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. — schopenhauer1

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

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 saying that. I'm saying, once the kid is born, they have been forced. — schopenhauer1

Yeah, by mother nature maybe.

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.

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. — schopenhauer1

At the most basic level it would seem as though most if not all pleasure (hell, even pain for that matter) is in some way dependent on certain structural illusions, one of which is the apparent requirement that life, or at least our lives, continue for as long as possible.

Given that suicide is not usually a viable option for whatever reason, it shouldn't be controversial to see the practical importance of making an intolerable situation less intolerable. Your form of pessimism, while it certainly does point out real existential issues (such as this instrumentality you keep bringing up), is actually somewhat dangerous in my opinion, because it seems to lead to a sort of defeatist complaining. Capitalism is a bad thing, and making the alternative (socialist-anarchism) seem like an incoherent pipe dream threatens to sustain the very thing that needs to go, the thing that makes life so much worse.

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.

What is the most common sexually-transmitted disease?

Birth. — Michael Ossipoff

I got that quote from the Internet, and of course there's something to it, because birth, and what follows it, isn't easy, is often uncomfortable and always entails suffering. But it isn't possible to objectively weigh the suffering against the good parts of a life, or to say it isn't worth it.

In the sense of a disease as being something undesirable or wrong with us, I don't perceive life that way.

Sure, the Eastern traditions seem to imply that. Nisargadatta said that birth is a calamity, and I don't doubt that the peaceful and quiet sleep at the end-of-lives, for the (rare) life-completed person is a good thing.

It seems to me that we're each here in life because there's a hypothetical life-experience possibility-story about us, as its protagonist...a hypothetical experiencer who wanted or needed life, or was in some way inclined or disposed toward it, at least subconsciously.

Maybe that want, need, inclination or disposition was misguided, and it would have been better to leave well-enough alone, but that's moot now. We're in life now, involved, and sometimes the more we do, in an effort for satisfaction and completion, the deeper we get involved.

It's a bit reminiscent of the Uncle Remus story about Bre'r Rabbit punching it out with a dummy made of tar, which had been set up for him as a trap The more he punched it, the more he got stuck to it.

...so we must punch it out with the gummy-figure until we really achieve life-completion. ...having gotten started in life..

...until we resolve life, the situation that we've gotten into by our want, need, inclination or disposition.. It's obvious that that resolution isn't usually going to happen in one lifetime.

I can't prove that there's reincarnation, though my metaphysics implies it.

But if we're in life because we're the hypothetical protagonist of a hypothetical life-experience possibility-story, and therefore someone disposed toward life...and if that disposition is unchanged, or even increased at the end of this life, then the reason why we're in a life will remain at the end of this life.

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.

Anyway, if we aren't yet life-resolved, which would we prefer?

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?

And still speaking for myself, I can say that, with a lot of help from parents, culture, and peers, I thoroughly botched my early life, from as early as I remember, didn't know what I was doing, how to interpret, regard, and conduct life.

You, Schopenhaur1, sound like you, too, have had a rather sour experience with life. What happened?

...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

I think you are 100% correct, but few others will agree with you. It seems as if most people are hardwired to feel life is good or "worth it" regardless of what their living conditions are like.

What's the real existential issue of instrumentality? — Πετροκότσυφας

Presumably that we suffer only for us to continue to suffer. We don't go anywhere, nothing changes. It's a whole lot of effort for nothing.

Presumably that we suffer only for us to continue to suffer. We don't go anywhere, nothing changes. It's a whole lot of effort for nothing. — darthbarracuda

How awful. You really believe that?

What should change? Why should there have to be a purpose? Why is it bad if there isn't one.

As we all know, life isn't all bad.

Michael Ossipoff

But if we're in life because we're the hypothetical protagonist of a hypothetical life-experience possibility-story, and therefore someone disposed toward life...and if that disposition is unchanged, or even increased at the end of this life, then the reason why we're in a life will remain at the end of this life. — Michael Ossipoff

We're in life because our parents had sex, an egg was fertilized, we were successfully carried to term and born, and we haven't died since.

We're in life because our parents had sex, an egg was fertilized, we were successfully carried to term and born, and we haven't died since. — T Clark

Thank you,, Mr. Science-Worshipper.

Yes, that's what they told you in school, and it's true, as far as it goes.

