Anti-life is completely futile as the universe has clearly demonstrated that if life can happen, it will happen, somewhere at some point, again and again and again. Death just means you disassemble back into the spare subatomic parts you were made from. You dissipate back into the universal mix, all of what you were will be used again in new variations and new combinations. Nothing to be afraid of. The little life variation you were is gone forever but you will not be forgotten if you leave a respectable legacy and future transhumanism may offer many more options. — universeness

Yeah, but when it really comes to our own lives, we are all such egoist whimps. :sad:

If I die tomorrow, at least I'll be happy that my children are now so old that they will remember me. It would really suck to die when your children are so young that they won't remember anything. But at least I had them and a loving wife, so one notch to the "successful human/animal life"-table.

Death is boring!

I have no suggestions if one finds life undesirable. Imagination is good, but living at the moment requires courage. That's it. Courage to face the mundane and the ordinary. Escapism has flourished over the last last decade or so. You've seen a lot of them in vlogs. Cottage fairies is one example. Another, is living a life in the 18th century, complete with costume and oil lamps and lack of modern technology. There's also the shopping addiction. Acquiring things to fill a void. Or just simply using drugs and alcohol to enter the state of stupor and mindlessness.

I don't know what to think of those people. I try to avoid them.

But I know that looking at the determination of animals in the wilderness, that's what I call living. They have enough energy pent up inside them that when they spring into action, all those energy is released like superpowers. Relatively, they live a short life -- when you always give your all and use all your energy to bag a prey, you're bound to have a shorter life. The wear and tear you sustain makes you powerful, but also short-lived.

What am I saying?

There's enough chemicals and enzymes in our body potent enough to fight hopelessness and boredom. We just need to know how to use them. When you use them, your mind is focused and even minutes of your life count. Of course, moments like that don't last 24 hours, 7 days a week. Eventually, the highs subside. That's when you sleep, or just do some physical activities. Or eat.

We just need to know how to use them. — L'éléphant

You’ve already defeated your own argument that we are “at home” like other animals and extolled the existential /absurdist dilemma (of the specifically human condition) in one sentence.

Motive implies I choose it and it is part of me, but it isn't. It's just a force more or less that prevents me from doing stuff. I don't really want to live but I sort of have to.

Death just means you disassemble back into the spare subatomic parts you were made from. You dissipate back into the universal mix, all of what you were will be used again in new variations and new combinations. Nothing to be afraid of. The little life variation you were is gone forever but you will not be forgotten if you leave a respectable legacy and future transhumanism may offer many more options. — universeness

Well you can't really be sure about that. Once I die it is blackness, I cannot verify past that. Also your point about disassembling is what Ernest Becker would call inventing stories to assuage death anxiety, in your case becoming part of something greater and eternal.

Also you will be forgotten, transhumanism ain't gonna fix that. I mean granted it's not gonna fix anything IMO.

I assume anti-lifers struggle when nice things happen to them and to others around them as feeling good must be painful for them. — universeness

Nah, it's just another blip in experience.

I have no suggestions if one finds life undesirable. Imagination is good, but living at the moment requires courage. That's it. Courage to face the mundane and the ordinary. Escapism has flourished over the last last decade or so. You've seen a lot of them in vlogs. Cottage fairies is one example. Another, is living a life in the 18th century, complete with costume and oil lamps and lack of modern technology. There's also the shopping addiction. Acquiring things to fill a void. Or just simply using drugs and alcohol to enter the state of stupor and mindlessness. — L'éléphant

Living does not require courage, that's just rationalization to avoid having to reckon with death, same with calling death boring.

But I know that looking at the determination of animals in the wilderness, that's what I call living. They have enough energy pent up inside them that when they spring into action, all those energy is released like superpowers. Relatively, they live a short life -- when you always give your all and use all your energy to bag a prey, you're bound to have a shorter life. The wear and tear you sustain makes you powerful, but also short-lived. — L'éléphant

That's sort of ignorance about what nature is like. Animals survive because they know nothing else. They aren't brave and I wouldn't call that living.

