Sex in the Future: The Reproductive Revolution and How it Will Change Us

Baker, Robin

ISBN 10: 1559705213 / ISBN 13: 9781559705219

Published by Arcade Publishing, New York, 2000

About this Item

320pp, bibliography. Paperback. 'The author explains the technologies of assisted reproduction that are currently available [1990s] and those likely to become available as we proceed in the 21st century: from in vitro fertilization and surrogate motherhood to cloning, gamete banking and novel ways of micromanipulating sperm and egg, testes and ovaries.' Size: Trade Paperback.

Seller Inventory # 016281

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Sex in the Future: The Reproductive Revolution and How it Will Change Us
• Publisher: Arcade Publishing, New York
• Publication Date: 2000
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1559705213
• ISBN 13: 9781559705219
• Binding: Soft Cover
• Edition: First US Edition.
• Condition: Fine

About this title

Synopsis

An authority on human sexual behavior and evolution offers a provocative look at how advances in reproductive technology will affect human behavior and relationships in the twenty-first century. 50,000 first printing.

Reviews

"The demise of the nuclear family is an inevitable step in social evolution," argues Baker (Sperm Wars; Baby Wars) in this analysis of the possible effects of new reproductive technologies. Baker, a former reader in zoology at the University of Manchester, sees in vitro fertilization, surrogate motherhood, cloning and other procedures as logical and practical ways for human beings to maximize reproductive success. Such technologies, Baker writes, can certify paternity, making it impossible for men to reject responsibility for the children they father. With legal mechanisms in place to require fair child support from men and women regardless of marital status, individuals will naturally gravitate toward single-parent families--which are already on the increase and, in Baker's view, a completely satisfactory system for raising children. Reproductive innovations can also end male and female infertility. The possibilities seem outlandish at first, but even a procedure as shocking as the transplantation of human testes into rats as a potential treatment for male infertility appears more reasonable as the analysis proceeds. Baker explains the science behind the new techniques with clarity and precision, and constructs fictional scenarios that serve as entertaining, if not wholly plausible, illustrations of possible post-reproductive revolution behavior: a typical sketch involves a middle-aged man lusting after a daughter cloned from his wife (it's not really incest, Baker points out, since the young woman is not genetically related to her "father"--as if DNA were all there is to parenthood). Baker tends to see utopia ahead; many readers may see his future as a dystopia to be avoided. (May)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.