TOW #23 (Written text)- "Babies cry at night to prevent siblings, scientist suggests"

Reading/ Writing Goals- Read an article on a topic that does not particularly interest me, but might be a topic that may show up on the exam. Choose rhetorical devices that are essential to the author's argument/purpose.

            Around the world, people invest hundreds of billions of dollars annually on scientific research in various fields, but what for? Whether people feel that it is necessary to invest so much money in science or not, scientists’ main goal is to find answers to the many questions people have regarding the natural world. Nowadays, you can find scientific research that has been conducted on nearly every topic known to man, even those that seem to have no use or importance. Recently, a neuroscience writer named Laura Sanders wrote an article published Science News analyzing the behaviors of babies. Using hypothetical reasoning and specific diction, Sanders argues that babies likely cry at night not because they are hungry or are looking for comfort from their parents, but to prevent their mothers from conceiving another child.

            Everyone knows that newborn babies are often a hassle, as they constantly cry, wake up in the middle of night, and require constant attention. Typically, people believe this is so because they are so young and cannot care for themselves, but Sanders argues otherwise. According to Sanders, babies are so demanding, especially at night, in order to gain their mother’s attention and occupy her so she is unable to have any more children. In the article, she supports this claim by offering up multiple hypotheses and reasoning to back them up. Although, her main source of reasoning is that babies naturally know, through genetic evolution, that the more attention they receive from their parents, the more likely they are to survive. Therefore, if a mother was to have a second child, the first child would receive much less attention and care than they would as an only child. Though this hypothesis seems reasonably, it is ultimately ineffective because it lacks experimental evidence and results that are required in science to prove a claim to be true. So far, Sanders only has hypothetical evidence to base her reasoning off, and therefore can not successfully make the claim that babies cry at night to prevent having siblings.

            Likely because Sanders lacks such evidence to make her claim, she relies diction that characterizes babies as much smarter and more aware of their actions than they actually are. In the article, Sanders claims that babies desire to prevent another sibling is a “devious intention” and that babies are “nighttime nursing liaisons.” Sanders depicts babies as “devious” because her argument states that babies somehow have it programmed in their genome at birth to prevent their mother from having another child. Obviously a baby cannot prevent this from happening in a more direct manner, so they resort to other underhanded tactics, such as waking up and crying at night, to prevent sex. Also, Sanders argues that babies are liaisons determined to break up sexual relations between their mother and father. Once again, I believe this is unlikely because babies can simply not survive on their own and have no other way to get attention than to cry. Sanders cannot suggest that babies are this devious and smart to develop close liaisons with their mother solely to distract them.

In conclusion, I believe this article is a great example of the diversity within the field of science, yet Laura Sanders does not effectively achieve her purpose. She cannot rely on hypothetical evidence and such diction to claim that babies act the way they do to prevent the birth of siblings.