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Francois Tcha
CST 300 Writing Lab
12 February 2018
Artificial Womb

Have you ever heard of the term “ectogenesis” before? Probably not. According to

Brandy (2015), “The term ‘ectogenesis’ – the gestation of human embryos in artificial

circumstances outside a human uterus – was coined in 1923 by J.B.S. Haldane in his essay

entitled Daedalus, or Science and the Future” (Scheillace, 2015). The lack of technologies

during that time did not have a chance to engineer such a device but that did not prevent

scientists from writing and talking about ectogenesis. Fast forward to today, scientist and

researchers are now able to engineer artificial wombs in test labs. Leading the forefront are Dr.

Helen Hung-Ching Liu and Dr. Yoshinori Kuwabara. According to Rewire, Hung-Ching Liu’s

research focuses on helping women who are unable to conceive and gestate babies while

Kuwabara focuses on finding ways to save premature babies (Chemaly, 2012). Hung-Ching Liu

and her team created an artificial womb that almost grew a mouse embryo to full term and was

able to grow a human embryo for ten days in an artificial womb. Kuwabara was able to gestate

goat embryos in a machine that holds amniotic fluid in tanks (Chemaly, 2014). The

advancement in technology in this field is a cause for celebration. The usage of artificial wombs

could help save premature babies, it could help couples have babies by providing them a new

fertility option, and it could also be an alternative to abortion. However, these are some of the

concerns: How will artificial wombs be tested? What are the long term effects? When and how

does medical professionals decide to use the artificial womb? Will medical insurance cover the

usage of the artificial womb for this purpose? Who will be responsible and liable if the process

fails?
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Stakeholders

As technology continues to evolve in the medical field, the available fertility treatment

options increases. Couples wanting to grow their family and are unable to due to biological

reasons can potentially use the option of an artificial womb to make their dreams a reality. On

the other hand, couples who are faced with the challenges and heart wrenching reality of having

a premature child, can save their child by using an artificial womb to continue to incubate their

baby to full term. These two groups of stakeholders have strong reasons to advocate for the

usage of artificial wombs. Additionally, doctors can provide women seeking an abortion the

option to save the baby’s life by using an artificial womb to allow the baby to continue to grow

to full term.

Evidence

Infertile couples, older couples, and gay/lesbian couples currently have the opportunity to

use treatments such as fertility drugs, in-vitro fertilization, intracytoplasmic sperm injection,

donor eggs and embryos, and intrauterine insemination as options for conception. Now, with the

advancement in technology and the success of incubating a lamb in the famous research by a

team of doctors at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia in Pennsylvania, researchers are

moving in the direction of using artificial wombs for gestation. Similar to the uncertainty of

success in options like in-vitro fertilization, artificial wombs might not be guaranteed even after

a full case study. For example, in Liu’s research, she successfully grew a mouse embryo to

almost full term in one of her artificial womb experiments, but days after percolating, the rodent

fetus died (Reynolds, 2005). Couples may be more willing to spend more money and use an

artificial womb as an option if the chances of having a baby as a final product is higher.
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From the perspective of the couple and potential parent, having a baby at all cost

outweighs any criticism about the usage of an artificial womb. Let’s consider the journey of a

lesbian couple wanting to have a child. If a lesbian couple chooses this method, an egg will be

extracted, a sperm will be added in a petri-dish. Once the embryo is ready to be implanted, it

will then be inserted in the uterus for fertilization. Typically, the harvesting of an egg costs

$3000, without the purchase of the sperm. According to Dr. Sher, in an interview that he gave

for a blog by Kathy Bedge, he stated that, women under 35, have a higher chance of getting

pregnant after three tries of IVF. It typically costs couples $14,000 to access three tries of IVF

(Bedge, 2017). Therefore, if the usage of an artificial womb is a guaranteed, couples with the

desire to have a baby may consider this as an alternative instead of gambling with another

hopeful attempt at conceiving through IVF. Another group of individuals who will benefit from

the option of an artificial womb will be couples who have a premature baby.

