We’ll have to dig our way out of that. One way I’ve come to value a person is to recognize her originality. Nothing like her has ever existed, nor ever will, because she’s original, one-of-a-kind, and in that sense effectively priceless. — NOS4A2

It would be such a better world if every human on the planet had this basic opinion and used it towards each human they met until that human displays actions which don't comply with the golden rule of 'treat others as you would have them treat you.' What I also like about the golden rule is that this allows you to insult or fight with others if you feel there is no other choice and you would accept such treatment from others if that is what you dish out. You can treat others badly if they have treated you badly.
I don't mean an 'eye for an eye,' approach either, your response to bad treatment must fall short of this imo.

natalists will be hunted down and hanged from the nearest tree for being part of the "conspiracy" to cause unimaginable human suffering by encouraging and precipitating a population explosion that exceeds the Earth's carrying capacity. — Agent Smith

You should write stories based on dystopian futures, you would entertain many children and perhaps even give some jollies to the antinatalists. Are your fears not alleviated by future projections of humans living beyond our home planet or if we organise our living spaces and our ability to produce resources without destroying our ecology? I live in Scotland and we have many many uninhabited island spaces and in fact a lot of mainland space. Scotland is relatively empty and could support many more people imo.
Humans have to get their social and political practices correct. We have simply been unable to control the nefarious amongst us adequately so far. I personally think we do control them and bring them down more successfully that we have in the past. We still have some king-style creatures like Putin, Xi Jinping and Kim Jong-un, but we just ended the political career of the clown BO JO in the UK so we can bring down the nefarious. We just have to learn how to prevent creatures like him or Trump gaining power in the first place. POWERFUL CHECKS AND BALANCES is what our human race needs not moronic antinatalism!

Morality obtains when the conditions are around for morality to be in play. — schopenhauer1

So, only AFTER a baby has been born then and not before. So as others have already pointed out to you in this thread. It's nonsense to suggest that it's immoral to have children as they are born innocent and then suffer because they cannot be born innocent if they are never born. So the 'innocence' point in the OP has already been debunked.
Your arguments regarding your conflated criteria for 'unnecessary harms' are utterly subjective and on a case-by-case basis, far too complicated and nuanced to be used as an argument for such a blunt dimwitted solution as antinatalism.
A forest fire could be labeled an unnecessary harm but after the fire, a lot of new growth occurs.
As I have told you many times your thinking is too shallow. You deserve every insult thrown at you as you will not accept scientific fact, you will still try to blunderbuss your way through because you are incapable of admitting you are completely wrong. You are a prideful idiot.

Rather, I am refuting that the actual idea of "I want a baby/I want to reproduce" is an instinct. — schopenhauer1

So the fact that almost every animal species has a 'mating season,' and humans are members of all animal species. for you, is not scientific evidence that procreation has a massive instinctive imperative.
The fact that humans in the past stole women from other tribes to grow their own tribe also should be handwaved away. The physical pleasure aspect is an attractor Sherlock, it's there to encourage procreation, the fact that sex feels good is why it's useful to the imperative of procreation. You need to learn more biology.

The question at hand is the moral question of what can deliberated upon regarding suffering, not the origin of "human suffering" in general. — schopenhauer1

So you are unable to deliberate on the origin of human suffering, at least you are beginning to admit to your shortfalls. Some progress in that at least.

t's similar to attributing a murder to human evolution or compassionate act to human evolution. — schopenhauer1

Human murder cannot occur if humans did not evolve Sherlock!

the argument is not valid or invalid because you think I'm a misanthrope or you have prescriptions for me. — schopenhauer1

All that you are influences all that you type. Try to think like a grown-up man instead of a dimwitted brat, your brain will appreciate the revelation.

I see animal upon animal suffering as different precisely because it is non-deliberative actions. — schopenhauer1

Suffering is suffering, try to understand that. Its the responsibility of all humans to help reduce all suffering. Just get on with doing that and you will become less useless than you are at present.

