I was recently directed by an individual elsewhere on the internet to a philosophical paper written by Julio Cabrera, which aims to criticize the antinatalistic asymmetry of David Benatar.

At first, I was a bit skeptical, because there have been numerous attempts to attack Benatar's asymmetry, and all of them have failed miserably. But to my surprise, I found this paper to be extremely compelling, and I realized that many of the points that Cabrera brought up had been subconsciously mulling around in the back of my mind but I hadn't been able to piece the problems together in the way that Cabrera has done.

There are many points that Cabrera brings up. The most striking and important is that he claims that there is no asymmetry at all.

A refresh of Benatar's argument: pleasure for the existing is good, pain for the existing is bad, absence of pleasure for the non-existent is not-bad, and absence of pain for the non-existent is good. Therefore, it is claimed, birth is always a harm.

Cabrera finds fault, though, in Benatar's apparent use (or abuse) of counterfactuals (if...then). Benatar applies the counterfactual to the potential, non-existent person in the case of the absence of pain, but in the absence of pleasure, he does not apply the counterfactual. Instead, in the case of the absence of pleasure, he uses an "empty" placeholder for a potential, non-existent person.

It is this misuse of counterfactuals that makes Cabrera argue that there is actually no asymmetry at all, and that if Benatar is going to use counterfactuals for the absence of pain, he must use counterfactuals for the absence of pleasure as well. Therefore, the absence of pain is good, while the absence of pleasure is bad, and therefore, there is a symmetry instead of an asymmetry.

There are other points brought up in the paper that are not, in my opinion, as important, but are still legitimate issues against the antinatalism of Benatar. It should be said, however, that the author himself seems to be a kind of antinatalist himself.

Anyway, I thought this might make to be an interesting discussion, as there is currently a war going on in another thread about antinatalism and what better way to quench the fires than to spread them elsewhere...wait... :P