This is nuts as there is hardly a crying need to protect the human population from the dangers of cultish antinatalists.
With 2.5 billion people in 1950, 6.5 billion in 2005, and 9 billion by 2050, there just ain't a problem in that regard.
Antinatalism is as meaningless as a possum throwing itself under a passing truck and trailer. — apokrisis
More crazy arithmetic.
The way societies actually think is that small global changes can improve the average lot of the many. You only have to focus on shifting the mean a small degree to make a large difference for the many. — apokrisis
Yeah. But you hardly invented this idea yourself, did you? You are simply repeating what you heard others say. So you speak for a familiar vein of thought - the romanticism that became existentialism that has become pessimism. And you are looking around on this forum for moral support for this stance, along with seeking to "other" me so as to confirm the social validity of that way of thinking.
You can't escape the very game you pretend to reject. If you could, you wouldn't even bother coming on a forum like this to argue with someone like me. — apokrisis
I think you misread what I was trying to say. I'm saying that you tend to use the appeal to majority as a way to substantiate your point- because it must be "true" in its historical development of the group to be considered appealing. However, even if this is the case, I doubt many want to hear that they are solely existing to keep institutions alive simply because that is what the institution wants. Whether its true or not, the lack of autonomy that implies is as unappealing to most individuals as the fact that by preventing the creation of another person, they are preventing the harm that would be experienced by that person. Both may be true (and so I am even granting you the point for argument's sake), but both are unpopular. Thus, as I said, your point could make sense but it does so in a way that does not pass your own test which again, is an appeal to the majority. — schopenhauer1
it's a bit unfair to paint me as an advocate of factory farming don't you think? — apokrisis
Thus, as I said, your point could make sense but it does so in a way that does not pass your own test which again, is an appeal to the majority. — schopenhauer1
You fail to understand that our species' ability to self-reflect means that we not only follow the group-individual dynamics that you describe, but we can make judgements, evaluations, and conclusions on our species' activity as we are participating in them. — schopenhauer1
We have this general-processor brain capable of not only solving immediate problems but understanding our very own human condition. — schopenhauer1
the individual point of view is still unique to each individual. — schopenhauer1
This group dynamic thing you promote has to work on statistics rather than necessities. — schopenhauer1
On average it has to work well for most people, but it does not have to work for everyone. — schopenhauer1
A cursory glance at culture reveals a deep sense of cynicism about life. — darthbarracuda
The reason they are popular is because they speak a bit of refreshing truth in a sea of madness. — darthbarracuda
Individual lives tend to look almost like an MMO — darthbarracuda
To talk about the virtues of veganism or antinatalism is just pointless displacement activity. It is to accept the disconnect between the social and individual sphere which modern civilisation is using to do its thing. It is to exist in a world that is actually eating ever greater quantities of meat and breeding with exponential zest, and simply want to do "the opposite" without actually dealing with the core mythology that makes that society what it is. — apokrisis
The fact is that entropification is natural. — apokrisis
That is what life produces in copious amounts: irony, the comedic aspect of tragedy. — darthbarracuda
In terms of postmodernity, consumer culture has been seen as predicated on the narcissism of small differences to achieve a superficial sense of one's own uniqueness, an ersatz sense of otherness which is only a mask for an underlying uniformity and sameness.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narcissism_of_small_differences
The Wisdom of Silenus would have been the True Detective of ancient Greece. — darthbarracuda
You can talk of entropy production but life adds such insignificant amount of entropy to the overall state of the universe that this makes it rather unimportant.... Where there is sentient life, there is irony. — darthbarracuda
Life is an accident, it's a thing that just "happened". We shouldn't expect it to be purpose-filled and comfortable. — darthbarracuda
Veganism was practiced thousands of years ago — darthbarracuda
I enjoyed True Detective (the first one at least) at the level of well-acted murder porn. But let's not pretend it had any philosophical merit. Or even artistic merit. It was a soap with glossy pretensions. — apokrisis
Humans are warming a whole planet. That's quite impressive historically speaking. — apokrisis
It takes a gallon of petrol to produce a modern cheeseburger. A gallon of petrol represents the geologically-reduced remnants of 98 tons of ancient planktonic biomass dug out of a deep hole. — apokrisis
So to the degree that irony exists, it is evidence of the value we all place on a capacity to exert social control. Laughter is the clever way we now draw sharp boundaries so as to define a group identity - even when that laughter is aimed at the very fact that this is the kind of social trick we are always pulling, as in a very fine comedy like the Life of Brian. — apokrisis
