Yes you can. There's a distinction to be drawn between 'Kant's ethics' and 'Kantian ethics'. I am not talking about Kant's particular view - this is not an attempt at Kant scholarship. I am not saying that Kant himself was an antinatalist.

By a Kantian ethics I mean one in which it is the nature of the act - as opposed to its actual consequences or the character of the agent who performs it - that is the focus, and additionally where consent plays a central role in determining the ethical quality of that act.

Well if you don't care, don't participate. And you can't refute an argument by being indignant about it.

How is that a false assumption? It's exceedingly obvious both as a matter of logic as well as general language use that only something that does exist can be affected. If you want to argue otherwise, the burden to establish that logic is on you. — Echarmion

Er, the person you will have created exists at the time you create them - and can thus be affected by the act of creation.

People - lots and lots of people - are grateful for having been created. Are they irrational? (No) If being created is not something that affects you, what are they grateful for?

Again, assume you know that any person you create will live a life of immediate and unending agony. If you create that person the first moment of pain negatively affects them, yes?

Imagine Jane knows that if she ingests a certain drug prior to conception, then any person that results will be deaf and blind and mentally retarded. She takes the drug. Has she negatively affected the person she creates? (Yes, obviously).

Presumably you would agree that killing someone affects them - yes? So if taking someone out of existence can affect them, then so too can bringing someone into existence.

But really this is beside the point. I mean, just imagine that those who procreate are not creating new persons but rather bringing into this realm persons who already exist in another. After all, that's possibly true. Well now even you would surely agree that procreative acts significantly affect someone without their consent, yes?

Now we do not know whether acts of procreation genuinely create a person who did not already exist or whether they force someone who already exists to live a life here. But it seems implausible to think that the morality of procreation hangs on which one of those possibilities is actual.

Why might that be? I suggest it is because either way, the act of procreation significantly affects someone without their prior consent and that is the morally relevant feature of such acts.

I do not understand your point. Yes, there are consequentialist arguments against procreation. But there are also deontological ones. The one I have presented here is squarely deontological.

Labels ultimately do not matter. But 'Kantian ethics' and 'Kant's ethics' are not the same, the former being far broader than the latter and not held hostage to the letter of what Kant's writings.

An argument, such as the one I have made here, that focuses squarely on the nature of the act rather than the character traits of the agent or the actual consequences of the act is deontological and, because it focusses on consent, is Kantian in spirit.

By a Kantian ethics I mean one in which it is the nature of the act - as opposed to its actual consequences or the character of the agent who performs it - that is the focus, and additionally where consent plays a central role in determining the ethical quality of that act. — Bartricks

Unfortunately, this isn't an accurate summary of Kantian ethics.

Er, the person you will have created exists at the time you create them - and can thus be affected by the act of creation. — Bartricks

Clearly they do not. The word "creation" refers to bringing something into existence. If whatever we are talking about already exists, we are not creating it.

You can even see that you are contradicting yourself by looking at the grammatical construction of this sentence. Things you will have done cannot be already done.

Again, assume you know that any person you create will live a life of immediate and unending agony. If you create that person the first moment of pain negatively affects them, yes? — Bartricks

But only because they already exist at the first moment of pain.

Imagine Jane knows that if she ingests a certain drug prior to conception, then any person that results will be deaf and blind and mentally retarded. She takes the drug. Has she negatively affected the person she creates? (Yes, obviously). — Bartricks

But the person would - could - never have been anything other than deaf, blind and retarded. How can we establish this is a negative affect without a comparable alternative?

Presumably you would agree that killing someone affects them - yes? So if taking someone out of existence can affect them, then so too can bringing someone into existence. — Bartricks

This does not follow. The two statements have no logical connection.

But really this is beside the point. I mean, just imagine that those who procreate are not creating new persons but rather bringing into this realm persons who already exist in another. After all, that's possibly true. Well now even you would surely agree that procreative acts significantly affect someone without their consent, yes? — Bartricks

Sure. If we're baselessly speculating, that's possible.

Now we do not know whether acts of procreation genuinely create a person who did not already exist or whether they force someone who already exists to live a life here. But it seems implausible to think that the morality of procreation hangs on which one of those possibilities is actual. — Bartricks

So, if we have to consider all possible options, what about the possibility that the souls, before they are incarnated, exist in a living hell much worse than this life, and all desperately wish to be born? Or maybe only the souls that press the big red button of consent are incarnated?

↪boethius I do not understand your point. Yes, there are consequentialist arguments against procreation. But there are also deontological ones. The one I have presented here is squarely deontological. — Bartricks

My point is that that Kantianism is not synonymous with deontological ethics. Your title is "The Kantian case against procreation".

