What if I told you it bothers me?

Maybe this is a slam poetry contest in disguise.

Off topic, but why the hell do you always have several lines worth of space before you begin your comment? Is that part of the wisdom of pomo or something? It's bizarre.

The reality of the transcendent doesn't only include God, it would obviously include other spiritual forces - angels, demons, etc. — Agustino

I see. I should've known. This little trick was used by the Church Fathers. It's rather irritating in its unfalsifiability, but I guess I must grant it.

Ah, shoot. I read a "not" that wasn't there. To be honest, I was expecting you to answer that Mithras does not exist. That you think he does is even more bizarre. Explain yourself.

the spiritual reality signified by Mithras' name does exist. — Agustino

Okay.

Yes — Agustino

Then you mean "no." :-|

So why is your God real but Mithras not? If you answer that you have in some way experienced God, then what distinguishes your experience from the Roman soldiers' experience of Mithras, such that your experience is true and theirs false?

And, at birth, and maybe before it too, you might have felt an opinion about not wanting this unexplained state of affairs, about which you obviously, at any time during those times, had no choice. — Michael Ossipoff

This is false. A fetus, by definition, attempts to live and grow unless impeded from doing so by external factors.

why infants cry at birth — Michael Ossipoff

The crying is concomitant with trying to breathe air for the first time and is used to predict the health of the baby.

Wouldn't that attract predators, and therefore be maladaptive and therefore selected against? — Michael Ossipoff

Early humans were not stupid and so wouldn't give birth next to lion dens. They traveled in protected groups.

Mithras is a name. Does it matter whether you call it Mithras or Cthulhu? — Agustino

"It?" Does the being signified by the name Mithras exist?

But couldn't you have that perception at the beginning of your life?

"I don't want to be here. How did this happen?"

As a newborn, aren't you forced? — Michael Ossipoff

You exist at the moment of conception. You're apparently trying to say that you don't exist until you're born, which is absurd.

What does being real mean? Being real doesn't have only one understanding. Clearly the transcendent is not real in the same sense an immanent object is - for one the transcendent cannot be object. Numbers are also real in a different sense than chairs are, etc. — Agustino

Does Mithras exist or is he a figment of Roman soldiers' imaginations?

This thread seems pretentious.

It doesn't matter, because tautologies are no less true by being tautologies. — Michael Ossipoff

I'm not saying it isn't true. I'm saying that it doesn't say what anti-natalists want it to say and/or imply.

But being forced into life doesn't require that you were a pre-existing person who was then forced into life. — Michael Ossipoff

Yes it does.

I've always had the feeling that Schopenhaur1 has about this. I always said, "I never chose to be born."

And of course it's true. — Michael Ossipoff

It's only true in the trivial sense that you didn't exist prior to being born, which is in fact a mere tautology, but not in the sense that you were forced to exist. Anti-natalists want to make the latter claim so that they can declare birth an evil and procreation immoral.

If the function of life is to circulate and continue its existence. Then its purpose can be defined as its function. — ThinkingMatt

All you have established is that, at minimum and with no other considerations, this is what life's purpose is. It could be that life has some other purpose in addition to the one you describe here. In other words, evolution, which is basically what you're describing, can be true but may not tell the whole truth about ourselves and why we're here. My question for you is: Do you rule out any such additional purpose and, if so, why? If you answer in the affirmative, you are effectively arguing for naturalism, which would require more philosophical justification than simply pointing out, as you have done, what we know from biology about ourselves.

When reflecting on one’s life we can see that all our actions and behaviours are to essentially serve this greater purpose. — ThinkingMatt

That's not true, though. Doing philosophy, for example, doesn't serve any such purpose, and yet here you are doing it, so the very act of making the claim refutes it.

Just because there was no "pre-born souls" which you very-well know I don't believe in, does it then mean that people are not "thrown into existence". You are born without having a say, because it is impossible. Someone is born and it happened not of their own cause. It is not hyperbolic, but is simply what happens. There was no human, and then there is. Wherever you cut this "there is", it happens at some point and that is the "thrown" that you think is hyperbolic. — schopenhauer1

"Thrown" has implicit normative connotation. It implies that someone who already exists is forced to do something without their consent. But as I argued and as you acknowledge here, that is not what happens. Parents cause their children to exist, but they do not, and cannot, force them to exist. Thus, the causative act of procreation is amoral and, for that very reason, permissible.

