I think this is mostly down to interpretation. — Echarmion
I mean if you don't care about whether rules like "you cannot kill people" can be derived from more basic principles, that's fine. But it is kinda the point of moral philosophy. — Echarmion
I only really associate "conservative" with a political movement and an approach to social questions. In that sense it's very much associated with the root "to conserve". I don't know where you take your usage of the word from, but if that's the definition you wanna go with, I am not going to argue. — Echarmion
It's trivially true only if you suppose that people that don't exist nevertheless exist — Echarmion
The problem is that you then have to answer why we're not nuking the planet into oblivion. — Echarmion
And if we cannot divine what the child's feelings are about being forced to live, isn't that a great reason to refrain from forcing it to?
— Tzeentch
This implies that there is a child with feelings, floating around as a disembodied soul or something, before the decision to even have a child is made.
Otherwise, the sequence of events doesn't work out, because by the time there is a child, it's already living, and the relevant decision is in the past. — Echarmion
If you’re indifferent, then you don’t care enough either way to make the issue a moral one. — Pinprick
Let's say one lives in absolutely dire poverty and there is no doubt that any offspring one may bring forth will also lead a short and miserable life.
The line of reasoning you present would see no issue with birthing children in such conditions, since there's no individual whose well-being we need to take into account preceding the birth. — Tzeentch
If a baby is 99% sure to get tortured if born, we don't need it to be born to have torture, so that torture exists so that we can then say it is wrong. — schopenhauer1
Because that hurts people, and Antinatalists are striving to eradicate all suffering. I don't understand why people keep using this ridiculous argument. It's tiring. — khaled
That's just false.
Grass is greener than freedom. Because freedom has no color. — khaled
Then we arrive at the problem already presented: — Tzeentch
there needs to be an acceptance of the relativistic framework. — Isaac
There is. And I've repeatedly said there is. On multiple threads. — khaled
if I grew up in a neighbourhood where theft and murder are the norm, and I was reprimanded for not participating, I think most people would say that I do NOT have a moral duty to steal and murder. — khaled
How would one argue as a moral relativist in your book if "you wouldn't do X would you?" is somehow indicating moral naturalism. I would think a moral naturalist would say "You shouldn't do X". He won't ask what you think because that is irrelevant to him, within his framework he already knows he's right.
I don't think there is anything that implies that the speaker there is a moral naturalist. I think you have a bad habit of reading what you want into what others write. — khaled
Maybe despite being relativistic, I am trying to see whether or not there are people who share the same premises but don't end up with the same conclusion, and if so how they do it, just out of personal interest. — khaled
It's not avoided at all. I specifically mention unavoidable poverty. — Benkei
I'm not sure I see this as a problem. — Echarmion
It won't hurt if you use enough bombs. — Echarmion
Well then, nothing else needs to be said. Your argument ultimately rests on nonsense, in the most literal sense of the word. — Echarmion
...you imply there's a moral duty beyond that which any community merely 'think' is a moral duty. — Isaac
I think most people would say that I do NOT have a moral duty to steal and murder. — khaled
Anything which attempts to work forward from some premise to undermine an already held position is a form of moral realism. — Isaac
We also have a moral intuition that ending the human race would be wrong. — Isaac
It's disingenuous to keep switching as it suits your argument — Isaac
It is only the task of a moral realist to attempt to show one to e 'wrong' by use of the other. — Isaac
Your main problem is that you cannot compare the suffering of someone to the "suffering of nothing". Maybe that's true. But that would imply some nasty things I'll start with one. — khaled
The problem is simple. If one accepts the premise that children do not have a well-being to take into account before they are born, this implies that it is perfectly acceptable to have children even when one is fully aware that they are causing them a life-time of suffering.
To me this contradicts any conceivable notion of parenting and morality. — Tzeentch
Malicious genetic engineering is fine. Even if your next child would have been born healthy. Because there is no actual harm being done when you genetically engineer a child to be blind and deaf for example. There was not a child that was harmed, as once the child is born they are already blind and deaf, the relevant decision is in the past.
