This week's "Spiritual Life" column in the Boston Globe features the work of Debora L. Spar, the Spangler family professor of business administration at Harvard Business School, and president-designate of Barnard College.
In her research, Spar, whose books include The Baby Business, explores the assisted-reproduction industry in the United States, considering both the numbers—$3 billion a year—and the ethical implications. She examines the attitudes of various religious traditions and the wider society toward treatments such as in-vitro fertilization and prenatal genetic testing, how these attitudes have developed over time, and what texts and historical customs have affected them.
Read more about Spar and her work in the Globe story—In Baby Business, What are the Rules?—or in a Harvard Magazine story from 2006.