Ah, so no reply. Good one.

I’m not particularly interested in the topic, but I think this is a good inconsistency to have found. — AJJ

But if it were even my argument. My whole point to him was that he keeps pretending I am talking about the nonexistent nobodies when I am just talking about states of affairs of creating collateral damage or not creating it. You sir, are perpetuating his endless straw man with this.. Encouraging it.

Which, in turn, was only a response to the idea that it's necessary to prevent harms but not important to create goods. Again, it's quite important to have a consistent view. What also matters is creating a state of affairs wherein a good X will take place, not that it's absence would lead to a deprivation. — DA671

I know and I wonder if you don't keep harping on this (non) point that I am not making as you know I have been careful not to make it. As if to just bug the hell out of me you keep bringing this idea of consistency when this whole time, you know that I have been careful to always say X state of affairs or not X state of affairs. But I'd like to just not talk about it. I just need you not to bring it up as if I am.

I've seen that before. I don't think that the potency of the joys can be ignored either. Many of the happiest people I've met were often those who didn't have a lot. A lot of beings can find great happiness in their lives even in the presence of harms. However, it's true that suffering is a serious problem, which is why thoughtless procreation must be opposed. — DA671

I said my thoughts in that earlier post so you can look back for reasoning why suffering created is not good to do.

It wasn't a mischaracterisation. It was merely a response to the claim that the absence of happiness does not matter because nobody is feeling deprived of it. Moving on. — DA671

And that was a response to the idea that there was some "loss" to "someone" going on- that there is no "downside" for any "one", only a projection of a downside (just as there would be as you pointed out to the joy of being alleviated from suffering). What matters is not creating a situation of X taking place. Not that X is good for someone.

For me, when one takes into account the innumerable positive experiences that countless people experience throughout their lives that act as a source of inimitable value even in the face of harms, I believe that the creating the benefits can be ethical. Therefore, in my view, the correct answer is, usually, yes. — DA671

I've stated my case contra this here before:
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/643425

In one state, there is benefit. In the other state, there are no benefits.

If the goods are high enough to allow the person to live a truly happy life, it's indeed justifiable to create the person. As long as you don't attempt to derail the conversation by talking about nobody being deprived due to an absence of suffering and falsely accusing me of straw manning you whenever I point out the fact that nobody is benefitted from the lack of harms either, there's not much left to say. — DA671

Right, so the disagreement is always with whether causing harm is immoral. It is never because of "unhad" anything for the "no one" that exists. And so, characterizing the "not causing suffering" as "not causing benefit" either, is mischaracterizing the states of affairs.. Do you want to cause this or not cause this state of affairs..

You can surely make the same case for benefits.. Do you want to cause "benefits" or not cause "benefits", but that isn't the full story which is why I phrase it all encompassed as "collateral damage". It is the acknowledgement that with one, comes the collateral of the other. Is this right/just to cause on behalf of another unnecessarily? The answer is no.

To notice this fact is not sadism, mild or bitter. That is an argument unworthy of you, and smacks of desperation. I'm stopping here, because it is clear that we have again reached the nub of our disagreement, and further discussion would be pointless suffering. — unenlightened

I am sorry Un, but I don't really get what point you are trying to make.
Are we not in agreement that another life can come about if a parent decides to procreate?
And thus, if life has suffering, which we both agree it does, why, as the parent would you want to procreate and have a person who will suffer, as we both agree they would?

I thought you were trying to say that you think that "Yes, procreation is good despite suffering, because suffering isn't bad".. And I was responding to that. If I am not getting your argument, please explain.

Your just arguing to argue now. Piss off if you can't be consructive. I've given you plenty here to loock back at.

You keep wanting to drop my earliest statements on state of affairs.
In on state, there is collateral damage. In the other there is not.
Should you create the state with collateral damage? That is the question. That is all. Anything else you say is straw manning me, and the fact you keep doing it, makes it now a red herring.. So stop.

For the last time, if the absence of joy doesn't matter due to an absence of an actual deprivation, the lack of damage cannot be considered good, since neither does it lead to a tangible relief/benefit. — DA671

I am saying exactly that actually. You seem to not care what I am saying, which is evident. The only thing that matters here is the parent not creating the harm. That is the moral decision. I am not saying that the non existent person is thus alleviated.

