Because it's a foregone conclusion you are always going to unintentionally cause some harm once born. Try your best, but the outcomes simply won't pan out. Once born into existence, compromises are necessary, and those compromises do indeed lead to harm. — schopenhauer1
The point was that your idea seems cynical as well, "No pain, no gain".. which is essentially what it amounts to when you put anything other than consideration of someone else's harm/suffering/negative outcomes in a decision that affects them. — schopenhauer1
Ironically, since procreation is something that is subjected from an outside force, your maxim might be used against yourself. The only move you can make here is to do the usual, "But no one exists prior", — schopenhauer1
yet this doesn't negate that an outside force will affect someone. — schopenhauer1
It's like saying if someone decided to immediately punch the new person in the face once born, that this is okay, as it was pre-planned (before there was a person with a "will") :roll:. — schopenhauer1
If you knew the person whose life you save will end up a serial killer, then yes it's absolutely your responsibility. I already told you how I deal with this: By taking into consideration what you can predict. You could not have predicted that the person whose life you save will end up a serial killer. If you could have then you shouldn't have saved them. — khaled
But better not to do so knowingly, surely? — khaled
Or the caveat that it depends on what you know. In other words: Try your best to not cause harm. Doesn't sound crazy does it? — khaled
What does this have to do with anything. You were the one that just said "I prefer not to have been born" makes no sense. Neither does "I prefer to exist and suffer". Because at no point were they in a position to choose. — khaled
You don't know it's one time. And that we do punish them by law doesn't necessarily make it right (I agree it's right in this case though) — khaled
If you don't want to be in a relationship and you are obligated to be in one that would fall under "Having things done to you that you wouldn't want done to you" I think, no? So it is prevention of harm. From yourself. — khaled
Depends on how good they are at them. If they're good enough that they will not really risk harming others then it's fine. — khaled
Point is, there is a breaking point at which you cannot seriously say that they are causing harm by riding. A point at which frustrating their desire to ride a motorcycle arbitrarily can be predicted to cause as much harm as actually riding the motorcycle. Until that point, yes it is wrong to ride the motorcycle. That point is around where they get a license — khaled
So why did you call doing harm without justification "evil"? — khaled
Net harm reduction is the measure you use elsewhere. Net harm reduction. The net harm reduced by having a child is something which is at least arguable. Certainly requires actual empirical data and is not this ridiculously simplistic equation you would have everyone use. — Isaac
Likely will not be overall harmful to himself or others — khaled
I am saying that EVEN IF the child is likely to have a net harm reduction effect, that does not make procreation right. — khaled
How do you judge what someone "can predict"? — Echarmion
But it is knowingly if you understand the logic. It's a certainty that the actions you take cause indefinite causal chains and therefore also cause harm. — Echarmion
How is it possible to "do my best" if I know I'll inadvertently cause harm by seekingly innocuous acts? Like if I celebrate my birthday, there is a significant possibility that by having a party, I cause not just one, but possibly several children to be born. I know this to be the case, it's not some outlandish scenario. So no parties? — Echarmion
I am asking how you arrive at the conclusion that preventing people from existing is morally equivalent to preventing some particular instance of suffering, since you agree they're not one and the same. — Echarmion
But if just potential avoidance of future harm is sufficient, how does this not apply to children? — Echarmion
Does it matter here how strong the feelings are? Maybe you don't don't find the other person objectionable, you just don't think you'll be as happy as with someone else. But of course you don't know that. So why cause the immediate, certain harm? — Echarmion
Noone is good enough not to risk harming others. — Echarmion
And we determine this breaking point how? What's the mental operation here? Because from the outside, it looks like you're just taking the status quo and then saying "this is what causes the least harm". — Echarmion
Yes, I gather that. Which is inconsistent with your response to surgery, laws and parenting where in those cases you use the net harm reduction to justify the action to take on another's behalf. — Isaac
With surgery: NOT doing the surgery is the more harmful option.
With laws: NOT having the laws is the more harmful option.
