No one is talking about “enforcement” of some criminal statute or something. Missed my point. — Fire Ologist

But a lot of people argue, oddly enough, passionately against AN as if it were being proposed as law. it seems to me, weirdly misplaced hostility. If it’s not worth consideration, you don’t even have to think about it. But often being angry about something means there is something of consideration that you find worthy of having to be addressed. It’s causing you a disturbance in some way that you can’t let it go. It’s not even popular enough that you can say it’s all over so you can’t avoid it. It’s a small minority position in philosophy, an already small subset.

You're all missing the mark to some degree. The main argument is not about "How much suffering" per se. That can be a dimension, but only after the core of the argument is understood.

The argument relies on the asymmetry of preventing suffering and not preventing suffering. You already have to have as an ethic something "pinning" suffering to ethics. In my case, I am "pinning" via common notions of deontology about the dignity of people, and how they aren't to be used or "messed with". For example, non-harm, and autonomy seem to be pretty essential to the dignity of a person. All things that would be violated by having children. [It matters not that they "can't" be consented either, simply that they wouldn't be.]

Not preventing suffering via procreation, will lead to the violation of this ethic (non-harm, autonomy). Procreation leads to harm/suffering.

And again, if you want to parse out "suffering" and throw out categorical errors and strawman for examples, you can save it, as like in previous posts, I have provided the distinction between preventative actions (prevent the harm if possible, especially if it is unnecessary to let the harm happen in the first place!) versus remediative harm (the harm is already taking place, now a set of actions is needed to remediate it!).

It also becomes a problem of aggressive paternalism, as no procreation leads to no person being affected, and thus nothing caused to be affected ("forced" in shorthand colloquial speak), whereas procreation does lead to harm. Thus the aggressive paternalism only leads one way, that of the decision to procreate.

What do I mean by aggressive paternalism? That is what I was explaining in many of these posts, the simple idea that you shouldn't violate a negative ethic (such as non-harm, autonomy) to promote a positive ethic. That is to say, you should not force recruit people who will be harmed, and profoundly, because YOU deem the game necessary for someone else to play based on your personal estimation.

Now here is where perhaps we can discuss the dimension of: "HOW MUCH suffering?"- and I did bring up the Veil of Ignorance as we can never truly know, what the world beholds for someone else. But more than a primitive harm/benefit analysis, it is just a fact that the world has many known and unknown/unanticipated harms that will befall someone. That alone is enough to preclude life from being something one should "inflict" for another. Perhaps if we were indeed living in a parallel universe where there were very little suffering considerations, it would be more on the level of an ACTUAL gift. What do I mean here? I mean that (unlike life), an ACTUAL gift is something that would not impose an overriding set of inescapable BURDENS onto someone else, along with the "positives" of the gift being given. So even though this ethic doesn't need the dimension of "how much suffering", it still doesn't pass the test, even on this front.

Your definition of “just world” itself is an unfair game being that no one born agreed to it. If anything, that’s using people for an ends of whatever game of Justice, Karma, or otherwise this world represents.

We are used. Enough said about “just world”. Add to that contingencies of luck, cause-and-effect, our own striving nature, individual pathologies, and a self-reflective animal that knows its own condition- forget about it.

This is an interesting way of putting it. I'll have to think about it. — T Clark

:up:

How does this work with billionaires sitting on their fortunes like Smaug and trying to tax them so you can provide for the common good? You're clearly causing at least some of them great harm, to hear them talk of it anyhow, and they are only going to benefit from the harmful tax in a rather indirect way. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I've said this in other threads.. I don't think personal ethics translates to political actions. I think there is such things as ethics in politics, but that is not political actions per se, but personal matters in how one acts in political situations. This goes down to meta-ethics. I think ethics is at the individual level, and "society" itself is not a target for ethics proper, but political actions. There can be good or bad political actions, even just or unjust ones, but it wouldn't be ethics we are discussing even if it is a value system or axiology. The locus has to be the individual for it to be ethical. What is "war" to an individual? It is a category error. What is "taxes" to an individual? It is misapplied if whether to tax this or that group that amount as "ethics". Its inherently aggregated, and aggregation into a concept (like social welfare, greater society, etc.) is now beyond the realm of (personal) ethics and into the realm of social axiology (politics).

Or military conscription? Harming older people through climate change legislation that will have no meaningful impact in their lifetimes? — Count Timothy von Icarus

Same as above.

As far as anti-natalism (I did start Ligotti's book, it's quite good), the principle of "you should never deprive someone of happiness or pleasure for no reason" would just cut the other way, no? — Count Timothy von Icarus

Yes it is.. You should never deprive someone of happiness or pleasure for no reason...This is precisely the ethic I am talking about. Happiness in this case, comes with much harm. No happiness (for someone who cannot be deprived) is no problem. No harm can be neutral if you want as well, but it's when harm occurs that the violation takes place. We just have to agree that causing harm (unnecessarily, not to remediate an already harmful situation) using the excuse of "promoting happiness" is unjust/wrong/misguided

The argument you have been making has two parts: 1) If I am not allowed to do something then I am not allowed to do it even if it would be helpful or useful to me — Leontiskos

No, that is misconstruing it again. "If I am not allowed to do something...". Well, of course what does that mean? Rather, you are not allowed to do something in regards to if or how it affects another person's negative ethics. If it does then, correct, it is not allowed.

What I have said from the very start is that the problem with your argument is (2). (1) is trivial, but you keep arguing it even though no one has opposed you. — Leontiskos

That is because you split it up from the whole thing which is that a positive ethic should not override a negative ethic. I also think it is not trivial as some people's ethics might say that causing some "unnecessary harm" is okay. And then I stipulated when I thought it was "okay" (remediation from harm already occurring).

No I did not. The accurate quote is, "we have no negative right not to be caused suffering*" (↪Leontiskos). Strawmen aside, I was saying that we have no negative right not to be caused suffering [by other people]. — Leontiskos

Again, it does lead to trivializing the argument unless you add in the "Negative right not to be caused suffering from your positive projects".

No I did not, and in fact I already told you that I did not. You are persisting in an error that has already been clarified. — Leontiskos

Yet, you don't really have any counter-arguments. I especially was waiting so on the example I gave, and you said you did not agree there. So which is it?

If we continue this we should move it into the antinatalism thread. — Leontiskos

You have turned it into it by persistence on the non-identity issue. It can remain a non-AN argument nonetheless. Go back to my example for a very minor example of what I mean.

So again, let me do an archeological excavation of the conversation..
1) We were discussing whether a positive ethic should override a negative ethic.
1a) I gave a specific example of if a project promotes welfare or happiness, but it violates the negative ethic of not causing harm to another.
1b) You agreed with the point of this example (or so you said), that someone's positive project, even if it leads to their welfare, cannot be an excuse to cause harm to another.

2) I admitted that there is a difference between cases of "preventative" and "remediation". Preventative are cases where the harm could clearly be prevented, full stop. There was no need to cause someone else's suffering by your positive desire for a project.
2b) I also admitted that if someone is already put into a situation of harm, then remediative ethics comes into play. That is to say, ethics whereby now one must negotiate how to trade greater harms for a lesser harms.

3) You then said that "one doesn't have a right to no suffering".
3a) I responded that I didn't say they have a right to "no suffering", just that one doesn't have a right to cause suffering (if it can be prevented) because one wants to promote a positive project.
3b) You seemed to agree, but then shifted the focus to the non-identity problem
3c) You disagreed and said it's because "If they don't exist they have no rights".

So as far as I'm concerned, almost everything of what I said so far has been agreed to by you, except as applied to "preexistent persons". I still say this is the identity problem. The main focus of the debate has now shifted to whether ethical considerations can be taken for future people, which of course, I would simply start defending this position. I just want to acknowledge that we have gotten this far.

It's not a point of disagreement. I already said that, "I am among those who hold that a good end does not justify an evil means." If you have a right to life and I need an organ transplant then I cannot kill you in order to obtain an organ, because the end does not justify the means. The real question has to do with what our negative rights are. — Leontiskos

So you are not in disagreement, but yet you do disagree, because the example exemplifies my point, which again, you agree with.

