--- title: Pandora’s Baby: The New Science of Predicting Your Child description: I have two children. At the moment, all I know about their genes is that they both have 46 chromosomes, and one is XY and... canonical: https://time.com/4448000/pandoras-baby/ author: Emily Oster article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-08-11T10:48:33.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-22T23:55:01.546Z article:section: Health og:title: Pandora’s Baby: The New Science of Predicting Your Child og:description: I have two children. At the moment, all I know about their genes is that they both have 46 chromosomes, and one is XY and... og:url: https://time.com/4448000/pandoras-baby/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Pandora’s Baby: The New Science of Predicting Your Child twitter:description: I have two children. At the moment, all I know about their genes is that they both have 46 chromosomes, and one is XY and... twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # Pandora's Baby: The New Science of Predicting Your Child by [Emily Oster](https://time.com/author/emily-oster/) ## Emily Oster Aug 11, 2016 10:48 AM UTC by [Emily Oster](https://time.com/author/emily-oster/) ## Emily Oster Aug 11, 2016 10:48 AM UTC I have two children. At the moment, all I know about their genes is that they both have 46 chromosomes, and one is XY and one is XX. I try to treat them equally, to assume equal potential. But what if I knew my daughter carried a “smart” gene and my son did not? When he came home from school with a B, would I assume it was because of his genes and not push him to try harder? And what if I could have known this before he were born, at a time when he was just a little blip on an ultrasound? Frankly, I’m not sure I would trust myself with that information… [**Read the full story here.**](http://time.com/expectingbetter/) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4448000/pandoras-baby/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4448000/pandoras-baby/"},"headline":"Pandora's Baby: The New Science of Predicting Your Child","datePublished":"2016-08-11T10:48:33.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-22T23:55:01.546Z","description":"I have two children. At the moment, all I know about their genes is that they both have 46 chromosomes, and one is XY and...","url":"https://time.com/4448000/pandoras-baby/","keywords":[],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Emily Oster","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/emily-oster/"}],"articleSection":"Health","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/health/","name":"Health"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4448000/pandoras-baby/","name":"Pandora's Baby: The New Science of Predicting Your Child"}}]}] ```