2) Many Church Fathers and Christian theologians have not interpreted the command to "be fruitful and multiply" as relating to procreation. — Thorongil
This ad hominem is something I would expect a fraternity boy to utter, not someone on a philosophy forum. — Thorongil
a failure of the poster to express him or her self with sufficient clarity, as seems to be the case here. — Sapientia
you ought to at least give my criticism serious thought, rather than evade it. — Sapientia
At any rate, my point was simply that there is nothing illogical about wanting there to be more children in the world and also wanting to be celibate. — Hanover
And that too is an ad hom — Hanover
considering I was in fact in a fraternity (shocker I know). — Hanover
There is no relationship to celibacy and natalism. — Hanover
So now I identify as an anatalist, both because I find natalism unjustified and because I happen to be celibate. — Thorongil
[...]is a poor reason to become (or identity as) an anatalist, and should not influence the decision. [Rather, i]t should be incidental. — Sapientia
Someone whose lifestyle negates the possibility of having children would just be someone who happens to inadvertently conform with the life choice of a weak anti-natalist. It has nothing to do with assent, which is a wilful acceptance, and without such explicit assent, it'd be a mistake to judge that they "practically assent" based solely upon said-lifestyle, unless it was clear that they held weak anti-natalist views without realising it. There are other, more likely, explanations. — Sapientia
do you or do you not stand by the following statement that you made in your opening post? — Sapientia
there was another part about celibates "practically assenting" to weak anti-natalism which I reject. — Sapientia
Someone whose lifestyle negates the possibility of having children would just be someone who happens to inadvertently conform with the life choice of a weak anti-natalist. — Sapientia
It has nothing to do with assent, which is a wilful acceptance, and without such explicit assent, it'd be a mistake to judge that they "practically assent" based solely upon said-lifestyle, unless it was clear that they held weak anti-natalist views without realising it. There are other, more likely, explanations. — Sapientia
A celibate person is someone who is not married and who does not engage in any kind of sexual activity. They are, practically speaking, anatalist, since they repudiate natalism by their actions, which don't include, by definition, having children. Now, they may still theoretically assent to natalism, or they may not, but this is a different kind of assent. — Thorongil
To flip it around just to show you what I mean, imagine an anti-natalist who has children. Is this manifestly self-contradictory? No, for it could mean that the person theoretically assents to the proposition "having children is immoral," but for whatever reason still had a child. Perhaps he was caught in a moment of personal weakness or perhaps his condom didn't function properly. At any rate, such a person would be a practical natalist, in that he had a child, but also a theoretical anti-natalist, in that he still agrees that having children is immoral. — Thorongil
It is not necessarily the case that the engagement of sexual activity is required in order to have a child. — Sapientia
This is actually very close to what I am saying, if not exactly what I am saying. — Thorongil
Aha, so you don't think there is any such thing as "practical assent." I believe I've now pinpointed the issue you have. — Thorongil
Is this honestly the content of your objection? Female insemination? Sure, okay, I grant this very technical exception. On the other hand, how is this not simply an appeal to an extreme? — Thorongil
To label oneself celibate has for millennia entailed that one neither has, nor plans to have, children. Period. — Thorongil
You might view it as an appeal to the extreme, but it is nonetheless an exception which corrects the error implicit within your association of the two positions. — Sapientia
I have since realised that I don't personally fit the definition of a celibate if the definition contains the exclusion of all sexual activity — Sapientia
And one which I have granted, though your victory is only proportional to the size of your objection, which as you note, is quite small. — Thorongil
Sometimes, to be celibate can refer to someone who abstains from marriage, but it can also refer to someone who abstains both from it and from sexual activity, which is how I've been using it. Chastity is another word that has two slightly different connotations. Sometimes it refers to someone who abstains from sexual activity until marriage and sometimes to someone who abstains from sexual activity completely. You may have been thinking of one or another of these different meanings of said words. — Thorongil
Aha, so you don't think there is any such thing as "practical assent." I believe I've now pinpointed the issue you have. I can only ask why you think this, for I regard it as absolutely undeniable that one can assent in two different ways, one in a physical and active sense and the other in a mental and psychological sense. You can murder someone and yet agree that murder is wrong. You can be an alcoholic and yet also wish to be a teetotaler. You can not eat meat and yet not agree with veganism/vegetarianism. Each of these relies on the distinction in question, and I could proffer a million more examples, but you ought to get it by now. — Thorongil
They are, practically speaking, anatalist, since they repudiate natalism by their actions, which don't include, by definition, having children. Now, they may still theoretically assent to natalism, or they may not, but this is a different kind of assent. — Thorongil
Me not having sex with men is not a practical assent of homophobia. So me not having children is not a practical assent of anti-natalism. — Michael
You wish to redefine "assent" to mean "acts in a way that requires a specific result." — Hanover
Obviously #1 and #2 are contradictory. — Hanover
A person who engages in wild promiscuous sex can be an anatalist as long as that person uses birth control. — Hanover
1. Behavior that requires a certain result.
2. Belief or agreement. — Hanover
my thought is that your attempt to redefine the terms was an attempt to save your theory that somehow anatalism and celibacy were related. — Hanover
Alright, but does this mean you deny any validity between the distinction in question? I don't see how you could. — Thorongil
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