Matrescence: The Cellular Science of the Unself

One of the most discomposing things about the sense of individuality is the knowledge that although there are infinitely many kinds of beautiful lives, there is but one way to come alive — through the bloody, sweaty flesh of another; the knowledge that your own flesh is made of someone else’s cells and genes, the fact of you a fractal.

While mothering can take many forms and can be done by many different kinds of people, the process of one organism generating another from the raw materials of i...