So perhaps instrumentality is a meaningless issue, although I suspect it isn't. If nothing can ultimately have any purpose at all, then what does it mean for us to wonder why things exist? If it's impossible for something to have ultimate purpose, then can it really be bad that it has no ultimate purpose? What would need to be the case in order to satisfy the problem of instrumentality?
Probably the answer is that we humans need reasons for things and the absence of any is discouraging. Just as we need justice even if there isn't any. Or beauty when there isn't any. etc — darthbarracuda
The more fundamental question is why we continue bringing forth more people. — schopenhauer1
It is not necessarily one of why things exist in the first place, but rather, why we want to put more subjectivized beings in the world who will need to form goals to follow and make more people who will also form their own subjectivized world and need goals to follow, etc. — schopenhauer1
Why do these needs need to be brought forth to a new generation, ad infinitum, until species or universal death is the question more or less. — schopenhauer1
Say nobody suffered. Say we all loved life, and death was not feared but calmly accepted without any sadness. What would be wrong with instrumentality?
Your focus on needs makes me believe that it's the struggle that is problematic. If everything was easy-peasy lemon-squeezy there'd be nothing wrong with an absurd life. — darthbarracuda
Your vision of no struggle would be something I would not even recognize as it would not be life as we know it. The struggle of being faced with "to do" or more accurately "to deal" with life, is structural. — schopenhauer1
The more fundamental question is why we continue bringing forth more people. What is it about having a next generation that needs to take place? The thoughtful answers would be something like: self-actualization, scientific discovery, art/music/humanities, creativity, flow experiences, physical pleasures, friends, relationships, achievement in some field or area of study, and aesthetic pleasures. — schopenhauer1
In our time all Greece was visited by a dearth of children and generally a decay of population, owing to which the cities were denuded of inhabitants, and a failure of productiveness resulted, though there were no long-continued wars or serious pestilences among us… For this evil grew upon us rapidly, and without attracting attention, by our men becoming perverted to a passion for show and money and the pleasures of an idle life, and accordingly either not marrying at all, or, if they did marry, refusing to rear the children that were born, or at most one or two out of a great number, for the sake of leaving them well off or bringing them up in extravagant luxury.
So to summarize, there is the "goal-seeking" primary need for need, which we do not need to self-reflect on, and then there is a more abstract philosophical problem of why more "to do" in the first place. — schopenhauer1
So to summarize, there is the "goal-seeking" primary need for need, which we do not need to self-reflect on, and then there is a more abstract philosophical problem of why more "to do" in the first place. — schopenhauer1
To live, to exist, is to enter into a contract with these parties, the voluntary opting out of which is only possible through suicide and the involuntary through imprisonment due to crime. This is not a duty for each individual to procreate, but it is a duty for society as a whole not to so completely wither away. — Thorongil
For this evil grew upon us rapidly, and without attracting attention, by our men becoming perverted to a passion for show and money and the pleasures of an idle life, and accordingly either not marrying at all, or, if they did marry, refusing to rear the children that were born, or at most one or two out of a great number, for the sake of leaving them well off or bringing them up in extravagant luxury.
Again, human beings will be born into the world whether we like it or not, but the deliberate procreation of children who are raised to carry the torch of civilization both does not squander the immense positive, constructive labor of previous generations and does not forsake future generations to abject misery. To not assert that we have this duty is, ipso facto and in practice, to prefer barbarism and anarchy. — Thorongil
But even granting the truth of this claim, which I am not entirely convinced of, the absence of a need to produce need does not, in itself, constitute a reason not to procreate. You've merely identified procreation as an action that isn't strictly obligatory for the individual. You haven't moved beyond the descriptive to the prescriptive.
Pointing out the apparent absurdity and vanity of existence leads one to question why more people ought to be created. But at that point, the assigning of moral blame to those who do so requires enumeration of what qualifies something or someone as morally blameworthy. Absent that, threads like this become mere plaintive tedium.