The only thing you said of any normative value is that you think creating collateral damage is not immoral. Okay then, we disagree.. BYYEEE.

I don't know. It's your story you tell it. — unenlightened

To want suffering to exist because you want to see people struggle and overcome hardships, can be construed as mildly sadistic. Just because it happens to be people's stance a lot of the times, doesn't mean it still isn't a great stance to have regarding what they want to see from other people.

Neither does the absence of damage, because nobody is relieved from their absence. — DA671

I am not saying that.. For the last time. It is simply wrong to create collateral damage unnecessarily unto someone. That is what I am saying. Not the consequence on the non-existent person for not doing that.

f absence of happiness only matters when there is a conscious feeling of deprivation, the lack of suffering also only matters when there is an actual relief. — DA671

No, keep up dude. The point is that YOU keep saying that if the parent doesn't procreation, then there are "unhad goods" and this is bad, but it isn't for anyone. All that matters is NO HARM is taking place. I am not saying that the "alleviation is thus good" as you seem to be about unhad goods (being bad).

Do you think there is such thing as a mild form of sadism?

If I kidnap you to work my garden and you eventually find some goods and bads with it, and I watch in amusement as you experience these things.. Am I being not just a little sadistic in my paternal amusement?

It was a clarification regarding the value of good, not a reference to nonexistent beings, so imaginary traps can be safely discarded. If unhad goods isn't bad, then neither is the absence of harms good. — DA671

Unhad goods matters not if no one exists to be deprived.
Alleviation of bad matters not either.. because there was no one to be alleviated.

All that matters is the parent doesn't choose "create collateral damage" onto someone else here. So all your points are moot cause I am not even trying to argue those.

I think we agree as to the facts. It's the morality that we differ on. you equate harm with evil, and I utterly reject it. — unenlightened

Reject harm as evil, or reject that we are at all harmed?
Also, I am glad we agree on the facts.. @DA671 keeps going in circles to make it so that we can't agree on them.

Weasel to messiah—quite a metamorphosis. The point is that even if it's somewhat good (due to lack of harms), it cannot be entirely good (since all benefits would also be absent). — DA671

This is like "how many angels fit at the head of a pin". I don't care about the "benefits of unhad alleviation" just that the parent isn't choosing to cause harm where they could have. Stick with the states of affairs and not the strawmen invisible empty set.

Unhad goods do lead to harm for existing people (such as loss of health leading to pain). — DA671

Unhad goods had by no one, I said.. Not just unhad goods in and of themselves.. I am careful not to fall into the non-identity traps you (and everyone else here apparently) likes to set.

As for those who don't exist, if unhad goods don't matter due to the fact that nobody is experiencing a deprivation in the void, the absence of harms is not preferable either, since there aren't any souls in nihility who are fulfilled/relieved from an absence of suffering. — DA671

Good thing I am not talking about the alleviation of bad then, right? Same reason why I wouldn't care about unhad goods.. It's about the parent not creating harm for others.. So glad we are not repeating that constant reworking of my statements.

Benefits had is good for a person and we should strive to help and support each other as much as possible. As ever, have an excellent day/night! — DA671

And this the only thing you said here which is a legitimate normative statement.. That you think parents have an obligation to create benefits, despite the collateral damage that is created. I of course disagree that creating benefits, if it means creating collateral damage, is never good to do unnecessarily.

Who? — unenlightened

You, the parent, aren't creating (unnecessarily) someone else who is harmed.

Preventing suffering at the cost of all joy can never be moral in the ultimate sense. — DA671

What does "ultimate sense" here mean.. You sound like a god damn messiah trying to spread the word.. You aren't, there isn't.

The damage is bad, but the benefits are good. My position is that it can be ethical to create the person due to the presence of goods, and you emphasise the harms. Ultimately, we have different intuitions as far as this topic is concerned. — DA671

I am saying at the end of the day, unhad goods mean nothing for no one. Rather, harms had is bad for someone and not do that to someone. Good day.

