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Is there any objective value of having your biologically own kids?
Imagine if you are married and want to have kids, and you have a friend who clearly has better looks and/or health than you or your spouse. Would you like to ask them to provide egg cell or sperm? Why not?
What's the value of true lineage for humans who can select using human mind, not only being led by instinct? Is selfishness the only reason to have your own biological kids or there's something else?
If this statement doesn't telegraph that you're asking this question in bad faith, I don't know what does.
Agreed, I've tried to write a response a few times but I can't seem to string together an argument without sounding hostile/defensive (and I don't even have/want kids). It's just an ugly conversation.
I'm sorry for forming the question that way. Maybe then, is there a value in providing someone's own egg cell or sperm for reproduction comparing to someone's else, besides satisfying the common human feeling of possession or control?
You've made up your mind before even talking to us that people must have children from their own DNA in order to possess and control them.
Now I know that you are not interested in having any meaningful conversation because you're starting from the position that people who have children from their own DNA are somehow selfish or controlling.
Controlling not as parents, not towards kids, at all. Only about the fact of passing genes.
Alright fair enough. That wasn't obvious to me. Apologies.
I feel like you're trying to have a transhumanist conversation but it's gone awry lol
I honestly didn't read what OP said that way.
There are so many unknowns in conceiving, giving birth and raising a child. Maybe from my own biases, but I more read it as a way for parents to control the situation of having kids.
Yeah, you're right. OP clarified.
Objectively speaking, a person who looks better will have better economic outcomes than someone who doesn't. Better health follows a similar vein.
I don't think economic outcomes are everything, but there is an objective reason to value these things, if you care for the comfort and security of a child's life.
While we're doing this thought experiment, it might be important to consider that money does not objectively guarantee comfort and security, at least by the thought process being used in this thread.
Nothing is truly a guarantee in life. There's too many factors.
I'm just pointing out that there are, at the least, economic facts tied to genetics. We don't know enough about consciousness or genetics yet to tie anything to intelligence, emotional well being, optimism, happiness, or other potentially desirable traits but I suspect one day we will and those will be objective, or facts, once we do.
This will probably be a controversial comment, but I think this is called eugenics, and I am pretty sure we have debunked that idea back in the XX century. If you follow Kant, you could conduct a thought experiment and imagine a society, where only those who have good looks, genius minds, or a healthy physique are allowed to reproduce. Reminds you of anything?
Gesturing vaguely at bad outcomes and saying 'see this idea is debunked' is horribly sloppy.
Debunk capitalism? Sure look at the East India Companies. De-bunk the stock market? 2008! Socialism? The Gulags!
I'm not saying you're wrong, just if you want to even start discussing eugenics (or indeed anything). You should at least try and provide the arguments you believe you're making.
There's a world of difference between top down suppression and sterilization of "undesirables" against their will and parents voluntarily choosing their own reproductive path. I don't see anything wrong with parents having the choice of passing on their own genes and choosing not to. Certain people not reproducing isn't the problem, forcing people to not reproduce is.
The idea at the core of eugenics is that certain genetics can be deemed good or bad, and that we should as a society increase the proportion of "desirables" to "undersirables." This can be done by things like forced sterilization, but it also includes encouraging people with "good" genetics to have more children.
I think it's valid to point out that even if it's a personal choice to use someone else's egg/sperm because they have "better looks," this choice has connections to the general idea that some people should pass on their genes while others shouldn't.
I was trying to form my questions in a way to avoid the infamous eugenics. But looks like any, even positive (non-restrictive) intentional human sexual selection is eugenics and this idea is just taboo at least nowadays?
@Catt suggested selecting spouse, and that technically isn't different from "positive eugenics", it's just a case when spouse and parent are same person.
Finally, how about ourselves? Is it eugenics to deliberately refuse to be a biological parent and choose someone's else genetic material instead of your own?
Honestly, I find your questions sort of oddly worded, so if this seems off-topic, just let me know.
Practically speaking, unless you are only valuing looks (which are pretty subjective), you likely don't have enough medical information to even determine if they (including their family history) is going to produce a "better" offspring than you and/or your spouse.
This is also going to be extremely weird for most people.
I think selecting a spouse to build a family with is the "select using human mind" part. We choose our partners for a reason.
Again from a practical perceptive, I believe a lot of people are open to the idea of raising non-biological children. In terms of adoption, there are a lot of hoops and costs, and waiting. Getting a sperm donation from a friend is probably the easiest of the choices, and you'll likely still need doctor, and maybe a lawyer to facilitate the process. An egg donation is a huge commitment from the donor and a lot of money.
