Thinking about it here, what is lurking behind my objection to this reasoning seems to be Hume's guillotine: that one cannot derive an ought from an is. So my objection is that one cannot go from the claim "being is intrinsically good" to "therefore, one ought to procreate." — Thorongil
This is indeed a disagreement. I would reverse this order — Thorongil
Well, I disagree, so I don't see this conversation going any further. — Thorongil
Why have children? "Because I want to be a more selfless person." That is inherently selfish. — Thorongil
Word play. My argument was that selfhood is fluid. So we can (socially) construct a contracted definition of the self - as a solipsistic soul stuff. Or we can recognise that selves arise contextually to serve purposes, and so a social-level of self is also a thing. — apokrisis
The objection I will raise here is that you are making it seem as though because the self is socially constructed, it must be within our control to destroy this same self. — darthbarracuda
And so the locus of "the self" is a fluid thing - one poised between two complementary directions. And the optimal balance is a constant negotiation - one we are expected to actively partake in, especially in a civilised society. We are meant to be free to choose whether to be more competitive or more co-operative, more differentiated or more integrated, as best suits the prevailing context or situation.
That is what we want people in general to be good at doing. Striking the healthy balance which sees the whole flourish. — apokrisis
You sneak in a lot of YOUR preferences as what OUGHT to be. — schopenhauer1
Anyways, I'm going off the main point which is again, just because identity may be created from group dynamics, does not negate the fact that someone can evaluate LIFE (in total) and deem it an existence that they do not want a future person to have to experience. — schopenhauer1
And I already told you my ethic which is that if life has structural and contingent suffering — schopenhauer1
So this is the science-based framework through which I would view the "philosophy" of antinatalism.
Antinatalism depends on a theistic/romantic metaphysical model - one that treats mind or identity as something inherent to a body. A soul stuff of some sort or other. But I am arguing from the point of view where the mind or the self is emergent from the pragmatism of a modelling relation. — apokrisis
Antinatalism is instead about curling up in the corner and wishing you were dead. It is giving up on the possibility of "controlling things" - or rather, being a properly active part of the negotiations always going on "out there" in the real social world. — apokrisis
Yet there is a difference between science of life and life as it is lived. — darthbarracuda
You say the self is fluid, but the self we value as a self is precisely the differentiating self. — darthbarracuda
And so similarly we cannot help but see the self as a soul-like resident of the body. — darthbarracuda
To say the antinatalist point doesn't work because soul-like selves do not exist in reality is akin to saying the antinatalist point doesn't work because there is no such thing as free will, or God, or whatever, and this risks throwing the baby out with the bathwater. — darthbarracuda
Antinatalism is about taking control of one of the few things we actually do have control over. — darthbarracuda
Life is not "working". It's not up to standards and it never will be. — darthbarracuda
The pragmatic solution is to conserve what resources you do have and stop wasting them on future progeny. — darthbarracuda
Why does that have to be so? I absolutely don't see it that way. A rational science like positive psychology certainly wouldn't teach things to be that way.
It is only if you can't escape the clutches of literature and religion that you would be trapped in such a myopic view of personal identity. — apokrisis
So just note how you choose the third person voice. You already presume that objectively, for any possible person, life doesn't work. Thus you hope to win by rhetoric an argument you can't sustain by logic. — apokrisis
I can see that you disagree. And that you failed to provide a counter-argument. So yes, you have bowed out as far as any conversation goes. — apokrisis
Alongside positive psychology, — darthbarracuda
But those don't make people feel good. — darthbarracuda
Literature and, to an extent, religion, are treasures that are manifestations of hopes and dreams of real human beings. They ought to be taken as testimonies of the experiences of real people, not dismissed as being somehow fake or opaque. — darthbarracuda
First off, antinatalism need not depend on the claim that everyone's lives suck. I don't know why you keep bringing this up... — darthbarracuda
That being said, I do think even the best lives are still quite atrocious. — darthbarracuda
Any counterargument to this will require some form of justification of this reality - basically you need to provide a theodicy. — darthbarracuda
[....fades and crackles because we're still in the conceptual safe space] — csalisbury
tldr: get over it, you were already born. don't have kids if you don't want to. Find something else to focus on, or you'll never feel better — csalisbury
Then you have missed the point of philosophical pessimism.
There is a – let us say – a machine. It evolved itself (I am severely scientific) out of a chaos of scraps of iron and behold! – it knits. I am horrified at the horrible work and stand appalled. I feel it ought to embroider – but it goes on knitting. You come and say: “this is all right; it’s only a question of the right kind of oil. Let us use this – for instance – celestial oil and the machine shall embroider a most beautiful design in purple and gold”. Will it? Alas no. You cannot by any special lubrication make embroidery with a knitting machine. And the most withering thought is that the infamous thing has made itself; made itself without thought, without conscience, without foresight, without eyes, without heart. It is a tragic accident – and it has happened. You can’t interfere with it. The last drop of bitterness is in the suspicion that you can’t even smash it. In virtue of that truth one and immortal which lurks in the force that made it spring into existence it is what it is – and it is indestructible!
It knits us in and it knits us out. It has knitted time space, pain, death, corruption, despair and all the illusions – and nothing matters.” — Conrad
But spot the performative contradiction.
And, having spotted it --- what is the significance of the contradiction?
(hint: phil pess isn't doing what it needs to pretend its doing) — csalisbury
What are the reasons birds want to fly, fish want to swim, dogs want lick their own balls, my mouse nibbling on my shoes and humans want to procreate? The biological answer is not going to satisfy you. You are looking for a spiritual answer -- or basically a philosophical answer. You don't want an explanation, you want a justification. A philosophical normative case to procreate. — Kitty
But I do not foresee a fruitful discussion based on the premises you have provided. All "Reasons" can be taken down as mere rationalisations. For example, even if you accept my first sentence, you could still reject the notion of human flourishing, by questioning the idea as to why we would want humans to flourish in a non-selfish way beyond any subjective rhetoric. As long as the context of the debate remains in the restrictions of subjectivity, the result of the discussion will be inevitable, namely nihilism. — Kitty
Alongside? In what sense are they treated with the same scientific/therapeutic respect? — apokrisis
Ah. So they are better because they don't paper over the essential badness of existence! For people in a hole, they are a help to dig the hole deeper. — apokrisis
Probably because antinatalists keep mentioning it. Although I agree, you might take the more interesting position that basically life is 99% OK for you, but the 1% that sucks then makes the very idea of living an intolerable burden. Even the possibility of dying slowly in a mangled car wreck means an otherwise cheerful life is a metaphysical no no. — apokrisis
Well I can't get over the hopeless irrationality of a view that says a 99% full glass is still a cosmic tragedy in its 1% emptiness.
I mean I scrapped a knuckle doing some gardening this afternoon. It bled a little.
Even worse, the fibre cable installers cut through the underlawn irrigation despite me telling them exactly where to look out for it. Oh, the agony.
And yet I don't regret having been born. It's been another great day. — apokrisis
I accept one part of antinatalism. We ought to consider long and hard about bringing kids into the world. The future could be quite dicey.
But then that just commits you morally to doing the best that you can for them if you do. There is nothing particular to fear about life as a journey in itself. The variety of that journey, the challenges it presents, is pretty much the point.
To build a cult around persuading everyone to stop having kids seems weird. Frankly it is weird. It has value only as an illustration of what bad philosophy looks like. — apokrisis
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