See here: https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/657460

That's just how it works, old man; the egg is necessary to the chicken, and the chicken is necessary to the egg. Hence the unanswerable question. It is not necessary to me to have children but it is necessary to my children that I had them; and their suffering is necessary to their lives as your suffering is necessary to yours. — unenlightened

Why is the suffering "necessary" to take place in the first place? As the parent, you decided that their suffering is "necessary". This isn't a weird paternalism of amusement?

These are bald facts; but there is no life without suffering, so there is no unnecessary suffering {apart from all the unnecessary suffering that we ought to avoid, by not putting ground glass in the bread and not shooting folks in the knee-cap etc.} — unenlightened

Ah, so you are misunderstanding my point about unnecessary suffering. Unnecessary in the fact that, unlike most of life where you do indeed have to worry about not doing X to prevent Y, and weighing various outcomes of harm.. This is a case where you (the parent) can not create ANY harm for another person..

But this future possibility regarding the well being of others (however they may be conceived) is something that applies to all actions we take. — Constance

I'm going to stop you right here, because it actually doesn't. There are some things due to the special nature of procreation vs. already existing people that make the decision different.

It's certainly important. However, it's also important that genuine benefits are taking place. That is the moral part. The parents should do that. That is moral. — DA671

Creating suffering for the sake of happiness is, and doing so unnecessarily.. That is moral? So at least you are not weasling here.. You get my point, right. It is the state of affairs where collateral damage is taking place that is where the moral issue comes into play right? The fact that no one exists if one doesn't actual decide to procreate matters not.. You can call that decision "good" or "not good or bad".. but the point is the collateral damage is the "bad" here.. That is the morally relevant state of affairs we are deciding to select or not select for someone else.

There is no benefit in one case and there is benefit in another. If the lack of damage is good even though it does not provide relief/satisfaction to an actual person, the absence of happiness can also be bad even if it's absence doesn't cause conscious "collateral damage". — DA671

No no.. I'm going to call you weasel if you keep weasling like this.. Look at what I said again instead of what you would like to see:

The most important part of this is to understand by procreation, collateral damage IS taking place. That is the immoral part. The parent should NOT do that. That is immoral.

If it can be good to not create harms for "someone" even though nobody is relieved from their absence (a parallel to the nobody is deprived of joy claim), it's also problematic to not create any joy on the basis of one's pessimistic desires. — DA671

Ah, so we are back to you not agreeing to the facts on the ground.. Okay here we go back to the fuckn drawing board.

It's not "problematic" because in one case collateral damage IS taking place. That is a fact.
In the other case, collateral damage IS NOT taking place.

The most important part of this whole thing is collateral damage IS taking place. THAT is the immoral part. We want to NOT do THAT because THAT is immoral.

If preventing the harm was necessary even though we don't have evidence for souls in nonexistence desiring it, the creation of the blessing is certainly necessary. The harms matter, but so do the positives. Creating the greater good can be justified. — DA671

See my above comment because this is just more strawman.

Phew, finally one can realise that not working in the garden isn't better/preferable for a person either, since one can logically see that they are neither being deprived nor being relieved/fulfilled from an absence of harm. And yes, nobody is being "forced" into that garden of yours if one would think about this issue thoroughly, but that's a separate matter. — DA671

Don't be stupid. No one "needs" to realize it. Remember, this is about the parents, not "non existent people". The parent is not creating collateral damage for someone else unnecessarily. Didn't we agree on this like many posts ago? Or are we slipping into weasily strawmen again because this line of reasoning (of yorus) is unreasonable to sustain?

Since it's not the case that an alternative greater good could exist from an absence of that harm, it can be ethical to bestow that good as long as it leads to a mostly valuable life for a person. The same would apply to a life that could have some real goods but ultimately turn out to be bad. — DA671

I am tempted to make the "how would you know either way, and air on the side of caution if you don't" argument, but that would go down another path (though valid too). Staying with the deontological argument that is valid.. It is about the decision to not create for someone else harms. The joy not "had" by a person, while may be sad face to the parent who projects about missed joy, is still being more ethical here despite their sad face projection, because they didn't create harm.