But no, you then say you don't here...

I don't have the right to CAUSE you to suffer because I want something out of it...
— schopenhauer1

No one thinks you have that right. The question is whether your victim has a right that prevents you. You are incorrectly multiplying rights. — Leontiskos

And I don't even know what you are getting at there, so you'd have to be very careful in clarifying that.

The antinatalist seems to think that the right of a preexistent person is being infringed when they are conceived. The right that is said to be infringed is the right to not be brought into a world which contains suffering (absent consent). My point is that the preexistent person has no such right, and therefore procreation does not infringe this right. — Leontiskos

OOOHH so instead of the argument at hand, it's moving the target to a different one (non-identity). Lame.

I understand, and again, my point is that the rights you are invoking do not exist. For example, we have no right to not be caused suffering. Again, the crux of the question is what counts as a negative right. — Leontiskos

First off, you didn't address my example. I take this that you don't have a good response?

Second off, it's about the prohibition of positive ethics at the behest of negative ethics. Thus, "I want this to happen, therefore I get to make you suffer" is the more-or-less what is being discussed. You subtly changed it from "no right to not be caused suffering" in the impersonal. I don't have the right to CAUSE you to suffer because I want something out of it, de facto, just like that, because I want it. There is a difference between that and "generally" being "caused" to suffer (by existence, by the environment, by your own mind, etc.).

I don't, and I think it's simply true. — Leontiskos

Of course

Okay, then we agree on this. — Leontiskos

:up:

I am among those who hold that a good end does not justify an evil means, but my point is that what counts as a negative ethic (right) is enormously important. That is where the crux of the question lies. — Leontiskos

Here is an extreme microcosm of what I mean about YOUR projects versus MY rights...

Let us say there is one bridge that connects one part of the park to the other. You cannot get to the parking lot unless you go through this bridge. However, on the bridge there is a group of people fishing off it into the river below, effectively blocking your entry. They are having a good time.. They are happy. They ignore your requests to move because they think they are going to catch one of the biggest fish they're ever going to catch. They have a project. But now THEIR project becomes YOUR problem/project. Your negative right is affected/effected by their positive ethic of happiness-promotion. In fact, even in utilitarian terms, there are more of them and they are gaining much more happiness from this than you might get for the whole rest of your day, even if you make it to your car.

For sure it would not be moral of me to neglect my children so that they suffer terribly but that then causes them to be self-sufficient and highly successful. The end would not justify the means. But I do think there is merit to not spoiling the child, to making them endure their struggles. There is real difference between adults who had upbringings where they were provided their every need and those that earned their way. — Hanover

Ok, but I am not arguing that one shouldn't provide ways to overcome obstacles or prepare children so.. Again at this point, child-rearing is remediation from the damage not prevented.

It's the person who has learned his lessons through experience that is most steadfast, and I'd argue most virtuous. The person who never faltered and never considered veering the course is a special breed, but his behavior might be best explained as obedient and compliant, doing as he does because he never contemplated otherwise. But the guy who refuses to be diverted from the virtuous path because he knows too well where it leads, whose behaviors are the result of a life not perfectly lived, is the person who has a more heroic way about him. — Hanover

Ok, not refuting this either. What I am refuting is the notion that if YOU have a positive ethic (people should do this), then that should not override other people's negative ethic (they have a right to not be interfered with unjustly). I have and am currently acknowledging things like "child-rearing" and certain "governmental actions" as different (remediation), than cases where it was unnecessary to begin with (you could have prevented it). And of course much of the dialogue will center around "unnecessary" and "prevent".

I don't PURPOSEFULLY put you in a situation SO THAT YOU CAN OVERCOME IT, if I don't get consent, etc.. So for example, if I wanted to force someone to join my project, simply because I liked it, that is not my right to force someone to join my project. If I couldn't ask, I shouldn't do this. If the project required unknown amounts of suffering, but certainly known that suffering will incur, that would be wrong that I forced someone into that project. Things like this.

Similarly, let's say you want to X society (project) to incur. In order to do this, you need to populate this society. This requires you create people (negative ethic of non-autonomy), and that these people will be harmed (negative ethic of non-harm). You cannot just create the people because you want to see X society, and you need a population to join this society. Once born, sure, if it requires that people need to be instilled with X, Y, Z values when young in order to survive, that is only because of a remediation was necessary (you needed to trade a greater harm for a lesser harm), and they are in your care.

The problem is that the "negative ethics" being espoused are not true ethics at all (and of course this all relates obliquely to your antinatalism). We have no negative right to not be criticized; we have no negative right to not receive moral admonition; we have no negative right not to be imprisoned and coerced when we commit serial murder; we have no negative right not to be caused suffering*, etc. This is "negative ethics" run amok, and it violates the sort of minimalism that has classically characterized negative rights.

* At least in the way that the antinatalist thinks of the causing of suffering, which includes everything from inconvenience to bringing about conditions which may lead to suffering. — Leontiskos

But that is a very uncharitable understanding, don't you think? It fits nice if you want to try to defeat the argument, sure.

It's not that we have 'no negative right not to be criticized'. That's not necessarily part of the negative ethics. That is simply interaction. Rather, if I said to you, "Please leave me alone", and you stood there yelling in my face, chasing me down, harassing me, then that might qualify for a negative right not to be harassed. But simply criticizing someone doesn't meet that threshold. What qualifies as "right not to be... (fill in the blank)" can be up for interpretation. The point is, whatever negative ethic there is, you cannot use your understanding of what is a positive "right" to violate it. WHAT COUNTS as a negative ethic, is up for interpretation though.

And I'm not leaving things at saying that free will is the highest good because I think there's something higher than that, which is humanity, which is our unique ability as creatures to have the ability to act freely as we do. That is, we are people, and people are important per se and we cannot do anything that damages a person's right to be as he is. To state that an attack on a person's intellectual or moral decision detonates his individuality is a questionable claim, as it would seem that special element within the person is indestructible given the proper spirit. If that's the case, then it would follow we ought instill virtue into individuals so as to not make their spirit subject to dissolution at the simplest of criticisms. Character, through instilling virtue, then becomes the highest good, and all else then becomes subservient to that. Any claim though that virtue cannot be forged through criticism is contrary to facts. People do become better when challenged, like it or not.

In fact it is criticism and challenge that leads to greater resolve and character. I, for example, have been provided all sorts of benefits in my life, many beyond what others have, but I also was provided enough criticism and challange (and suffering actually) to have emerged with a much more valuable character. — Hanover

So this is a great example of a positive ethic as opposed to a negative ethic. A positive ethic is one where you are supposedly obligated (or the best outcome is) to do something. A negative ethic would be one where you are obligated not to do something. So, a negative ethic might be not harming other people intentionally, for "no reason". A positive ethic might be something as you are proposing like "instilling character".

This has been my question in the other thread.. At what point can you impose a positive ethic if it violates a negative ethic? When is one justified over the other? My answer has been that you cannot generally justify a positive ethic over a negative ethic if there was no need for it.. In other words, if I am causing the source of harm for you (negative ethic), in order to make you go through a positive ethic (character building) this is wrong. However, if you are ALREADY in a situation whereby you need remediation (child-rearing), it may be said that if one is the caregiver, one can impose a positive ethic, as it is now perhaps necessary in order for the person to flourish in the future in some way. The harm has been done (one failed to prevent), so now one remediates.

Those who do wrong are very often ignorant of their wrongdoing, whether culpably or not. It has always been considered a mercy to make them aware of it - to help them avoid what will only become a bigger problem for them and for others. — Leontiskos

But then how to avoid being put into all of this in the first place.

So, at the end of the day, it requires respect of life to allow one to be in a position to create, let's say a bomb, to end all intelligent life, on Earth? Since life will exist otherwise. And the AN argument is, this is pure suffering. — Outlander

Huh? Why make strawmen? You don't "fix" a violation (non-harm, no autonomy) with another violation (non-autonomy at the least, and non-harm in certain forms of hedonism/utilitarianism).