Yes if a tree falls in the woods, and there's no one there to hear it.. People need to exist for consent to exist. Thus, there cannot be "no wanting to exist" without existence. I was figuring you were going to go in that direction. The problem is, not existing would have not even made this an issue in the first place. Why create any issue at all? Why create those who need to be obligated to others, if what you are saying is something you strongly believe is what we must do. Forcing someone into an obligation to the species or be obliged to commit suicide seems its own bizarre justification. — schopenhauer1

Why are you asking me? I don't plan on having children, but I recognize that other people do and that this can be beneficial with respect to the maintenance of civilization. Secondly, you're still resorting to normatively charged, hyperbolic language, e.g. "forced." Once again, no one is forced into said obligation, just as no one is forced to exist. Whether you find this "bizarre" or not is irrelevant to its truth.

Not preferable but, simply would be a non-issue. Born = issue. Not born, no issue, nor would it matter that there is no issue either. Just non-being.. Cannot get beyond the words here unfortunately whend discussing non-being (shades of Wittgenstein..etc. etc.). However, from the perspective of being, born one can get to understanding of instrumentality, striving, and for the non-reflective the actual "living in striving" and the ever present contingent harms of the many ways the world impinges on us in unwanted ways. — schopenhauer1

I don't think you can say in an absolute sense that there is no issue with not being born. How could you possibly know that, unless, again, you had prior acquaintance with nonexistence so as to make the comparison? It could turn out that God exists, in which case, nonexistence is known to be worse than existence from his larger perspective. It could turn out that rebirth and/or reincarnation is true, in which case, even if all human beings ceased procreating, they would still be reborn as other creatures and so continue the cycle of birth and death, or else be reborn as human beings in a future kalpa.

I'm not sure about that.. Again, Bushmen might like their lifestyle and not give a shit about the millions of complex technological advances or whatever other standin for our current civilization. — schopenhauer1

No, they live in a primitive society. Primitive -> barbaric -> civilized. Merriam-Webster: "barbaric: possessing or characteristic of a cultural level more complex than primitive culture but less sophisticated than advanced civilization."

As an aside, I am not liking the character of this debate because I am being pigeonholed into a debate about an absolute ethics which I don't hold. I don't condemn people who have kids. I don't think there is necessarily an obligation either. I just want people to think more about the implications of procreation, what that will do for the future person, and what instrumentality means about human life in general. — schopenhauer1

I apologize for in any way souring the conversation, but I was simply interested in knowing where you stand on this issue. You and I go back a long time at this point, schop1. As you know, I used to be an anti-natalist, and I know you were one too, but as I explained earlier, over time I realized I couldn't reach its conclusion based on the ethical premises I accept. I have also come to find the arguments for anti-natalism unpersuasive. At the moment, I'm neither a natalist nor an anti-natalist. Your present position has remained a bit of an enigma, in that you make threads like this one that seem to beat around the bush. If you don't condemn people for having children, that is actually news to me, especially given the many artifacts of anti-natalist arguments you have employed thus far in this thread. When did you reject anti-natalism, and how did you come to such a position?

There's a lot of collateral damage in that, with the individuals thrown into existence to maintain this. — schopenhauer1

This appears to be your answer to why instrumentality is a problem. The problem with it is that, instead of merely acknowledging the fact that human beings will exist in the future, you resort to hyperbolic and sophistical expressions like "thrown into existence." No one is thrown into existence, for no one exists before they exist, which is both impossible and absurd. The act of procreation does not pluck pre-born souls from the ether and force them into bodies.

No one asked to be born and to contribute to the maintenance of civilization or will otherwise agree that suicide is the only recourse for not contributing — schopenhauer1

Nor did anyone ask not to be anything or not to contribute to the maintenance of civilization. Prior to existing, we couldn't ask to be or not to be anything, because there was no "we." Moreover, once we do exist, there isn't any way to determine whether existence is preferable to non-existence, since no one has or can experience non-existence to make the comparison. So you have no reason to conclude, on the basis that humans behave instrumentally, that it is preferable that they not exist so as not to behave in such a way. For all you and I know, which is, by definition, nothing in this case, non-existence may be worse than existence.

it could be true that I was born into a "barbaric" society (whatever that is), and still enjoy it, if I knew no other alternative — schopenhauer1

A barbaric society is one inferior to a civilized one. If you understand and appreciate the benefits of civilization, then you wouldn't enjoy living in a barbaric society, even if you knew of no alternative, for otherwise you would be other than you are. Not all people living in such societies enjoy living in them, and so you would be one of them.