Purely from the sake of simplicity and convenience, it's much easier to go with the traditional method rather than messing with the medical and legal complications of acquiring other people's biological material.
Adopting isn't fraught with the same complications, but it has plenty of complications of its own and often has a high cost associated as well. It's not easy at all to adopt a young healthy baby that is "objectively" better genetically.
Looks are one of the most arbitrary and subjective traits a person can have. I would hope my kid doesn't look deformed, but beyond that, it's not even close to a consideration I have for my offspring. As far as health goes, if I had a debilitating genetic disorder, then yes, I'd maybe consider not having kids, but most people are reasonably healthy.
As far as arguments for having biological kids, it mostly boils down to lineage. Each living person is a direct ancestor from the very first self replicating protein. There's an unbroken chain of successful reproduction from those complex chemicals, which could barely even be considered to be alive at all, to single celled organisms, to microscopic creatures, to invertebrates, to amphibians and reptiles, to simple mammals, to more advanced primates, to human beings who lived in and created great civilizations, finally to your immediate family and you. There's an appeal to continuing that genetic chain, to not being the one in that chain that finally does not reproduce and breaks it. Personally, the idea that some part of what makes me me has a chance to be floating around in the shared pool of the human genome in 100 or 1000 years is appealing to me.
Finally, I would counter your question with another question. What's the true value of having kids at all? A sense of accomplishment? Having someone to take care of you when you're old? The experience of raising another human being?
Couldn't you consider all of those things selfish as well?
Futhermore, consider the value of not having kids. More free time? More money to peruse your interests and the things you're passionate about? Less stress in your life?
Aren't those things also selfish?
Isn't virtually everything that people do selfish, ultimately?
I always think about value for them. They are just humans who are going to experience all wonders of being alive, but until certain age they are weak and dependent. Also new people are new minds to develop civilization further, although at some cost of environmental pressure.
I think we have an instinct to further our genetic and social influence, and that that's why we want to have our own kids produced from our own genes. This is wild speculation, but it seems reasonable to me to think so; maybe there are any scientific studies on this? But still, if we accept such instinct or even strong want, that is then the fundamental reason for bothering to carry a baby at all. The hypothetical spouse has such instinct too, and having a kid from someone else's genetical material would be denying them the fulfilment of such instinct. That would certainly mess with the persons psychology.
Then there's the big problem, with your suggestion, of how will the child react when they somehow learnt the truth. Also, the question of why not just pick a more healthier, more good-lucking spouse?
For health reasons, it helps to know when you have encounter certain health issues throughout your life. You can easily diagnose these issues in a blood related child. For example, my father has digestive issues with lactose, I have recently begun having those issues and I now understand the symptoms. I'll be able to convey the time frame and symptoms to my son when he is of age to begin noticing problems. If we were to have had a son from different egg/sperm DNA, the little nuances of growing up with pains/skeletal-muscular structure/etc would not be fully known by me or my wife, so the child would not have as much instruction from their parents' experiences.
Edit: there are so many closet philosophers in this thread, but the question was asking about the pros/cons without human feelings to having a blood-child.
Is it possible for a person to have an 'objective value'? Given that I, the person, am required to provide the judgement, isn't that judgement necessarily subjective?
And if the person isn't me - or isn't even a person - then we're still left with the issue of how we define value without a valuer. For example, it might be considered better for society to only breed from "good breeding stock" but in order for that to be the consideration, the Valuer is society with a defined set of values which are immediately subjective to the perceived needs of the society.
NB. the example is not my view, just an example.
The use of the term "objective value" is hard to nail down. Like, are you asking what some deity wants you to do? The answer could be anything. You'd be better off asking a theologian of whatever religion you subjectively believe is objectively correct.
I don't know about objective, but there are nonsensical trains of thought very much involved too.
As someone who is probably never going to have children, it's pretty weird to think that I'll be the last.
The last link in an unbroken chain that started some four billion years ago. I will be the one to break that unbroken series of species, and more species, propagating through the aeons and geological periods against all odds, and through all the catastrophies.
Now, when we are at our most prosperous era ever, my chain probably terminates here, and I will be guilty of that. It's comforting that the only place that any this matters is just in my head.
edit. Typos and wording
There is some evidence to suggest that women who carry pregnancies to full-term have lower risks of certain types of cancer.
https://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/causes-prevention/risk/hormones/reproductive-history-fact-sheet
Is there any inherent value in giving birth to your own child? Why would you need your neighbor's gametes -- why not adopt?
Objectively, what is the value of having children at all?
In a world of 7.6 billion people, is selfishness the only reason to have kids?