Where do we go from here? What about possibility of life on other planets? Should life be respected long enough to ensure our entire universe is destroyed or rather "made incapable" of supporting life in perpetuity? We're not at that state, currently. So surely, the irony or at least unacknowledged (at least at present) reality which requires such a truth to become actualized is ignored?

That is to say, life (the true AN equates with suffering?) will still exist until more life is created that allows greater potential to prevent itself? Do you understand this is what you're saying? — Outlander

I don't understand what it is YOU'RE rambling on about. Killing people to "save" them is not what AN is saying. It is a ridiculous straw man.

Ironically, the only way death occurs is being born in the first place, so try again.

Due to Original Position, even if Earth was transformed into a Utopia, a hypothetical almost "alien world" where suffering is so rare and unheard of it now requires true and intense effort to create (versus the current dynamic where suffering seems to be the default and likely outcome without large [and for some non-accomplishable] levels of planning, effort, and perhaps luck), procreation is still responsible because a person did not choose to be born, and inevitably will face some restriction as a result, such restriction amounting to enslavement (ie. follow the moral laws, be a good neighbor, feed oneself, manage stress in a socially-acceptable way lest one be punished by physical incarceration, etc, etc. that one never "asked" or was even involved in being placed in). Something like that? — Outlander

Yes. So, as you just pointed out, life has a limited set of choices. We tend to look at life as the degrees of freedom of choice, rather than the degrees of limitations. That is to say, you can't choose what is not available- a world or circumstance that cannot or does not exist, for example. THESE are the set you can choose from. But what if I don't want these set of choices? You are shit out of luck. Some people might have some mitigation, or even say to just go kill yourself you ungrateful bastard. But you see, there's something callously and unjustly wrong with this kind of response to the forced set of choices, once born. Once a person is born, there is only what life offers, with a brain that can understand there are undesirable things about life. And if you need to mitigate and change your mindset, or whatever else you're going to throw as a palliative, you have already conceded the original violation of forcing a limited set of choices.

Edit: And thus, why I say one should not violate the negative ethics of non-harm, forcing someone into YOUR project, for the positive ethic of X, Y, Z (usually along the lines of promoting happiness, a value of some sort, virtue, and then we can go down the litany of purely selfish personal projects).

If I value X, Y, Z about a project and think it is good, this does not mean I should affect other people to be forced to also be part of the project.

Because you were wrong. I will not interact with you any more. My post was directed at the others who failed to understand the AN position. I tried to guide them towards a better understanding that is all.

Bye — I like sushi

Wrong about what? Wrong about THE AN position..Right.

Added some more

I responded to people asking about the AN position is in general. I did that. What your personal position is is your business to explain. — I like sushi

People were responding to my last comments generally, then you swooped in there like you owned the place.. Please.

We've discussed this before. We've discussed this before. Again, swipe clean. Last time you were tag-teaming my argument with some other poster.. I forget which of the handful of anti-antinatalists that like to join..but they'll probably pop in too. Your friend perhaps.

Also, I'd like to add to your 'No harm is better than no pleasure" summation that it's not as simple as that, as nothing is. It is also the fact that one is pursuing a positive ethic by breaking a negative ethic, or justifying breaking the negative ethic (don't harm), by pursuing a positive ethic (promote X, Y, Z outcome.. happiness or whatnot). One would have to get past this notion that one should force a new person into an intended goal by breaking the negative ethic of no-harm, no-autonomy, etc.

Yeah the non-identity thing is then thrown out like a poor defense because "Who is harmed?" "Who is violated?" And of course this is supposed to justify doing any number of things that could potentially harm a future person.. It's obvious that any number of other scenarios that might happen to a "potential child" would be considered wrong, even if a person isn't actually born yet. It's the weakest of the anti-AN defenses, and not even clever.

Nonidentity is neither for nor against (it is not specific to AN either). It is the question of whether, or how, ethics can be applied to people who do not as yet exist. — I like sushi

Why do you state it like I don't understand this?

The main positions are:

- We have no right to bring life into existence (nonidentity issue involved here in part).
- No harm is better than no pleasure. — I like sushi

Replace "pleasure" though with happiness or "positives".

I pointed to the issue of non-identity (about which there are many positions) and about asymmetry (about which there is more to say too in terms of its implications). Pointing out to those asking that looking at one without considering the other is kind of futile. — I like sushi

Right there are many positions, but you lump despite this. Anyways, the "non-identity" issue works AGAINST natalism. That is to say, if we believe in not violating dignity/autonomy etc. The violation only happens when someone is born, not when someone is not born.

If we had a set of beliefs about an event, even as big as "life itself", ranging from really like, disappointed with, frustrated by, not happy with, etc. None of that becomes so much a moral issue insofar as it is someone's own personal reaction. The minute that "I like X, so SOMEONE ELSE SHOULD LIKE X", it becomes a problem, as now someone ELSE will be affected by YOUR evaluation.

But again, this is my argument, not all of AN. So don't misconstrue that even though I am continuing the debate.

I have read, and listened, extensively to the AN position. — I like sushi

Again with the THE. It's not ONE position. The "gist" is not having children. The arguments are numerous and nuanced. To lump it in as "the" position would be misleading.

You can provide links for them if you wish. I have read, and listened, extensively to the AN position. — I like sushi

That's ok. I've written plenty if you want to search.

My position is that it is VERY useful to look at for anyone considering having children - but not because I believe it will, or should, stop them. — I like sushi

What you said there are very different things. Let's say Kant's CI or Aristotle's virtue ethics is correct, that wouldn't necessarily mean people "will" stop people from X, Y, Z or promote people to do X, Y, Z. The soundness on the argument doesn't rely on whether it affects a lot of people. I can try to show tens of millions of people that someone like Trump is a conman liar that doesn't have your interests in mind, and that doesn't mean it will affect them, even if there is plenty of evidence it is the case.

I as referring to the general AN positions not your personal ones.

What I said outlined a couple of the main points AN puts forwards. I said no more than that. — I like sushi

There’s a lot of AN positions so it’s easy to pick and choose strawmen. What “general ones”? Even Benatar, the most well known proponent, is misconstrued terribly.

I'm sure you're correct in most instances. Of course we have yet to meet or question an actual practicing anti-natalist (not counting the obvious resident one, joyous and pleasant to know him as he is..., of course, a bit or irony but that's beside the point, for now) — Outlander

I'm just watching as you all wildly miss the mark on antinatalism. I do love it when others try to argue it, but I also cringe at the misguided notions when they inevitably misunderstand it. It also seems no one pays attention to my previous arguments, so every time I argue something it is like all the arguments made previously are put on reset and wiped clean, and then people take other arguments that are not correct, and replace those as strawmen instead. I refer everyone to my last several posts and interactions in this thread, starting with the Veil of Ignorance as a starting point, and then once you have caught up to the relevant arguments, rather than misrepresenting them so as to knockdown poor strawmen, I can reenter the chat. Otherwise, please keep arguing misguided points for misguided notions.

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/908702

But humans came here naturally. So ethics, which tells you how to live good and rightly, came here naturally. — Fire Ologist

That premise is misguided or misleading in either one of two ways:
1) If humans came here naturally, then anything can be justified as it came about from humans, which came here naturally so anything we do is technically "from nature".. reductio.

and

2) Descriptive ethics is not normative ethics. There is no directive from nature. This is as existentialists say as "bad faith".. Or it is a smokescreen as you can say that "Nature tells us this", and I can say "Nature tells us that". "Nature tells us clearly that we need to procreate because animals procreate". That is literally the definition of the naturalistic fallacy.

Like reifying an abstract “good not to inflict” in the physical act of procreation. — Fire Ologist

That's not reification. You are giving ethical powers to nature. Ethics are usually things that are in the realm of human decisions.

So we are allowed to inflict lots of suffering throughout our lives, but the rule not to inflict suffering is super important when looking to consent to the naturally produced function of procreation. Got it. — Fire Ologist

Are you willfully ignoring what I am saying between preventative and mitigative? Mitigating is only needed once you have to trade a greater harm for a lesser harm because there is no other way out of the harm. It is already happening.