I presented to you a claim and you have yet to address it, — schopenhauer1

Only in your own head but I have in fact fully addressed your claims and have debunked them, despite your petted lip.

Genetic fallacy and avoiding the issue- you don't like the source (me), so it must be wrong. But it's true, ad homs are considered not legitimate in good faith argumentation, because they detract from the argument. They are an act of desperation or embellishment, or appeals to emotion from the proverbial "crowd", or meant to throw someone off by making them angry or hurting their feelings — schopenhauer1

Yes, it's ok, you have already revealed yourself as a tenderfoot, you don't have to keep crying in Latin.

Again, I see no scientific claim for your reproductive imperative. If it is so pervasive in scientific literature, show me the overwhelming evidence that this exists. — schopenhauer1

I have no interest in educating you, do your own work!

things that aren't present but can definitely happen in the future based on my actions (procreation). — schopenhauer1

What you don't get you fool is that there is no future under antinatalism, your cowardly solution to human suffering is to advocate for a purposeless universe. That logic is moronic.

Indeed, this is the kind of behavior unnecessary in a philosophy forum and leads to unnecessary and incessant trolling. — schopenhauer1

No, it just means that you get told some home truths regarding your shallow thinking. You assign yourself significance that you just don't possess.

Just stop being an asshole and argue your point. Otherwise you are right, you are not worth debating bedirectlycause most of it is rhetorical blather. — schopenhauer1

As arse is a very good waste disposal system. It lets a person rid themselves of a lot of shit.
Perhaps that's why you type directly from it! Just trying to help you maintain your wish to cry Latin tears Timmy.

In your example it is the fact a person has expended some effort that makes them deserve something, not the fact what they have done will likely yield a certain outcome. — Bartricks

Again Mr pedestrian, you make trivial unimportant points. People expend effort which will produce an outcome, who cares if YOU think they deserve a reward or not! You award yourself significance that only exists in your own head. Your thoughts about who deserves what can be completely ignored by everyone just like your BS viewpoints about antinatalism. Does this not demonstrate to you that your personal application of the human concept of 'deserves,' may not influence the outcome of any event AT ALL or else it might have an effect on the outcome of some event. That's as far as it goes.
The OP is a political question imo, its up to humans to organise and establish global human rights.
Do all humans 'deserve' water, food, shelter? YES is the answer imo but only if they enforce it. I don't really care how or why each little armchair philosopher muses about the labels involved. I care much more about ensuring all basic global human rights are established and are permanent and unassailable.

Again you demonstrate your pedestrian thinking. Deserts to tables are all human labels for constructs natural and built. A table has its own history of development from any flat surface to any modern table design. There is no BS platonic ideal of 'table' or 'desert.' Many deserts contain a large variety of life and oasis etc. People live and procreate in desserts. Do you think a dessert or a table is inherently associated in any way with the word 'deserves?'
I stated that 'deserve' was a human concept not dessert or table.

I would simply consider that an unfortunate situation, and not a moral one because they can't have a choice in the matter. What do you think I would say? — schopenhauer1

Perhaps from the 'thought experiment' of a sentient species that reproduces asexually and has no natural control over the process but still 'suffers' in life in the exact same way humans do, would help you see how shallow your antinatalism is. The fact that humans procreate sexually is a biological happenstance and therefore the origin of procreation through sex had no moral driver (as I have now stated many times.)
Human procreation is not the source of all human suffering as humans were produced by processes with a time span of 13.8 billion years. If you advocate for terminating that process then you are negating every process which naturally occurred within that 13.8 billion years to produce humans and your sole, tiny little reason is human suffering. You are unable to see how ridiculous your reasoning and your suggestion is. Humans are capable of reducing the more heinous forms of human suffering if misanthropes like you give us a chance to. Meantime try to help out rather than add to the suffering by typing the BS you type.