If I die tomorrow, at least I'll be happy that my children are now so old that they will remember me. It would really suck to die when your children are so young that they won't remember anything. But at least I had them and a loving wife, so one notch to the "successful human/animal life"-table. — ssu

I think it would be better to die when they don't remember anything, it's less painful. Your reply sounds pretty self centered.

Few things encourage me to, as Beckett says, "I'll go on" like reading the blackest passages of Cioran :cool:

To get up in the morning, wash and then wait for some unforeseen variety of dread or depression. I would give the whole universe and all of Shakespeare for a grain of ataraxy.

My faculty for disappointment surpasses understanding. It is what lets me comprehend Buddha, but also what keeps me from following him.

I am enraptured by Hindu philosophy, whose essential endeavor is to surmount the self; and everything I do, everything I think is only myself and the self's humiliations.

In the fact of being born there is such an absence of necessity that when you think about it a little more than usual, you are left ... with a foolish grin. — E.m Cioran- The a Trouble with Being Born

:death: :fire:

If one lives as though it is good to inhale, but bad to exhale, one will not be happy for long. — unenlightened

:strong: :smirk:

You’ve already defeated your own argument that we are “at home” like other animals and extolled the existential /absurdist dilemma (of the specifically human condition) in one sentence. — schopenhauer1

I don't see how what you just said rejects what I said. Care to explain?

Living does not require courage, that's just rationalization to avoid having to reckon with death, same with calling death boring. — Darkneos

Well, you're helping my argument, not hurting it. We are humans after all. So, yes, we use rationalization like animals use instinct. Courage consists of going against our tendency towards hopelessness. We use rationalization, of course. But there are enzymes and chemicals in our body at our disposal.

That's sort of ignorance about what nature is like. Animals survive because they know nothing else. They aren't brave and I wouldn't call that living. — Darkneos

Pardon me. I went back to my post and see if I called the wild animals brave. I said, humans need that. The animals live the way they are designed to live. Because they know nothing else, they use their energy to fuel life.

I shall name this village Melancholia, which sits in a flood prone depression next to the River Angst. The dark clouds are confined in the valley by the heights of Mount Despair and Mount Regret, where a true rain never falls, just an eternal cold drizzle.

Only one small path leads out, but its trailhead can only be seen by casting one's gaze above shoulder height, and none have yet looked that high up. They've heard of this Path of Hope, but never having seen it, they scoff and shrug, looking at the ground, firmly denying it.

They've heard of this Path of Hope, but never having seen it, they scoff and shrug, looking at the ground, firmly denying it. — Hanover

:hearts: :sparkle:

I think it would be better to die when they don't remember anything, it's less painful. Your reply sounds pretty self centered. — Darkneos

I have many good memories of people that have died. They are not painful at all. Why would it be painful to have good (or even not so good) memories of people that have loved and cared about you?

If you think it's great to be an orphan who has no memory about his or her biological parents, I have to disagree. Do you really think that is better?

People die and if you remember the generation of your grandparents, the older people of you childhood, later you will notice that you have become part of that "old generation" to younger people.

Cioran is highly edifying in his inertia. Even suicide is caring too much.

He's hilarious!

I don't really want to live but I sort of have to. — Darkneos

No you dont, you can check out any time you’d like. I think if you wanted to be dead you would be. You don’t really want to check out though do you? What you actually want here is attention, to validate your feelings about how unimpressed you are with life as an option.

Im not one thats going to tell you life is precious or that you have a gift or you have good in your life if you'd just embrace it. I accept you get nothing out of life, that you see nothing special about living and that death/oblivion seems like a better option than living…I’ll concede all that to you right now.
What your wrong about is that any of those feelings have anything to do with how much life sucks or how much better an option death is. Life isnt the problem, you are.
Your thoughts are those of a depressed mind. Just because its a common response you get ( get therapy) doesn't mean its wrong. You might need meds or something else that you are unqualified to dismiss as a cure for your little dilemma.
If youre adamant about depression or other mental illness not being the source of your view here then you’ve already gotten the best advice in the form of a question:

Are you sure youre doing life right?
If you truly have nothing worthwhile to live for, then you are actually more free than most other people. With such little attachment to life you have a freedom, a liberation of action, that means you can fill your life with whatever you want. If you cant exercise that freedom, then thats on you, not life.

