We tend to give utilitarianism a hard time in “Pointed Remarks”. But sometimes we could do with a bit more utilitarianism. It might keep the media – and many doctors, too – from being so dewy-eyed about apparent successes. Take IVF, which celebrated, so to speak, its 40th anniversary this week, with the birthday of Louise Brown.
In some respects, IVF has been quite a success. An estimated 8 million IVF children have been born since then. A thriving industry has grown up, worth some US$15 billion, making lots of doctors, scientists, technicians and administrators very wealthy. That is the happiness side of the ledger.
But how about the women who endured cycle after cycle of IVF without conceiving? Their lives have been filled with suffering as a result. And there are far more of them than women who eventually conceived. How about the destruction of millions upon millions of human embryos? And how about the disturbing future of IVF – designer babies and genetically-engineered children? That is the pain side of the ledger. It hasn’t been quantified, of course, but it must be acknowledged. I would venture to say that the balance is negative.
Whether I’m right or wrong about that, I do think that we need a clearer vision of the negative side of assisted reproductive technology.
In some respects, IVF has been quite a success. An estimated 8 million IVF children have been born since then. A thriving industry has grown up, worth some US$15 billion, making lots of doctors, scientists, technicians and administrators very wealthy. That is the happiness side of the ledger.
But how about the women who endured cycle after cycle of IVF without conceiving? Their lives have been filled with suffering as a result. And there are far more of them than women who eventually conceived. How about the destruction of millions upon millions of human embryos? And how about the disturbing future of IVF – designer babies and genetically-engineered children? That is the pain side of the ledger. It hasn’t been quantified, of course, but it must be acknowledged. I would venture to say that the balance is negative.
Whether I’m right or wrong about that, I do think that we need a clearer vision of the negative side of assisted reproductive technology.
 Michael Cook Editor BioEdge |  |  |  |
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Predatory journals masquerade as legitimate, mainstream journalsSouth African bioethicist David Benatar explores the human predicament
by Michael Cook | 28 Jul 2018 | 1 comment
For about four years, it seemed likely that Cape Town would become the world’s first major city in modern times to run out of water. Fortunately, that danger was averted by about March this year, but not before millions of words were spilled about the hopelessness of its plight.
Whether or not this bleak situation influenced David Benatar’s latest book, The Human Predicament, it certainly is an emblem of his pessimism. Professor Benatar, the head of the bioethics centre at the University of Cape Town, became a kind of intellectual celebrity with his 2006 book, Better Never to Have Been: The Harm of Coming Into Existence. The New Yorker has even described the bioethicist as “the world’s most pessimistic philosopher”. With the shade of Schopenhauer hovering over history's cavalcade of philosophers, this is a very big call, but Benatar's anti-natalist view that bringing children into the world is a kind of cruelty, may support it.
His latest book continues in the same vein. According to the publisher, Oxford University Press:
Benatar argues that while our lives can have some meaning, cosmically speaking we are ultimately the insignificant beings that we often fear we are. A candid appraisal reveals that the quality of life, although less bad for some people than for others, leaves much to be desired in even the best cases. But death, David Benatar argues, is hardly the solution. Our mortality exacerbates rather than mitigates our cosmic meaninglessness. It can release us from suffering but even when it does it imposes another cost - annihilation. This unfortunate state of affairs has nuanced implications for how we should think about immortality, about suicide, and about the aspects of life in which we can and do find deeper meaning.
Perhaps the pessimism has something to do with Benatar’s utilitarianism, upon which his arguments are largely based. While academic utilitarians may be karaoke champs on their weekends off, reading their dour and earnest prose suggests otherwise.
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