You're telling me. Hurt my sciatic nerve again a couple days ago... too much down time... can't someone lay in bed eating pie all day and suffer no adverse effects? Wtf world? Seriously though, like body builders will eat up to like 12,000 calories some days... but I can't eat like 4... in pie?

I don't sleep right, so being all full and sleeping hurts me.

Gotta go to work now... hopefully it just warms up and it's fine. The pain levels are pretty high.

How many countless people suffer from metabolism and sleep problems? Just add it to the pile of harms.. see here: https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/669/how-many-different-harms-can-you-name/p1

Perhaps I should put "prevent" instead of "deny" in the first line as I am referring to "life" not that "life is a pain in the ass".. People do not pass on denying that "life is a pain in the ass".. Indeed that is the problem, they DO deny that life is a pain in the ass and then this causes people to not deny life for others (procreating them). But maybe the ambiguity could be good?

Schop, do you ever have days where you don't feel this way?

It's been really striking to me just how primary the 'way I feel' is. It seems to be what animates these otherwise hollow verbal exchanges. Sometimes it's obvious that life is fundamentally terrible. That seems to happen on its own from time to time, but there are some consistent ways to produce the outlook (e.g. opiate withdrawal). Anyway, for me, it's more common that I don't feel that way. And when I don't, there's something somehow more lucid about my inner world where it seems clear that the 'life is terrible' outlook is the dream to wake up from rather than vice versa.

The arguments, logic, words, are just byproducts. My view is that the anti-natalist simply overextends language beyond its context. The arguments are hollow when that's not your inner experience. You are doomed to only ever preach to the choir.

You are doomed to only ever preach to the choir. — Roke

(Y)

But to deny it, people are wont to pass — schopenhauer1

This line is a bit confusing, especially the second clause. I think you're trying to say that people deny that life is a pain in the ass, but it doesn't quite read that way.

Here's a poem I wrote several years ago on a similar theme:

Were that I a bird
Free to fly above the herd
Were that I a snake
To slither away from hate
Were that I a rabbit
To hop as my habit
These and more I wish to be
For anything but human
Sounds better to me

Get a desk job moving papers around or maybe be a paper weight.

Jobs as paperweights have been automated out of existence.

And when I don't, there's something somehow more lucid about my inner world where it seems clear that the 'life is terrible' outlook is the dream to wake up from rather than vice versa. — Roke

What if you are merely escaping to your inner world to retreat from the disillusionment you feel toward the external world, which is ultimately contributing to this lucidity? It is not preaching, but calling out from this inner world with the hope that maybe someone will hear and see you for who you are, to have the void, that loneliness filled not by the withdrawal but rather the engagement. We're out here, you know, chasing the echo of the same desperate calls in the hope of capturing one to embrace and save from the terror. We will never hear you if you remain caught in your own illusions.

Yeah, I was wondering if I should use "prevent" rather than "deny" in that second line.

It's not that my inner world is more lucid than the external world. I'm saying I have experience (as I think most people do) with both kinds of inner states - (a)"life is obviously terrible" and (b)"everything is OK".

While experiencing (a) it feels undeniably true. If I only ever felt (a), the antinatalist arguments would be compelling. It's from the vantage point of (b) that (a) is clearly just a subset of a broader awareness (lucidity/richness) available to me.

Dreams can feel very real until you wake up. I'm wondering if Schop is stuck in a bad dream I've had before. I don't mean this in a patronizing way, like I know the truth about life's value and if you disagree you need to wake up. I'm saying the truth about life's value is fundamentally subjective and driven by your inner world, something primal and much more real than words and arguments. So, for example, I wouldn't try to convince Schop that life has value because I realize, no matter what combination of words I use, it won't take unless he already feels it.

The antinatalist argument, to the extent it's anything beyond preaching to the choir, is distastefully presumptuous about the ineffable inner worlds of others.

I'm too dumb for that. I'm better at manual labor.

It was fine though, I had to go in since I got most of the tools and ladder, but when I got there I told buddy about it (incidentally, he also hurt his sciatic just before I did the first time, when we first came back). I showed up, and said I was hurting, and they were like "so are you going home then", and I was all like, "nope, I'll just be shitty".