It’s completely preventative of ethics too. No more ethics along with no more suffering that the ethical ones couldn’t stomach inflicting on others (except they could stomach the risk of inflicting suffering by every other act they take besides procreation). — Fire Ologist

Yeah and again, no humans, no ethics needed. No problem.
Also, no one is saying one should try to inflict or to not prevent suffering other than procreation. Not sure where that comes from. I just said procreation is unique in terms of prevention. It doesn't mean anything else.

Antinatalism is a weird reification of being ethical, of the “good” as in a good choice being choosing not to inflict life with its suffering. — Fire Ologist

That's not reification. Reification is this:

Reification is when you think of or treat something abstract as a physical thing. Reification is a complex idea for when you treat something immaterial — like happiness, fear, or evil — as a material thing. — Vocabulary.com

In your case, you were treating nature/necessity as something which we need to have fidelity for.

In the case of AN, there is no necessity of nature being appealed to. The ethic itself isn't a reification, simply a weighted value (against causing suffering). You can question that value, but that is not reifying an abstract thing into something more concrete. Nature's evolutionary aspect has no ethical component to it, and to pretend it does, would be a reification. Similarly, if you said "good exists in the world like a chair exists in the world", some might accuse that kind of thinking as a "reification" of good. You are doing this to necessity.

Then we often have pleasant experiences in the present that we rough up later with our cherry-picked and more subdued memories of the pleasant experience. That’s all psychology. — Fire Ologist

Indeed it is psychology. Either way looks pretty poor for evaluation then. Interestingly enough, the negative biased people that have mild depression have been seen as "depressive realists".. That is to say they may have a more accurate view of things. This doesn't seem to be the norm as the average person doesn't have mild depression (aka dysthymia).

It is false to say we are never right to inflict suffering. Just not a tailored ethic anyone could ever follow. We can follow a rule to not steal. We can not lie or murder. But never inflict any suffering?? We would need to not ask anyone to ever do anything. We couldn’t tell someone we loved them for fear this would burden them and increase their suffering. Teaching someone about antinatalism could inflict tremendous suffering on them - the meaning of life and all their plans dashed because they involved a family and kids. It is NOT true that “Happiness is not obligatory, whereas preventing suffering is.” Neither happiness nor preventing suffering are obligatory. You reify your ability to reduce suffering, and the ethical rule that tells you this is the highest good. — Fire Ologist

So again, for the nth time, the unique thing about procreation is it is completely preventative.. It prevents the cause of all suffering. Every other instance has an aspect of not only prevention but mediation. I see your other arguments as not mattering because of the difference between positive and negative ethics. As you yourself stated in the last post, just because YOU have a project you want to see carried out, that doesn't mean others need to be inflicted with suffering as a result of this. And being that no one is forcing antinatalism, no one is forcing you live out the AN ethic, if it pains you so. It is up to you whether you want to decide for another that they should suffer because you think that some X positive project overrides this consideration. That is the whole crux of the argument.. Is allowing the conditions for someone else's suffering with X positive ethical consideration you might have? The AN would always claim that no, it is not. No need to cause suffering, if it was unnecessary.

Arising by the necessity of chemistry on earth, life began. This led to animals, which by the natural necessity of evolution led to animals on land, which by necessity led to humans, which by necessity led to logic and ethics, which by necessity led to antinatalism, which, if practiced well, necessarily leads to the end of all of this living necessity (at least of the ethical kind). The natural evolution of ethics in the world was necessary so that ethics could be ended by these ethical animals.

Basically, all the rest of the living things by necessity procreate, as procreation is part of the very life that has now spit out ethics, and our ethics is to end life itself, unlike every other natural, necessitated living thing. Seems like natural necessity gone astray because of our “ethics”. Or, just — Fire Ologist

Don't know what the other person would say, but your use of "necessity" here is the problem. Necessity is being used in some ethical fashion. We aren't "necessitated" in an ethical way by any natural logos or impulse. Meta-ethically, we at least act as if we have the freedom of deliberation, so I am not sure your point. We have no fidelity to "evolution", "the chemistry on earth" or anything else. That is a weird reification to me.

Maybe wrong anbout some of the “most people”? Isn’t it THEIR lives? It’s none of my business to say your life is suffering, just like it’s none of your business to say my life is anything. — Fire Ologist

Interesting enough, this is partly the basis for deontologically, why it would be wrong to decide for another that they should suffer. It isn't your business to determine that for someone else :D.

But besides this, empirically-speaking there is solid ground to stand on in regards to Pollyannaism. That is to say, we often have very unpleasant experiences in the present that we often smooth away later with our cherry-picked and more subdued memories of the unpleasant experience. This leads to a false estimation of each event in the moment as opposed to the events in hindsight which throws off later reported evaluations of good and bad. Or, even worse, trying to compress all experiences in an evaluation later on, not pulling apart each individual events negative experience as lived.

I got into a debate with someone elsewhere about Antinatalism and the badness/evil of all life in the universe ceasing to exist. I think it would be obviously bad because I think sentient life is objectively intrinsically valuable and death is bad for the being that dies even if they’re not technically around to experience it. As explained in detail in the thread linked at the bottom death is bad because of the deprivation and opportunity cost. To me saying “But a dead person can’t experience or want anything” is just restating what makes it so bad to begin with. I don’t think the badness of something is necessarily dependent on a conscious mind being aware of it or experiencing it in some way. — Captain Homicide

So this is going to be a round about way of answering contra your view on death using antinatalism as a counterpoint...

Antinatalism is a decision that can only be made from the parents' perspective. Though it is considering a person who potentially could exist in X future time (that is only contingent on X circumstances that lead up to the event of X future time, including the decision to procreate), it can never be from the perspective of a non-existent person. This key point is why the Benatar asymmetry works so well. That is to say, non-existent people can never experience good, and that is neither good nor bad because there is no "one" there to even be deprived. Happiness is not obligatory, whereas preventing suffering is. Because the same thing applies you might say, "no one" is around to experience the benefit of "non-harm". True, but from the parents' perspective, all that matters is the obligatory stance of non-harm took place rather than the non-obligatory "happiness promotion".

So all this is just a prelude to illustrate that indeed, only from the perspective of the people who already/still exist would it matter about X's death being "bad". However, the death itself was neither "good nor bad" from the perspective of the person dead. So if we are to look at death as an impending moment that ends all one's positive projects, death can be considered bad. From the perspective of the already dead person, it is neither good nor bad, because they are not deprived of anything. Only whilst alive, is death (and then only as a concept of end to benefits) a bad. Once dead, death is neutral. It turns from a bad (for the amount of time alive) to a neutral (once dead), from the perspective of the person who died. It may be perceived as a bad from the people already alive, but being that this is only a concept in the minds of others and not affecting the person in question who is already dead, it is irrelevant except as a talking point about the X person dead. The actual harm is the person in question, not the people who feel X, Y, Z on behalf of that person.

Unlike the procreation scenario, where another person DOES count in one's perspective, because it would be something that affects (very profoundly) another person, the death scenario of people left to regret someone's death is irrelevant, as it does not affect the person who died. They are already dead.

I didn't read entire thread and don't know if this was discussed already but isn't anti-natalism perfect solution to overpopulation?

It's not new that overpopulation is a problem, and killing off billions of people is unacceptable, but Anti-natalism would solve that problem in only 50 years without anyone suffering. — SpaceDweller

Antinatalism can take many forms, but most antinatalism is not about preventing various environmental or population outcomes but due to not wanting to allow suffering for a future person. Indeed, a result would be a reduced people born, which would in fact reduce the population, but that is generally not the position of most philanthropic or misanthropic antinatalists. Once the population levels off to a "correct" level, the environmental/population "antinatalist" would no longer be so, and thus was a contingent natalist, really.