For something so accidental, life managed to happen rather easily. It appeared pretty much immediately once the biophysics allowed the semiotic phase transition involved. So from a biological perspective, it is about as "accidental" as steam condensing to water once the temperature has sufficiently cooled. — apokrisis
If we are going to talk about purpose, then it doesn't seem a problem to me that that is only meaningful in an ultimately thermodynamic sense. I'm all about the naturalism. — apokrisis
As for comfort, who ordered that? Thermodynamics justifies talk about balance or equilibrium. And you need two to tango. So if there is satisfaction, there must be unease. If there is comfort, there must be striving. It's yin and yang. Your monotonic notions have no value in nature. — apokrisis
So should I be a vegan because I believe animals have souls and in the truth of reincarnation? — apokrisis
Cannibalism was practiced until a few hundred years ago. And with a similar theistic logic. You ate the dead so as to make something of them also something of yourself. — apokrisis
So let's stop pretending that there is a fixed morality at work here. Rationality is not enough as a guide to what is right. You also need an accurate empirical picture from which to draw those rational conclusions. — apokrisis
And this is what I've been saying you lack. You just make up the facts to fit the particular cultural prejudices which are symptomatic of your cultural miillieu. You have picked up various ideas that are fashionable for the moment and sticking to them like glue. — apokrisis
That is my position on this: speciesism is wrong and should be abolished in the same way racism, sexism, and homophobia have/should be. It is inconsistent to support the abolishment of the latter while ignoring the former. — darthbarracuda
Has anyone actually disagreed with this position in this thread? — zookeeper
Except that it hasn't done any such thing. 99.9% of the species that have existed on Earth are now extinct and that ratio will at best remain constant although as nature has failed to find a predator to keep the human species which is doing a bang up job of exhausting its food sources that's pretty unlikely. — Barry Etheridge
The most important aspect of life is competition. Without it life would never evolve into the variety of forms and behaviors that we see today. — Harry Hindu — Harry Hindu
Somebody's been drinking a little too heavily at the Dawkins trough. Symbiotic and co-operative relationships between species are far more effective at preserving diversity than competition. Competition, by definition, results in a winner and a lot of losers. Co-operation results in a lot of winners. Evolutionary theory tends to fixate on higher order animals as single organisms when in fact they are a co-operative colonies of thousands of species constantly constantly interacting with thousands of other such colonies. — Barry Etheridge
'...it's a bit unfair to paint me as an advocate of factory farming don't you think? — apokrisis'
I'm afraid that crusaders in this field tend to have little time for fairness. — Barry Etheridge
You've avoided any real response so I'll only repeat that pessimism is a cliche - the latest reincarnation of romanticism - and not an interesting philosophical analysis. It finds only what it already presumes. — apokrisis
Yes, of course.
Has anyone actually disagreed with this position in this thread? There's big piles of seemingly dissenting words but they all seem to be about metaethics. — zookeeper
I'm still waiting for a decent argument against the OP that doesn't reek of subjugation and question-begging naturalistic fallacy bullshit. — darthbarracuda
For example, if as you say empathy is the starting point, and if it's immoral to experiment on things with which you empathise, then if you empathise with humans but not with non-human animals then it's immoral to experiment on humans but not immoral to experiment on non-human animals." — Michael
We can see how rights are applied to humans that are explicitly non-rational, like toddlers, or the mentally disabled. We can see how non-human animals are sentient. We can notice how our empathy is inherently tribe-like. And we can piece these together to come to the conclusion that our application of rights is completely arbitrary — darthbarracuda
1.) The ability to suffer is a prime candidate for ethical priority (plausible)
2.) Non-human animals can suffer (highly likely)
3.) Non-human animals therefore have ethical priority (from 1 and 2)
It's only arbitrary if sentience is the only relevant factor. Given that we also give rights to the dead would suggest that this isn't the case. Rather it seems that humanity is a relevant factor. And given that non-human animals aren't human, it's not inconsistent to not give them the same rights as us. — Michael
I don't quite understand the implication of this. What exact rights are you proposing we give to non-human animals? The right to marriage and to run for President? What does treating animals with equality actually entail? — Michael
Yet, as I have argued, there are no constraints that aren't arbitrary, contradictory, or irrational. — darthbarracuda
Ancestor worship is irrational, the deceased are no more and cannot be harmed. — darthbarracuda
Administering rights to humans but not to non-human animals requires a justification, which will take the form of an ethical constraint. Yet, as I have argued, there are no constraints that aren't arbitrary, contradictory, or irrational.
