The spectre of a harsh, impersonal and authoritarian dystopia always looms in these discussions of reproductive control and selection. Whether it’s Newsweek reporting in 1978 on the birth of Louise Brown, the first “test-tube baby” (the inaccurate phrase speaks volumes) as a “cry round the brave new world”, or the New York Times announcing “ The brave new world of three-parent IVF” in 2014, the message is that we are heading towards Huxley’s hatchery with its racks of tailor-made babies in their “numbered test tubes”. Instead, the gestating fetuses and babies are tended by workers in white overalls, “their hands gloved with a pale corpse‑coloured rubber”, under white, dead lights.īrave New World has become the inevitable reference point for all media discussion of new advances in reproductive technology. There are no parents as such – families are considered obscene. Set in the year 2540, it describes a society whose population is grown in vats in an impersonal central hatchery, graded into five tiers of different intelligence by chemical treatment of the embryos. That book was, of course, Brave New World, published in 1932. Inspired by predictions about the future of reproductive technology by the biologists JBS Haldane and Julian Huxley in the 1920s, Huxley’s brother Aldous wrote a satirical novel about it.

It’s a long way from the image conjured up when artificial conception, and perhaps even artificial gestation, were first mooted as a serious scientific possibility. View the Groupon Goods FAQ to learn more.If there’s any kind of future for “designer babies”, it might look something like this. For post-purchase inquiries, please contact Groupon customer support. Requires three AAA batteries (not included)įor questions pertaining to this deal, click the Ask a Question button below.Up to three hints per category 3,000 hints total.Answer as many questions as you can during two-minute turns.

Designed for two teams, the game provides a safe, competitive alternative to the mixed martial arts bouts that inevitably arise at family gatherings. Up to three hints are provided per category, but calling on too many could be detrimental, as the winner is the one who gets the most answers right with the fewest hints. A new twist on the classic game of Trivial Pursuit, this electronic edition offers hints, not jeers, to struggling players.

Electronic trivial pursuit