If Kantians here on the forum let is slide, people may assume anti-natalism is easily derivable from Kantianism. I'm not saying it's impossible to make such an argument, but I'm pointing out you haven't provided one which you yourself admit:

Labels ultimately do not matter. But 'Kantian ethics' and 'Kant's ethics' are not the same, the former being far broader than the latter and not held hostage to the letter of what Kant's writings. — Bartricks

Well labels do matter, else you wouldn't try to make the distinction between 'Kantian ethics' and 'Kant's ethics' in the next sentence. And indeed all words are labels for things, be those things objects or concepts or cultural processes of some sort. "Labels" don't matter is an adage usually about labeling people and then assuming those labels constrain those people's actions, beliefs or potential for growth. A pharmacists would certainly defend correct labeling of things in their context.

As for the content, I agree Kantian Ethics is not synonymous with Kant's ethics, which is why my response focused on core principles of Kantianism, not simply pointing out that if Kant was an anti-natalist he probably would have said so.

Kant places fundamental value, more fundamental than the categorical imperative, on one's own value as well as society as a body politic. The direct corollary to that is that propagating society through births is also good (though not obligatory as that would turn people into the ends to the means of propagating society: i.e. it's not an obligation but it's not immoral to have babies, nor separate from circumstances).

I don't see anyway to go from Kants core principles to anti-natalism, and since that's not even your objective I'm just clarifying to the people unfamiliar with Kant that the title of your post does not match the argument you are trying to make. It's reasonable people dropping in here maybe expecting Kantians to weigh in on your title, so I am contributing this.

For your argument in terms of a different, not-Kantian, deolontologic argument for anti-natalism, I don't have any major contribution that other posters don't already seem to be getting at; but if I see something amiss I will contribute.

If you ask my own position, it would be the Kantian argument of "babies sometimes" outlined above; the consent argument (again which is not a core Kantian principle, as civil society, which Kant is for, does things people don't consent to all the time; is the defining feature of government), other posters seem to be adequately addressing.

Yes it is. Like I say, it is common to draw a distinction between 'Kant's ethics' and 'Kantian ethics'. The latter is a broad term reserved for any kind of deontological view that emphasises - a la Kant - the centrality of the agent's autonomy in determining the morality of an act. So, for example, Rawls and Regan would be described as Kantians, even though their substantial views are not identical with Kant's ethics.
Anyway, I do not want to get embroiled in a pointless debate over labels. I have not incorrectly used the term 'Kantian' in referring to the argument I am focusing on in that way. But by all means put whatever label you like on the argument - called it 'Terry' if you like - just focus on it.

I have noticed that you like to throw the word 'logical' into what you say a lot. Yet you seem to mean by 'logic' 'what Echarmion says'. Why not express yourself in logical arguments?

If you cannot affect someone by creating them, kindly explain how you can affect someone by destroying them - and explain in a way that will not allow me to say the same about creating someone or that will not just involve making some arbitrary stipulation that has no support from reason.

As you think you like logic, here's an argument and you tell me which premise you dispute, or the first premise you dispute if you dispute more than one of them.

1. It is default wrong to do something to someone that significantly affects them without their prior consent and wrong because it significantly affects them without their prior consent.
2. If people exist before they are born into this world, then procreative acts significantly affect others without their prior consent.
3. Therefore, if people exist before they are born into this world, then procreative acts are default wrong and default wrong because they significant affect others without their prior consent.

I am just trying to get clear whether, for you, the success or otherwise of the Kantian argument I have made depends crucially on whether people pre-exist.

At what point have I said that Kantian ethics and deontological ethics are one and the same? A Kantian ethics will be deontological, but a deontological ethics will not necessarily be Kantian. Where, exactly, have I said anything at all to suggest otherwise?

I should also say that you seem fundamentally to misunderstand Kant's ethics - so, you say that Kant places supreme value on one's own value and that it somehow follows from this that therefore Kant would be in favour of promoting the existence of more people.
No. Kant is all about respect - respecting that which has value, rather than 'promoting' that which has value.
For example, Kant is all about respecting free will. How does one do that? Well, not by creating lots and lots of creatures who have free will. That's what a consequentialist would do - they figure out what's valuable and then seek to create as much of it as possible. That's precisely NOT what a Kantian - or Kant - would do. You respect the intrinsic value of free will by allowing others to make their own decisions. What your free will allows you to do - make decisions - you should allow others to do with theirs, otherwise you're not respecting their free will because you're acting as if your free will is special.

So, the fact you think that, having established that X is valuable, Kant would then proceed to promote that value shows that you don't understand Kant's view, or a Kantian view.

Anyway, let's put all this blither blather to one side and just focus on the actual argument. I mean that was the point of this threat - to focus on the argument, not discuss what label to put on it or what some long dead Prussian might have thought about it.