Now, in my own case, I have realized that attempting to justify anti-natalism on non-consequentialist grounds is like trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. For me, the motive determines the moral worth of an action, not its consequences. Hence, because the motive of most parents in having children is not to inflict or create more pain and suffering, they have done no wrong. Perhaps you agree but still see no positive reason to have children. That's fine, for again, there isn't any personal obligation to procreate. — Thorongil
But if life takes more than it gives (which is what I see to be the umph behind instrumentality), then what reason is there to keep living, and make more people who will live? — darthbarracuda
So I think the part where I might be disagreeing with you is that I find enjoyment to be positively good and a justifying reason for doing (some) things. All things considered, if something brings me pleasure then I have a good reason to do it and keep doing it, even if it's repetitive. Maybe if I see how repetitive it is and wonder if there's anything "more" to life will I cease to find pleasure in what I am doing - but that's the problem, really, I cease to find pleasure in it. — darthbarracuda
Some people do not see the vanity in it. The ironic thing is that the more reflection we have on it, the more it becomes in vain, the more repetitive and unnecessary it seems. Why do people need to go through it in the first place is a bit different than, we are already here an we get pleasure out of things. — schopenhauer1
Why does it need to be carried out? Why go through it in the first place? — schopenhauer1
However, a more vague fear is the fear of eternity. Levinas sort of touches upon this, the inability to shut off, to sleep, to not have to bear the burdens of existing and being. — schopenhauer1
First, the contract has to be agreed upon. No one signed a contract that says "I want to be born to keep civilization going, and that upon rejection of this civilizing effort, I have no recourse except suicide, otherwise I would be harming mankind by sticking around and not doing so". No one signed that. — schopenhauer1
We don't want to starve and live in a barbaric way so we keep civilization going so others can be born — schopenhauer1
what is the reason to keep the fruits of civilization going? — schopenhauer1
So even if this was the implication, so what? Why not take it even further, prefers nothingness.. because after barbarism and anarchy, perhaps complete extinction of the species, right? — schopenhauer1
But they have. It is implicitly agreed upon so long as one upholds the law and desires its just emendation, respects the rights of others, and looks to the past so as to determine one's actions in the present and the future. You do all of that on a daily basis. As I said, the only way to opt out of this contract is to commit suicide or a crime that leads to imprisonment, whereby one is voluntarily or involuntarily removed from society. — Thorongil
So that others can be born without having to starve or live in a barbaric way. — Thorongil
Wrong. We have already agreed that humans reproduce whether in civilization or in barbarism, and it is clearly preferable that they do so in the former. You can't have it both ways. You can't simultaneously bemoan the injustice, evil, and suffering in life while at the same time deliberately condone their infliction in order to bring about the extinction of human beings. You must choose: either you commit to maintaining civilization, in which case you oppose barbarism, or you commit to barbarism, in which case you have no grounds for advocating anti-natalism on the basis of concern for human beings. Your anti-natalism would have to be grounded in a hatred of life and of human beings and in the desire for human extinction or the pleasure you feel in imagining this. — Thorongil
For many people, simply because they have an inborn feeling that they want to. What more reason do you expect or ask for?
A want, choice or preference needn't be justified in terms of something else.
For others, it might, instead, be that they just enjoy the process. :) — Michael Ossipoff
Levinas also touches on enjoyment, on jouissance, being primary, before all this thinking. What of this aspect of his views?
I'm interested in the absence of sex/gender in your musings about this topic. It doesn't require a psychoanalyst to wonder whether there isn't something about *mothers*, rather than people in general, that you're implicitly addressing. The abstractions you talk in seem to be the ways an academic could-be-father would think about such a topic. What of the could-be-mother's body and what the body's moods and tempers and temperaments tell a woman?
I'm a fairly old man, beyond fatherhood now, and never fathered children. Even this male body of mine sometimes feels a great surge of parentness, though, towards children, and grief towards the children I might have had. These are profound feelings that seem to be treated as somehow insignificant in your account. — mcdoodle
As I said earlier: "No one signed a contract that says "I want to be born to keep civilization going, and that upon rejection of this civilizing effort, I have no recourse except suicide, otherwise I would be harming mankind by sticking around and not doing so". No one signed that." — schopenhauer1
So again, how does this refute the earlier argument I made: "Now, I see where you are sort of going with this- others will always be born, so it is up to us to make sure they have the fruits of civilization. We have obligations to past and future contingent connections, etc. However, this also suffers from no justification. I may be part of this historical-cultural setting that I was thrown into, but what is the reason to keep the fruits of civilization going? It is a snake that eats its tail.. We don't want to starve and live in a barbaric way so we keep civilization going so others can be born and so others can be born and so others can be born.. It is still all instrumental. It does not get out of the cycle." — schopenhauer1
I rather prefer that civilization comes to a point where it realizes the instrumentality of things, not that civilization demises altogether. — schopenhauer1
For many people, simply because they have an inborn feeling that they want to. What more reason do you expect or ask for?
A want, choice or preference needn't be justified in terms of something else.
