Sex and the Planet, with Peggy Battin and Jim Tabery

2025-03-07

What if advances in technology were already changing the causal logic of human reproduction which is now taken for granted? Could pregnancy shift from an event which some opt out of through prevention or termination, to an intentional, elective choice? How should such a system work, and what would be its likely consequences? These questions comprise the “opt-in conjecture” by University of Utah Distinguished Professor of Philosophy Margaret Pabst Battin, whose book, Sex and the Planet: What Opt...

What if advances in technology were already changing the causal logic of human reproduction which is now taken for granted? Could pregnancy shift from an event which some opt out of through prevention or termination, to an intentional, elective choice? How should such a system work, and what would be its likely consequences?

These questions comprise the “opt-in conjecture” by University of Utah Distinguished Professor of Philosophy Margaret Pabst Battin, whose book, Sex and the Planet: What Opt-In Reproduction Could Do for the Globe was published by MIT Press.

In discussion with James Tabery (Professor of Philosophy), of the Center for Health Ethics, Arts & Humanities at the University of Utah.

Introduced by Scott Black, Director of the Tanner Humanities Center.

Episode edited by Ethan Rauschkolb. Named after our seminar room, The Virtual Jewel Box hosts conversations at the Obert C. and Grace A. Tanner Humanities Center at the University of Utah. Views expressed on The Virtual Jewel Box do not represent the official views of the Center or University.

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