But this is the naturalistic fallacy. Isnis not an ought. Unless you think we individual human organisms are morally bound to carry out nature's program. Is it really feeling good that's going on, or just a default for living? This question is one step abstracted from the daily will to live that we clearly feel. It is rather, what is it about this will to live that needs to be carried out.

That's the conceptual way you look at it now. You're talking adult-learned concepts. But that isn't what life was when you were younger. You know that. — Michael Ossipoff

Sure it was. It was preparing for maintenance. It was enculturation, cultural preparation.

I won't pretend to like that. But I don't have your attitude about it, because I realize that, for whatever reason, this sequence of involvement started, and, for some other reason, I drew a bad world this time. What can I do? Just make the best of it, while I'm in this one. Rejecting it won't accomplish anything, no matter what my opinion of the people I have to share this world with Just get through it, making the best of it.

That last clause, the emphasis on making the best of it, is the difference between our attitudes. The life-rejection attitude just wouldn't do any good, and would make things worse. — Michael Ossipoff

I just don't believe the narratives given about the mattering, mentioned earlier. We are trapped in a mattering cycle I guess. To know that is at least part of the key here. To flinch and give into the mattering stories as something that is necessary, desirable etc, is to miss the point that it is forced work that we integrate as wanted work. You mentioned children- it starts young and continues until you just get into a mattering pattern. Is it philosophical to not question this pattern? The final hurdle is the adulthood mindset- acceptance that the patterns of maintenance are what "matters". I don't think so. Just because it is in the realm of the pessimistic, does not mean that the worth of this questioning is suspect. Quite the opposite- it can be the enema of the mind necessary to clear and restore existential perspective.

One lives for the sake of their self understanding. And one of the things one does for the sake of their self-understanding/mattering is work. In this sense even alienated work is extremely meaningful. — bloodninja

But isn't this just de facto what we do, because the counterfactual of suicide is repugnant? Just because suicide is usually culturally/biologically not an option for most, doesn't mean that the opposite (having things matter) is good. It is what we do yes, but why is mattering something good in itself other than its the default state of a human mindset?

Repeating that it is or asking me why it is not, does not help me much to understand what the problem is and if you don't care to explain yourself, then I don't need to try to make any sense of what you're saying and which appears to me as absurd. — Πετροκότσυφας

Let me ask it this way, why do you think it is permissible or right or a good idea to create a new being that must maintain its survival and regulate its comfort and boredom?

But there doesn't need to be a need to have children for antinatalism to be false, so your question is irrelevant to me and most people here. — Thorongil

Use your imagination. You can contemplate before-birth imaginatively, and death imaginatively. To simply ask why the in between matters as that is going on with you right now. It is deep down, a religious sentiment, or at least an axiological one.

Life can involve a lot of necessary chores. But that just says something about those particular forms of activity. The fact that "work" and "repetition" can also be highlights of our existence means your basic thesis is flawed. The problem isn't with existence in general, it is with particular situations that we might feasibly improve upon. — apokrisis

Life is not necessary, but it does indeed involve a lot of necessary chores. What is with this need for people to improve on things? Why expend energy in the first place, let alone needing to improve on the kind of energy output? Why excite the electron to the next level when you can just keep it at its lowest state :p. All this enthalpy.. running around, over and over. Is it good, or is it just what we know? Non-existence is tricky. People think of stifling darkness, disassociation, suffocation, etc. Of course the repetitive acts of survival, regulating comfort, and boredom seem "ok", it's all there is, in this animal's purview of what is metaphysically even fathomable.

So, you need to to give an argument as to why you think it's not right. — Πετροκότσυφας

Do I? I guess I believe giving people work to do is not right. Giving someone a constant chore of maintenance is not a gift. To put a new person in a constant need for upkeep and stimulation where there was no need before, is no good. Why must an all new situation of expending energy need to take place? Let sleeping dogs lie.

There is a danger in believing that the profound and anomalous nature of the question in itself entails antinatalism's truth, as though such a question couldn't possibly admit of the answer the vulgar masses would give to it. — Thorongil

Yeah, I haven't given any robust arguments before... I prefer mine a bit pithier these days. I'm all ears if someone wants to expand though. As I've said, there is potential birth and death. Why does the stuff in the middle need to take place?

To the extent that social relations are ties that bind, it is because receiving without giving, whether in an economic or friendship context, is not a relationship at all, but an ossification. — Joshs

I don't really get what you're saying. If I was to interpret, you are saying people don't have to work, but they should. I guess the presumption is why should anyone be born at all to work? Why is someone existing to work better than not existing and no work?