No one denies the material account, the science. But this is a philosophy forum, not a science forum.

Of course, if you're a Scientificist, then you're a Materialist, and you're legitimately expressing your metaphysics of Materialism. Acknowledged.

But your Materialist metaphysics has (or is) a big brute-fact.

Your belief in a cause-less brute-fact is an act of faith.

And, even if the causeless, brute-fact, fundamentally-existent, physical world that you believe in objectively exists, then it superfluously exists alongside, and duplicates, the inevitable complex system of inter-referring abstract if-then facts whose events and relations it matches. ...making the proposal of your objective physical world an unverifiable and unfalsifiable proposition.

Michael Ossipoff

Thank you,, Mr. Science-Worshipper. — Michael Ossipoff

I'm not a science worshipper. See my posts on other threads. What I am is a smarty pants.

And, even if the causeless, brute-fact, fundamentally-existent, physical world that you believe in objectively exists, then it superfluously exists alongside, and duplicates, the inevitable complex system of inter-referring abstract if-then facts whose events and relations it matches. ...making the proposal of your objective physical world an unverifiable and unfalsifiable proposition. — Michael Ossipoff

In a discussion of transubstantiation over on the Shoutbox right now, I'm supporting exactly that position.

Then I apologize for misunderstanding you. You were kidding, and didn't mean that biological explanation as the full explanation.

Michael Ossipoff

Then I apologize for misunderstanding you. You didn't mean that biological explanation as the full explanation. — Michael Ossipoff

As I said, I was being a smarty pants. I didn't mean to mislead you.

More like life. — darthbarracuda

Life is not exclusively sexually transmitted, so...no.

Revised post (original was canceled):

Presumably that we suffer only for us to continue to suffer. We don't go anywhere, nothing changes. It's a whole lot of effort for nothing. — darthbarracuda

How awful. You really believe that?

What should change? Why should there have to be a purpose? Why is it bad if there isn't one?

As we all know, life isn't all bad. Most any life has good parts, and some lives have mostly good parts.

If there's reincarnation, then it averages out. If there isn't, then you needn't now be concerned with birth, and it doesn't matter what other lives are like, because this is your only one. One finite life, followed by quiet, peaceful deep sleep.

Some argue that that sleep isn't available if you still feel agitatedly-inclined.

Anyway, by my metaphysics, but maybe other Idealisms too, what is, is good.

Michael Ossipoff

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.

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.

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.

How does future humans who may or may not come into existence and have to work affect you?

It seems like your motivation to make this argument is not being based on you actually trying to prevent future 'suffering experiences' from coming into existence, but rather is a way of you trying to convince others that life is bad. As in, you don't primarily want to prevent suffering (acting out of compassion/empathy), rather you want to convince others that your view on the world is the correct one.

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?

I’ve missed the definition of “instrumentality” that’s being used here. According to dictionaries, “instrumentality” means “use for a purpose”.
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I don’t understand what is meant by that word’s use here. If everything you do is for a future purpose, then you don’t have a life. If you’re saying that all of a person’s life is like that, there are people who say that we needn’t live that way, and that it’s a reliable formula for unhappiness.
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No, this [a sequence of lives] would be a grotesque horror show when seen from an objective viewpoint. Not only instrumental for 80+ years, but for eternity. Ugh.

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1. 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.
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2. If life would be bad with more than one life, then it’s also bad with one life. If any life is bad, then your message is gloom and doom. Presumably you’re saying that a rational person regards this life as something to just somehow get through, in order to have the sleep at the end of life? (…with the assumption that there’ll just be this one life.)
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But what’s the consequence of a life that’s regarded only as something to get through, to get overwith, for something better later? Of courses that’s another instance of living for the future. …a recipe for misery, as described in #1 above.
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…because the future never arrives, as you well know.
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3. According to the Eastern traditions that speak of reincarnation, the sequence of lives isn’t eternal. It’s always finite. Everyone eventually achieves life-completion, life-resolution (often called “Liberation”), and the resulting end-of-lives. But, the Easterners (reasonably) say that you won’t reach that by wishing for it and living for the future.
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4. A life has good parts. And remember that life needn’t and shouldn’t be instrumental. Do you really think that there aren’t things that you like, for their own sake, not for a future purpose?
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5. Whether people who reproduce are causing births that otherwise wouldn’t happen, depends on your metaphysics. You’ve agreed about that. If you could achieve a goal consisting of convincing everyone on Earth to not reproduce, that will prevent some births if you’re a Materialist. By my metaphysics it won’t prevent any births, but will just remove one planet, in one possibility-world as a birth-location.
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6. What’s the conclusion of that gloom-&-doom view? You seem to be implying that, not only is life bad, but what is, must be bad too. …a nightmare conclusion. Do you really think it’s that bad? Even suicide won’t help anyone escape from that bad Reality that you claim. It’s just plain doom.
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By the metaphysics that I propose, what metaphysically (describably, discussably) is, is insubstantial, ethereal. …implying an openness, looseness and lightness that’s opposite to grim Materialism.
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That’s a reason why I say that what is, is good, beneficent, implying benevolence.
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...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
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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.