A lion eating its prey can't deliberate on it, so it is amoral. It is unfortunate for the prey getting eaten at that particular time though, nonetheless — schopenhauer1

So by your logic, would you stop a lion from eating a human? If your answer is yes then why do you feel differently when its a lamb getting eaten by the lion? Does the lamb not suffer?
Does your morality about suffering flex quite a bit depending on which creatures are involved?
Animals suffer, would you not prefer your antinatalism to free them from their horrific sufferings?

it's a better look. — schopenhauer1

I think your viewpoints are illogical so I am hardly likely to pay attention to your opinions of what is 'a better look.'

You have not overcome the argument that to conflate THIS preference with instinct is pseudo-scientific misconception. — schopenhauer1

Nonsense, You claim I have not 'overcome' your shallow arguments, I say I have. Others will judge. I am not interested in a panto exchange with your ridiculous non-scientific claims.

Unnecessary harm here has been explained earlier. It has to follow criteria like: — schopenhauer1

I have little interest regarding your dictated criteria that the English phrase 'unnecessary harm' HAS to follow. You use sweeping unscientific generalisation constantly, so you have demonstrated no ability to posit balanced arguments. You handwave away biological fact such as the reproductive imperative and try to convince others that the reproductive imperative in humans is no more powerful than mere whim.
That handwaving alone is enough evidence to condemn you as a pure sophist who is trying to peddle BS to avoid admitting that your antinatalism is based on limited illogical shallow thinking on your part.

It's always morality about what the parents do, not the child born. — schopenhauer1

There is no morality regarding a child before it is born. That which does not exist cannot have any moral aspect to it. This has been pointed out to you by many posters. This has not penetrated your foggy thinking yet!

I refer you to philosopher David Benatar's asymmetry argument. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Benatar — schopenhauer1

He had to be born to make his argument, did he not? Just like you had to be born to make your dimwitted antinatalist arguments!

like you need the theatrics of "you dimwit" and "coward" and things like this.. — schopenhauer1

Antinatalism is a vile viewpoint. I offer no apology for any insult I have so far typed regarding your attempt to peddle it as valid. I think antinatalism is dimwitted and cowardly, that does not mean you are a complete dimwit and a total coward, just sometimes and only in my opinion based on your typings.
I am sure your opinion of me is not a flattering one. I don't care if you choose to express your disdain in the same way as I do or not. I leave it to the site moderators to raise a concern with me if they have any.

Two political sides just insulting each other is not debating the policies at hand. We've all seen examples of constructive debate and something that resembles a debate but was just a way to insult the other side. — schopenhauer1

I agree if that's all they do is insult each other. I think your antinatalist arguments have been debunked and you are the one displaying the sour grapes. If you are a little timmy timid and you cant take any insults then perhaps you are correct and you should not respond to me anymore as you are perhaps too precious to not suffer due to your perception of my discourteous approach to your 'dialogue.'

'Deserve,' is a human concept akin to the human concept of justice. I think it has no relevance whatsoever to the natural events which have occurred in the universe in the approximation of around 14 billion years of events since the big bang. 'Deserve' is only relevant to creatures like humans. I think it has been less relevant in human society in the past compared to now. If we continue to progress towards what I and hopefully most decent thinking humans consider a fairer society then the word will become more and more important as a metric. It can, like most other human concepts, be abused by nefarious people for their own purposes or be equally abused to try to support merely misguided viewpoints by those who advocate such standpoints as consensual antinatalism.

Dude, you should know basic definitions before you make a fool of yourself: "Procreation- the production of offspring; reproduction".
Reproduction can be asexual or sexual. — schopenhauer1

Right back at you DUDE! Asexual reproduction does not require procreation with a mate so advising a creature that does not reproduce through sex, not to reproduce shows your ignorance.
Asexual reproduction happens through parthenogenesis, there is no choice for the parent involved DUDE.