Admittedly, the getting-by task can be a pain. But it isn't everything. Also, many people can find a job that they don't hate, or even one that they like. — Michael Ossipoff

I don't see how the repetitious maintaining of whatever systems, objects, processes, needs to happen. Novelty schmoevelty.. it's all the same- MAINTENANCE. Why provide a person to put forth the energy of maintaining their survival, finding entertainment, etc. It just doesn't seem like a good thing to for someone else. It's not about the outcome in this case, simply the question. I don't care if people literally don't have any more kids as much as asking the question of why having more people should take place in the first place. This is where you fundamentally miss me. Same with @Thorongil but we have been over the idea before of not the outcome but the question being important as the philosophical crux of the issue.

I'm still missing the point, I'm afraid. We do stuff. Where's the problem? What's the argument? — Πετροκότσυφας

So why give people "stuff" to do. The "stuff" isn't so innocuous. Essentially a new person is created that must put forth the energy of maintaining their life. I don't see the point in doing this for someone, and in fact don't think it's even right to do for someone. There is the possibility of birth (every sperm/egg combination perhaps?), and death. What's with that "stuff" in between? Why does a person have to do this stuff?

We are aware of the instrumental nature of surviving but for no reason. Putting in more energy, stress, all to maintain a human body and mind in order to pursue some happiness principle or some justification we give.

Life needn’t, and shouldn’t, be primarily instrumental. Sure, we plan for the future and do things for the future, but plainly the present, not the future, is what life really is. Not everyone lives in or for the future. As stated above, that’s a reliable formula for unhappiness. — Michael Ossipoff

Instrumentality isn't necessarily about living for the future. It is simply the repetitious nature of surviving and keeping our mind's entertained between birth and death. Putting in energy to maintain survival, comfort, entertainment, this day, then the next, then the next, then the next.

I mean do you really care possible future sufferings experienced by others you will never meet or know about? Do you weep now for all the suffering that will be experienced in the future? Are you really that compassionate? — antinatalautist

It's more about posing the question than the result.

It's still not clear to me what is being argued or what is the problem here. Can you be more specific? — Πετροκότσυφας

You get up, you do stuff to keep yourself alive, make sure your environs is more comfortable, find stuff to entertain yourself. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. To link it to work- you must put in energy to keep yourself going. Why is this a good thing? You are born, you put in the energy to keep all these functions going and to entertain yourself. You die. Between the born and die, why is it important for more people to put energy in to keep functions going?

If we're still wrapped up in life, then next will it be that peaceful quiet rest, or will it remain life, because we're still slugging it out with, and stuck to, the gummy-bear?

Shakespeare said, "...to sleep, perchance to dream." Maybe it's the eventful, emotional dream, instead of the quiet, peaceful deep sleep, for people who haven't yet resolved the dream. — Michael Ossipoff

Interesting points. To sleep that peaceful deep sleep is something that is not an option, though the hope is there in Eastern thought. Yes, the gummy-bear is a good analogy. Survival, boredom, and regulating comfort leads to so much more and more and more, and on and on and on, the "instrumental" nature of things. Work begets more work, energy needed begets more energy needed. We cannot help it, there is no other option once born.

Speaking for myself, I think a next life would make perfect sense. Sure, It would be a bit scary, both from my point of view now, and from how it would seem then. But, if there's a sequence of lives, then the good and bad would at least average-out, right? — Michael Ossipoff

No, this would be a grotesque horror show when seen from an objective viewpoint. Not only instrumental for 80+ years, but for eternity. Ugh.

...and what do you expect, and what would you prefer, after this life? Quiet sleep? But do you feel calm, quiet, completed, resolved and restful enough for that to be likely? — Michael Ossipoff

Well, here is the crux of antinatalist dilemma. People rather have eternities of experience in all its forms than some sort of non-existent sleep. However, in the meantime, more people are born that need to expend energy to maintain their comfort, deal with their own personal burdens, entertain their minds, and survive.

Is this an empirical claim? If so, what's the claim exactly? Also, why call that "instrumentality" and not, I don't know, "life's a bitch and then you die"? What does instrumentality have to do with all this? — Πετροκότσυφας

The meaning is related to the term. Instrumental in the fact that there is no finality. Survival, regulating comfort, and entertainments are simply inputs that need to be constantly maintained, over and over and over.

