The Future of Abortion and Cloning is Now

[Zelig]

Let's assume the following technological advances are present:

- Home nanobot swarms are cheaply available and the vast majority of households have one more more swarms. (About as common as TVs are today.)
- Safe abortions are trivially easy. (You can download an abortion app for your nanobot swarm.)
- Fetus extraction and artificial womb construction are trivially easy. (You can download fetus extraction and artificial womb construction apps for your nanobot swarm in order to extract a zygote/embryo/fetus at any stage of the pregnancy and incubate it to term.)
- Cloning is trivially easy. (You can download a cloning app for your nanobot swarm which is able to extract the DNA from any human cell, alive or dead, create a zygote from the DNA, and incubate it to term.)


- Any legal restriction on these technologies will have no impact on availability.


How do you deal with these technologies?
Which of these technologies are "ok" to use?
Do you pass laws regarding them, despite the ineffectiveness of the legislation to decrease availability?
Do you take any measures to encourage/discourage certain uses of these technologies?

 

[Samson]

If it was up to me, I would try and restrict (possibly by making it illegal) late stage abortions without a doctors permission. If technology is in this state nothing should come as a surprise, so there is no good reason for this to wait until the later stages of pregnancy, so it should not be an issue and I cannot see much need for enforcement.

Other than that, then no. I cannot see why it would be needed, and any enforcement is bound to fail.

 

[fromeast2west]

Well, most pro-choice arguments are based on the viability of the fetus at various stages; then if you assume the technology exists to bring a fetus at any stage to term easily, then you can't really continue to allow abortion as we know it. It would be replaced with the nanobot extraction and support to term outside of the mother (or father if we've also perfected male pregnancy by then.)

 

[Silurian]

If nanobots could extract a fetus they could also insert a fetus.

Male or Female anti abortion and anti artificial womb activists would then be able to become pregnant to save the fetus.

This should only be done with their consent.

 

[Kozmos]

Such nanotechnology would make these concerns seem pitiful considering what else you could do with it. The question is what would post-humans do with regular humans.

 

[Silurian]

Such nanotechnology would make these concerns seem pitiful considering what else you could do with it. The question is what would post-humans do with regular humans.

I can not see the tech in the OP happening for some time.

The post humans would risk some sort of melding plague no doubt.

 

[Leoreth]

With this kind of sophisticated nanotechnology, I'm pretty sure contraception will be so safe and convenient that abortion will be a non-issue.

 

[Silurian]

Maybe some organisation or individuals could release anti contraceptive nanobots.

The advance in tech described in the OP could lead anywhere.

 

[Synobun]

Let's assume the following technological advances are present:

- Home nanobot swarms are cheaply available and the vast majority of households have one more more swarms. (About as common as TVs are today.)
- Safe abortions are trivially easy. (You can download an abortion app for your nanobot swarm.)
- Fetus extraction and artificial womb construction are trivially easy. (You can download fetus extraction and artificial womb construction apps for your nanobot swarm in order to extract a zygote/embryo/fetus at any stage of the pregnancy and incubate it to term.)
- Cloning is trivially easy. (You can download a cloning app for your nanobot swarm which is able to extract the DNA from any human cell, alive or dead, create a zygote from the DNA, and incubate it to term.)


- Any legal restriction on these technologies will have no impact on availability.


How do you deal with these technologies?
Which of these technologies are "ok" to use?
Do you pass laws regarding them, despite the ineffectiveness of the legislation to decrease availability?
Do you take any measures to encourage/discourage certain uses of these technologies?

See, here's the thing. I am fine with abortion in any case as long as you have been pregnant for less than a month. I am fine with abortion if the baby will pose a health risk to the mother or is caused by rape. I do not support abortion if you are having a baby because you didn't use protection or "forgot to".

With this technology, you could instantly abort a fetus before it even becomes a fetus, which is fine by me. If you wait, my conditions above still apply.