With parenting: NOT sending your kids to school is the more harmful option. — khaled
Whereas NOT having kids guarantees 0 harm. — khaled
With birth, there is no way not doing it can harm. — khaled
This again? We already went over this. — khaled
I'm saying it's surely better not to do something that you know is way more likely to cause more harm than its alternatives. — khaled
You likely haven't increased the number of children in the world in any way, so no. — khaled
Point is, you're being ridiculous by taking a single possibility and based on that concluding that the thing is wrong. At the level you're talking at, with things that have incredibly low chances of happening, no amount of processing the possibilities will yield a very clear answer. — khaled
Which is why I don't think having the party is wrong. It doesn't do any clear damage. You can think of a million ways it can harm and I can think of a million ways NOT having it can harm. So don't be outlandish and try to only highlight the bad. — khaled
With birth, there is no way not doing it can harm. That's the point. — khaled
It isn't. Because in the once case (preventing an instance of suffering) that's usually seen as a good thing. You helped someone. But not having kids is not a good thing. Not a bad thing. The point is "Not a good thing, not a bad thing" is better than "A bad thing" which is the alternative. — khaled
I don't get what you mean here. — khaled
I said "not really risk harming others". You know what I mean. — khaled
It's more like, I find the point at which it becomes acceptable around the point of the status quo. — khaled
I actually see the inconsistency now. Will get back to you later. This might just do it. — khaled
Wow. You would be about the first person I've ever debated with on here that's even considered the possibility of changing their position in response to an argument put by the other side. Regardless of what you come up with in response, I'm impressed you'd have the intellectual honesty to do so. — Isaac
And I admit being angry and combative on my part probably only makes it harder. — Echarmion
, good to know that I'm not in intellectually dishonest spawn of Satan :blush: — khaled
I would still want to see some proof that the parent can actually parent before considering having kids to be right. That they actually are likely to produce ethically good children. But this has always been the case. — khaled
I find that it's a trend that the more posts you have on this site the more combative you become. Looking at you Isaac. — khaled
Sorry if my response came out a bit condescending. — Isaac
I'm impressed you'd have the intellectual honesty to do so. — Isaac
You're just being disingenuous now. — Isaac
But then how do you deal with a The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas situation? By this logic, it would be fine to do what was done in the book. Imagine for instance, that you knew your next child will be absolutely miserable, to a point where normally you would consider it wrong to have them (warzone, genetic illness, poverty, you name it), but would cure cancer. Is it ok to have them? — khaled
Says the guy with "special suffering" — khaled
Imagine for instance, that you knew your next child will be absolutely miserable, to a point where normally you would consider it wrong to have them (warzone, genetic illness, poverty, you name it), but would cure cancer. Is it ok to have them? — khaled
“It’s fine to hurt them cuz if they don’t like it they can just kill themselves”
Do I need to say more? What does this NOT justify? — khaled
But to those who disagree, and who see life as full of harm, to them death ought to look pretty good. And yet you don't see many antinatalist suicide notes... Why is that? — Olivier5
A question of causality
If living entails suffering (e.g. philosophical pessimism) then living doesn't cause suffering. Much in the same way that me killing a person doesn't cause his death, killing entails death.
So if the position is, suffering is intrinsic to life then it must necessarily fail as an argument because living then does not cause suffering and the ethical question becomes moot.
The fact that all living things suffer at some point in time, is not a valid argument to conclude that living is a sufficient condition for suffering so this does not resolve the causal chain.
A disease causes suffering, being run over by a car causes suffering, a break up causes suffering etc. etc. Suffering is unique and particular and for an important part based on how a person experiences it and remembers it.
How would you respond to this?
The claim is that, by not having children, you are harming those they could have helped. And I don't really find "You couldn't know that having children will result in them helping people more than average" convincing but it was my first line of defense. Most people have a positive impact overall I'd say.
And if you want to commit to "It is not harming them since you were never responsible for them" then that would put you in a weird situation when it comes to saving drowning people. Because then it becomes wrong to save them. They could have been trying to commit suicide. And by saving them you risk harming them. However, if not being responsible for someone means you are not harming them, then by not saving the drowning person you are not harming them (since you can't really argue that you have a responsibility there, unless you're a life guard). So it becomes: Save(risk of harm) or Don't Save(No risk of harm) and by that logic you would be obligated to let them drown.
Point is that it becomes similar to the situation of finding someone drowning. I apply my system:
Would they have suffered if I hadn't been there? Yes. Ergo, I do not have to pick the least harmful option (because it's not my responsibility), but I still can
Now we consider alternatives:
1- Save the drowning person / Have children:
Likely to be good overall. Small chance of being bad overall.
2- Do not save the drowning person / Do not have children:
Likely to be bad overall. Small chance of being good overall.
The key is that option 2 is actually more risky. And is not 0 risk, if you consider the "system" as comprising of everyone not just the parent and child.
So the less risky option is clearly 1. But you do not have to pick this. — khaled
That is using people, and as I've stated before, I believe this violates their dignity (once a person is actually born), to put some other cause above the harm/suffering/impositions put upon the person that would be born. — schopenhauer1
Antinatalists like their life or hope it will get better. Ok. Now what? — khaled
And curse it also sometimes, but often enough they will cherish it — Olivier5
In a less absolute argument against it but still relevant is that it relies on probabilities and contingencies one can never know for certain regarding how it affects the aggregate (however, we do know how that birth affects the person being born, almost certainly negatively to some degree). — schopenhauer1
The point is not that having children is no longer harmful, or that there is some "greater cause" that justifies it, it is that the alternative, not having children is ALSO harmful. Not to the child, but to those the child would have helped.
In both cases, we cannot pinpoint the harm being done. I know my child will be harmed, but I don't know how. Point is, I also know that the people he would have helped would be harmed by him not being around but I don't know how, in the exact same way. So now EITHER option is risky. Either option harms people. — khaled
this kind of aggregation puts some abstract cause above and beyond the individual. — schopenhauer1
it relies on probabilities and contingencies one can never know for certain regarding how it affects the aggregate — schopenhauer1
When I want to prevent suffering, I am preventing unnecessary harm from taking place (for what would be that future person presumably). — schopenhauer1
Conversely, having a child to help some aggregate scheme — schopenhauer1
believe this violates their dignity (once a person is actually born), to put some other cause above the harm/suffering/impositions put upon the person — schopenhauer1
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