You might as well just say "socialism doesn't work". Well, clearly nothing is going to "cure" us of life but capitalism is making things abhorrent. A person who gets sick in a socialistic system worries about their health and their relationships and projects. A person who gets sick in a capitalistic system, in comparison, ends up also worrying about their debt. It's grotesque how people fear disease, for instance, not simply because it's a disease but because it will induce an economic crisis. And when it comes down to it, when a person gets seriously sick, they care far more about these things than anything like "instrumentality", because their life is on the line and they don't want to die. Nobody really wants to die. They just want to stop suffering. — darthbarracuda

This makes sense to an extent. I still say it was better never to be put into the position of a system, of course, but if put in this position, certainly, I agree, it is grotesque how there are opportunities to cure/help/alleviate harm for people, yet they are denied full access to this due to economic circumstances.

Didn't really answer my question.. It's also not just a matter of "work" in the formal sense of going to work, but all the things necessary to maintain- the hut needs patching, the electrical circuit needs rewiring, the roof needs fixing, etc. So it can include anything where more energy is needed to keep oneself surviving and comfortable.

This is utterly false. You cannot force anything upon someone who doesn't yet exist. — Agustino

I'm not saying that. I'm saying, once the kid is born, they have been forced. The main word being "once". But, beyond this debate of non-identity, the bigger question you brought up, is that work itself is good in and of itself. What is your justification for this?

I'm not putting a gun to their head to work. So I'm not forcing them to do anything. I cannot force someone who doesn't yet exist. — Agustino

By having the child, it is well-known that the child will eventually have to find a way to survive. Having the child, means knowing that the child will have to work to survive. Thus, having a child is forcing the child to eventually have to work to survive. If we look at the fact that humans are animals, and animals that have the same instinct to survive as other animals, not working and starving/dying of exposure seems to not be an option for most.

Boring.

Simply because there are distinctions between forcing someone and not forcing someone. If I don't put a gun to their head, or take a whip and threaten to whip them if they don't work, then I'm not forcing them. — Agustino

I don't think so. It's pretty basic that by having a child, that child is going to have to find a way to maintain its survival in a social setting- aka work. It is not like it is so far removed- it is very much wrapped into what it means for the child to live its life out.

I didn't say making others work, I said work itself is good. Forcing someone to work (like the Nazis did in concentration camps) is not good. — Agustino

By having people, how is that not forcing them to work de facto? I mean sure, they can always go against their instincts to live, especially when enculturated for a lifetime in a social setting, but that's not going to happen for the majority except the practically non-existent suicidal hermit-ascetic.

Work is good, thus antinatalism is bad since it prevents a good. — Agustino

How is making others work good in and of itself other than appeal to some arbitrary divine command theory? It's only good in a hypothetical imperative.

Except where we volunteer our labor because we value the cause, and a scattering of paid jobs which happen to be human, we do not know what unalienated work feels like. But, most of us have had at least a taste of good work, and it tastes good. — Bitter Crank

I'm not sure causing other people to be born to have goals to fulfill is really good, especially in the light of the fact of contingent harms that will take place.

Sometimes living is just fun. — T Clark

But many times not.

This is pretty pitiful. Sorry, I don't mean to be disrespectful, but his is so hideously self-indulgent. Intellectually dishonest. — T Clark

Not really.

Creating work for people is much different than making people work. In an ideal socialistic => anarchistic society, work is not "negative", at least not any more negative than anything else. It's not something you're "enslaved" to. You work and enjoy the work, instead of being completely exhausted by it. — darthbarracuda

I just don't see it. Work for what? Sustaining oneself, to work, to sustain, to work, to sustain. We are tragically too self-aware for this scheme- anarchic, communist, mixed economy, capitalist, what have you.

What is the most common sexually-transmitted disease?

Birth. — Michael Ossipoff

Correct

You work for someone else's needs, someone else works for your needs. That's how life works, from bacteria up to Schopenhauer. — Bitter Crank

Yet we measly humans can choose to not perpetuate it, that is where the difference is between bacteria and the rest.

People would like working for each other's needs more if we could get rid of the invisible hand in the iron glove concealed in an economics textbook. — Bitter Crank

How so?

As for your solution, it's a "one solution to all problems" solution, no matter what the problem is. "Let's all just die out and then every problem will be resolved by our absence. Except, of course, the problem that this creates for those who rather liked being alive -- despite all the deplorably dangerous disasters to which we are positively prone. Nobody thinks it's a perfect world, but a lot of people like it, and your "reprehensible reproduction rigamarole" just isn't appealing to most people. — Bitter Crank

What is it they like so much? All this energy leading to disappointment, suffering harm.. All for a bit of pleasure. What a short-sighted vision this happiness principle is.