Interestingly, in the US, countries in Western Europe, Japan, Korea, Russia, and even China (even AFTER the one child policy restrictions) the population has gone to below replacement levels which makes economists and social conservatives uneasy. They need little units of labor to keep the pyramid scheme going, and this "lower than replacement level" gives them pause for alarm. Here are some recent stories on this:

https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/20/health/global-fertility-rates-lancet-study/index.html
https://www.wsj.com/us-news/america-birth-rate-decline-a111d21b
https://www.economist.com/leaders/2023/06/01/global-fertility-has-collapsed-with-profound-economic-consequences?utm_content=section_content&gad_source=1&gclid=CjwKCAjw7NmzBhBLEiwAxrHQ-Z7JGafAcUZiAufKxKdpfX4yzbiPVxb0FOEcHE1d1-oiBo7YEc6WLRoC7cwQAvD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds
https://www.vox.com/23971366/declining-birth-rate-fertility-babies-children

https://time.com/6836949/birth-rates-south-korea-japan-decline/
https://www.ft.com/content/008a1341-1882-4b98-83d4-0d7dc08a4134
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/china-fertility-rate-record-low-rcna100353

Now I'd love to think this worldwide decline in fertility rate is because everyone realizes that bringing more people into the world means bringing more suffering into the world, and they want to prevent this in a noble ethical way, as good antinatalists.. But that is not the reason. The reason of course is mainly due to the fact that the more educated a population, and higher the standard of living, the harder it is to raise a child. People also end up living more individualistic lifestyles that tend to skew child-free over family-type living. So it is more about lifestyle choice, the cost of raising a child, and a more individualistic, less traditional view of goals in life.

Of course in poorer, less educated (for women especially), and more traditional societies like the Middle East, parts of South America, Africa, and Asia, the fertility rate is still fairly high and so in those areas you will continue to see growth, and the overall growth will continue being that there's simply more people on the planet in general, but it will slow.

Either way, no, population decline is generally not the goal of antinatalists. Since population reduction is context dependent (as presumably it would be permissible to have children again once sustainable levels are reached) we maybe can call it "context-dependent antinatalism". I guess in theory as well, "misanthropic" antinatalism falls under this (rather than philanthropic ... or "to prevent suffering").. That is to say, people think that humans are ruining the environment, other animals, habitats, and the current living conditions and thus need to stop breeding until such time as these recover. Usually these people are simply for fewer children, not absolutely no children.

This is two parts: 1. That SOMEONE does not exist. And 2. “Exist to suffer”.

You are talking about the child as if actual, not potential. You did a much worse job of making this about the parent. The ethically good outcome has to be about the parent, the ethical person acting ethically. Not someone else. Be they “not exist” as a potential child or “exist to suffer” as an actual child. — Fire Ologist

No. Again, it IS from the perspective of the parent. You CAN project onto the future and see hypotheticals. Someone DID NOT SUFFER (that could have). There is no actual "someone", but from the perspective of the parent, this prevention was what was the ethical decision, and being a negative ethic, it is good that it DID NOT occur. And again, the ethic, being a negative ethic, was about NOT allowing the suffering. The asymmetry is when you project to the other way, "Happiness did NOT occur". This is not a violation; it's not obligatory to promote happiness, only prevent the situation where an ACTUAL someone would suffer. The ACTUAL someone did not suffer. Violation did not take place.

As an aside, you can certainly disagree with the formulation and reformulate it. That is fine. The nature of the ethic doesn't change, just the language used for hypothetical scenarios. But oddly enough, however you formulate the language, we actually agree it is from the perspective of the person making the decision.

Don’t really need to reply here. I’m not talking about nature like it’s intentional. It’s causal. Mother Nature is a metaphor for causality, or natural necessity. Like a biological function. Like procreation. Like, in the case of humans, ethics. Ethics came from humans and humans came from natural processes so ethics sits directly in nature in us humans. Antinatalism would be nature’s human ethics that requires by natural necessity humans unnaturally stop procreation, which ends the ethics that sits only in humans which formerly sat in nature. Total mess. — Fire Ologist

Natural necessity? This is all bad faith arguing. You are arguing as if humans cannot deliberate for themselves, or that there are directives from nature that force us to decide a certain way. Calling your argument by another name "causality/natural necessity", doesn't change the incoherent nature of the argument, thus everything imputed on your idea of "Mother Nature" remains for this new term, that also matters not to moral decisions. There is no logos, no natural necessity to fall back on.

Suffering prevention. Is this the highest ethic, the only ethic, a foundational ethic to all that are built on it? Or just another ethic where someone might hold some other ethic higher while keeping suffering prevention close, just not central?

I think you have to say it is up there pretty close to your highest ethic. All other ethics might add some suffering to the world.

Antinatalism sort of is a one size solution fits all human immorality solution. — Fire Ologist

Indeed negative ethics, like not violating rights, or making people suffer unduly, would be pretty high up there, yes. The basis could be several things, but it is based on a deontology of not using people in this case. YOUR positive projects shouldn't be at the behest of SOMEONE ELSE'S negative violation. The right not to be used/rights violated/negative ethics violated is above someone else's notion of what is best to occur in the world.

What a phrase.

And I know you don’t care about this but it means ethics is as meaningless as your suffering, your life, and your precious preventative sentiments. Why be ethical? It’s a different question, but antinatalism does not promote a good sense of meaning and purpose behind being ethical. It rids the world of the life out in place that would do the preventing of procreation. — Fire Ologist

No, I am not sure why this phrase or concept is so puzzling to you. Let's say instead of ethics, it was "Make plastic". Would it make sense that humans need to be around so plastic exists? That makes no sense. Nothing "needs to be around", including ethics. It's a byproduct of what humans face when making decisions. If there is no potential for ethical considerations (like procreation, murder, theft, etc.) to exist, then there are no need for ethics. It's not much more complicated than that.

Who knows? No one can influence what a person gets for themselves out of this life. That’s up to them to get out of it what they can. To the ones who are born to us we can only give them things out of life - it is up to them and their intentions to take these and get things out of life. All we can intend is the same thing we can physically provide - an opportunity. It’s called procreation. — Fire Ologist

Right..so this speaks to exactly my point about the intent versus reality, Veil of Ignorance, and creating projects for someone else. I know you don't see anything wrong here, and that is part of our miscommunication/disagreement. I at least want you to understand where the disagreement is, even if you disagree. I don't know if you see it here with your answers to these questions..

There’s nothing paternalistic by banning all babies? It is an ironic use of the term “paternal” but “thou shalt prevent suffering and never have children.” Just as wide open to derision for “paternalism”. — Fire Ologist

No, that would mean all ethics that say "Don't do X" is paternalistic. That would be absurd as any action that is an "ought" would be this, and we would be abusing language. "Don't murder" is not paternalistic. Rather, unlike the antinatalist ethic, which PREVENTS a paternalistic scenario from happening, procreation WILL cause another person to be affected, to be born for X reason/project. THAT is paternalistic to think another person should be allowed to suffer because you have a notion of X. No one is affected by anything by not procreating/antinatalist argument. So by definition and applying it to the outcome, antinatalism cannot be paternalistic like procreation would indeed be. Also, being that almost no antinatalist philosophies entail being "forced" to not have children, but rather provide an ethical reason not to, there is no problem here either. The person can freely choose what they think is right.

But this is interesting. The antinataliat who doesn’t think a fetus is a person and who supports abortion would have to agree with the following: it is unethical to cause a sperm and an egg to form a fetus because that would be inflicting suffering on another person, but is it ok to kill the fetus after it is formed because a newly conceived fetus isn’t a person.

Doesn’t an antinataliat have to be an anti-abortionist to lay out a consistent treatment of future people we do not want to inflict things upon? — Fire Ologist

I didn't answer because it's a non-sequitur. This isn't a debate about abortion. An antinatalist is not entailed to believe anything regarding abortion, but certainly, one who believes that the fetus (qualified perhaps by a certain time period of gestation), is not a person yet, would think that abortion is permissible.

Wrong. YOU are still talking about the child too. You should be saying something like this: Do you, the potential parent want to be a person who inflicts suffering, do you want to walk around being an unethical person who inflicts suffering, or do you want to be be ethical? Takes the child out of the equation. If it’s not about the child then it is not about preventing suffering “for another”. — Fire Ologist

Don't look now, but you are making my arguments...
Yeah reformulate it to take the child out of the equation. It's about the parent.
However, I am not opposed to talking in "potentials" or "future children". What I AM opposed to is talking AS IF the future child will feel "deprived" of not existing. So I think it's fine to say, "You can prevent future suffering", because it is the NOT SUFFERING that matters. That someone DOES NOT exist to suffer is the ethically good outcome. That someone DOES NOT EXIST TO BE HAPPY matters not one wit..