It's arguable that it is a "compulsion" — schopenhauer1

No it's not! For many humans it is the biggest imperative in their existence. I know that for you, this is just another of those pesky, inconvenient biological facts, that debunks your confused antinatalism.
The entire animal kingdom demonstrates how strong the reproductive imperative is every single year and we are a member of the processes that produced all other life species on the Earth.
You attempt to handwave away all of that rigorous scientific biological truth with the claim that 'human reproductive urges are no more than insignificant whims, similar to an urge for some chocolate.' You are peddling BS bottles of Dr schopenhauer1 or bottles of batshit crazy batricks as the elixir to solve the problem of human suffering. :rofl: You could make a good comedy duo but not a valid argument.

Again, unnecessarily harming people is always wrong. — schopenhauer1

You have been told many times now that this is just your shallow thinking and the issue of human suffering is NOT COVERED by your small concept of 'unnecessary harms.' You have been given many examples. Here is another for you. Don't touch things that are too hot because such will cause you harm. Receiving pain from something which is too hot is not an unnecessary harm, but it is a harm regardless of your status as an innocent. Your dimwitted antinatalism offers the solution 'well if you are not born then you cannot burn your skin and experience that suffering.' How seriously dumb is that?
As others have already told you, if no one exists then you cannot even pose the dilemma! The universe would most likely have NO PURPOSE! If we exist then we give the universe purpose and that is far far more important than your silly little fears regarding human suffering. Stop being such a coward and work hard towards causing as much joy in the lives of others as you can. In that way you might become useful to human society instead of a complete waste of DNA. We are short of many good species like panda bears we are not short of misanthropic humans like you.
You and bartricks can hold hands and skip towards oblivion together.

Yeah, right. You really hurt me when you smashed your face onto my knee and then repeatedly hit my foot with your crotch. Good technique! — Bartricks

There you go! You don't even see the sources of your own suffering. Your stressed brain invokes my imaginary face and crotch, that's probably just your imaginary thinking underpants trying to communicate with you again, as your compromised intellect smashes off the canvas once again.
You have been revealed as a shallow thinker by almost every poster on this thread, you are just too far gone to realise it. You continue to entertain me as well as be a good exemplar of a bad interlocutor.

Don't procreate. — schopenhauer1

Perhaps you should read up on how asexuality works!

Because not being able to unnecessarily harm others, even if it frustrates ones preferences, even if one is doing it because one wants to focus only on the possible positive outcomes, and intends only the best, is wrong. — schopenhauer1

Nonsense, as for many it would not merely 'frustrate one's preference,' it would prevent them from fulfilling a deeply held natural compulsion and would cause them serious mental and physical harm.
You just handwave this suffering away which reveals you as a hypocrite who does not care about the suffering of others if their suffering does not fit the skewed logic you use to promote your morose antinatalist viewpoint.

I mean all of life is going to have harms, and you can try your best to dismiss them as "learning experiences", but then you can cause any harm to someone else in the name of "learning experiences", but you most likely would not do that. Rather, unnecessary harm is unnecessary harm. — schopenhauer1

More nonesense, all of life, is NOT going to have harms. When you take a painkiller your pain reduces, it does not get worse. Do all medicines do harm in your skewed world? Antinatalism is an unnecessary harm it causes many many harms. You, therefore, advocate for harming others by suggesting that no one deserves children despite reproduction being a strong natural dictate for the survival of any species. Your antinatalism is vile but harmless and will only ever gain any credence among the fringefreaks in society.

A preacher doesn't make arguments. I make arguments. You just say stuff. It's tedious. Up your game. — Bartricks

You have been knocked out so many times you are punchy and stuck in repeat BS mode.
You remain an entertainment!
How many contributers did you get to your second BS thread on antinatalism?
Only some sympathy posting from the tired musings of shopenhauer1.

I got it - but I've been listening to Billy Joel ever since you posted..... — Cuthbert

Can't beat a bit of Billy Joel. A much better songwriter than most, including Paul McCartney imo.

"Don't go changing, to try and please me......" — Cuthbert

I think that was just a cover of the Billy Joel song 'just the way you are.'
I was thinking more of Barry singing songs like:


Some of his songs were supposed to have caused a lot of procreation so big Barry was an antidote for any antinatalists BS.