However, I would never say that everyone is "here to maintain civilization" as an end to itself. — schopenhauer1

Neither would I. You have phrased this as a descriptive claim, but I'm saying civilization ought to be maintained, not that it is maintained because that's our purpose. And it ought to maintained for the reason that we owe it to future generations.

As I said earlier: "No one signed a contract that says "I want to be born to keep civilization going, and that upon rejection of this civilizing effort, I have no recourse except suicide, otherwise I would be harming mankind by sticking around and not doing so". No one signed that." — schopenhauer1

And I disputed this claim you have quoted.

So again, how does this refute the earlier argument I made: "Now, I see where you are sort of going with this- others will always be born, so it is up to us to make sure they have the fruits of civilization. We have obligations to past and future contingent connections, etc. However, this also suffers from no justification. I may be part of this historical-cultural setting that I was thrown into, but what is the reason to keep the fruits of civilization going? It is a snake that eats its tail.. We don't want to starve and live in a barbaric way so we keep civilization going so others can be born and so others can be born and so others can be born.. It is still all instrumental. It does not get out of the cycle." — schopenhauer1

What are you talking about? I answered the question you asked in this quote.

I rather prefer that civilization comes to a point where it realizes the instrumentality of things, not that civilization demises altogether. — schopenhauer1

Then you presuppose the maintenance of civilization until it reaches such a point.

First, the contract has to be agreed upon. No one signed a contract that says "I want to be born to keep civilization going, and that upon rejection of this civilizing effort, I have no recourse except suicide, otherwise I would be harming mankind by sticking around and not doing so". No one signed that. — schopenhauer1

But they have. It is implicitly agreed upon so long as one upholds the law and desires its just emendation, respects the rights of others, and looks to the past so as to determine one's actions in the present and the future. You do all of that on a daily basis. As I said, the only way to opt out of this contract is to commit suicide or a crime that leads to imprisonment, whereby one is voluntarily or involuntarily removed from society.

We don't want to starve and live in a barbaric way so we keep civilization going so others can be born — schopenhauer1

Finish the sentence. We don't want to starve and live in a barbaric way, so we keep civilization going so that others can be born without having to starve or live in a barbaric way.

Thus:

what is the reason to keep the fruits of civilization going? — schopenhauer1

So that others can be born without having to starve or live in a barbaric way.

So even if this was the implication, so what? Why not take it even further, prefers nothingness.. because after barbarism and anarchy, perhaps complete extinction of the species, right? — schopenhauer1

Wrong. We have already agreed that humans reproduce whether in civilization or in barbarism, and it is clearly preferable that they do so in the former. You can't have it both ways. You can't simultaneously bemoan the injustice, evil, and suffering in life while at the same time deliberately condone their infliction in order to bring about the extinction of human beings. You must choose: either you commit to maintaining civilization, in which case you oppose barbarism, or you commit to barbarism, in which case you have no grounds for advocating anti-natalism on the basis of concern for human beings. Your anti-natalism would have to be grounded in a hatred of life and of human beings and in the desire for human extinction or the pleasure you feel in imagining this.

So to summarize, there is the "goal-seeking" primary need for need, which we do not need to self-reflect on, and then there is a more abstract philosophical problem of why more "to do" in the first place. — schopenhauer1

But even granting the truth of this claim, which I am not entirely convinced of, the absence of a need to produce need does not, in itself, constitute a reason not to procreate. You've merely identified procreation as an action that isn't strictly obligatory for the individual. You haven't moved beyond the descriptive to the prescriptive.

Pointing out the apparent absurdity and vanity of existence leads one to question why more people ought to be created. But at that point, the assigning of moral blame to those who do so requires enumeration of what qualifies something or someone as morally blameworthy. Absent that, threads like this become mere plaintive tedium.

Now, in my own case, I have realized that attempting to justify anti-natalism on non-consequentialist grounds is like trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. For me, the motive determines the moral worth of an action, not its consequences. Hence, because the motive of most parents in having children is not to inflict or create more pain and suffering, they have done no wrong. Perhaps you agree but still see no positive reason to have children. That's fine, for again, there isn't any personal obligation to procreate.