Feeling a lot better though now. Not like I hurt it working, I hurt it lay around and not working enough, eating too much, and things. Same thing that happened last time, I ate a bunch of pastry stuff, and slept. Then woke up like that. No more doing that...

Sciatic nerve injury caused by pie eating must be a medical first. Quick, call the Mayo Clinic.

Do you have a theory about how pie-eating behavior would affect you sciatic nerve?

Oh yes! Many! With lots of possible variables.

The main cause is fairly simple, but what to do about it, and how to make it better rather than worse is a little more complex. Almost everyone is bound up to their other side, and have lots of imbalances. The body is fairly simple, just make all the weight go through the joints, and not get cut off. The muscles just bull themselves tightly on to the bone, in order to maintain structural integrity, as it were. So all that is important is keeping form, basically. Only, when you're all fucked up, as most of us are, you gots to take some drastic measures.

People can hold great postures standing up, but then when they bend over, they lean over, and hinge their weight at the hips in one of many ways. This hinging lengthens some muscles, and contracts others. A big one, which is what I did, was basically lift the opposing leg you're leaning over with. I'm all fucked up in all kinds of ways, but like, I said, I'm more sink or swim measures. See, all of that yoga has gave me pretty good physical awareness, and I can feel the tension, and places where things are bound up, so's that I just force a release, and see what happens. When you start to lengthen one side too much, and shorten the other one too much, you'll start to flex muscles in your neck, mainly, to hold the weight from hurting you, basically, from pulling too much on a nerve, probably for that reason, I figure. So, that giving me more movement between my shoulder blades, and widening my shoulders (people have told me that I'm getting thinner, but I've actually put on like fifteen pounds) also widened my lower back quickly.

Then, if I can't contain my lower abdomen, then that puts too much work on the lower back, which now has more movement range than it probably ought to. I sleep on my stomach, and like eating a lot and I'll lose structural integrity in my lower right ribs, and under my left bottom shoulder blade, and that combined with containing my core less cause I'm all stuffed, all makes my lower back contract too much when I'm sleeping... something like that...

Ass is a pain in this life
Exemplars of ass are rife.
Ass is a thing oft pursued
Ass often ass found it's rued.
Our wants so ever elastic
Give us illusory plastic.

Asstute observations on our asspirations
Lust, moot perturbations on constant frustrations
No dispute, desire the root of thwarted machinations

Truth for the sake of truth is said to be noble, but exposing people to pessimism without any additional advice or considerations seems to accomplish very little. Have you considered the ethics of promoting pessimism without prudential care or a substitute method of dealing with life for those who gain nothing and lose a lot from learning about the bleakness of existence?

I ask this because these posts, while certainly not excessive per se, seem to be repetitive cul-de-sacs that have no positive outcome: people leave without their beliefs being substantially changed, and/or now everyone is even more conscious of the collective suffering in the world than they were before. And for what?

I suppose I'm too pessimistic for pessimism.

The antinatalist argument, to the extent it's anything beyond preaching to the choir, is distastefully presumptuous about the ineffable inner worlds of others. — Roke

I've made a similar argument in the past against anti-natalism. But anti-natalism is arguing against bringing more people into this life, not against lives already being lived, where you try to make the best of it.

I've asked myself the following thought experiment. If I could create another Earth-like planet, and put a new batch of humans on it, would I do it? Probably not if I gave ethics serious consideration. Because whatever inner value those humans experience, there is likely over time being a lot of war, injustice, rape, murder, discrimination, unfairness, disease, mental illness, misery, poverty, etc. Kind of like our world. And I'm not sure that world would be worth it. I'm not sure whether our world has been worth the terrible cost.

In fact, if I had to chose whether to experience my own life over again to this point, I'm not sure it would be worth it either, even though I've been spared the worst. Maybe when we wake from the nightmare of feeling that life is awful, we do so to the day dream of feeling that life is wonderful.

While experiencing (a) it feels undeniably true. — Roke

The issue here is that (a) being life is obviously terrible misrepresents reality and it also represents your state of mind and therefore my remark relating to the lucidity of your inner world reaches a new position of plausibility. A narcissist, for instance, though one would think that his/her state of mind may perhaps be viewed as entirely self-delusional, their narcissism in fact relies heavily on the opinions of others.