But yeah, Batricks won't go changing unless it pleases him. he is too chiseled to know how to do otherwise.

You type like a fundamentalist preacher. You ignore all the valid counterpoints made by others and just continue to preach from your antinatalist pulpit. Keep going! you will encourage more procreating than the music of Barry White ever did!

In nature, sexual reproduction just happens to be the method that became established for humans. We might have been asexual reproducers like the Komodo Dragon, Burmese Python, Bonnethead sharks etc. If humans reproduced asexually, they would still suffer as they do today, they would just have less choice about procreation. I don't normally suggest hypotheticals but it's an interesting posit imo.
If humans reproduced asexually, where would that leave antinatalists?
If we met a sentient asexual alien species who suffered in the same way as humans do. What would your antinatalist advice be for them?
I suspect your response will be unimaginative like 'I don't answer hypotheticals' or 'that's a matter for them, if such creatures exist.'

You also have not answered the following:
For many humans, not reproducing would cause great mental and physical harm as it is a natural compulsion developed over millions of years and it is a very very strong instinct. Why are you unconcerned about this set of harms your antinatalism would cause?

You may harm the universe, as life was evolved from within it and YOU have no idea why so how do you know that your antinatalist suggestion would not be very harmful indeed to the progress of a possible emergence of a collective universal consciousness. The totality of all individual consciousnesses.
Perhaps, preventing that, would cause more harm than all human suffering ever has or could. How do you know differently?

Guilty pleasures, that's all that's on offer at the moment. If not eliminate, like you said (morphine), minimize suffering — Agent Smith

I understand why anyone with little in their lives on a day-to-day basis, except suffering, turning to whatever escapism they are able to take part in. I wish I had more power to help all such people.
Other humans becoming organised and insisting on change for the better is the main hope such people have had. This remains the case at present and it has been ever thus.
They will certainly get no help from antinatalists as they tend to merely watch and complain that life is just too scary for them.
Major change for the better is very slow but it has happened many times, life is better for most humans than it has been in the past.
There are so many stories of humans who have experienced extreme suffering and they have been shown intense love and care because of it and that exchange has produced deep meaningful relationships between many carers and those who are cared for. The antinatalists would have you believe that all who suffer, do so alone, in the dark with no help or care from anyone. They also peddle the BS that all of those who suffer would prefer not to have been born. Just false impressions that feeds their messed-up personalities.

So you are literally stating the cause for which you are using people (by harming them unnecessarily). — schopenhauer1

No as in the transhuman future I envisage there will be a lot more options to control what YOU currently consider 'harms.' Even today, you have a skewed view of human suffering and its function. Your viewpoint is shallow and based on your own fears.

Yes, I think we will gain much better control over all examples that we currently call human suffering and we will have much more choice about how (and for how long)we individually choose to live and die.
This is 2022 thats a lot closer to a planck time duration when compared to almost 14 billion years since the big bang. Again to all antinatalist misanthropes I would shout 'give us a f****** chance you cowards!'

Those early experiences are still part of who we are and still directly influence our primal fears.
The struggle will continue, the antinatalists are utterly impotent. The need to find out how and why we and the universe exists, remains compelling and it remains the main purpose of our species.
We are currently mortal and transhumanism is in its infancy so we still require children to replace those who die. I think we always will produce new children as the universe is such a big place, so even in the very distant future of transhumans, I think will still need newborns.

Let's meet halfway as I've been suggesting, unknowingly, all along. Those who can guarantee a reasonable degree of comfort for their children are welcome to procreate but those who can't should use contraceptives/avail of abortion clinics/at the very least, have fewer kids. Life isn't a bed of roses, but it ain't all sunshine and rainbows either. — Agent Smith

I have no children of my own because I was unable to establish the necessary stable environments (couldn't pick a good woman out of a crowd if my life depended on it) and I am too old now Imo. I have always spoken against having children just because you can or as an attempted insurance for your own old age. These cautions are very far indeed however from the main tenets of antinatalism.
I think poor people traditionally had a lot of children either due to religious doctrine or because they believed this was the best way to ensure they had help when they grew old. I agree that both of these reasons are bad.

antinatalism probably spawned in a fit of severe depression and to that extent its validity is questionable. — Agent Smith

Are you referring to your own dalliances with the concept of antinatalism?