As in the research by the team of doctors in Philadelphia, they were able to incubate the

baby lamb to full term (Stein, 2017). The lamb research was groundbreaking and validated after

examining the lamb. The lamb had normal growth, brain maturation and development (Stein,

2017). Currently, babies who are born premature, 24 weeks or less will face a lifetime of

difficulties such as neurological problems, underdeveloped lungs, and 50% survival rate. With

the lamb experiment, the device used to sustain the lamb simulated everything that a mother does

to support normal fetal development. It was a bag consisting of synthetic amniotic fluid, which

was attached to an umbilical cord that functioned like a placenta. The placenta provided the

lamb with nutrition, oxygen to the blood and removed carbon monoxide. The whole process is

kept in the dark, while researchers played the sound of the mother’s heartbeat (Stein, 2017). The
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same process can be used to save premature babies. Elizabeth Yuko states the following, “An

artificial womb could eliminate or address many of the issues and risks that face premature

infants in incubators such as undeveloped lungs and neurodevelopmental challenges, and could

be a life-saving technology for many” (Yuko, 2017).

Couples seeking artificial womb as a fertility treatment and as an incubator for their

premature baby believe that their individual opinion is right, to grow their family and to reduce

the health risk of their premature baby. According to Barbara MacKinnon and Andrew Fiala, the

couples’ ethical judgments and beliefs are the expressions of their moral outlook and attitudes of

individual persons is known as individual relativism (MacKinnon, 2013). The individual

relativism ethical framework has is no right or wrong. According to Moral-Relativism (2002), “

morals and ethics can be altered from one situation, person, or circumstance to the next.” This

same ethical judgment and belief can also be applied to doctors who are in a position or is put in

a position to save a life or take a life.

The abortion debate is ongoing. With the development of an artificial womb, women

seeking an abortion can now have the option of controlling their body by ridding their body of

the baby (fetus) and eliminating all burdens of pregnancy without killing the baby (fetus).

Liberation from the burdens of pregnancy is not the only interest women have in abortion. When

it comes to Roe v. Wade, the US Supreme Court recognized that a women has the right to be

“free from unwarranted governmental intrusion into matters so fundamentally affecting a person

as the decision whether to bear or beget a child” (Greasley, 2017). However, a doctor, acting on

their beliefs and moral attitude may be able to save a baby by using an artificial womb to bring it

to full term. In doing so, the socio-economic ramifications will be tremendous. Consider the
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massive influx of children with no parents who are available for adoption who will have unmet

needs. Not to mention, the expense of providing artificial wombs as an alternative to abortions

and sustaining the growth of the baby (fetal) development until full term.

The ethical concerns of using artificial wombs can relate to the natural law theory.

According to Philosophy of Religion (2008), the natural law theory “in its Thomist form, it

characterises morality as a function of the rational human nature that God has given us, stressing

God’s purposes in Creation as defining our purpose as human beings, and therefore as defining

how we ought to lead our lives.” The rightness of an act depends on whether it is in accord with

our natural inclinations as creatures. As humans beings, the bond between a mother and a child

is at stake because no machine can replicate the mystery of how babies bond with their mothers

in utero. Not only that we do not know enough about the technology of an artificial womb to

rely on it. There could be long term effects that causes more serious health issues than what

premature babies are currently facing. According to Rosemarie Tong, “artificial wombs could

lead to a commodification of the whole process of pregnancy and to the extent that we

externalize an experience like pregnancy, it may lead to a view of the growing child as a ‘thing’”

(Rosen, 2003).

Student’s Position

The advancement in fertility technology is something that needs to be revered. There are

many benefits of the usage of artificial wombs; however, there are also many unknowns.

Therefore, as a parent, a stakeholder, I do not believe that the benefits and usage of artificial

wombs outweighs the potential consequences. One of the arguments for artificial wombs is that

it can be a viable option for infertile couples or gay/lesbian couples who have a desire for
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children. Currently, there are many children in the nation and across the globe that are in need of

a loving home. If those couple’s desire is to be a parent, to share their love, and to provide a

loving home, there are many children who will be ready to receive their love.