Never

Interesting post, and seems to provide some good evidence of the unhappiness of romantic love. In tribal societies, perhaps this area is a bit less complicated, but we have made it an overwrought and over-complicated subject in the "modern" world of the individualized marketplace.

If I use Schopenhauer's psychological mechanisms as a model- we are basically driven by the pendulum swing of survival (via cultural institutions), comfort-seeking (we need to do various things to improve our comfort), and boredom (we need to occupy our minds). Loneliness is essentially one degree away from boredom. It is a boredom that happens from not having company or friends or an intimate partner. Thus we fill this need by seeking out partners to connect with physically and on an emotional level. It is just part of the human animal, and like I said.. is a special case of fleeing boredom and is only relevant to social creatures such as the human being.

The problem is, where people at one time were able to fill this loneliness aversion in very close quarters (in tribal societies), where they had limited options that were none-the-less suitable to the culture, that is not the case anymore in modern societies. These societies also had tried and true traditions for courtship. However, the modern world is driven by an overabundance of options. The more atomized the individual is in their "unique" personality, their "unique" interests, their "unique" desires, fewer and fewer people will fit the mold of the ideal lover. Intimate relations quickly become just a lifestyle choice. The new behavior pattern and cognitive outlook is to be emotionally detached. Shallow connections become the norm. In the modern world, the people most emotionally detached will have a leg-up. True connections will become rarer and rarer as people will become self-absorbed. One has to open up to the other, and in a culture where options are plentiful, yet shallow, this will not happen often as no one is good enough for anyone's "unique" personality, interests, and needs. There are less clear courtship rituals, more murky, leading to probably stuff that has been discussed in this thread. People don't know what they want in terms of emotional/physical connection. People don't know how to channel their need for intimate relations. Social relations become awkward and strained rather than natural and easy. Lifestyle trumps loneliness and the most emotionally detached, and with the least desire for connection wins this game. Romantic visions of fate, kismet, "it will just happen", and similar slogans are thrown out there, as agency in this department becomes less clear. They push it on to forces out of their control. But these slogans just continue the murkiness and detachment.

All social relations related to friendship or romantic partners are about bargaining for loneliness. Humans are more-or-less social creatures, but with varying degrees and tendencies. The ones able to be by themselves for longer periods of time are the most valuable. They generally have the most power as the more "needier" party is always lacking, while the alone party only needs him/herself. The power dynamic is actually about which person feels the need to be around other people more. But, this kind of folk philosophizing is where the real stuff happens.

Just trying to bring some Friday cheer to the conversation! ;) No good?

Perhaps all dating, sexual encounters, and intimate male/female relations in general are victimizing women in unfair power dynamics. Well, if it hastens antinatalism- so be it. Less dating, less sex, less people are born, less suffering in the world.

Everyone can move to their respective lonely corners, reflect on the absurdity of the 80+ possible years of their human life, maintaining themselves, occupying their minds with whatever entertainments, bearing the burdens of whatever harms, and generally being pricks to each other in the process of having to live in a society. Cheers!

Cheer up Schop. Take the long view. Either humanity will work out what it is about or your wish will be granted. You can wait 50 years surely? — apokrisis

So you're saying through our destructive use of natural resources we will die out. Why would we just not intentionally choose to not add more absurd instrumentality- growth, maintenance, death?

Yes and that the more important questions we should be asking is why we put more people into the world in the first place. What to grow, maintain, and die? At least ecologies and biomes can't control the absurd nature of continuing to continue. Humans can.

@StreetlightX

Ecologies don't need a telos. That they exist, flourish and work as a system is a well known fact. Humans though have the ability to justify why they put more people into the world, why they need more people to grow, maintain themselves, and die.

Humans are autonomous because they have evolved to be autonomous. Autonomy wasn't invented a couple of decades ago. Children need years of nurture, but nature has set the table. It is the nature of our species to employ culture to perpetuate ourselves. Language, story telling, writing, drama, music, fiction, factual material -- all sorts of narratives are composed to perpetuate ANY culture. — Bitter Crank

Agreed, but that's my point. ALL humans from EVERY culture are here to perpetuate the culture, and are not here for themselves. That is an impossibility since we are too imbued with the systems of culture/institutions that provide survival and entertainment for it to be otherwise. Why do humans have to born, if what we are doing is not for X, Y, Z for Johnny the individual, but really to keep X, Y, Z for the cultural institutions going.