Like all things, antinatalism isn't meant for everybody, being reserved as it were for extreme suffering, — Agent Smith

Antinatalists don't present it that way however. They declare having children as immoral regardless of how many examples exist of people who have declared something like 'I have had a wonderful life,' on their deathbed. They will focus on those who declare something like 'Life was crap,' on their deathbed.
Perhaps we need official stats on deathbed declarations about quality of life.

Nobody wants to go to hell for sure! — Agent Smith

Well, it doesn't exist anyway but do you not think an ETERNITY in heaven would become the same torturous experience as hell?

That should make natalists think a thousand times before they go preaching door to door. — Agent Smith

I don't know who you are really referring to? The main advocate for reproduction is natural instinct in my opinion not door-to-door people who try to encourage reproduction. Some like catholic priests may well do so to newly wedded young Catholics perhaps but not much nowadays probably.
I personally advocate for only having children when you can afford to and when you think you can genuinely offer them a good chance at a good life and you are fairly sure will be there to support them.
Antinatalism as a general proposal for the future of the human race is beyond contempt in my opinion and anyone who advocates for it should be fervently engaged in debate and be revealed as the misguided fools they are.

Would you or would you not put down an animal who is beyond help but suffering (intensely)? That is to say are you for or against mercy killing? I'd wager you aren't averse to putting the suffering out of their misery with a coup de grâce — Agent Smith

In general, I do support assisted death or the right of a human to legally request termination of their own life if they are terminal and face a future of increased or maintained suffering.

Some of us are in a whole lotta pain, mental/physical/both; so much pain in fact that such folks would even describe their existence as hell! Wouldn't you then honor their request to die (rather than suffer)? — Agent Smith

Yes I would.

f such cases exist and one simply can't ensure that one's children won't ever end up in a similar situation, would you still want to have kids? — Agent Smith

Yes because there is a plethora of examples of wonderful lives lived. Lives that have made massive contributions to human progression. Lives that have impacted millions of other lives in very positive ways. I have experienced a great deal of happiness and wonderment in my own life and I continue to do so. I have also experienced some intense suffering but not compared to others. Such measurements are all relative. I think its nonsense to require surety of a pain-free life, as a prerequisite to having a child.
Humans have to learn and grow into what they will become. You need to face comparators such as pain and pleasure to be able to become anything of value. That's why heaven would soon become hell for 'thinking' humans. Only automatons with no individual personality could enjoy something as insipid as heaven.

First of all there's the anguish of not wanting to live and to add insult to injury one has to experience the agony of dying too. — Agent Smith

This may sound a little strange, but I am in earnest. I would personally prefer what you describe above than what is offered by the Christian description of heaven. An eternity of purposeless existence in homage to a gods ego. After a million years of pleasure, do you think you would only crave suffering just so you could feel something to compare your million years of pleasure against?
You can defeat 'the anguish of not wanting to live' by reacting to it differently and you can defeat 'the agony of dying' by getting pumped full of morphine/heroin etc when death is close.
I agree that if there is no hope for you then it's time to offer you every legal/illegal high on the market.
As I said, I support assisted death. I also support the use of any drug that can produce euphoria for those in great pain and who are close to death, as available and free and based on personal choice.
I don't know if I would choose such. I might after I have said all my goodbyes to those who matter to me when I still had my wits about me.
I welcome death however as a harbinger of change. I also advocate for transhumanism and more individual control over and choice regarding when you die.