Edit: I realize that some philosophers distinguish between motive and intent, but I'm using them interchangeably here.

The more fundamental question is why we continue bringing forth more people. What is it about having a next generation that needs to take place? The thoughtful answers would be something like: self-actualization, scientific discovery, art/music/humanities, creativity, flow experiences, physical pleasures, friends, relationships, achievement in some field or area of study, and aesthetic pleasures. — schopenhauer1

Outside of the obvious biological answer to your question, the most cogent that I have found, though not quite fully assented to, is that we have a duty to maintain civilization, given 1) its superiority to barbarism and 2) the fact that people will continue to procreate whether we like it or not, as you noted. All of the items on your list presuppose even more basic relationships that contribute to the functioning of civilization. The most important of these relationships is, as Burke says, between those who are living, those who are dead, and those who are to be born. To live, to exist, is to enter into a contract with these parties, the voluntary opting out of which is only possible through suicide and the involuntary through imprisonment due to crime. This is not a duty for each individual to procreate, but it is a duty for society as a whole not to so completely wither away.

Look at what the Greek historian Polybius says, for example:

In our time all Greece was visited by a dearth of children and generally a decay of population, owing to which the cities were denuded of inhabitants, and a failure of productiveness resulted, though there were no long-continued wars or serious pestilences among us… For this evil grew upon us rapidly, and without attracting attention, by our men becoming perverted to a passion for show and money and the pleasures of an idle life, and accordingly either not marrying at all, or, if they did marry, refusing to rear the children that were born, or at most one or two out of a great number, for the sake of leaving them well off or bringing them up in extravagant luxury.

This ought to sound very familiar. Polybius asserts that the barrenness of Greece effectively led to geopolitical weakness, which in turn led to Roman conquest. The conquest turned out not to be so bad, as the Romans were able to clamp down on violent feuds between smaller factions and replace inept Macedonian rule. The Romans were also emulative and admiring of the Greeks, so they did not produce a mix of antithetical values and cultures. But when Rome itself succumbed to the tendencies Polybius describes above, there was no culturally friendly power waiting in the wings to preserve it. Thus, civilization collapsed, leading to what has been called, not unreasonably, the Dark Ages. Civilization's light was only precariously preserved in monasteries. Now in our own time, the West is repeating the same "evil," but unlike Greece and like Rome, there is no other society to carry on its values and prevent, this time, what would be a global descent into darkness and barbarism were it to collapse. Again, human beings will be born into the world whether we like it or not, but the deliberate procreation of children who are raised to carry the torch of civilization both does not squander the immense positive, constructive labor of previous generations and does not forsake future generations to abject misery. To not assert that we have this duty is, ipso facto and in practice, to prefer barbarism and anarchy.

Noble Dust the prophet.

I won't be reading any more of your post — Thanatos Sand

And if you keep this act up, I predict no one will be reading yours, since you'll be banned.

Of course you're in favor of it, since in your quote directly above you clearly express your preference for a period when child education was rampant and there was terrible racial discrimination being used in making education worse for Black children than for White children. Your own words make that clear. — Thanatos Sand

You're repeating the same false accusations here.

Now, you're pretending you think things are actually better when we spend money on education. — Thanatos Sand

No, I'm not. Reading comprehension is not your strong suit it seems.

You expressed your horrid support of periods of racism and child labor over our present period of spending billions on labor. — Thanatos Sand

Once again, repeating this doesn't make it so! If you're just trolling, then I hope you find something better to do with your life. If not, then I hope you seek psychological help, as you've displayed nothing but pathological, ungrounded antipathy toward me and, by the looks of it, other people on this forum too.

And you clearly showed you're in favor of child labor and racial discrimination because you said you preferred a period when those things were much more prevalent than our current period. — Thanatos Sand

Wow. This is so ridiculous that I'm not entirely sure you're being serious! First, no, I'm not in favor of child labor or racial discrimination. For you to assume that I am is uncharitable in the extreme. Second, no, I never said I "preferred" the past, I simply challenged you to prove that US students were receiving an inferior education compared to today, which you have still failed to do. Ergo, you're trying to deflect the conservation by means of character attacks.

Of course it was worse. At least 1/2 had the money for school and ended up doing child labor on to terrible labor the rest of their life, and the facilities for Blacks were decidedly inferior to those for Whites. — Thanatos Sand

You're trying to make marginal cases the normative ones. Sorry, these are red herrings. I'd like an answer to my question without offensive insinuations that I'm in favor of child labor or racial discrimination.

