Schrodinger's Cat, Eugenics, and the Compulsory Sterilization of Welfare Mothers: Deconstructing an Old/New Rhetoric and Constructing the Reproductive Right to Natality for Low-Income Women of Color 17 Cardozo Law Review 1995

17 Cardozo L. Rev. 531 (1995 - 1996)
Schrodinger's Cat, Eugenics, and the Compulsory Sterilization of Welfare Mothers: Deconstructing an Old/New Rhetoric and Constructing the Reproductive Right to Natality for Low-Income Women of Color

handle is hein.journals/cdozo17 and id is 549 raw text is: SCHRODINGER'S CAT, EUGENICS, AND THE
COMPULSORY STERILIZATION OF
WELFARE MOTHERS:
DECONSTRUCTING AN OLD/NEW
RHETORIC AND CONSTRUCTING THE
REPRODUCTIVE RIGHT TO NATALITY FOR
LOW-INCOME WOMEN OF COLOR
Beverly Horsburgh*
INTRODUCTION
According to the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum the-
ory, objects in the microscopic universe exist in potentia. An ob-
server compels an electron to become real and to be located in
space by introducing an apparatus that detects its presence.1 The
relationship between the microscopic world and the measuring de-
vice is measured, not the underlying nature of the subatomic
world.2 In attempting to measure, the observer is limited by her
awareness of only those properties that exist in the macroscopic
world. She measures the position or momentum of a particle be-
cause these attributes accurately describe her universe of knowl-
edge even though these attributes are not the innate characteristics
of subatomic particles, which lack an underlying reality.3 There are
postmodernist limits to knowledge insofar as our information
comes from inventing tests that, in turn, are based on the scope of
our own frame of reference. Electrons take on a location in space
because we ask a macroscopic question. Reality is observer
created.
An issue remains, however, as to whether the indeterminacy
of the microscopic universe has implications in, or spills over into,
the macroscopic universe and if human-scale events also lack ob-
jectivity, influenced by the observer's presence. The physicist, Er-
win Schr6dinger, devised a thought experiment designed to address
I * Associate Professor of Law, St. Thomas University School of Law. B.A., Smith Col-
lege; J.D., University of Miami School of Law.
I thank my research assistant, Michelle Acebo, for all her help in writing this Article.
I also want to thank my colleague Professor Peter Margulies for his thoughtful suggestions.
1 See HEINZ R. PAGELS, THE COSMIC CODE: QUANTUM PHYSICS AS THE LANGUAGE
OF NATURE 120-21 (1982).
2 NICK HERBERT, QUANTUM REALITY: BEYOND THE NEW PHYSICS 160-61 (1985).
3 Id. at 46.

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