Choosing the sex

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Of your baby. I read some where (newspaper i think) that doctors/scientists are choosing the sex of baby's now. Its not affordable for everyone yet, but it may be in the near future.Do you think this is taking science to far? Ethical, unethical?

As long as people choose boys, it's fine.

But seriously, it is totally unethical, and totally stupid. People will chose to have more boys, and there won't be enough girls to go around. A lot of guys will wind up in commonlaw marriage with their left hand.

i agree. especially in places like china where they want all boys already and are going to have a big problem with population soon. it's gonna drop big time :s

**I think it should be legal and affordable for people who have a disease or abnormality that affects either males or females in their family. But, for 'normal' parents i think its wrong to choose the sex of your baby, my god i can't imagine how awful it will be when people are choosing hair/eye colour and sex..........and i don't see why anyone should even want to. Its totally superficial, if thats the case it seems that they would have children as more of a symbol than for the sake of having a child, and if thats the case they shouldn't be having one in the first place. **

Deff feels it's unethical. Messing with nature will always end up badly.

i dont even think it should be done for those who have a chronic illness in the family. the baby that is designed will be just there for the purpose of helping somebody else, there for all the wrong reasons. and what if the baby found out?? when it was older it found that it was designed for that one purpose?? it will feel unwanted. its not fair on the baby, you shouldnt be able to pick and choose. and how about the kid its saving or changing?? when they find out, they will feel inadequate, not good enough for the parents. next they'll be doing it to help cure disabilities, and that is also wrong, the child who has the condition should be loved unconditionall. it is totally unethical and unmoralistic.Becky xxx

Well as a parent of a child with a disability, i know for her sake that if i could have prevented her disability i would have. However, that doesn't mean that i don't love her unconditionally, i just wish life wouldn't be so hard for her. If you havn't got kids then you have no idea what i mean. You want the best for your kids, and hate to see them having to struggle, but seeing her bump into things everyday breaks my fucking heart. You have every right to your opinion, but, i don't think you can make an informed decision about something like this without having had children. If you know that an illness ran in the male line of your family, and that if you had a son you know he would die before he reached his 5 th birthday, woudln't you want to change that?

_especially in places like china where they want all boys already and are going to have a big problem with population soon. it's gonna drop big time _
And that's a bad thing? Considering that China and India alone are 1/3 of the worlds population... that's a lot of mouths to feed.

Isnt this a good thing considering the over population? If its all Men in 20 years and very few women, thats outomatic population control. and even though I have a live in I still married to my right hand an cheat on it with the left one.The wife, and the mistress

hmmm.. a world with mostly men.. maybe I need to change my opinion on this topic.LoL. Jk

"Isnt this a good thing considering the over population? If its all Men in 20 years and very few women, thats outomatic population control." come on give me a break don't tell me you believe in over population. the earth can handle the people no problem, and are you also saying that people should be controlled like animals in cages or in zoo's so they can't procreate? by any chance have you been watching captain planet when you grew up?:P j/k but seriously though over population is a myth there is no reason in the world we live in today that anybody should go hungry.

Lots of sexually frustrated men, roaming aound, raping and pillaging. Not a good idea. Their one-kid-to-a-couple restriction seems to be working fairly well, but some people thing that that is unethical.All those single men are totally screwed when they get old. There will be on one to take care of them. It seems that no matter what we do, suffering on a massive scale is the result.

so true steveA. i mean we don't want to regress as a civilization do we? to where we don't have any welfare or social security or medicade just the stuff we take for granted today isn't much already. just remember the fifties and the baby boomers and then how that generationg didn't have enough kids, and now they'll be working longer and hard to support themselves, all just because the population didn't grow enough. but that's just what i think

You sound like Pronatalist (an old member). Sure the earth can handle more people but not without consequences. There are many many resources that are affected. How about deforestation, overfishing, oil, etc... Sure we can do a better job of managing resources but what about developing countries? That's not at the top of their list, I'm sure.If you look at population growth charts and depending on birth rates, growth is usually not linear but rather exponential. There is a limit as to what nature can handle without serious disruptions.

I belive 100% in overpopulation
china is a prime example of it. besies feeding them all where do you plan on housing them? and if you take up all the area of earth to house them where do ya think they are going to grow food?
Besides that the earth is a economy driven place, we dont give away food and places to live that shelter us. Why should I goto work to pay taxes to support people all over the earth? I have myself and family to take care of and thast enough.
and for the record I saw captain planet when I was growing u and I hate that show :P
Im not saying its impossible to provide for the world, but its ot my problem to do so and its not economically feasable to do so either. someone has to do the work and provide and pay.

you both make very good points but as technology moves and progresses so will our abilities to provide and disperce goods and housing and all the other necesities(sp) not to mention the new resources that will be uncovered in the future. our world is constantly change(for the better i hope). and as for housing you need to see some of the things engineeringis doing in japan and hong kong for mini cities(huge buildings with parks and stores that is fully self sufficient). mankind is always finding ways to better themselves i think one day (not in my lifetime) it will become very much a reality.

sdp that old member did you guys like him? or was he a jerk?

He wasn't a jerk... just a major extremist. Kind of a wacko if you ask me.

oh well that can't be good for me:S at least i don't consider myself an extremist:S do you think i am?

> You both make very good points but as technology moves and progresses so will our abilities to provide and disperce goods and housing and all the other necesities(sp) not to mention the new resources that will be uncovered in the future

I was arguing that messing with the make/female balance is a bad idea. I was not defending the population explosion. You have an idealistic and unreal idea of what technology has to offer, and how quickly it will evolve. China is turning into a filthy, polluted mess. As the cities become unlivable, factories will be moved to the countryside, where the more natural areas will suffer. More people means more energy consumption, which means more pollution.

The oceans are already running short of some species of fish. Fish farming is yet another big source of pollution. People are starving all over the world. Even if the world can produce enough food to feed everyone, distributing that food to everyone who needs it is a political impossibility. The U.S. and Europe produce more food than they need, and they can produce even more, but there is still hunger in the world. The fact that the U.S. and Europe are largely Christian doesn't seem to help.

The Earth does not have an infinite carrying capacity for human population, especially as more of the word expects to live more lavishly, as Westerners do. More population means more suffering and more death.

well no frickin' duh it's impossible right now but if people keep thinking like you do the world will never change into what it can. if you don't think it's possible then it will never be. and as for the energy crisis thing nuclear energy is eviromental friendly if used correctly. sounds like you need to do some more research on things steveA and why do you (if you're athiest) bring religion into everything you talk about? it does get kinda tiresome....i think you're looking for arguements about something or other. i know the earth can't hold an infinate amount of people...but as of yet we haven't reached it. for the oceans being polluted is because of carelessness of people nothing else.