Science Fiction and Artificial Wombs

Today on Technoprogressive Hub I’m speaking with Dr. Evie Kendal, a bioethicist and public health scientist at Australia’s Swinburne University of Technology. She is the author of the provocative and influential monograph, Equal Opportunity and the Case for State Sponsored Ectogenesis, in which she argued that artificial wombs are a potential requirement for genuine social and gender equality. In her latest volume, Science Fiction and the Ethics of Artificial Wombs (Bloomsbury, 2025), Dr. Kendal pivots to the “imagination as a laboratory.” She critiques the traditional bioethical reliance on sterile clinical vignettes, arguing instead that the “thick” narratives found in science fiction—from the cautionary tales of Aldous Huxley to the liberating visions of Marge Piercy and Octavia Butler—provide a more robust framework for anticipating the social and political shocks of emerging biotechnologies. Show Notes Evie Kendal’s recent publications https://experts.swinburne.edu.au/6209-evie-kendal/publications Google Scholar page: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=9x0hed0AAAAJ&hl=en Equal Opportunity and the Case for State Sponsored Ectogenesis, Evie Kendalhttps://link.springer.com/book/10.1057/9781137549877 Science Fiction and the Ethics of Artificial Wombs, Evie Kendalhttps://www.bloomsbury.com/us/science-fiction-and-the-ethics-of-artificial-wombs-9781350542990/ “Artificial Womb: A Short History,” J. Hughes https://philarchive.org/rec/HUGAWA This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit technoprogressives.substack.com