For others, it might, instead, be that they just enjoy the process. :) — Michael Ossipoff
What are you talking about? I answered the question you asked in this quote. — Thorongil
Then you presuppose the maintenance of civilization until it reaches such a point. — Thorongil
A subset of the population without those needs would be long-extinct by now. — Michael Ossipoff
By my metaphysics, the mere possibility of there being a world in which not everyone uses birth-control is all it takes. By individually not reproducing, you aren't really preventing any births. — Michael Ossipoff
Nevertheless I wouldn't want to cause anyone to be born, unless I were with someone who really badly wanted to rear a child. — Michael Ossipoff
A subset of the population without those needs would be long-extinct by now. — Michael Ossipoff
What is wrong with that though? You are assuming that is necessarily bad. It is simply non-being.
By my metaphysics, the mere possibility of there being a world in which not everyone uses birth-control is all it takes. By individually not reproducing, you aren't really preventing any births. — Michael Ossipoff
Yes I acknowledged this in my first post. You'd have to elaborate on your "metaphysics" though in order for this to have context though.
Nevertheless I wouldn't want to cause anyone to be born, unless I were with someone who really badly wanted to rear a child. — Michael Ossipoff
But that is yet again, not thinking of the future child which you are now going to create that needs to need, when the need did not have to be created in the first place if you never had the future child.
There's a lot of collateral damage in that, with the individuals thrown into existence to maintain this. — schopenhauer1
No one asked to be born and to contribute to the maintenance of civilization or will otherwise agree that suicide is the only recourse for not contributing — schopenhauer1
it could be true that I was born into a "barbaric" society (whatever that is), and still enjoy it, if I knew no other alternative — schopenhauer1
However, I would never say that everyone is "here to maintain civilization" as an end to itself. — schopenhauer1
This appears to be your answer to why instrumentality is a problem. The problem with it is that, instead of merely acknowledging the fact that human beings will exist in the future, you resort to hyperbolic and sophistical expressions like "thrown into existence." No one is thrown into existence, for no one exists before they exist, which is both impossible and absurd. The act of procreation does not pluck pre-born souls from the ether and force them into bodies. — Thorongil
Nor did anyone ask not to be anything or not contribute to the maintenance of civilization. Prior to existing, we couldn't ask to be or not to be anything, because there was no "we." — Thorongil
Moreover, once we do exist, there isn't any way to determine whether existence is preferable to non-existence, since no one has or can experience non-existence to make the comparison. — Thorongil
For all you and I know, which is, by definition, nothing, non-existence may be worse than existence. — Thorongil
A barbaric society is one inferior to a civilized one. If you understand and appreciate the benefits of civilization, then you wouldn't enjoy living in a barbaric society, even if you knew of no alternative, for otherwise you would be other than you are. Not all people living in such societies enjoy living in them, and so you would be one of them. — Thorongil
My girlfriends haven't had that need. — Michael Ossipoff
Just because there was no "pre-born souls" which you very-well know I don't believe in, does it then mean that people are not "thrown into existence". You are born without having a say, because it is impossible. Someone is born and it happened not of their own cause. It is not hyperbolic, but is simply what happens. There was no human, and then there is. Wherever you cut this "there is", it happens at some point and that is the "thrown" that you think is hyperbolic. — schopenhauer1
Yes if a tree falls in the woods, and there's no one there to hear it.. People need to exist for consent to exist. Thus, there cannot be "no wanting to exist" without existence. I was figuring you were going to go in that direction. The problem is, not existing would have not even made this an issue in the first place. Why create any issue at all? Why create those who need to be obligated to others, if what you are saying is something you strongly believe is what we must do. Forcing someone into an obligation to the species or be obliged to commit suicide seems its own bizarre justification. — schopenhauer1
Not preferable but, simply would be a non-issue. Born = issue. Not born, no issue, nor would it matter that there is no issue either. Just non-being.. Cannot get beyond the words here unfortunately whend discussing non-being (shades of Wittgenstein..etc. etc.). However, from the perspective of being, born one can get to understanding of instrumentality, striving, and for the non-reflective the actual "living in striving" and the ever present contingent harms of the many ways the world impinges on us in unwanted ways. — schopenhauer1
I'm not sure about that.. Again, Bushmen might like their lifestyle and not give a shit about the millions of complex technological advances or whatever other standin for our current civilization. — schopenhauer1
As an aside, I am not liking the character of this debate because I am being pigeonholed into a debate about an absolute ethics which I don't hold. I don't condemn people who have kids. I don't think there is necessarily an obligation either. I just want people to think more about the implications of procreation, what that will do for the future person, and what instrumentality means about human life in general. — schopenhauer1
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