At what point have I said that Kantian ethics and deontological ethics are one and the same? — Bartricks

Your title is "The Kantian case against procreation" then you go on to say that you don't really mean to bring Kant into it, just want to discuss a deontological argument you propose. I have no problem with this, but it seems reasonable for Kantians to point out the argument doesn't seem to follow from Kant's framework and outline the reasons why (for people interested in Kantianism who click on a thread starting with the word Kant).

Stop label munching and address the argument itself. Just know that I am not misusing the term 'Kantian', whatever you may think about it.

I should also say that you seem fundamentally to misunderstand Kant's ethics - so, you say that Kant places supreme value on one's own value and that it somehow follows from this that therefore Kant would be in favour of promoting the existence of more people. — Bartricks

My argument of why it's difficult to derive anti-natalism form Kant's ethics was an outline, to backup my claim that your OP maybe a deontological argument for anti-natalism but does not seem to me Kantian. You provide no reason in your OP of why your title is an accurate description and then clarified you just want to discuss your argument as it is, that the label Kantian doesn't matter to you, which is fine, I just don't have much to add on-top of other posters who have already spoke.

Now it seems the label Kantian does seem to matter to you, and discussing that is fine too, it seems relevant to the title of the thread.

I do not say Kant places "supreme value" on the individual, but fundamental value.

This fundamental value is posited in order to assign value to thoughts and conclusions. If I have no value, my conclusion that I have no value has no value; which is a problematic starting point for thought and action.

Kant also places fundamental value on civil society, that duties and justice depend on participation in civil society. If one were to "opt-out" of civil society, Kant basically accepts that "law of the jungle" arguments would be valid, and so places a moral obligation to enter civil society relation if one can, in order for right action to be determinable.

Kant doesn't necessarily say these are the "supreme good" but they are good things in Kant's system.

The typical problem of anti-natalism in Kant's system is that it implies oneself and society should not exist, this undermines the above core principles. Oneself and others have value in Kantianism, "one does not wish for oneself to not-exist". In other words the principle is not universalizable, one wishes ones own existence despite one not "deciding to be born", and therefore one gives the benefit of the doubt that other people who likewise did not "decide to be born" also merit existence.

These value argument about oneself and society precede arguments of "right action" in civil society, which depends a lot, as you say, on respecting everyone's free will and as ends in themselves.

Keep in mind also that Kant is a deist, and holds typical views that creation has meaning and humans are created from a divine source, so "being born" is perhaps mysterious but isn't bad.

Now, you can take away Kant's deism, take away assigning value to society, take away assigning value to civil society, take away assigning value to oneself, and with these qualification and still call such as system Kantian. If you make it clear you're not interested in these aspects of Kantianism, ok (if you explain your label, I have no problem discussing henceforth with that explanation for this discussion).

Or, you can attempt to show that anti-natalism follows reasonably from deism, assigning value to oneself and one's birth, assigning value to society and it's continuation (up until now at least).

But I have not seen such an argument; your argument seems very focused on consent, which plays a part in many moral and legal questions in Kantianism but isn't fundamental; Kant does not try to derive all moral questions from consent. Maybe other Kantians view things differently, or you are able to cite any of Kant's writing that would lead us to take consent as fundamental in Kantianism.

As a clarifying note, free will and consent are not the same thing. There's lot's of things civil society allows and other people do generally that I don't consent to, and there's no argument in Kantianism that my consent is required; sometimes consent is relevant and sometimes not.

So, the fact you think that, having established that X is valuable, Kant would then proceed to promote that value shows that you don't understand Kant's view, or a Kantian view. — Bartricks

The concept of value doesn't somehow disappear in Kantianism or deontological system generally. When Kant says "treat others as ends in themselves, not means to an end" this is assigning value to individuals beyond the value they can contribute to some other goal. Individuals have value and thus should be respected. Kant values a lot of things.

Kant values justice and then promotes justice, maximum justice. Kant values truth and promotes more truth being discovered and being available to people, maximum truth (too maximum truth for some people, that this is the usual criticism of Kant). Kant values the individual's moral autonomy and promotes respect for individual moral autonomy. Kant value society and promotes the continuation of society.

Kantians generally don't view consequentialists as doing something fundamentally different in moral philosophy, just doing it in a seemingly clever but actually stupid way. It seems clever to talk of "happiness maximization", but if this concept can't be actually be constructed without reference to the good (and no consequentialist, utilitarian, emotivist has ever done so), then you require a deontology to input into your "happiness maximizing" scheme: the same moral philosophy would result (if one wasn't so happy to be doing economics in the interim that the scheme actually gets completed someday). That consequentialists require determining what is valuable does not somehow exclude deontologists, much less Kantians, from also determining what has value.

