代理孕母的意思是指一個女性替代別人懷孕、生產，但所生的孩子要歸還給委託者。這樣的記載在人類歷史中可追溯到很久遠以前。隨著生殖科技的進步，四十多年前開始有了人工授精的技術，此時期的代理孕母雖不必與委託人發生關係，但嬰兒的DNA有一半來自孕母的卵，一半來自委託男性的精子。二十年前試管嬰兒技術成熟，又轉入一個新的形勢。在這之後，委託方的夫妻可以先用自己的精子與卵子在體外﹝試管中﹞受精，再將受精卵植入代理孕母的體內。這時代理孕母與子宮內的胎兒完全無血緣關係，這種做法成為今天的主流，我們要思考代理孕母的做法是否合理。作者認為，代理孕母是一個剝削窮人，物化女性，販賣嬰兒的行為，即使在合法的國家，也是一種不智的做法。我國目前法令禁止代理孕母，個人十分贊同。新的科技本身是中性的，但若它將人的價值貶低了，我們就應審慎取捨，才不會本末倒置，失去了人性最寶貴的一面。

A “surrogate mother” is a woman who, for financial or other reasons, agrees to bear a child for another woman who is incapable to conceive herself. In other words, she is a “substitute mother” that conceives, gestates and delivers a baby on behalf of another woman who is subsequently to be seen as the “real” (social and legal) mother of the child. Though the practice of surrogacy has already become a big market in western countries, it has also generated countless challenges for the law because it adds a third dimension to the meaning of motherhood. Like adoption, surrogacy separates the role of rearing mother from what the law has called the natural mother, but gestational surrogacy breaks the latter down into the roles of genetic mother and birth mother, leaving two women with biological connections to the child. Because surrogacy tends to commodify and dehumanize people, and because of all its legal, social, and psychological complications, it is obviously not wise to accept surrogacy as an alternative way of procreation.