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What is infertility? (And why we should care)

31 October 2024, 6:30 pm–8:00 pm

three pregnancy tests all showing a positive result

UCL Health Humanities Centre is pleased to welcome Giulia Cavaliere (UCL Philosophy) to give this seminar.

Event Information

Open to

All

Availability

Yes

Organiser

Institute of Advanced Studies

Location

IAS Common Ground
G11, ground floor, South Wing
UCL, Gower St, London
WC1E 6BT
United Kingdom

What descriptor aptly characterises the experience of having regular, unprotected sex and being unable to conceive? We normally consider ‘infertility’ to be such a descriptor and use ‘infertile’ to refer to the subject who is experiencing infertility. But what is infertility? In this paper, I argue that addressing this question requires meeting two challenges.

First, the term ‘infertility’ is used as a descriptor for several phenomena, many of which radically differ from one another. But what do cases of infertility have in common? I call this ‘the heterogeneity challenge’. Second, it is unclear whether ‘infertility’ is an individual or a relational property. Are couples infertile? Or are individuals infertile? I call this ‘the individual/relational property challenge’.

Despite the importance of relying on an account of infertility that allows one to correctly adjudicate cases of infertility and non-infertility, my first aim in this paper is to show that existing accounts of infertility fall short of this ideal. To establish whether they should be adopted to adjudicate cases of infertility, I test their ability to deliver on two desiderata: explanation and extensional adequacy. I will argue that existing accounts of infertility fail to be either appropriately explanatory, extensionally adequate or both. The second aim of this paper is to develop an appropriately explanatory and extensionally adequate account of infertility.

I contend that, given the nature of infertility and the ways in which the experience of infertility can be ameliorated, a person is infertile if she is unable to conceive a) unassisted, b) with their current partner, and c) she has propositional attitudes towards parenthood. I will argue that a), b) and c) are individually necessary and jointly sufficient conditions for infertility. Further, I suggest that an explanatory and extensionally adequate account of infertility needs to embed in the account the goals of having a certain concept rather than making these goals a potential outcome of having such an account. Thus, building on work by Sally Haslanger (2012), I argue that an account of infertility needs to i) be revisionary, ii) attend to social structure, and iii) be goal-oriented.

All welcome but please register to attend: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/what-is-infertility-and-why-we-should-care-tickets-1044856382567


The UCL Health Humanities Centre draws together staff from different disciplines, departments and faculties engaged in teaching and research on matters relating to health, illness and well-being.

Photo by Laura Ohlman on Unsplash

About the Speaker

Dr Giulia Cavaliere

Lecturer in Engaged Philosophy at Dept of Philosophy, UCL

My research lies at the intersection of applied ethics, feminist theory and political philosophy. I work mainly on infertility, the desire to have children and novel assisted reproductive technologies. I am an associate editor at Res Publica.

More about Dr Giulia Cavaliere