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\begin{document}

\title{Pseudo-embryology and Personhood: How embryological pseudoscience helps
structure the American abortion debate}



\author[1]{Scott Gilbert}%
\affil[1]{Swarthmore College}%


\vspace{-1em}



  
  \date{May 24, 2024}


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\begin{abstract}
There is a pseudo-embryology existing today, well nourished by popular
science, religious ideologies, and the public media. Just as eugenics
was a pseudoscience that influenced (and still influences) American
popular culture and which was responsible for racist anti-immigration
laws (such as the Immigration Restriction Act of 1924),
pseudo-embryology is also influencing popular culture and legislation.
This new pseudoscience promotes the belief that science supports current
zygotic and fetal personhood movements and anti-abortion legislation.
However, what often passes for science are actually ideological myths,
often grounded in and supporting male superiority. Indeed, the first
myth of pseudo-embryology is that fertilization is a masculine act that
can be viewed as a classical hero narrative. The second myth is that
fertilization is ensoulment, allowing it to displace the feminine act of
birth as to when life begins. Here, DNA is seen to play the secular
analogue of soul. The third myth is that the fetus in the womb is an
independent autonomous entity and that birth merely moves the fetus from
the womb to the outside world. This expresses the ``seed-in-the-soil''
myth that was also prevalent in ancient cultures. In this manner,
masculine stories of fertilization are valorized while feminine
narratives of birth are suppressed. So when public narratives discuss
what ``science'' says about when human life begins, we are not really
discussing science. Rather, we are allowing our discussions to fall back
into tenacious ancient misogynist myths that have nothing to do with the
conclusions of modern developmental biology.%
\end{abstract}%



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