@unenlightened unfortunately makes the wrong assumption that you need to exist so that you have "something" for which you are not harming. He isn't understanding that it's simply the state of affairs of not creating collateral damage that needs to take place for it to be a moral decision. "The parent did NOT create collateral damage unnecessarily". That's all that needs to be met to make the moral decision.

It could still be comparatively worse. And even if it is an imposition in some cases, it can also be a genuine blessing. I shall not forsake consistency when I don't have a reason to do so. — DA671

Just because a "blessing" can be created, doesn't mean doing the harm was justified, if it was unnecessary to start.

Thankfully, one isn't being forced to do something against their interests when they are created ;) — DA671

Stop it.. Born into a volcano is okay because everything prior to the volcano that person didn't exist :roll:. Dumbass notion. Only in the case of NOT having a child would the "forcing" not happen. Because as you point out, no ONE is forced. At X time of existence, there is someone. "They" didn't just come about in that place and time by fiat. The things that led up to that.. that is the force. Look at that!

If someone would probably want to work in a garden but is not able to ask for going there on their own, it doesn't make sense to not give them the chance to do so because of one's own evaluation that might not be shared by the other person (telling them that their joy was unnecessary and that their harms are what really matter can also be quite paternalistic). — DA671

Phew, luckily there was no one who is deprived of the garden experience beforehand. No one who was "forced" into the garden. HERE is where you can make your case about non-identity NOT the one where someone actually is born.

Intrinsic bad/damage also doesn't mean much, by the same token. If the argument is that it's wrong to impose/cause an action that is against one's interests (suffering), I believe that it can be good to bestow/cause a good that's in their interest. If we are intuitively averse to one, the preference for the other also matters. — DA671

But it isn't bestowing on their interests without causing harm, so you are in a conundrum of causing suffering to cause a good.

No. I refuse you a break. — unenlightened

Ah I see you needed to hang your hat on that one...

There is no 'if' about it. Every child suffers, and every child dies. This is an inescapable part of what being alive is. Harm is necessary to life, not unnecessary to life. — unenlightened

Harm is necessary but someone else being born from YOUR decision is not. You know this, yet you phrase it like no decisions are made.. They are all made by default. No a parent MAKES a decision.

I have not made a non-identity argument. My argument is that life is good because without life there would be no antinatalism. — unenlightened

Haha, I see what you did there. Why do you, the parent, have to be the harbinger for other people's experiences? You are almost making the point I am trying to make to @DA671

Yeah, some people mistakenly think that being an antinatalist means that you should end your life/harm other people. While I have met some who did espouse such views, most proponents disagree with that. I am not sure if this has happened to you yet, but I want to apologise from other people's behalf if they ever said something to you regarding harming yourself. It's not fun stuff. — DA671

Yeah the "go kill yourself" argument against antinatlism is tiresome and should just be ignored at this point.

No, it's equally important to create joys and opportunities. — DA671

But it is never just that!! It is entailed with forcing suffering upon someone. This is smugly paternalistic if harm is ignored for X reason (joy). It is presumptuous and paternalistic to think that, "Someone needs this!". But why? If I force you to work my garden, and you go through various moods and experiences of hating and loving it.. and then turn to me and say, "Why are you forcing me to work this garden?" And I say "Because SOMEONE NEEDS to experience this".. I am just a paternalistic douche who likes to see other people do X for my amusement.

What about joy needs to be had? Intrinsic good doesn't mean anything to me. Joy is good, is just a sort of tautology. What is the argument that joy needs to be created at the cost of harm?

I never said that there's just joy. However, it's also true that many people can find their lives to be unfathomably meaningful even in the face of harms. If it can be bad to create a person even if not creating the person doesn't lead to greater good for the person (by fulfilling their need to not exist) either, I don't see any good reason to not create the opportunity for experiencing innumerable positives. One is going ahead and creating a benefit (that they would have probably preferred despite the harms) that could not have been asked for by the person themselves. It is ethical to procreate (but not always). — DA671

Because there is no obligation to create "opportunity", "good", "joy". There is only obligation to prevent unnecessary harm when one can.

Look, it's a given that when you have children, they will not have a life free of suffering. — Constance

Why go any further? I'm serious.