One does not have the right to impose a lifetime of injustice on another person — Bartricks

Yeah Sherlock, humans must continue to struggle to build a fairer society for all, well done, you worked that one out all by yourself.

if procreative acts visit great injustices on those whom they create — Bartricks

They don't Sherlock!

Desiring to hurt others, for example, is a bad desire. — Bartricks

Not if the person you are trying to hurt is evil and is currently hurting others Sherlock.

The rest of the points you make are based on your usual shallow, infantile thinking. People who have children do not deliberately intend to create invalid, ignorant creatures who suffer from birth, that's just your misanthropic viewpoint which has already been discredited by poster after poster along with the points you made in the OP.
Responding to you will become for entertainment value only if you keep trying to flog your dead arguments.
You argue with the same conviction as Monty python's black knight:

There's an argument in the OP. You need to address that argument. — Bartricks

Your OP argument has been addressed and exposed as impotent.

Currently you are simply venting. — Bartricks

I have responded in kind to your insulting manner and you will continue to get back what you try to dish out to others. Try to learn from it like a grown-up.

an unrecognizable and extraordinarily unhealthy lump of nonsense. — Bartricks

You need to look in the mirror and repeat the above words toward yourself until you learn how to debate others and come up with logical arguments.

True, but for the poor, the sick, suffering > happiness. — Agent Smith

Again, I beg to differ. You made no comment regarding my example of the recent death of Deborah James who was very life-affirming despite her intense level of suffering. Your formula above would only work for her imo if it was the sick, suffering < happiness as a measure of 'totality.'
What you suggest is true for those who say it is true but that membership cannot claim all sufferers. I would dispute that it even has claim to a majority of sufferers. This is why I accused you of making sweeping generalisations, perhaps based solely on your own personal feelings.

Antinatslism is for these demographics. Another issue is the difference in weightage of suffering & happiness: :sad: ≥≥ :smile: + :smile: + :smile: +... (you get the idea). — Agent Smith

I agree that there are morose people who will focus on the single stressful event that happened to them on a particular day and that event will outweigh the multiple unstressful everyday events that occurred.
That's what a pessimist is but even in those cases it's the ability to moan about everything that makes such people content. This for them is a positive, a vent.
It is unlikely even truly evil people would advocate for antinatalism as evil people would have no one to prey on.
Antintalism would cancel the (as far as we know) around 13 billion years of time it took to produce life.
For most of the existence of the universe, the antinatalist existence was in vogue. What purpose was inherent in the universe then? Perhaps the only purpose was its progression towards creating life. If antinatalism was realised through global human will and consent then the universe would simply try again. Do you agree that this would be the most likely outcome based on what science proposed has happened since the big bang?

Sweeping generalization? — Agent Smith

As you yourself agree, no economic or academic or sociological condition that you possess can protect your offspring from random happenstance harms. Suffering is just a bad justification for the antinatalist viewpoint because suffering is too complicated on the cost/benefits analysis scale for it to be used as the main justification for antinatalism.

I was a (hopeless) romantic too once. — Agent Smith

I am not hopeless (even in brackets). One person's romance can be experienced by another as pure trauma.

I made it a point to mention the well-to-do and their right to have as many children as they wish. Only they'll never be able to ensure the happiness of their progeny to a 100%. — Agent Smith

Do you really think the rich qualify as good parents merely because they are rich?
Why do so many children of the rich end up as messed up as any child of a poor person?

Or perhaps oh mio povero bambino is more appropriate.

Address it, Sound and Fury. The premises are clear. Deny one. — Bartricks

I think its time to treat you as an innocent. Italian sounds most apt imo.
oh mio caro bambino

Full of sound and fury. Address the argument — Bartricks

Is that it, is that all you have? Just 'address the argument,' no matter how many times and how many posters have not just addressed your infantile arguments but have completely debunked them and revealed them as having no substance. I have lost any sympathy for you I might have invoked. You deserve all the ridicule you get. You would be as well walking up and down the streets where you live wearing sandwich boards with the words. 'Address the argument!' written as many times as possible on both sides. Then when people approach you and ask 'what argument?" you can respond with 'I am an antinatalist with no idea how to defend the viewpoint so I thought I would make these sandwich boards and walk up and down the street as I don't know how else to defend my...............something........thoughts......I think.....?