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Then you’re saying that you don’t believe in sleep at the end of life, for anyone? …and that everyone has eternal experience?
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Well sure, that can reasonably be argued. You’ll never experience a time when you don’t experience. Oblivion never arrives. Of course that’s the problem with rejecting life, and waiting and hoping for the end of experience. It never arrives.
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As I’ve said, at the end of lives (the end of this life if there’s no reincarnation), there comes a time during the death shutdown, when the person doesn’t remember that there ever was, or could be, such a thing as a worldly life, identity, time, or events. That person has reached Timelesssness. Yes, their body is about to shut down, after which their survivors will know that they aren’t experiencing anything. But by then (but before the complete shutdown of awareness) you don’t even know that there ever was or could be a body or a life anyway.
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(If there’s reincarnation, then most people won’t reach that deep stage of shutdown, because, while (and because) you still have your subconscious needs, wants, inclinations and dispositions, you’re someone who is starting a life, in some life-experience possibility-story. In other words, the reason why you’re in a life now, will still obtain at the end of this life.)
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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.

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No, they don’t only need. They also like. That’s what you people are missing. There are things that you like and enjoy, in the present, in this life.
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Michael Ossipoff

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?

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.

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.

Instrumentality isn't necessarily about living for the future — schopenhauer1

It's about doing something for a reason other than because you like it.

But there are things that you like.

It is simply the repetitious nature of surviving

Working for survival is doing something for the future, as we always must (unless we're food-gatherers in a paradise-like environment).

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.
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and keeping our mind's entertained

You make that sound like another chore. "Oh great, now I have to have fun."

There are things that you like. In this discussion you're ignoring that basic fact.

"Repetitious"?

If your "entertainments" are repetitious, then they aren't entertainments. If they're repetitious and boring, and you don't like doing the same entertainments all the time, then vary them. There's no one forcing you to keep repeating the same entertainments that you're tired of.

between birth and death.

Negative.

Experience doesn't end at death. You never experience a time when you don't experience.

Don't expect death as a relief, an impatiently longed-for end of experience, because, as I've emphasized, there's no such thing as oblivion. You never get there.

As Rajneesh (and maybe others) pointed out, your death won't be better than your life,. if your life is bad because of a rejecting attitude toward it.

(Whatever else is said of Rajneesh, he said a some good things)

You'll say, "So here I still am." Really, what did you expect.

...reminding me of Christopher Plummer's line in Wolf: "Well here you still are."

Putting in energy to maintain survival, comfort, entertainment, this day, then the next, then the next, then the next

Though experience never ends, life does. Enjoy it while it lasts. Otherwise, you'll feel plenty silly later.

But I'm not saying that you instrumentally should enjoy it to avoid feeling silly later. A lizard will get out of the sun if he feels too hot, and out of the shade if he feels too cold. Learn from him, and don't keep to a routine that you don't like.

Purposely living a routine that you don't like, and objecting to it, rejecting it as you adhere to it, doesn't make sense.

I say that you're in life because you had, and still have, a predisposition toward it, or even a want for it.. But whether or not you agree with that, you're in it, and it's temporary, so, while here, you might as well allow yourself to like it. That's just being realistic and self-honest. And there are things that you like. Build a model ship, Read a more cheerful philosopher. There's got to be something that you like.