Yeah, but when it really comes to our own lives, we are all such egoist whimps. — ssu

This is true for some but we have many people amongst us who are very humble and genuinely humanist. They just get on with helping people every day and hardly mention their own suffering. When you compliment them or show them admiration they tend to shrink away, truly embarrassed.
They are imo much more numerous, among the poor and weak than among the famous/rich and strong.
Incredible unsung hero like everyday people exist in all our communities. I am not suggesting such people are perfect but they certainly easily compensate for those I would label misanthropic.

But at least I had them and a loving wife, so one notch to the "successful human/animal life"-table. — ssu

WELL DONE SIR!! A great legacy!

Well you can't really be sure about that. — Darkneos

Yes I can. Science has very strong empirical evidence for The law of Conservation of Energy, which states that “Energy cannot be created or destroyed.” In other words, the total amount of energy in the universe never changes, it can only change from one form to another. It is actually quite unlikely that after you die, some of your disassembled subatomic particles will never be involved in any new combination events until the end of the universe. YOU will be recycled.

your point about disassembling is what Ernest Becker would call inventing stories to assuage death anxiety, — Darkneos

I can only assure you and Mr Becker(in memorium) that I have no such death anxiety and I would suggest that you are simply trying to project your own anxiety onto me. I love life and will welcome death as a harbinger of change. I fear and I am anxious about the way I will die but I have no fear of oblivion for the obvious reason that there is no awareness.

Also you will be forgotten, transhumanism ain't gonna fix that. — Darkneos

You have no information regarding the legacy I will leave so you have no idea as to how long I will be remembered. Modern techniques store more and more information about our individual lives so future people will get to know a lot more about the lives of past people if they wish to. Future transhumanism has the potential to offer humans vastly improved robustness, ability and longevity. This will offer many new options. If you stick around you may witness its infancy. If you don't then there are many newborns to replace you. The global population has been increasing since we came out of the wilds.

Only one small path leads out, but its trailhead can only be seen by casting one's gaze above shoulder height, and none have yet looked that high up. They've heard of this Path of Hope, but never having seen it, they scoff and shrug, looking at the ground, firmly denying it. — Hanover

There's always a way out. And I'm sure we don't mean death, which defeats the point.

Some motives you can't choose. Like, do you like certain types of food? Do you like orgasm? Do you dislike being hungry? Do you dislike being cold? All of these are ordinary motives that drive our lives and they are wired in our bodies or minds and thus are part of us. And they drive us toward pleasant feelings that make life worthwhile and away from unpleasant feelings that make life miserable. Getting killed is unpleasant and the survival drive drives you away from that.

Coincidentally, I had planned today on visiting the grave of someone who bailed out too soon. But, I had to do something else, so next week maybe.

But I know that looking at the determination of animals in the wilderness, that's what I call living. They have enough energy pent up inside them that when they spring into action, all those energy is released like superpowers. Relatively, they live a short life -- when you always give your all and use all your energy to bag a prey, you're bound to have a shorter life. The wear and tear you sustain makes you powerful, but also short-lived. — L'éléphant

:clap: In general and in history, I think non-humans have suffered more than humans. I wonder how many lions or lambs decide that life and living is just a bad idea and they should covet death instead? Why does the prey run from the predator when they offer the placid oblivion of death and I don't think that they would have the same concerns as @Darkneos that they might survive the attempt to cause their own termination. Surely that strong survival instinct that has already been mentioned many times and that all species seem to have must have important purpose behind it.

There's always a way out. And I'm sure we don't mean death, which defeats the point. — L'éléphant

Right, I was talking about finding a way out of despair, not of life.

