Taking if further now, what should we do with the rest of the people already and still existing? I assume you would think that many or all of these people will continue to harm themselves and others. According to your morality should we kill or eliminate those people, since it may not be moral to allow human suffering to exist in any way? Should the whole planet commit mass suicide? — punos
You're not taking account of the point that several have now made that innocents don't in any absolute sense deserve to be harmed or protected from all harm. Another point is that maybe we all need to experience some pain in order to grow and mature. — Janus
In any case as compassionate beings, we have a natural tendency to want to protect innocents from deliberate or even random 'bad luck' harm; we don't need to invoke the idea of deserving or not deserving to feel that. — Janus
Thinking in terms of deserving or not deserving is a category error when it is taken out of the context of what is earned and of reward and punishment. — Janus
↪Bartricks
It seems absurd to say that the idea that innocents do not deserve to come to harm tout court comes from God, when it is God as creator who purportedly created this world wherein innocents may indeed, due to misfortune, be harmed.
— Janus
Above not addressed by you. — Janus
But that a person will be subject to a great many harms in a lifetime is true beyond a reasonable doubt. Of course, recognizing that requires that one be reasonable, which you clearly aren' — Bartricks
In other contexts, the fact an act will significantly affect another person without their
prior consent typically operates as a powerful wrong-making feature of such deeds. — Gerald K. Harrison- Antinatalism and Moral Particularism
if I know that, were I to have a child, the child’s life would be one characterized by intense suffering, then — Gerald K. Harrison- Antinatalism and Moral Particularism
No it doesn't. We do this all the time. Practically the whole of modern child-rearing involves this, our entire criminal justice system relies on this, all actions on shared resources (air, water, built environment) rely on this. Practically everything you do has a profound effect on the others who share your world, we do not ask their consent. In fact the number of things we do assuming consent far outweighs the number of things we do asking for it. — Isaac
The point here is that there are many of them and that, other things
being equal, the fact that an act will subject another person to many harms is a fact
about an act that, typically, operates with a negative moral valence. The fact that
stepping on your toe will cause you the harm of pain provides me with a moral reason not to step on your toe. Likewise, then, the fact that procreative acts will subject
another to a catalog of harms of the kind mentioned above, and others besides, is a
fact that — Gerald K. Harrison- Antinatalism and Moral Particularism
Harrison gives no argument at all as to why the threshold ought to lie with the normal harms of life. — Isaac
Animals are innocent too. But why bring animals into the equation? — Bartricks
It's not question begging. — Bartricks
Innocent is only the one who can become guilty. — spirit-salamander
So in moral particularism and particularism in general, you can look at context. — schopenhauer1
Unlike child rearing, you aren’t mitigating a circumstance. — schopenhauer1
Normal harms? Fuck that idea. More of the same logic whereby anytime a person debates harms with an antinatalist all harms become trivial harms — schopenhauer1
No one “deserves” to be unnecessarily harmed. — schopenhauer1
:clap: :smirk:I am quite capable of calling someone a complete cunt and yet taking their argument as an argument detached from said cunt. — I like sushi
:fire:If you make the most basic behaviour of humans immoral, it's your judgement of moral intuition that's wrong, not humanity. — Isaac
:100:So the argument that we have a duty to avoid harm befalling innocents cannot be derived from the intuition that innocents do not deserve harm. They don't deserve harm, but they don't deserve non-harm either. — Isaac
:up:If the OP's argument is based on the premise that the innocent shouldn't be harmed because they don't deserve it then, they don't deserve joy/happiness either, oui? They haven't done anything to deserve anything. — Agent Smith
My child would be my flesh and blood, mine, and of course I wish to have no harm come to him, so I would do everything to prevent any such harm, including not conceiving the child at all.
— baker
Interesting that you have already chosen a gender for your imagined child and suggested a singular ownership rather than joint ownership with your imagined partner in procreation. — universeness
Can you give a clear idea of exactly which harms you might be unable to protect your imagined child against?
Are you ok with, accidental bumps/bruises/scratches/throwing up/nappies containing something akin to nuclear waste?
would you also not have a child because it might become a drunk or a junkie or even worse, a UK tory or a US Republican later in life?
Are you concerned your imagined child might become a serial killer or be the antichrist?
What actual list of harms/learning opportunities do you want guarantees against?
Illness, old age, disease — baker
Such as, "When you'll get older, you'll become numb, and then life will be much easier."