So, back when we didn't pump billions into education, didn't have a department of education, etc, US students were receiving an inferior education to those now?

You might want to look up Einstein's definition of insanity.

Then you face the empirical problem of how the ever increasing billions spent on education hasn't translated into students being better educated.

all energy — WISDOMfromPO-MO

Vague.

all focus — WISDOMfromPO-MO

Vague.

all capital — WISDOMfromPO-MO

Ah, money and property.

all solidarity — WISDOMfromPO-MO

Vague.

all creativity — WISDOMfromPO-MO

Vague.

all passion — WISDOMfromPO-MO

Vague.

We have crumbling infrastructure to repair — WISDOMfromPO-MO

Which will cost money. From whom?

We have public debt to reduce — WISDOMfromPO-MO

What do we cut from the budget to do this?

We have alarming rates of incarceration to reduce. — WISDOMfromPO-MO

Why would this be a bad thing, if criminals are being brought to justice? Are you saying that we're producing too many criminals or that we need to punish them less?

We have non-renewable resources to conserve — WISDOMfromPO-MO

Are not all resources non-renewable? What do you have in mind?

We have inefficient elementary, secondary and higher education systems to reform. — WISDOMfromPO-MO

How are they to be reformed? Throwing money at them?

We have epidemic levels of obesity and opioid dependency to intervene in. — WISDOMfromPO-MO

How are they to be reduced? Throwing money at them?

That makes me a political pragmatist, maybe? — WISDOMfromPO-MO

No, it makes you vague, an increasingly disillusioned progressive, and, for the moment, a purveyor of platitudes as a way to deal with that disillusionment.

And right now nobody seems to be more intolerant than people who identify as "progressive". — WISDOMfromPO-MO

You are correct here.

Out of all of Nietzsche's works, my favorite seems to be his very first, the Birth of Tragedy. The later Nietzsche seems like a power-crazed insane man quite often. Not to mention that I find pretty much his entire GM to be pathetic, even intellectually - the first two parts for sure. — Agustino

I'm less well read of Nietzsche, but from my limited knowledge of him, I'd say I agree. The early Nietzsche is the most interesting, in my opinion, because that's when he was most influenced by, complimentary of, and in agreement with Schopenhauer. The Nietzsche that simply reverses Schopenhauer's ethics and berates his mentor is rather insufferable.

Speaking of biographical anecdotes, here's something I dug up some time ago but never shared that you might find interesting, as I feel it's a propos some of our previous discussions (taken from The American Catholic Quarterly Review from 1916):

One of [Nietzsche's] friends, who had come under the influence of Schopenhauer, was a Dr. Romundt. To quote his sister in the matter: "Now, strange to say," she declares, "his profound study of Schopenhauer had made Dr. Romundt decide to become a Catholic priest. My brother was beside himself in anger, for he was very fond of Dr. Romundt. He could not in the least understand how a philosopher who had learnt to value freedom of thought could possibly intend to take up a position which, from an intellectual standpoint, was so terribly confined on all sides. And the fact that a friend, after having frequented his company for eight years, could thus secretly have planned such a coup against the freedom of his own spirit made him thoroughly unhappy. After lengthy discussion, however, Dr. Romundt did at last decide to return to his earlier calling as a teacher."

This is important, as it brings to our attention what Nietzsche's idea was concerning Catholicism. It is evident that Dr. Romundt, like Nietzsche's sister, interpreted Schopenhauer in quite a different way from his friend. "My brother," says Frau-Förster-Nietzsche, "understood perfectly well that as a Christian my understanding of Schopenhauer was very different from his; for instance, I scarcely realized Schopenhauer's atheism at all." As for Dr. Romundt, Schopenhauer had simply impressed him with a sense of pessimism that had not gone so far as to make him the materialist and atheist that it had made of Nietzsche, but had brought home to this truth-seeking soul the fact that he was a pilgrim in this "valley of tears." Naturally enough, he turned his thoughts heavenward and did not seek to find on earth true and lasting happiness, but looked towards the Catholic Church for the haven where he might anchor safely after wandering about in a sea of doubt. The freedom of spirit which he sought would find its realization in the conserver of a true faith, based upon a satisfying certainty of true knowledge. It was to be confined only in the sense that it was to be determined by certainty of truth. But he did not realize the logical necessity of faith based upon right thinking, and so he once more turned in his weakness back to his scoffing companion and did not appreciate fully the true meaning of the step he had taken. The greatest of all truths and the only satisfying truth neither he nor Nietzsche had arrived at, namely, that truth is one, so that in its essence it cannot be uncertain and indetermined and that the conclusions that Nietzsche had arrived at were but disordered emanations and illogical calculations of the real truths. He could but wander forever in a circle that led him to rest only in restricted declarations of false premises that were not correctly based upon real truths. Beyond the simple truths that were clear to the minds of even such great pagan philosophers as Plato and Aristotle, Nietzsche thought he saw still greater truths and more subtle ones, which in reality were but contradictories and which led him into sophistry. And this he mistook for freer and higher thought, and so he drifted into a mysticism which was pure madness.