Procreation happens because nature is running that particular show. People do not breed to make political statements (well, almost never), but people do avoid breeding to make political statements. One has to go way out of one's way to avoid procreation; if one isn't paying attention, reproduction will happen. Nature makes sure it does. — Bitter Crank

That is the radical notion going on here though, that even though procreation is not thought of as political it is one of the most political of actions. By procreating you are assenting that you want to see something participate in (and therefore strengthen and perpetuate) the current institutions. It's a very conservative political statement actually in the true sense of preserving traditions by having new people thrown into the world to navigate and perpetuate them. The good worker, the good consumer, the good family man, the good innovator, the good thinker, the good entertainment-seeker, etc. etc. it's all part of perpetuating the institution. All the hopes put on the newborn is really hopes for tribal flourishing. However, Bitter Crank, as you know, the mere descriptive is not where my conclusion stops. The main point is that individual lives are used at the behest of institutions. We are thrown into the world with the burden of navigating the institutions for survival and entertainment, and every waking day must put forth the energy to keep our bodily systems going and minds occupied by putting forth energy by interacting in all sorts of (often stressful) ways with institutions. Then comes the notion of instrumentality. Why do more people need to keep doing this? It is circular reasoning. Because parents or society in general likes to watch new people navigate the course of life seems to be the stock answer that I am trying to get at with this "perpetuating institutions" argument. This is a political statement that the institutions are "good" and people need to "experience" them and continue them.

Even if it if sounds far too simple and obvious, the reason for these institutions to exist is that societies so complex and interdependent as we have now can function. Institutions, those "stable recurring patterns of behaviour" are simply demanded in a highly complex society where basically all people are dependant on actions of others. People living in huge megacities totally dependent on a globalized market literally need a highly complex logistical system that could not exist without a multitude of various institutions that people would follow.

The more specialized our society comes, the more it needs various kinds of institutions: economic markets, nation states, international organizations and so on. Thus there are various kinds of institutions that we have to teach people. We have more roles as individuals that let's say some hunter-gatherers of some small tribe earlier. Everybody here has is a member of various organizations, likely has a profession and are citizens of some country. — ssu

But my point was that it doesn't matter how complex the society is, institutions are there even in tribal societies. The point was the opposite rather, that across cultures, society wants to perpetuate its institutions at the behest of the individual by procreating more people which will carry forth the institutions of the culture. This can be in more complex societies, or tribal societies. The function works the same way. It's just that in "modern" societies, the appearance of individuals doing things for themselves and not for their institutions seems to hide this fact, but it is really the same.

I think too much emphasis is put on institutions as being a way to control the individual... as somehow without them (the institutions) being forced upon us, we as individuals would be better off (and hence these institutions shouldn't be forced upon the individual). Much less is given thought to the sheer rational of institutions as ways to create social cohesion, ways for our large societies to operate smoothly. — ssu

You also got this misinterpreted. I DON'T think we can survive without institutions. The point was that individuals are here to perpetuate the institutions. At the least, we are here in order to navigate through the mazes of the existing set-up (but for no reason except to watch someone go through this). At the least it is absurd. Why do people have to be born to navigate the institutions?

Hence It's not in any way surprising that one of the biggest institution that Schopenhauer1 states to be the "cultural practice of personal development" that "gets people to more fully embrace the institutions which need perpetuating" would be in my view the educational system as a whole, that now spans from kindergarten to the university. — ssu

Not necessarily schooling, no. That could be part of it. What I mean by personal development, is how we egoistically try to pursue our own self-interest and by thinking that we are doing things for ourselves, really we are participating more full-heartedly in the institutions (markets, school, consumption, production, jobs, investments, government, family, etc. etc.). In other words, you thinking you're doing stuff for yourself, is actually strengthening the institutions so, the perpetuation of the institutions is a bit more hidden than say a tribal society where the individual directly knows they are perpetuating tribal cultural/institutional norms and practices.

Hence Western individualism, consumerism, democracy, justice-state, human rights and so on are not seen as part of Western culture, but of something universal condition that has come as irreversible force upon human kind. Of course when look at the discourse in non-Western societies about just what is "Western", it tells a different viewpoint from ours. But we don't care about that. — ssu

Although you may have a point here, you are getting tripped up on the word "Western". If you'd like, think of the word "modern" or "post-modern". I don't care. The point is that in our "modern" globalized system now, that started in the 1400s in Europe, and continued increasingly with the industrial revolution, etc. these institutions have become more and more atomized so that individuals think that by pursuing their own self-interest they really aren't just throwing more individuals into the behest of institutions, However, that is not the case. By having more children, the parent is trying to say that the child needs to participate in institutions and carry them forward (work, production, consumption, government, etc. etc.). Thus the final idea is that individuals are not born for themselves. That is an impossibility. They are here to keep institutions going.