Rather, equality means equal treatment - if we treat humans with respect, then we ought to treat animals with respect. If we wouldn't murder a human, then we ought not murder an animal. If we wouldn't enslave a human (anymore at least...), then we ought not enslave an animal.
So? Clearly our moral considerations do not just take into account harm done, which is exactly why it is not sufficient to argue that animals ought be treated with equality simply because they can be harmed. — Michael
Administering rights at all requires justification (if it requires justification at all). And it might be that part of the justification for administering rights to humans is that they are human – i.e. humans have rights not because they can suffer but because they are human – and given that non-human animals are not human it is not arbitrary, contradictory, or irrational to administer rights to humans but not to non-human animals. — Michael
I'm guessing the implicit premise is "we ought not kill things which can suffer". Clearly this isn't a premise that many agree with. — Michael
Yet we can refine our moral considerations and reject the notions of common sense morality that make no sense. — darthbarracuda
But why should we limit these rights to only humans? As I've shown there's really no justification to not give these rights to non-human animals. — darthbarracuda
It says something about the arbitrariness of common-sense morality when we look at how a hunter might own a pet dog to help sniff out the game, and has an emotional connection to this animal and cares about its welfare, while simultaneously failing to attribute these same rights to the elk it murders. It's cherry-picking bullshit, through and through.
What do you mean by it not making sense? — Michael
Why limit rights to only those things which can suffer? And why do we need justification to not give them rights? — Michael
Why must our application of moral rights not be arbitrary? If I choose to give some people cake but not others then I'm being arbitrary. Am I obligated to give everyone else cake? Of course not. So that we choose to give some things rights but not others is arbitrary. Are we obligated to give everything else rights? Prima facie, no. A case needs to be made for other things deserving rights. And maybe non-human animals don't deserve the same rights as us, either because they can't suffer or because a capacity to suffer is not sufficient. — Michael
In order to argue against my claim, then, you will need to argue that equality shouldn't be applied universally (and thus not be equality in any meaningful sense), and that suffering is not the only ethically important notion - and from my view, the former would depend on arbitrary moral constraints, and the latter fails to fulfill the open-ended question. — darthbarracuda
If animals, for instance, can't imagine their own extinction by death and so experience existential dread, then do we get to take that distinction into account, or not? — apokrisis
You are taking an all or nothing approach to sentience. And where are the facts that would justify such an arbitrary stance on your part? — apokrisis
I am coming from a perspective that affirms the concept of equality and the ethical importance of suffering. In order to argue against my claim, then, you will need to argue that equality shouldn't be applied universally (and thus not be equality in any meaningful sense), and that suffering is not the only ethically important notion - and from my view, the former would depend on arbitrary moral constraints, and the latter fails to fulfill the open-ended question. — darthbarracuda
In any case the murder of a non-human sentient would be similar to the murder of a human — darthbarracuda
I mean that it is not consistent or rational. — darthbarracuda
Well, because having a feeling mind carries with it certain liabilities, like the capacity to suffer. And I see no good reason to posit alternative capacities that makes something worthy of ethical consideration.
I am coming from a perspective that affirms the concept of equality and the ethical importance of suffering. In order to argue against my claim, then, you will need to argue that equality shouldn't be applied universally (and thus not be equality in any meaningful sense), and that suffering is not the only ethically important notion - and from my view, the former would depend on arbitrary moral constraints, and the latter fails to fulfill the open-ended question.
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