Almost as hollow as thinking we humans, the sole source of ethics, came to be this way by a natural process that was unethical all along. — Fire Ologist

Again, category error to input ANY ethical thing to nature. Humans are too plastic for this kind of thinking. Did nature intend us to have computers? No, nature intended nothing. Nature has nothing to say on nothing. Once you have degrees of freedom of deliberation, it is up to us to figure shit out and not go bad faith and say, "What did nature want?". As nature a) isn't something that can confer morality and b) nature doesn't tell us about morality. And any use of "appeal to nature" can be to justify anything because we are brutes and we do ethical things as well.. it is up to us to deliberate on what to sus out as the correct view and action. There is nothing to fall back on. Even if we did, it would be your interpretation of it. Or at best using descriptive ethics to justify normative ethics.

Don’t you think there is as long a list of great things that happen to people as your laundry list of dirty laundry? You need the clean clothes first before you can get stuck with the dirty laundry. You need life first, apart from suffering, free from suffering, to later suffer anything. — Fire Ologist

And that is my point, when not under mitigating circumstances, but preventative choices, mitigating circumstances don't matter. If you allow/inflict/not prevent suffering even with the intent on someone enjoying the good, but knowing you are allowing the bad, that doesn't mean that there wasn't a violation. Causing suffering that was not necessary to cause because you have an agenda is the height of paternalism and means-using.

What are you willing to take away from another person in your pursuit of your ethical ideals? Take away parenting? Take away loving your children. Take away pride in how those children endure and learn from suffering and are charitable with their sacrifices? — Fire Ologist

None of these things are ethical. In Kantian terms, they are simply "inclinations" or ends that people might want to pursue. They aren't moral onto themselves like suffering prevention is.

I also don’t want to inflict any more suffering on anyone to make matters worse for them. — Fire Ologist

That's good. But you are in the realm of mitigation now, since "not make worse", not prevention.

But, what is the point of being ethical when being ethical means there will no longer be beings being ethical? — Fire Ologist

Because ethics is around because there are humans around, humans aren't around to keep ethics going, for the nth time. In fact, it would be immoral to keep people around to keep some ethical framework going, as that is exactly the reason it is unethical in the first place- it is discounting the causation of someone else's lifetime of suffering for the promotion of some X ethical project that you conceive of!

It’s all backwards and confused. Like murdering someone for their own good. — Fire Ologist

Actually, quite the opposite. Death comes from being born in the first place. All the sufferings of life, including being murdered come from one's choice to overlook suffering for one's project. And since no one is exists to feel the "deprivation" of good, go back to the spilt milk argument.

Regarding the simple argument, I will ask you a simple question: Is it true that we should not procreate in a world where everyone receives one pinprick of pain followed by 80 years of pure happiness? Yes or no? Presumably some have ambitions of achieving such a world someday. — Leontiskos

And I gave you my answer....

Also, about "someday", I wouldn't make people in the meantime become grist for this goal.

Reasoning, including moral reasoning, is a result of evolutionary adaptation — Leontiskos

This is not fact. Moral reasoning isn't necessarily evolved for from evolutionary reasons, but could be a secondary byproduct of other reasons. I do know that whole fields like evolutionary psychology exist, but it's often contested certain methodologies being it's near impossible to know the original environment conditions of our ancestors, and what particular traits were evolved for versus simply having large brains with a degree of plasticity. For examples, presumably making computers wasn't "evolved for", but perhaps basic numeracy was. It would be bad faith arguing to presume you are going to get from basic structures to complex ones without it being a "just so" story. And spare me any articles, I understand that these theories exist.. Doesn't mean they are hard facts.

Evolutionary adaptation is ordered to survival — Leontiskos

Evolutionary adaptation isn't "ordered" per se, but rather, is a shotgun approach of genetic variation against environmental factors. It prunes away variations not fit for the environment reproduction. The order is simply our way of organizing the "real time" of this happening in nature. The "order" is not like some "logos", just how we humans are understanding the variations that cause change in species fitting into environmental niches.

Therefore, moral reasoning is ordered to survival — Leontiskos

Again, not necessarily the case. Moral reasoning might be even a more modern thing really. It could have been traditional understanding based on tribal traditions. I wouldn't call that reasoning as an appeal to tradition. For example, let us say there is a culture with a history of some heinous act, but the heinous act allowed them to survive. I wouldn't say this is "moral reasoning". There are blood feuds and slavery and honor killings, and all such things that have kept people in line. This doesn't mean it's moral. There may be stuff that helped to survive that is actually immoral.

The argument which says we should cease procreating would lead to extinction
Therefore this argument is unsound; contrary to evolutionary adaptation ordered to survival — Leontiskos

This is the same problem as Fire Ologist. Evolution has nothing to say about morality, and anything we glean from it is from post-facto reasoning, not because it is inbuilt. It is cultural, personal, existential, but not necessarily instinctual. There can arguments that basic empathy and fairness are seen in small children, but this is so general as to not be an actual ethical basis. I can say it is compassionate and fair to not procreate, and it just took being an adult with a certain amount of reasoning abilities to understand this, using my "evolutionary" traits of compassion and fairness.

This argument is a microcosm of the anti-Gnosticism argument, for the Gnostic must reject naturalistic premises akin to (1). For the naturalist, antinatalism is by definition irrational, as it is directly contrary to nature. Your arguments are all dubious, but one of the fundamental reasons they are all dubious is because you are essentially importing knowledge from a different "god," a god that is foreign to our nature, culture, religions, etc. In denying moral naturalism you must necessarily be appealing to some form of supernaturalism. Think of it in terms of the microcosm: if your ethic is directly contrary to evolutionary survival, then it must be coming from something above and beyond evolutionary survival. — Leontiskos

Again, as far as I am willing to entertain Gnosticism, it is as a metaphor that existence has some inherent suffering aspects to it merely by being something with becoming and is not fully being. I can go into it more, but it would be Schopenhauer's idea of boredom being a sort of proof of the negative nature of happiness, as a repose rather than something that actually satiates. It is the treadmill rather than the peace of fully being.. Schopenhauer might say that "higher realm" is some sort of non-willing peacefulness of nirvana. I don't necessarily believe that is possible. @Wayfarer has called this belief "nihilistic" because there is no soteriology whereby one can escape the cycle of suffering.

Let me bring you through a series of questions:
What are you intending a new person born to get out of life? Why must there be someone versus no one that isn't selfish from the start (remember, no person exists prior to you to care)?

Once born, let's say the thing you envision is some sort of happiness conceived of in whatever way (religious, social, personal, hedonistic, virtue, etc.). What if they fail on most of those ways?

If your answer is that "They just have to figure out a better way".. how is this not paternalistically assuming that people "must do" this project that you had for them? It's forcing a set of (de facto) choices that these new people will have to pursue. Once "in the game", there is no way out of having to make these choices, and sometimes they lead to no good outcome for the player. It is then quite gaslighting to blame the player for not following the plan well enough the way you want it, or to say that it didn't work out in their favor, or to say if they "just did this or they would be better". I can't emphasize enough the kind of hubristic paternalism necessary in deciding for another that this project is what needs to be played out be a person that is someone that is not you simply because you have the power to create that person.

Neither does nature care about any ethics at all, be it telling you to have 20 babies or 0. Neither does an unborn baby care what you inflict on it or not. Neither will anything care that there once were these ethical creatures who were so ethical they wouldn’t wantonly inflict their ethicalness on life anymore. — Fire Ologist

So again, for another time, the point is about the act of the parent, not the child. Do YOU (the potential parent) want to prevent suffering for another, if you can? It doesn't matter one wit, whether the child exists to KNOW this. It is about what YOU should do as the already existing person with the agency and means to do so.