I am deeply against cloning. As someone who is on the fence about spirituality, I do feel that each individual is unique, and creating copies of a unique individual removes that unique identity permanently. If there is an after-life, I am not sure how a clone would be handled. I am sure they'd be let in, though. If there isn't, it still removes the unique identity as I previously stated.

I would encourage use of these nano swarms to remove genetic defects from a fetus. Anything that has medical drawbacks should be removed from the baby before it is born, to ensure that it has a healthy chance at a good life rather than being stricken by a chronic condition.

Artificial wombs are a neat idea, but I am not sure what the consequences of this would be. A mother often develops her first bond with her child while it is still in her stomach, and rather early too. They produce a symbiosis relationship before the child is even conscious for the first time. Putting a fetus in an artificial womb would remove this, and bonding would be entirely reliant on the parents and how much they care upon the child being ready to enter the world.

That's pretty much my stance.

 

[Zelig]

With this kind of sophisticated nanotechnology, I'm pretty sure contraception will be so safe and convenient that abortion will be a non-issue.

Contraception is already pretty safe and convenient, the problem is just education and ease-of-access.

I am deeply against cloning. As someone who is on the fence about spirituality, I do feel that each individual is unique, and creating copies of a unique individual removes that unique identity permanently. If there is an after-life, I am not sure how a clone would be handled. I am sure they'd be let in, though. If there isn't, it still removes the unique identity as I previously stated.

Does this apply to twins/triplets/etc?

What if a clone is created long after the original DNA source is dead?

What if the clone is altered slightly? (ie. different eye colour)

Such nanotechnology would make these concerns seem pitiful considering what else you could do with it.

Yeah, but I created this hypothetical to question "how would you deal with abortion given likely future technology?", not "what would you do with awesome nanobot swarms?"

 

[Synobun]

Does this apply to twins/triplets/etc?

What if a clone is created long after the original DNA source is dead?

What if the clone is altered slightly? (ie. different eye colour)

I wouldn't think so. Twins, triplets, etc, are all caused by natural events inside the woman. They aren't caused by direct scientific intervention or via a test tube, but I feel that this may be more of an ethic issue rather than an actual issue. Twins and such are all different people, they just have a symbiosis relationship with each other and look similar to each other (sometimes).

But yeah, I'm not sure. I just feel that cloning is inherently wrong because of the unique identity one is given via a natural birth, even twins.

I'm not sure why one would clone a person after the original is dead. Would this be to resurrect old philosophers and scientists? Leave people dead, I'd say. It wouldn't be them anyways, just a shadow of who you cloned.

Cosmetic changes do not alter very much about identity except superficially. You are better off just having a test tube baby if you are simply going to make a new person anyways. It would be kind of weird to see an entire room of the same person except with different eye colour, though (I also do not see the point).

 

[Monsterzuma]

irrelevant questions, because the nanobots would be militarized and eradicate humanity.

 

[Zelig]

irrelevant questions, because the nanobots would be militarized and eradicate humanity.

Do you have the slightest clue what hypotheticals and stipulations are?

 

[Valka D'Ur]

See, here's the thing. I am fine with abortion in any case as long as you have been pregnant for less than a month. I am fine with abortion if the baby will pose a health risk to the mother or is caused by rape. I do not support abortion if you are having a baby because you didn't use protection or "forgot to".

Well, it's a good thing you're not in charge of who does and doesn't get to have an abortion, then. At less than a month along, many women have no idea they're pregnant at all, let alone what to do about it. And what business is it of yours why a woman might want an abortion, unless you're her doctor or her conscience?

I am deeply against cloning. As someone who is on the fence about spirituality, I do feel that each individual is unique, and creating copies of a unique individual removes that unique identity permanently. If there is an after-life, I am not sure how a clone would be handled. I am sure they'd be let in, though. If there isn't, it still removes the unique identity as I previously stated.

Nature vs. nurture. A clone of me would not be me unless it had the exact same upbringing and life experiences. Except for DNA, the clone would be a unique individual, and would live a life where different medical things happened and different life choices were made.