As mentioned, having "as many babies as possible" is not universalizable as this turns people into the means to the end of having babies, but neither is "no babies including myself should ever be born" without collapsing the basic premise of Kantianism (that oneself has value, enough to reason and draw meaningful conclusions and the capacity for right action), so the straightforward Kantian conclusion is "babies sometimes". I do not see any counter argument to this in what you have written.

Thesis:
A.) “....Kant is all about respect - respecting that which has value, rather than 'promoting' that which has value. For example, Kant is all about respecting free will...”

B.) “......You respect the intrinsic value of free will...”

Antithesis, and for the correcting of the record:

A1.) “...The immediate determination of the will by the law, and the consciousness of this, is called respect...”

A2.) “...The object of respect is the law only, and that the law which we impose on ourselves and yet recognise as necessary in itself...”

B.) “...There is, however, something so strange in this idea of the absolute value of the mere will, in which no account is taken of its utility, that notwithstanding the thorough assent of even common reason to the idea, yet a suspicion must arise that it may perhaps really be the product of mere high-flown fancy...”

Like bringing an antithesis battleship to a thesis knife fight.

Off topic. This is not about what Kant did or did not say. This is about whether procreation is wrong due to the fact that it is an act that affects another in a very substantial way without their prior consent. An issue that, I believe, you have previously expressed your total lack of interest in.
So you're bringing a picnic to a knife fight.

Yes, it is, because what you said he said, or what you think he means by what he said, is wrong.

I don’t care about your procreation foolishness; I care about butchering Kant by associating him with it.
——————

act that affects another — Bartricks

I am under the impression by another, you mean an unborn human person. Is that correct?
And you’re implying Kantian ethics either supports or contributes to that argument, Correct?

No I didn't. I don't think you understand this thread or much of anything really - certainly not Kant.

There is no other person that the people procreating are doing anything to. — Terrapin Station

You're confusing, I think, the act with the purpose of the act.

I don't think you understand this thread (...) - certainly not Kant. — Bartricks

You might be right. But I’m correcting what you think Kant means, using Kant’s words for what he means, and they are not the same.

I didn't say anything about what Kant means - look, you eat your picnic, I want a knife fight.

As said before, this thread is about whether procreation is default wrong due to blah did blah consent (can't be bothered to keep writing it). It is not about Kant.

This is not about what Kant did or did not say. This is about whether procreation is wrong due to the fact that it is an act that affects another in a very substantial way without their prior consent. — Bartricks

Everything affects everyone, usually without their consent. Therefore no one should be, and of those that are, they should not do anything, except - oops - that effects people too. Yes? No? Or do you have hidden qualifiers such that some things that some people do effect some people in some way, and so on?

not everything affects everyone, so that's false, and not everything that affects others affects them without their consent, so that's false too.
But anyway, the claim is that if an act affects someone else in a significant way then it is default wrong if the affected person has not consented to be affected in that way.
So not all acts that affect others without their consent are wrong, because some affect others in utterly trivial ways. And not all acts that affect others in significant ways without their consent are wrong either, because in many such cases there are other considerations in play that either cancel the wrongness that such acts would otherwise have, or countervail it with greater rightness.
For example, it seems self-evident that, again by default, we do not have obligations to do things we are incapable of doing. If, as you falsely claim, everything I do will inevitably affect another person without their consent, then this does not give rise to any obligation for me not to do anything, for that is not something I am capable of doing.

But anyway, the claim is that if an act affects someone else in a significant way then it is default wrong if the affected person has not consented to be affected in that way. — Bartricks

This is consequentialism not deontology. You are deeply confused it seems.

No, for although I believe we all existed prior to being born here, I think that is irrelevant. For even if the procreative acts that brought us here also created us, they still affected us.

Now, do you believe that it is default wrong to do something that will significantly affect another person without their consent?
If your answer is 'no' then THAT will be our focus. If your answer is 'yes', correct - you get a Kant-shaped cookie

No, it really isn't and you're the confused one. If you've tried to conceive a child then you're as bad as someone who actually did and you're being flung to the same circle of hell.

Your arguments are nothing more than...
cheap bar tricks, in other words the sophistry of the barrister.

Wrong again. As I made clear by saying that I was making a Kantian argument, the focus is on the nature of the act, not its real-world consequences (ethically significant though they are).
If my case is a sophistry, show me.

And since when do barristers play bar tricks?

the focus is on the nature of the act, not its real-world consequences — Bartricks

if an act affects someone else in a significant way then it is default wrong if the affected person has not consented to be affected in that way. — Bartricks

So being affected in a significant way without consent to it is not a real-world consequence?

Kant would not say raping someone is wrong because they suffer pain on account of the act, but because it is wrong to treat another as merely a means to an end...i.e. as merely a means to gratify one's own desires.