This is true for some but we have many people amongst us who are very humble and genuinely humanist. They just get on with helping people every day and hardly mention their own suffering. When you compliment them or show them admiration they tend to shrink away, truly embarrassed. — universeness

Yet helping others, bringing them happiness, make us feel good (at least me). And yes, people usually don't whine about their problems. Yet I don't think that humble and genuinely humanist people are totally indifferent about their own life. They don't want their lives to end.

WELL DONE SIR!! A great legacy! — universeness

Is that sarcasm, universeness? If so, why?

Ok, I have to admit that there was a bit of sarcasm with myself too in talking about a notch to the "successful human/animal life"-table.

The vast majority of people that have died before us are unknown and haven't left such an individual mark that we would remember them as historical figures. Yet very many of them are someones ancestors. Especially on a philosophy site the notion of continuation of life as a meaning for life might be boring and doesn't answer much, but it's something one cannot disregard.

Yet helping others, bringing them happiness, make us feel good (at least me). And yes, people usually don't whine about their problems. Yet I don't think that humble and genuinely humanist people are totally indifferent about their own life. They don't want their lives to end. — ssu

I completely agree!

WELL DONE SIR!! A great legacy!
— universeness
Is that sarcasm, universeness? If so, why? — ssu

No! I think anyone who has a successful marriage and has produced children and has managed to bring them up in a loving environment and they have all reached old age and continue to thrive is a very good (or great) legacy. Perhaps my use of capitals made you suspicious that I was being sarcastic, maybe its normal in today's society where most people are still a little shell shocked from Trumpism, Bo Jo etc that all comments/compliments made by people you don't know are treated with suspicion.
I am sure there is a lot more significance to the legacy your life will leave than a loving marriage and reproduction but such achievements ARE in themselves very good components of your legacy.

The vast majority of people that have died before us are unknown and haven't left such an individual mark that we would remember them as historical figures. — ssu

This imo, is more true the further you go back in time than it is now. I already stated my general opinion in my response to darkneous above:

Modern techniques store more and more information about our individual lives so future people will get to know a lot more about the lives of past people if they wish to. Future transhumanism has the potential to offer humans vastly improved robustness, ability and longevity. This will offer many new options — universeness

I think we have been, in the main, on the same page in our viewpoints on this topic.

The vast majority of people that have died before us are unknown and haven't left such an individual mark that we would remember them as historical figures. — ssu

Just a little bit more on this. I know some people who have traced the ancestry of their family and can describe a good deal of detail about many members of their family that go back centuries.
Historical figures that are known globally is just the tip of the iceberg compared to the information that does actually exist about the lives of non-famous people who lived. I find this quite wonderful.
I still remember a little about an everyday Roman soldier called Petronious Artibus because of some graffiti that was left about him. One stated 'Petronious Artibus got me pregnant!'

If value dies with existence, then it lies in existence (obvious but still worth mentioning). The good that matters for us (which transhumanism can also help provide) whilst we exist is not diminished/improved by the opinions of the posterity. Of course, we would definitely want to do the right thing.

Perhaps my use of capitals made you suspicious that I was being sarcastic, — universeness

Yeah, that was it. Well, thanks for clearing this.

Just a little bit more on this. I know some people who have traced the ancestry of their family and can describe a good deal of detail about many members of their family that go back centuries. — universeness

The basic problem is that only few of us have had great grandparents around to tell about their life. Hence it's usually this third generation where the personal link to history is lost. The thinking goes likes this: you surely remember what has happened in your lifetime. Everyone of us will remember for example the Covid-pandemic, which is likely a historical event (especially if the next pandemic won't hit us in the next 50 years). To events that have happened to your parents and grandparents one feels a link, especially if they have told themselves about it. But earlier generations, you don't usually know much if anything about their lives. Then it's hard to relate to them.