I would encourage use of these nano swarms to remove genetic defects from a fetus. Anything that has medical drawbacks should be removed from the baby before it is born, to ensure that it has a healthy chance at a good life rather than being stricken by a chronic condition.

Agreed, as long as these genetic defects are legitimate and not cosmetic. Or to make sure the "defect" isn't that a fetus is female instead of male.

Artificial wombs are a neat idea, but I am not sure what the consequences of this would be. A mother often develops her first bond with her child while it is still in her stomach, and rather early too. They produce a symbiosis relationship before the child is even conscious for the first time. Putting a fetus in an artificial womb would remove this, and bonding would be entirely reliant on the parents and how much they care upon the child being ready to enter the world.

They would be beneficial under some circumstances. But there would be a risk of Brave New World-style, literal baby factories.

What if a clone is created long after the original DNA source is dead?

I'm not sure why one would clone a person after the original is dead. Would this be to resurrect old philosophers and scientists? Leave people dead, I'd say. It wouldn't be them anyways, just a shadow of who you cloned.

I advise reading Cyteen, by C.J. Cherryh. That's one of the modern science fiction classics, in which a clone is created of a genius - but it's not just her body that's brought back, nor even just her knowledge. It's a decades-long experiment in "psychogenesis", in which the cloned baby is brought up as closely as possible to the way the original person was. Every stage of her life, from babyhood through teen years (the novel ends when the protagonist is 18 years old) is duplicated as closely as possible. At one point, she gets asked if she can actually remember being her predecessor/genemother. Well, of course not; this isn't reincarnation or immortality. And it's not the sort of thing available to just anybody, considering the unimaginable amounts of data, people, and money needed to pull it off - and this novel takes place in the 25th century. We're certainly a long way from being able to do anything like it in our own society.

C.J. Cherryh wrote a sequel, btw, called Regenesis, that takes up shortly where Cyteen leaves off. They're both extremely well-written and thought-provoking books.

 

[Synobun]

Well, it's a good thing you're not in charge of who does and doesn't get to have an abortion, then. At less than a month along, many women have no idea they're pregnant at all, let alone what to do about it. And what business is it of yours why a woman might want an abortion, unless you're her doctor or her conscience?

No need to be so confrontational. I never claimed my opinion was fact. It is my personal feelings. I see no need for a woman to get an abortion if it is not necessary or if it wasn't forced upon her. Obviously her choice, yada yada.

Nature vs. nurture. A clone of me would not be me unless it had the exact same upbringing and life experiences. Except for DNA, the clone would be a unique individual, and would live a life where different medical things happened and different life choices were made.

It depends on the type of clone. Are we talking about a full clone or a baby?

Agreed, as long as these genetic defects are legitimate and not cosmetic. Or to make sure the "defect" isn't that a fetus is female instead of male.

I wouldn't consider gender and a cosmetic problem to be a defect, so yeah.

 

[Zelig]

It depends on the type of clone. Are we talking about a full clone or a baby?

Clone starts at a single cell.

If you're copying an entire grown person, that's not a clone, it's some kind of magic.

 

[Synobun]

Clone starts at a single cell.

If you're copying an entire grown person, that's not a clone, it's some kind of magic.

OH.

Then scratch everything I said about clones. That is just fine.

 

[TheLastOne36]

If such a technology existed.... we could easily clone extinct animals!

 

[Leoreth]

Contraception is already pretty safe and convenient, the problem is just education and ease-of-access.

On rational judgment, yes, but there are still people who think using the pill / condoms (or other alternatives) is too much trouble or takes away part of the fun. Nanocontraceptives could be applied like vaccination at an early age and then you'd never have to worry about it again.

 

[Silurian]

If such a technology existed.... we could easily clone extinct animals!

You would have to put them on an island somewhere so they could not escape.

Spoiler :

The trouble is the DNA does not last very long after death or trapped in amber etc.