Now, the obvious response to this is something like what you are saying here:

I disagree that procreating is an act upon a person - we don’t “inflict” anything when we participate willingly in the natural act of procreation. We aren’t acting for or against any particular human being when we procreate. The particular human being comes afterwards because life is prior to all of this ethical speak and life is prior to the harm of inflicting suffering by anyone or any process. Procreation is a choice to accept new life - not a choice to make nature do nature’s thing. Nature does the procreating - we accept it. We don’t inflict it (even in vitro). — Fire Ologist

But you will "inflict" something to "someone". It again, is a bad faith argument to understand what procreation is (leads to a new person), and then say that "because we don't know the exact person who will be born, that they don't exist yet, that the act has no affect/effect to someone". That is just patently false. Any future situation by definition, doesn't occur yet, that doesn't mean people don't have agency now that would lead to various known outcomes in the future. This is just rhetorically hollow argument, and a poor one that lands flat just on the face of it based on the nature of what procreation entails, what even the concept of "future" entails, and what human agency entails.

But let's have a mind-journey here...
Me: Once born, we know that people will die. Is this acceptable?
Interlocutor: "Yes, death isn't bad in and of itself. It's the price we should pay for life".
Me: Ok, some people think this is a harm, but let's grant that this is acceptable..
Me: Once born, we are exposed to all kinds of illnesses and unfortunate circumstances including but not limited to:

Accidents, addiction, aging, allergies, Alzheimer's disease, anxiety, arthritis, asthma, bankruptcy, bereavement, betrayal, birth defects, blindness, broken bones, bullying, burns, cancer, car accidents, chronic pain, chronic illnesses, cognitive decline, crime victimization, cystic fibrosis, depression, divorce, domestic violence, drowning, eating disorders, economic hardship, environmental disasters, epilepsy, eviction, falls, family conflict, financial instability, food poisoning, fraud, genetic disorders, grief, harassment, heart disease, homelessness, hunger, hurricanes, identity theft, imprisonment, infections, infertility, influenza, insomnia, job loss, kidnapping, loneliness, loss of a loved one, malaria, malnutrition, mental illness, migraines, natural disasters, neglect, neurological disorders, obesity, pandemics, Parkinson's disease, personal injury, pest infestations, physical abuse, poverty, pregnancy complications, PTSD, racial discrimination, respiratory infections, 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premature birth, prostate cancer, psoriasis, psychosis, radiation exposure, radon poisoning, rape, respiratory failure, restless leg syndrome, retaliation, rickets, road rage incidents, roof collapses, salmonella poisoning, sanctions, SARS, scabies, schizophrenia episodes, scoliosis, seasonal affective disorder, seizures, septicemia, severe weather conditions, sexual exploitation, shingles, sinkholes, skin cancer, sleep apnea, sleep deprivation, smoking addiction, social anxiety disorder, soil erosion, speech disorders, spinal cord injuries, stalking incidents, stillbirth, stomach cancer, stress, stroke recovery, sudden infant death syndrome, suicidal ideation, surgical complications, swine flu, tax evasion charges, terrorism threats, thyroid cancer, ticks, tornadoes, toxic relationships, traffic congestion, trafficking in persons, transphobia, traumatic brain injuries, trench foot, tuberculosis, typhoid fever, ulcers, underemployment, unemployment, urban decay, uterine cancer, 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syndrome, midlife crisis, family obligations, cultural expectations, aging infrastructure, housing shortages, inaccessible healthcare, poor work-life balance, stigma of illness, fear of aging, generational conflict, substance dependencies, cyberstalking, deforestation, plastic pollution, extreme weather, droughts, heatwaves, rising sea levels, ocean acidification, social media harassment, self-esteem issues, fear of failure, infertility treatments, invasive medical procedures, chronic stress, overpopulation, resource wars, political instability, societal unrest, ideological conflicts, legal battles, copyright infringement, loss of reputation, deteriorating mental health, peer pressure, unfulfilled potential, financial scams, ergonomic injuries, urban sprawl, toxic friendships, loss of tradition, dealing with dementia in family members, balancing career and family, navigating personal identity, confronting mortality, technological obsolescence, scarcity of natural resources, global economic shifts, cultural misappropriation, fear of public places, imposter syndrome, financial market crashes, fear of flying, language extinction, misinformation, corporate espionage, loss of biodiversity, noise pollution, space junk, invasive species, soil depletion, and burnout.

Now, you may say that this is contingent and we don't know what people will really endure. And I would say, that i correct, and why I would call them "contingent/circumstantial harms". And thus, the beginning of this particular argument was showing that the Veil of Ignorance applies here, because (contra other posters here like TClark), we do not have even imperfect knowledge of what types and degrees of harms people will endure once born.

Then you will tell me, "No we do know to some degree the amount of harms, based on what we've experienced". But then, I would say the crux of the issue regarding dignity pops up. That is to say, what are you willing to allow another person to be exposed to in your pursuit of X? In this case, it looks like your X is an impersonal idea of "Life" or "Mother Nature". None of these things are entities that deserve the category of ethical consideration. The only people that matter are the people that might be born who will be affected. Those are the loci of actual pain and suffering.

Then you can tell me that the "goods" outweigh the pain.. That "Mother Nature" and "Life" deserves such-and-such. Besides being an impersonal concept, and thus a category error for ethical consideration that deserves absolutely nothing, being "deserves" doesn't even apply to such impersonal concepts.. We have to understand what it is about suffering that makes it weighted as more important to prevent than promoting-good/happiness. This goes to the notion of aggressive paternalism.

Just as you say here:

Don’t have children if you think life is so terrible that no one should be forced to exist.

Look down on people who do have children for their breaches of your ethics if you want. — Fire Ologist

Acknowledging that people have a right to their own estimation of things...
It is not just/fair to estimate for others, a whole lifetime of what various harms and suffering is acceptable. In fact, not considering suffering when they are not in a scenario where they need help (already exist), is purely using someone, because precisely because that person doesn't exist yet, any move to create that person, would always be one whereby one is inflicting that suffering upon them when it did not need to be inflicted so. Thus it is always the case that this is using someone as a means.

Adding Benatar's asymmetry (reformulated and tweaked a bit), this is no debate.
Preventing procreation prevents suffering and happiness. Preventing suffering is the obligation, preventing happiness matters not. And no "thing" will cry over spilt milk, not Mother Nature, not Life.

It is aggressively paternalistic to assume that your unhappiness for other people not experiencing X positive value, is the reason why people should thus suffer. And as I explained, certainly, Mother Nature and Life, abstract and reified ideas, have no say in the matter.

I might not only have to be an antinatalist, I might have to be an anti-hydrationist, because giving a thirsty person a glass of water, is like giving birth to a new person. — Fire Ologist

You still haven’t paid attention to preventative vs mitigative. One you’re already existing and now mitigation measures are appropriate. The other, you prevent the harm in the first place, as putting them in a situation in the first place which must be mitigated, is the ethical consideration in question. Hence, unique in moral choices.

Bottom line to me, in a raw, physicalist sense, life is prior to suffering, and life is more than this conversation about suffering and what to do about it. Procreating, consuming, growing, secreting, growing some more, always dying as newness is always born in each living moment - these are the experiences of living, not just suffering. And now life is thinking and writing or reading, not only suffering. Antinatalism isn’t just a tidy little syllogism categorized as ethics. It’s an act in the world, and an against life, which is procreative. Against suffering on paper, but inflicted upon all human life in action. — Fire Ologist

In existential terms this is bad faith. You are assuming the role of arbiter of life. Rather this is simply something you chose to take on, it is not some robotic imperative. We are deliberative and can choose non life by choice, so prima facie, this appeal to the species or life is a false narrative.

Mother Nature made use of suffering to fashion we species of ethical monkeys, only so that we could end the infliction of Her suffering on us and call it “good ethics.” Seems potentially delusional to have out smarted Mother Nature and her sufffering ways called “life.” With our “ethics” no less. — Fire Ologist

But ethical monkeys like us have ideas of antinatalism and choosing no suffering for others. You are anthropomorphizing nature. Nature doesn’t care whether the species dies or you or I fell off a cliff.

