Abstract: Since the publication of the Warnock Report 40 years ago, philosophers have deliberated extensively about the moral status of the embryo, the nature and scope of reproductive rights, the non-identity problem in relation to fertility tratments, and the degree to which access to IVF should be state-funded. Yet the status of IVF as a treatment for infertility has not itself been fully problematised. The fact that reproductive technology can fulfil the wishes of people other than infertile heterosexual couples, has become increasingly clear. The interests that motivate these requests go beyond what we would normally expect from the paradigmatic ‘infertile couple’ that the Warnock committee envisaged, and beyond even the ‘marginal’ cases such as single women and same sex couples, that were regarded at the time as being potentially problematic. In this paper I ask what IVF is, what kind of needs or interests it satisfies, and to what extent these needs or interests are the proper domain of medicine per se. I argue that IVF is best understood as a ‘person-generating’ intervention, undertaken in order to fulfil specific relationship aspirations held by those who seek treatment. I suggest that person-generation is inherently morally problematic, regardless of the relationship need it aims to fulfil. I show this, by demonstrating that the same arguments and criteria that are drafted in to uphold the notion that IVF is acceptable in the case of involuntary childlessness, can be used to support the case for person-generation for the fulfilment of other relationship aspirations. Such aspirations might include: friendship; sexual partnership; family relationships other than that of parent-child
Anna Smajdor is professor of philosophy at IFIKK.