I totally agree with you vis-a-vis your argument on anti-natalism; life is not obviously terrible, but we subjectively create meaning with an external world and there will inevitably be contact with what is considered terrible. But to say that it either is completely terrible or completely beautiful is quite simply delusional and a flaw in reason. Whether we create meaning or not, there is still an external reality and within it good and bad.

Truth for the sake of truth is said to be noble, but exposing people to pessimism without any additional advice or considerations seems to accomplish very little. — darthbarracuda

To question the very foundation of why we cause others to exist questions our own very existence. I think this adds value in the idea that it is a palate cleanser in terms of forcing us to reckon with our own evaluation of what life itself means. Most people really do not grapple with life- the meaning there of. Existential issues, vis a vis Sartre, religions, or otherwise sidetrack the issue. Procreation brings it into sharp focus.

Procreation brings it into sharp focus. — schopenhauer1

I wonder if Camus ever wrote about procreation. Is giving birth a form of rebellion against life's absurdity?

I'm not sure whether our world has been worth the terrible cost. — Marchesk

I think the endless possibilities are what makes it worth the going, but I agree that if this was it, if it couldn't get any better than this, then it wouldn't be worth all of the pain and suffering. But there is a very real possibility that in the not too distant future the situation could improve drastically and in the longer term it might even get good enough to justify the long bloody slog of life through the eons.

Procreation brings it into sharp focus. — schopenhauer1

I entirely agree - but what help is this to those who already exist? Might someone be better off not knowing their existential predicament, or at least exacerbating it through critical philosophical analysis? Why expose people to the pessimistic worldview?

The answer, from what I can tell, would be that the knowledge of the human condition, although difficult to bear, is a requirement in order to be a responsible human being. Understanding the predicament we are in can, hypothetically at least, lead to a change in character and expression. We become more compassionate and patient, appreciate the goods in life more and most of all refuse to procreate.

Without any ethical foundation, truth for the sake of truth is irresponsible. If our goal is to convince people to not procreate, then this provides a solid reason to shine light on the structural issues of life. Any other motivation, however, must be primarily self-serving, if only through catharsis or sublimation. I don't think we're doing anyone any benefit by pointing out these features of life for the sake of pointing them out. There needs to be some sort of positive reason or benefit to understanding the human condition that overrides the toll such an understanding has on a person. In the absence of such a reason, it is best that we just don't say anything. Nothing positive will have been accomplished and all we will have done is make the problem worse.

In the absence of such a reason, it is best that we just don't say anything. Nothing positive will have been accomplished and all we will have done is make the problem worse. — darthbarracuda

I leave it to you and others to figure it out from there. You already came up with some interesting conclusions: more compassionate and patient, appreciate the goods in life more, don't procreate. I have stated similar positions in the past, as you know.

Yes, it was not meant as a criticism per se but more as a recommendation, that perhaps pessimistic threads should be abandoned because they are not productive in any substantial way.

Yes, it was not meant as a criticism per se but more as a recommendation, that perhaps pessimistic threads should be abandoned because they are not productive in any substantial way. — darthbarracuda

What is productive in your mind? Again, you already came up with some conclusions yourself. Others have to work to justify why life is worth it. Even if simply to defend why human lives and the human project in general is good, means existential questions are at least being grappled with and not taken as a given.

Right, but the pessimistic point is that life is not worth living and that there are no reasons to continue it. It seems almost aggressive to demand people justify their existence, especially if you believe they won't be able to.

Jobs as paperweights have been automated out of existence. — Bitter Crank

Completely agree with that, with the possible exception of politicians. Until they too are replaced by machines. Oh wait... that sounds even worse, like a Philip K. Dick story. ;)

So you think it's too aggressive? Have you seen the debates on this forum? Also, most people have strong positions that require others to justify. I'm doing it right now! Why pick on this? Finally, the point again is to grapple with existential issues. This is fundamental and foundational to a comprehensive worldview. It feeds into all sorts of issues, including metaphysics, ethics, and social science.

Like I said, it was more of a suggestion than a criticism. I don't see these threads going anywhere and it seemed to me that you were getting frustrated with the lack of progress.