Also, I did mention it quite clearly in my previous post that selling antinatalism to the suffering is preaching to the choir. — Agent Smith

I think this is a sweeping generalisation and might even in fact be a purely personal statement.
How many 'dramatisations' have you seen of people experiencing great suffering who are still very life-affirming. I personally have memories of such life-affirmation from dying people.
Look at the recent example of the death of 'bowel cancer babe' Deborah James in the UK.
A lady who was life-affirming all through her excruciating battle with cancer.
She would have spat on antinatalism!
Suffering can cause you to fervently fight for life.
Dylan Thomas - 1914-1953
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Antinatalists, conveniently ignore, the massive harm and suffering many people would experience if they could not have children. People will turn to IVF or might even 'dump a loved partner,' because of their personal need to have a child. Are antinatalists REALLY accusing such people of being immoral?
Do they not care about how childlessness can cause great suffering for many people?

Second, the only basis upon which you think the universe has desires would also show that my underpants have desires. I conclude, then, that you are not very good at understanding or making arguments. — Bartricks

Well, the above certainly does demonstrate how skewed your logic is and how your bad logic results in bad conclusions.
I am left with the image of you constantly shaking your white noise-making rattle and your quivering lips in a mode of permanent tantrum. Infantile shallow thinking is indeed the forte of the antinatalist.

Where are the supporting documents that children chose to be born? There are none! — Agent Smith

You know that's not a valid question. In the same way that the response 'where are the supporting documents that children did NOT choose to be born? There are also none!' is also not a valid question.

You claim all who suffer already support antinatalism

The suffering are sold on the idea of anitnatalism. — Agent Smith

I am arguing that the cause and purpose of all harm/suffering is very complex.
It can be very useful as a teacher. There are many examples where people may say such things as 'well if that had not happened to me then I would not be here helping you today' etc etc.
It may be that that which is deemed innocent does not deserve harm but labels such as 'innocent,' 'deserve,' 'harm' are products of human constructs of morality. But our origins have no moral driver unless you claim that evolution through natural selection does contain a moral driver.
That's why the theists scapegoat gods for all human suffering and project them as morally qualified to inflict any harm/suffering as they see fit based on the claim that the humans involved must have deserved it even (from Christian myth) the killing by god of Egyptian first born babies.
If the antinatalist claim is based solely on the injustice of human suffering then it is defeated straight away by the fact that harm/suffering can be caused with absolutely no intent behind it whatsoever.
We don't know why life exists in the universe, BUT IT DOES! It is stupid to suggest that human life should be prevented due to the possibility of experiencing harm when we understand so little about why it exists in the first place.
To me, it's like ancient humans deciding against attempting to gain any understanding or control over fire because it can harm you. It's just shallow, selfish, cowardly thinking.
Antinatalism is the posit that human reproduction is morally unjustifiable because of the possibility of suffering and it is based on shallow, selfish, cowardly thinking in my opinion.

The parents would need to be held accountable for the misery that their children go through! Only then will the full meaning of antinatalism sink in! — Agent Smith

Is the child responsible for any pain/suffering/stretch-marked skin etc caused to the mother during the birth process or is it a consequence of an evolutionary process that has no inherent moral driver?

Yep, I find such people very inspirational. As a teenager, I decided to become academic and aim for Uni because of Carl Sagan. No single human has influenced me as much as he did and he continues to, even now when I am 58 and retired. I also oil paint so we have some common ground there.

I have always favoured string theory and Mtheory.

I like Sean Carroll and buy into the idea of a multiverse. — Jackson

I am also a Sean Carroll fan but I am a fan of all cosmologists even when they have different theories from Carlo Rovelli to Mark Tegmark.