Another argument for the usage of the artificial womb is to save premature babies. I

believe that all babies need to be saved; however, there is not enough evidence and time to

guarantee the success of the usage of artificial wombs to save babies. In order for all scenarios

and tests to be run accurately, tests need to be run and re-run to ensure the reliability and safety

of these artificial wombs. My questions are, how will researchers test this? What are the

long-term effects? We know that babies who do not form an attachment to their mother at an

early age may develop psychological issues in the future. When babies are in utero, they are

developing that bond to their mother. A baby who is developing in a machine is not

experiencing the same kind of bond regardless of the sounds of a mom’s heartbeat playing in the

background or having the lights dim while the baby develops. A famous researcher, Harry

Harlow, conducted an experiment with primates. In his study, he discovered that psychological

and physical development of infants requires nurturing and attention from a parent, not just food

and water (Szalavitz, 2012). Researchers have also argued that:

“[T]he lack of a secure attachment relationship in the early years has detrimental

consequences for both physical and mental health later in life, with long-lasting effects

that vary by sex. The persistence of these effects after the end of treatment emphasizes

the need to intervene early in life to prevent long-term damage” (Szalavitz, 2012).

The idea that doctors or women would have the option of putting their baby up for adoption

through means of having the baby grow in a machine is frightening. There will be so many
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social and financial implications that it will take generations to fix. As a child with the

knowledge that you are a “machine baby” can potentially do so much harm to one’s psyche.

Conclusions

I believe a woman’s role is to bear children. Artificial wombs will take away their

biological purpose. Many can argue for or against the use of artificial wombs; however,

currently there is just simply not enough information about the repercussions of using an

artificial womb.

References

Belge, K. (2017). ​Options for lesbians wanting a baby.​ Retrieved:

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https://www.liveabout.com/options-for-lesbians-wanting-to-get-pregnant-2171169

Chemaly, S. (February 23, 2012). ​What Do Artificial Wombs Mean for Women?​ Retrieved

from: https://rewire.news/article/2012/02/23/what-do-artificial-wombs-mean-women/

Chemaly, S. (February 4, 2014). ​What happens when we don’t need women’s body for

gestation?​ Retrieved from: https://www.huffingtonpost.com/soraya-chemaly

/ectogenesis-feminism_b_4385417.html

Greasley, K. (2017). ​Will artificial wombs end the debate on abortion rights?​ Retreived from

https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/feminism/2017/05/will-artificial-wombs-end-deb

ate-over-abortion-rights

MacKinnon, B. & Fiala, A. (2014). ​Ethics: Theory and Contemporary Issues.​ Retrieved from:

https://books.google.com/books?id=4DIaCgAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage

&q&f=false

Moral Relativism. (2002). Retrieved from https://www.moral-relativism.com/

Philosophy of Religion. (2008). Retrieved from http://www.philosophyofreligion.info

/christian-ethics/natural-law-theory/

Reynolds, G. (August 1, 2005). ​Artificial Wombs; Will we grow babies outside their mothers'

bodies?​ Retrieved from: https://www.popsci.com/scitech/article/2005-08

/artificial-wombs

Rosen, C. (2003). ​Why Not Artificial Wombs?​ Retrieved from:

https://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/why-not-artificial-wombs

Scheillace, B. (March 23, 2015). ​Early Ectogenesis: Artificial Wombs in 1920s Literature.

Retrieved from: https://medhumdosis.com/2015/03/23/early-ectogenesis

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-artificial-wombs-in-1920s-literature/#_ftn3

Stein, R. (April 25, 2017). ​Science create artificial womb that could help prematurely born

Babies.​ Retrieved from: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2017/04

/25/525044286/scientists-create-artificial-womb-that-could-help-prematuely-born-babies

Svalaivitz, M. (2012). ​The measure of a mother’s love.​ Retreived from: http://healthland.time

.com/2012/05/24/the-measure-of-a-mothers-love-how-early-deprivation-derails-child-dev

elopment/

Yuko, E. (January 26, 2017). ​It’s not science fiction: Ethics of artificial wombs. Ethics

Society.​ Retrieved from: https://ethicsandsociety.org/2017/05/11

/its-not-science-fiction-ethics-of-artificial-wombs/