Alvaro asked:

1. Reproduction... 2. Offspring... 3. Mating... 4.Having babies... A) Why do most people have the
   "urge" to reproduce? B) Do we have "the right" to bring "human beings" to life? C) What could I
   answer to my not-yet-born-child when he/ she asks the reason of his/ her "existence" and
   "production"... [e.g. Why did you have me...?] D) Is reproduction a deep-down self-regarding action?
   E) Would I have "the right" to ask my parents for their reasons for conceiving me? F) Is there any
   "rational excuse" to reproducing ourselves? G) Any books or articles on the subject? Thank you.

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I have never seriously thought about your question before, but I would like to explore it with the help
of a thought experiment.

Imagine a world where the tale about storks and babies was true. Do you know the tale? Young
children were told that when a new baby arrived it was brought by a stork who flew in through the
window and left the infant in the arms of its grateful new parents. (Or was the baby was left on the
doorstep? I can't remember.) As a small boy I was told the stork story and I believed it. But I was less
philosophical then than I am now. When you think about it even a little, there are all sorts of awkward
questions which the stork theory does not answer!

Let's not worry about those questions. In our imaginary world, parents were not in any way
responsible for bringing new life into the world. Every new child came as an unexpected gift.

But then one day the storks ceased to arrive, and everyone was very sad. Until one day a childless
couple discovered how to make babies.

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Unless you were an extreme pessimist who thought it best that all human life be allowed to be
extinguished, you cannot deny that it was a good thing that the secret of making babies was
discovered in the nick of time. But that does not answer your question.

Why were people sad when the storks went away? It wasn't just that the human race faced certain
extinction. Many couples who could no longer have children mourned the fact for their own sakes, for
the loss of the joys of parenthood. But that raises the question, why dopeople want children? Is it just
a biological urge, or is there a more rational explanation? I know several couples who have
successfully resisted the urge, and seem to be very happy in their childless state. What, if anything,
are they missing?

Let us allow that it is a good thing in general that new human life comes into being. However, for
reasons which should be familiar, it is not a good thing in every case. Can it be right to bring children
into the world, for example, when the mother and father know that their offspring will be born with a
severe genetic deformity? Can it be right to bring children into the world, when the parents live in
severe poverty and can barely feed themselves? Can it be right when the parents know that the
children will face a life of emotional deprivation, unwanted and unloved?

I fear that your questions may only be touching the tip of the iceberg. In a very short while, it will be
possible to choose, not only whether to conceive or not conceive, but many of the child's physical and
mental attributes. We could be on the verge of entering a world which is as different from the world
we know, as the stork world is from ours.

Geoffrey Klempner