Michael Ossipoff

But by then (but before the complete shutdown of awareness) you don’t even know that there ever was or could be a body or a life anyway. — Michael Ossipoff

An interesting thought. If life has no meaning (and here I refer to salvific, objective meaning, not the created, subjective meaning of the existentialist), then it doesn't matter whether one has children or not or whether the human race dies out or not. Absent such meaning, there is nothing, no God and no law of karma, keeping track, as it were, of all the suffering of human beings and other creatures. Suffering leaves no imprint in a meaningless world. Were the antinatalist's ultimate desire met, there would be no perspective available to anyone or anything to judge that the extinction of human beings was a good thing. It is therefore no more or less good than their continued existence.

You may as well say people are forced into socializing with each other, because economic relationships are just subsets of the dynamics of social ties. The concept of coercion isn't necessary to understand the basis of labor. 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.

If life has no meaning (and here I refer to salvific, objective meaning, not the created, subjective meaning of the existentialist)... — Thorongil

Well obviously life's meaning is subjective. It's for the person whose life it is.

I looked up "Salvific", and it means "Having the intent or power to save or redeem." That sounds like Biblical Literalist religion, which i don't subscribe to.

...but I have no idea what the subjective meaning of the Existentialists is.

The usual definition of Existentialism that I've seen is: The belief that existence precedes essence.

Because "existence" isn't metaphysically-defined, I have no idea what that definition means.

Merriam-Webster defines Existentialism as::

"A philosophical movement embracing diverse doctrines, but centering on an analysis of individual existence in an unfathomable universe, and the plight of the individual who must assume ultimate responsibility for acts of free will without any certain knowledge of what is right or wrong, or, good or bad."

First of all, that's really silly. How can (let alone "must") someone assume responsibility for a matter on which s/he doesn't (and presumably can't?) know what's right or wrong, good or bad?

Anyway, from those two definitions, I don't know what the Existentialist's subjective meaning of life is.

...then it doesn't matter whether one has children or not or whether the human race dies out or not. — Thorongil

Probably not, by any objective measure (but I don't know what objective measure there could be).

But if the human race dies out in a manner that results in physical suffering or undesired premature death of individuals, then that's subjectively undesirable for them (us).

...so let's not avoidably worsen global-warming.

And let's have in place surveillance for, and means to deflect, an asteroid or comet that is on a collision-course with the Earth.

But If the human race dies out because everyone becomes an antinatalist, who'd complain?

I have no problem with antinatalism, because there are too many people on the Earth.

Absent such meaning, there is nothing, no God

Atheism is a separate topic. As for keeping track, I don't subscribe to the over-anthropomorphic Biblical Literalist notion of God. Atheists are always talking about the anthropormorphic God of the Biblical Literalists.

and no law of karma, keeping track, as it were, of all the suffering of human beings and other creatures.

So, without an objective meaning for life (and I have no idea what that might be), there's nothing keeping track of all the suffering of human beings and other creatures. Because I don't know what that objective meaning would be anyway, or what form of keeping-track there would otherwises be, I can't disagree or agree with that statement.

There are organizations and NGOs that do keep track of suffering and harm to human beings and other creatures. They do so even if there's no objective meaning to life. Why should they? How about because they just feel like it, and they just don't like harm to living things (a feeling that they can have without life having an objective meaning).

But you're going a bit too far when you say that there's no law of Karma, without an objective meaning for life. The burden is on you to explain why what Hinduism and Buddhism say about Karma isn't valid if there's no objective meaning for life. If you harm people, that has subjective meaning for them. People don't like being harmed, regardless whether life has objective meaning.

In fact, actually, why must there be meaning anyway? People can do things that they like. Maybe many people would prefer to do so in a way that doesn't harm others. But if someone is harming others, then maybe those others will manage to avoid harm to themselves, individually &/or collectively.

But no need for meaning.

Suffering leaves no imprint in a meaningless world.

...but it can lead to prosecution and imprisonment of the perp.

...maybe thereby providing some deterrence.

Were the antinatalist's ultimate desire met, there would be no perspective available to anyone or anything to judge that the extinction of human beings was a good thing.

It is therefore no more or less good than their continued existence.[/quote]

That issue I'll leave to you and the antinatalists. But antinatalism is an undeniably good thing, because it could reduce population, on a more and more overcrowded planet.

Michael Ossipoff





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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?

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.