The Agu/Beebert battle commences once again. >:O

What I meant buy this is the fact that we keep alive long enough to reproduce and create the next generation - hence 'continuing the life of all living things'.
My question is, what is the purpose of continuing this cycle? — ThinkingMatt

What is the purpose of reproducing? From a biological perspective, it's to create more human beings. Obviously. But let's cut to the chase: What you really want to ask is whether there are any good reasons to reproduce, do you not?

What's an example? — ThinkingMatt

Jumping off a building.

Not mind reading but by studying human psychology which is close enough. Most people live out of habit or because they fear death. There's really no "decision" to live usually. — darthbarracuda

Ah, so "you" really means "most people." I find complaining about what cannot be changed to be rather tiresome. Condemning the masses for their ignorance, myopia, and credulity on a philosophy forum is merely preaching to the choir and makes you sound smug.

Right, but the unstated punch line is that you and the OP cast normative judgment on the hedonic treadmill just described. You think it's a bad thing and that it entails anti-natalism. I agree that a culturally reinforcing biological stimulus and response system exists and can be wearisome and agree that anti-natalism follows from it if that's all human beings are, but I don't think that's all we are, because I'm not a materialist. These threads merely prove that materialism is a pretty shitty philosophy if true. But I don't think it's true, and not because I'm trying to avoid its depressing consequences.

You exist, but why do you continue to exist? Presumably because it gives you satisfaction, or at least because you fear death and/or have not really considered life to be a form of momentum. And that's about it really. — darthbarracuda

Or perhaps for reasons other than these. Why do you insist on being a mind reader here? And surely you're open to a tu quoque reply: "If you're trying to suggest that my reasons to continue to living are bad reasons, but they're the only reasons there can be for living, according to you, then why do you continue to live? It must be for those same bad reasons, so why are you asking me something to which you already know the answer? Are you wanting me to commit suicide? But if you don't yourself commit suicide, then why should I believe that you're right about the reasons there are for living, since they clearly aren't convincing enough for you?"

mind pumps chemicals into your brain that make it feel happy — ThinkingMatt

No, your brain pumps chemicals into your body. Minds pumping any kind of physical matter is incoherent.

When you focus right down to it, every single behavior and action conducted by not only humans but all living things can be sourced right down to a mechanism just to sustain the continuation of life. — ThinkingMatt

This is demonstrably false. There are probably an infinite number of human actions that are not conducive to living. Just stop and think about it for a moment. Human beings are a rather risky species of animal.

then our purpose as living things is purely to sustain our life and future life — ThinkingMatt

I don't think you've proven this. You've merely pointed out a fact about our nature and then declared that fact our purpose. I think you're missing several steps to reach that conclusion.

but instead, ‘what is the purpose of continuing the life of all living things?’ — ThinkingMatt

A nonsensical question. No one person can continue the life of all living things.

Hmm?

Yes, too often people assume that pleasure is the highest good, as apparently the OP did, and so are really hedonists or sensualists, whether they realize it or not.

Suffering is more negative than pleasure is positive. — dukkha

This depends on what you mean by these terms.

would you experience one hour of the worst suffering imaginable in return for one hour of the best pleasure? — dukkha

What is the pleasure in question? There are some pleasures I don't want to experience, such as those found in the traditional list of deadly sins, and there are some pains I don't mind experiencing, such as those derived from fasting, exercise, surgery, and so on. And to anticipate an objection to the latter claim, I do not experience such pains as pleasurable nor do I submit to them in order to feel pleasure.

nappy training session — Punshhh

I must say that this phrase sounds so annoying.