Early on, I swore I would rather not have a child at all than to give him such answers. — baker
So is that one of the contexts which makes non-consent OK, or one of the contexts which doesn't? Seems you've just arbitrarily decided it's the latter. — Isaac
Of course you are. There's an existing generation which will suffer from a lack of children. You're mitigating a circumstance. — Isaac
Who said anything about 'trivial', the word used was 'normal'. There is a threshold of harm at which it would be morally wrong to subject another to them no matter the benefits. Most harms we consider reasonable to impose are those outweighed by benefits. Harrison just arbitrarily draws the line at 'the harms of life'. He give absolutely no argument as to why it should be there. — Isaac
For someone to deserve something means (in the context it's used here) there is a duty of moral agents to provide them it. For someone to not deserve something does not impose a similar duty on moral agents to prevent them from having it. It may be that they obtain it by chance, and no moral approbation comes along with that.
So the argument that we have a duty to avoid harm befalling innocents cannot be derived from the intuition that innocents do not deserve harm. They don't deserve harm, but they don't deserve non-harm either. — Isaac
What is more compelling: One's nightmare experiences in childhood and adolescence that led one to decide to not parent a child, or a logical argument? — Bitter Crank
It clearly isn't moral intuition - people disagree with you, so it can't be intuitive, can it. — Isaac
People have children all the time and virtually no one judges it to be moral problem
Unless you're reaching for some magical, or supernatural source of moral rules, you've got nothing to go on to judge intuition other than how people actually behave.
If you make the most basic behaviour of humans immoral, it's your judgement of moral intuition that's wrong, not humanity.
People do not see the harms of life as being significant enough to meet the threshold of "characterized by intense suffering" that would be required to initiate this 'wrong-maker'. — Isaac
So the argument that we have a duty to avoid harm befalling innocents cannot be derived from the intuition that innocents do not deserve harm. They don't deserve harm, but they don't deserve non-harm either. — Isaac
Think: Happy, at rest,
may all beings be happy at heart.
Whatever beings there may be,
weak or strong, without exception,
long, large,
middling, short,
subtle, blatant,
seen & unseen,
near & far,
born & seeking birth:
May all beings be happy at heart.
Let no one deceive another
or despise anyone anywhere,
or through anger or irritation
wish for another to suffer.
As a mother would risk her life
to protect her child, her only child,
even so should one cultivate a limitless heart
with regard to all beings.
With good will for the entire cosmos,
cultivate a limitless heart:
Above, below, & all around,
unobstructed, without enmity or hate.
Whether standing, walking,
sitting, or lying down,
as long as one is alert,
one should be resolved on this mindfulness.
https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/kn/snp/snp.1.08.than.html
So the argument that we have a duty to avoid harm befalling innocents cannot be derived from the intuition that innocents do not deserve harm. They don't deserve harm, but they don't deserve non-harm either. — Isaac
Procreating creates an innocent person. And an innocent person deserves a harm-free happy life. That's not something you can give them. So you've done wrong - a great wrong - if you create that person. — Bartricks
Science can help you with all three of those? — universeness
If not you then your kids or their kids but if there are no more kids then the human adventure dies along with the suffer/learn why/ prevent the suffering process, due to the whims of spoilsport antinatalists.
Yeah, I can appreciate that but you might have been the father of the one.
This view is limited strictly to some particular Western worldviews, namely, mainstream Abrahamic religions and secularism. — baker
This is the basic error in Bartricks's appalling bad argument. — Isaac
For someone to deserve something means (in the context it's used here) there is a duty of moral agents to provide them it. — Isaac
So the argument that we have a duty to avoid harm befalling innocents cannot be derived from the intuition that innocents do not deserve harm. They don't deserve harm, but they don't deserve non-harm either. — Isaac
No, animals are not innocent in the proper sense. — spirit-salamander
I brought animals into the equation because babies resemble them in terms of beyond guilt and innocence. — spirit-salamander
But as far as I know, God represents for you an ultimate axiom in all questions of morality and values. If God's existence or being is the absolute good, then any form of being, including suffering, is always better than non-being. — spirit-salamander
But that would indeed be breaking the very normative claim that people should not be used. — schopenhauer1
So here is where I think the largest difference in our values lie. I would not presume for another person what is the "right" or "normal" amount of harm that another person should be able to endure. — schopenhauer1
but to do it with no mitigating reasons, is "undeserved" in a sense that there was no reason for that to befall someone, if you could prevent it. — schopenhauer1
A fallacious ad populum. — baker
Get involved in philosophical discussions about knowledge, truth, language, consciousness, science, politics, religion, logic and mathematics, art, history, and lots more. No ads, no clutter, and very little agreement — just fascinating conversations.