The mass production of humans is now possible

[Gnosis]

Cheaply and safely, you can now get a fridge-sized machine pregnant with someone else's ovum and sperm and produce a healthy baby in 2 weeks for cents in energy and raw supply cost. The fridgewomb itself costs just a bit more than a laptop.

How would this technology change modern day society? Immigration policies? Labor laws and human rights? Family laws?

How would these machines be used, and by who?

 

[Yzarc]

A kid still needs 18 years and well, you can't sue the fridge for child support so......

 

[HOKKIS]

If it gets into the hand of Russia or China or any other Authoritarian society with burguning population collaps who dont want to replace their population with immigration then we will most likely will see massive "orphanages" where they mass-produce new citizens to avoid their nations collapsing.

Will it be used moral or humanely? No.
Will it be used anyway? Yes.

Is it perhaps the only way for these societies to continue to function with a reversed population pyramid? Probably...

We know from historical Romanian orphanages from when they tried to forcibly increase the number of children produced that it will create a lot of suffering but will create "functioning" humans in the end and that will be all that the Nations that are staring into the abyss of National death of aging cares about.

 

[Spylobster]

If it can reliably produce a specific kind of person, it will immediately be used to create and reinforce ethno-states.

 

[Rhymehouse]

An artificial womb would be an amazing invention for humanity. It would make the abortion debate far less thorny, provide a lot more flexibility in both biology and gender socioculture, and it would pave the way for designer babies and clones.

That said, I don't think any country would start mass producing newborns. As @Yzarc hinted, the hard and expensive part of making more humans isn't the sex and pregnancy stage (although that's still easier said than done), it's raising them for 18 years and getting a contributing adult in the end that's the real kicker. If societies just wanted more little kids and didn't mind shouldering the time and cost of raising them, adoptions in general and especially international adoptions would be far more popular. There would also be programs to support sperm/egg donors and surrogate mothers. If you just want to mass produce a workforce, cloning adults would have much more utility; or just skip the meatbag stage and mass produce robots that do whatever you want.

If it can reliably produce a specific kind of person, it will immediately be used to create and reinforce ethno-states.

Click to shrink...

Explicit ethnostates aren't all that common, at least not on the national political level to the point where a society wants to mass produce their in-group.

 

[Spylobster]

Explicit ethnostates aren't all that common, at least not on the national political level to the point where a society wants to mass produce their in-group.

Click to shrink...

Israel will 100% use it to produce their in-group. Japan probably too as the Japanese government is incredibly hesitant on immigration. You'd probably also see pushes in places like the Nordics and Germany to ensure a white Europe.

 

[Graviator]

As @Yzarc hinted, the hard and expensive part of making more humans isn't the sex and pregnancy stage (although that's still easier said than done), it's raising them for 18 years and getting a contributing adult in the end that's the real kicker.

Click to shrink...

The logical continuation of this is that states or large organizations that mass produce babies will find ways to economize on raising them. After all, abundant, cheaply manufactured toddlers means that it's less costly to lose a few... and the logical continuation of that is that new humans aren't really citizens and don't have even basic rights until they hit some threshold of investment that makes them not disposable.

Yeah, any serious attempts at optimized population-boosting would come with built-in humanitarian catastrophes.