Usually people get interested about their family and roots only at older age. It should be something that children should interested in when there older generations still around. And as you said, some families have done this and have stories about people that have lived far earlier. I think it's valuable to keep these stories. And in my country it's quite interesting as the people have lived in the same places, not much immigration here before, and the Church books usually go to the Middle Ages.

if value dies with existence — DA671

I don't think this has ever been true as most parents attempt to nurture and teach their offspring how to survive and even how best to thrive in the world they live in. The level of legacy and influence that humans achieve is what makes the difference. From word of mouth traditions to the invention of methods to record (hieroglyphics, books etc) experiences and happenings, outside of the body, so that they last much longer than a human lifespan is the main reason why we gained dominion against all other species.

The good that matters for us (which transhumanism can also help provide) whilst we exist is not diminished/improved by the opinions of the posterity. — DA671

I am not sure what you mean here. The most unfortunate aspect of history is the distortion of truth and the manipulation of 'what really happened,' so I think the 'opinions of the posterity,' is crucial, especially, if those opinions are based on seriously dubious historical reportage such as those offered by theistic texts or historical events which were exclusively reported on by those in power at the time or those who conquered. History is rarely written by the vanquished.

All the points you make are valid, but as I said, this situation is changing. Think of how much information will be available to future generations about the lives of their ancestors. Current technology can hold every photograph, every textual or audio word you ever recorded, every piece of footage you ever recorded. You can gather it and back it up to a single SSD and to 'cloud storage' and pass the whole lot to your offspring as legacy files. This will now be available for the rest of time! To all future generations.
In what ways will such information be employed a million years from now? We will be the 'ancients' at that point. I wonder how they will judge the anti-life people alive today? I predict they will be unfavourable towards them based on the fact that sentient life will still be thriving a million years from now. If no such sentient life exists a million years from now then it won't matter anyway. If antilife wins then there will be nothing around to declare their victory. Perhaps anti-life is inevitable in the same way as anti-protons or antimatter or antichrist. Universal balance seems to be the norm. The good thing about the anti story is that matter won the battle of annihilation! Life defeated antilife long ago. That battle has already been decided. Time to get on with life!

I agree! By value, I was referring to positive and negative experiences. Assuming that non-existence is neither good nor bad, it doesn't make sense to always prefer the void when existence can have pleasant experience that non-existent does not. It's about the good too, not about just avoiding the harms.

It's true that the opinions of the posterity do matter for them. And because we as rational and empathetic beings care about what they think and how their lives would be, it's vital that we do everything we can to create a better tomorrow. I was only responding within the context of the value framework that some pessimists have wherein the absence of life's goods isn't bad because you wouldn't have any needs. Well, if that is true, then the fact that we wouldn't be remembered by everyone long after we are gone should not be a problem (or a blessing), considering that we wouldn't exist to lose or gain from that. To summarise, one should not be inconsistent.

I was only responding within the context of the value framework that some pessimists have wherein the absence of life's goods isn't bad because you wouldn't have any needs. Well, if that is true, then the fact that we wouldn't be remembered by everyone long after we are gone should not be a problem (or a blessing), considering that we wouldn't exist to lose or gain from that. To summarise, one should not be inconsistent — DA671

As I have said many times, to me, the fundamental is a question of purpose. A universe devoid of life has no purpose that I can conceive of. Such pointlessness is far worse than any concept of undeserved harms human morality or human moralists can come up with. I vote for many more years of harms and suffering for humans, including those who some choose to label 'newborn innocents,' alongside the many many joys and wonders of life which also occur very regularly. I very much prefer this state, compared to the alternative of a lifeless, pointless universe. All good people will also, of course, continue to do exactly what you have suggested many times. We will continue to help alleviate and remove all forms of unjust and unnecessary suffering and even obtain far more control over the inevitability of death.

I would also ask this. Why is the survival instinct so strong in all species if purposeless nonexistence is the superior natural state? Something seems to me to be much better than nothing!

Amen, sir. And as long as concerted efforts and an indomitable spirit remains, perhaps there would not be a need to vote for the former aspect for much longer. At the very least, the number of those particular candidates can be reduced drastically.