap things up,
I've got an email from Ryan from Chicago. He says,
I feel you may have missed some important facts over
why the LBGT community does not just settle for civil
(18:34):
unions and or domestic partnerships. While many believe these to
be equal with regards to write and benefits to marriage,
the facts simply do not support that in most states.
While getting my BA, I remember hearing one of my
professors speak on the difficulties of him and his partner
um in obtaining his status, including psychological evaluations, mounds of
paperwork and weak slash, months of verification, etcetera. It's also
(18:56):
been pretty well researched. The marriage, while being a religious institution,
still provide it's many more benefits than evil even a
civil union, and unfortunately, um why those rights sometimes fail.
I love the podcast and applaud you for bringing up
I just hope that you will mention some of these
things as well, since many people don't realize the inequalities
of marriage versus other types of unions, and why the
(19:17):
LGBT community shouldn't have to settle for separate but equal.
Thank you, Ryan, So. If you've got an opinion, it's
mom stuff at how stuff works dot com. You can
also check out our blog it's called how to stuff
and as always, if you want to learn about anything
we talk about, including shield or Not the future and
head on over to how stuff works dot com for
(19:40):
more on this and thousands of other topics. Because that
how stuff works dot com. Want more house stuff works,
check out our blogs on the house stuff works dot
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