I am sure you don't agree. But how do you justify it? — khaled
Torture already exists. It's the individual child that does not. — Echarmion
This isn't the same argument though. This goes back to what I said earlier. You can avoid the problem of causality and attributing a will to nonexistence by committing to just eradicating suffering as a phenomenon. The problem is that you then have to answer why we're not nuking the planet into oblivion. — Echarmion
But then it's me who gets to judge, isn't it? — Echarmion
I do believe in future outcomes. The problem is that you want us to act as if the outcome has simultaneously happened and not happened. — Echarmion
Both these problems stem from looking at morality as a set of injunctions against specific outcomes, like a criminal law code listing a bunch of injuries you are not allowed to cause. And if a victim cannot be found and thus a prohibition not established, it then follows whatever you do is moral.
The alternative view is to ask what reasons we have for doing something — Echarmion
Creating suffering for the sake of suffering is not an acceptable motivation regardless of the outcome. It doesn't matter if I apply it by genetically engineering beings that suffer, or whether I punch my neighbor in the face for fun. — Echarmion
This is a straw man by the way. Nobody argues this. — Benkei
It doesn't logically follow from anything said and alluding to it like this as if it does makes a piss poor argument. — Benkei
Both these problems stem from looking at morality as a set of injunctions against specific outcomes, like a criminal law code listing a bunch of injuries you are not allowed to cause. And if a victim cannot be found and thus a prohibition not established, it then follows whatever you do is moral. — Echarmion
The alternative view is to ask what reasons we have for doing something, and whether those reasons are "good". Should I follow these reasons in other circumstance? Shoud everyone? Creating suffering for the sake of suffering is not an acceptable motivation regardless of the outcome. It doesn't matter if I apply it by genetically engineering beings that suffer, or whether I punch my neighbor in the face for fun. — Echarmion
The latter must include the former. When looking at reasons to do something, some of those reasons will be "bad" and therefore the action should not be done. For example malicious genetic engineering. I am asking why that is bad. — khaled
What is the reason that makes creating suffering acceptable in the case of having children then? — khaled
What I sought to point out is that your objection implies that actions that undermine the well-being of a future child cannot be considered wrong or immoral under your premise, which goes against all notions that I am able to conceive of what is considered "good". — Tzeentch
If you wish to shift morality from being about outcomes to being about intentions, I'll take the next step and state that "good" behavior requires both intention and outcome. — Tzeentch
Either way I do not see how this deals with the problem I have presented. — Tzeentch
Also, another thing to consider is there is a difference between starting existence and continuing it. As I said many times earlier, prior to birth, there is no person who could be harmed by not being born. — schopenhauer1
So how many times does consent and the individual matters do I have to say? How is nuking someone who already exists respecting the individual? Now that they exist, indeed they do have thoughts, desires, fears, preferences, etc. Ironically, this is back to making a decision for someone else again. — schopenhauer1
I don't see why you say that. We know suffering exists, with almost 100% certainty. We know of the varieties and kinds that could happen. We also know there is unknown sufferings we didn't even think of. All these things can be prevented. Doesn't seem hard to me. — schopenhauer1
Then it follows that necessarily there is also no person who could be harmed by being born. — Echarmion
You're ignoring the context of my comment. As I said over and over, you can either focus on consent, but then run into the problems discussed at length, or you focus on eliminating on suffeirng, but then you run into the question of why bother with consent if it's ultimately suffering we care about.
Both legs of the argument fail on their own terms. Stitching them together to form an inorganic whole doesn't help. — Echarmion
Sure they can be prevented. By nuking everyone, like I said. But you don't want to do that, because you care about consent. But when I bring up that consent cannot possibly apply, you go back and say that this doesn't matter because it's about preventing suffering, and so round and round we go.
You have chosen to use two fundamentally incompatible principles, and switch between them as the defense of your position requires. — Echarmion
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