There are clearly not. There are potential victims. This is why the analogy holds, for the most part. And taking this straight to your conclusion of "no playgrounds", yes, that's right, but antinatalists don't confuse the issue:
No humans. Not not playgrounds. Let the people who exist use hte playground, for reasons your point out that would make the "no playgrounds" conclusion stupid as heck. That said, it seems fairly clear that's not hte intention. THe intention is to leave the playground (world)as is, and remove the potential sufferer as it is (on this account) an unavoidable consequence of being one. We're not trying to get rid of oceans to avoid drownings - we're trying to stop people swimming where drowning is a clearly likely consequence (very shaky analogy, but there you go - can refine later if needed). — AmadeusD

Yep :up:

I think antinatalism is inherently bound up with Gnosticism. This is because it opposes the natural order, and to oppose the natural order requires appealing to some vantage point outside of the natural order. “You shouldn't procreate because the world is evil, addled by suffering.” But how do we know that the world or nature is evil? Surely nature did not tell us such a thing, nor cognitive faculties formed by nature. So then how would we know that it is evil? As the Gnostic says, it must be knowledge received from some god who is opposed to the god of this world (and the nature of the world it created). So again, antinatalism is theological in the sense that it presupposes nature-transcending knowledge. — Leontiskos

Antinatalism need not be synonymous with philosophical pessimism, though the two concepts are often related. Antinatalism only requires certain logical principles to be true. If we believe in a negative ethics where it's best not to cause suffering, harm, or use others, it is imperative not to overlook the consequences of procreation, even if motivated by a positive ethical cause, like promoting happiness.

Everything follows from this principle. There are no non-existent people who benefit from being born; rather, it is about preventing the suffering, harm, and violation of existing people, if they are born.

Gnostic-like elements can be used to justify why suffering is as bad or worse than people initially think. While these more theoretical notions of suffering can be indulged, antinatalism does not hinge on them. If we do take these aspects seriously, there is an argument, that it appears that once born, we are trapped in a cycle of unfulfilled desires with little chance for genuine repose. We can only mitigate this through psychological and physical means, such as fulfilling needs and wants or using mental exercises to manage angst, but this will never satiate, as Schopenhauer noted in detail.

Beyond the inherent suffering of existence, life imposes contingent suffering based on situations and circumstances beyond one's control. These include diseases, natural disasters, social injustices, and personal losses. The world subjects individuals to random and often severe hardships, from debilitating illnesses to the trauma of losing loved ones, and the cruelty of societal inequalities. Even small daily annoyances—everything from traffic jams, minor illnesses, interpersonal conflicts—accumulate over time, adding to white noise baseline of human suffering. By choosing to procreate, we are subjecting new individuals to these unpredictable and uncontrollable harms. This contingent suffering exacerbates the moral issue of procreation, as it means bringing someone into a world where their well-being can be drastically compromised by forces they cannot influence or evade.

While there are inherent goods in life, claiming that these justify causing harm oversteps a deontological point. The inherent goods can be summarized as follows:

-Physical pleasure: The simple joys of sensory experiences.
-Human or animal connections: Friendships, romance, group activities, bonding, nurturing, etc.
-Flow states: Getting "caught up" in something challenging and engaging.
-Aesthetic pleasures: Enjoying art, humor, nature, music, literature, etc.
-Learning: Gaining new concepts or skills, engaging in hobbies.
-Achievement: Accomplishing goals and feeling a sense of accomplishment.

These goods add value to life. But to assert that these goods justify the creation of life, with its inevitable suffering and harm, oversteps a fundamental deontological principle. This principle maintains that we should not unnecessarily cause harm for people (i.e don’t create circumstances of harm for someone that did not need existing harm reduced with a lesser harm)- this is regardless of potential positive outcomes. Procreation involves deciding that potential pleasure and meaning for new beings outweigh the certain suffering they will encounter, which is a significant and hubristic ethical assumption.

Humans are unique in their self-reflection. Unlike other animals that live in the moment, generally absent existential or moral considerations, humans do and can make self-consciously deliberate choices. Other animals exist within the simplicity of their instincts, unburdened by the weight of self-awareness. In contrast, humans have been metaphorically kicked out of paradise because we possess the knowledge of good and evil, the capacity for existential contemplation.

Choosing to bring someone into existence means deciding that they should live out the challenges and issues we deem meaningful. This is a profound choice, not a natural inevitability. People seek pleasure and meaning in various ways, but deciding for others what is meaningful or subjecting them to a lifetime of issues is something that is paternalistically assumed to be imposed for another.

You claim that the antinatalist is secretly religious, but even the most atheistic person promoting having kids is really the pseudo-religious because they see life as something necessary for someone to live out. Indeed the project of life becomes more important than the harms that that person would experience. It is this overlooking of suffering for the project of life that I am concerned with. It is this idea that is the crux of the dignity violation. It’s no “mere” here, it’s full stop.

Hmm, seems to be suspicious. Interestingly, here’s a recent article about water shortage in Mexico and US-Mexican border. Doesn’t look good.

https://www.cnn.com/2024/06/17/climate/water-conflict-us-mexico-heat-drought/index.html

People who are trying very hard to earn enough money for food, clothing, shelter, maybe school for their children, and so on, likely do not have a lot of energy left over at the end of the day, Being poor in a poor country is exhausting. Organizing for clean water, good schools, better control of the sewage in the street, better wages (or wages at all), and so on takes more energy than the people have left at the end of the day.

Clean water is something a good government can, should, ought, and must supply to its citizens with the least resources. Alas, many governments are pretty bad. The point is, heavy infrastructure takes top-down effort. — BC

Agreed. But I wonder if much of the billions of dollars goes into Coca-Cola for their bottled water and services related to that, rather than maintain an adequate public water supply..

No doubt there are places in the US even that have questionable water.. smelly water in California perhaps, or hazardous water in Flint, or brown water in Mississippi, but usually not large amounts of contaminants in widespread areas. I believe it to be more the old pipes that need to be redone. Also, there seems to be more limestone and sandstone which provides less initial groundwater filtration before it gets to the pipes. Mix that together with poor drainage and sewage, it will all make for bad water. Of course, there are probably municipalities that have better supplies than others, maybe more pristine than some US areas, but that is not the norm I believe. Also, it is precisely because water is so decentralized that many things probably don't get done outside the people running the poor districts. It seems to be something though that you would think would be a good target for unifying a national policy. "Aqua Potable Para Todos!" or "Viva Aqua Potable!".

Thank you. This is the kind of response I was looking for. It looks like you are pretty familiar with the issues surrounding water. Do you know the reasons why politicians don’t even bring it up as a goal, even if it’s not 100% possible to provide clean water in all of Mexico? Why wouldn’t it be like something akin to a space race or something with lofty goals that maybe would take many years? It would also create jobs, I would imagine. Why would clean water not be a part of any comprehensive national infrastructure plan?

Apparently, the problems aren't bad enough yet for enough of the people or the elites. And there are more seemingly immediate and pressing problems impacting large, mostly urban populations like crime, housing, unemployment, healthcare, etc than water scarcity & potability at the moment. Short-term reacting tends to be prioritized over near & long-term planning under the prevailing conditions of resource & fiscal scarcity especially, though not exclusively, in developing (non-G7) countries like Mexico. We're smug or negligent, chattering primates who amuse ourselves watching the proverbial frog slowly boil and still bet heavily (despite the data-trends) on "thoughts & prayers" to work that old magic. :sparkle:

Just my 2 pesos, señor.. — 180 Proof

Indeed. And I'm not going to say I know whether big infrastructure projects help or hurt the economy in developing countries, but I would imagine some of the problems you mention can be partially resolved (at least as the building projects happen) in building an improved national infrastructure for a water system with less bacteria, parasites, and amoebas that would be harmful to the population. Of course, all of this relies on large revenues and spending. There may be a case for some Keynsian demand-side deficit spending though. But again, wouldn't know the political economics of such large projects. I think of something like the National Interstate and Defense Highways Act of 1956 in the US or Trans-European Transport Networks (TEN-T) in Europe, or Chinese and Japanese bullet train rails, etc. But this large project would have more at stake and more important, because water is a basis for survival. Transportation is important, but not as important.