But if you treat the concept of suffering as a maxim for taking action, you will thereby be obliged to kill yourself now in the most merciful way. You will conclude that any suffering whatsoever defeats any possible justification for allowing the existence of something. — Constance

Why can't circumstances change depending on the situation? This is a ridiculous characterization of how my argument is stated. You have a chance to not create harm onto a future person. I am saying this non-action is the most ethical course. Don't create the harm.

I have also stated that once born, we must mitigate and allow for "necessary harms". Ironically, this is the lesser of the two.. In one case, you can purely prevent all harms. In the other, you must mitigate between lesser and greater harms for various interests involved. To do X, I must do harmful Y.. This sucks, but is the case. And suicide is definitely a major harm, or up until the suicide itself.

Collateral damage means that, despite creating joy, X suffering is entailed. Thus, we are never talking a paradise situation, or simply "Oh, I am creating joy". Rather, it is always joy entailed with suffering. Is it ever good to do this, and do it without any mitigating need (to alleviate a greater harm for that person)? No, it is not. One is going ahead anyways and creating the harm onto that person. It is irrelevant that the intention was joy.

The parent who decides to create a person, whose harms/benefits were being discussed. It's truly amusing. The need to create ethereal joys does matter. I don't see why it isn't except for some pessimistic biases. — DA671

You know what collateral damage is right? I'm not just saying "harm" in our discussion, and for a reason.

No, creating/preserving joy matters just as removing harms does. There is nobody whose interest is fulfilled by their lack of creation either. But if it's still necessary to prevent harms sans an actual good, it cannot be acceptable to prevent all joy. — DA671

Haha, are you just doing this to be funny? It's about the parent. The obligation to not create unnecessary collateral damage if you can prevent it. You haven't answered the question. Why is it an obligation to create joy? I don't see an argument except some adjectives.

Unnecessary to create it in the first place to whom? Life is necessary as the precondition for saying "the first place". Therefore life is the first place. Life is necessary to life. Life is necessary to claiming that life is not necessary.

Life is contingent. Harm is necessary to life. Life is necessary to say that life is contingent. — unenlightened

That is totally fuckn ridiculous. So, if someone is going to be born into horrendous conditions, because the kid is not "existent" yet, none of this matters? Give me a break :roll:. In your attempt to be clever with the non-identity argument you put yourself in a corner. You are better than that.

It's a dreadful argument. Always wrong to create unnecessary collateral damage? Living and breathing is creating unnecessary collateral damage. Time itself is unnecessary collateral damage, for time is constructed in the Hypothetical. My next banana contributes to an exploitation of third world people. Writing these very lines could give you a heart attack. The future itself does not exist, and each creative act is a hypothetical leap. You can't simply talk about parents bringing children into a dangerous world. That is arbitrarily, for this is only one occasion of hypothetically anticipating affairs. — Constance

Ah, so you haven't been paying attention to what I mean by unnecessary suffering.. I should just say to do the work and look back to what I said but I will explain it...

If one is already born, one cannot but help but create suffering (this I deem as necessary suffering). For example, creating a lesser harm to prevent a greater harm.. However, in the case of procreation, none of it is "necessary" to perpetrate onto another. You are not preventing a "person" from a greater harm, as they don't exist, you are simply creating unnecessary harm from the start.

I don't think that one is creating harm "for" someone. But it's quite important to create a genuine benefit for someone when it cannot be solicited by that individual themselves. — DA671

Answer this right here: Is this a moral OBLIGATION? Not just supererogatory.

If we have an obligation to prevent damage, I do think that we need to conserve/create good (though that also depends on practical limitations). — DA671

You state it that one is entailed in the other. That is just not the case. Harm is morally relevant. Creating joy, may not be and is probably supererogatory, especially when there is no actual person's interest that one is trying to alleviate by creating the joy. Mind you, this has nothing to do with "alleviating non-existing pain". either just that one is obligated NOT to CREATE that pain in the first place. That's all.

In the end, our intuitions continue to diverge because one of us only cares about one side of the coin, which ultimately fuels their one sided "deontology" of preventing damage but not being concerned about what could be rationally considered a genuine blessing. — DA671

Why is creating joy in the first place obligated? You've never answered this other than "blessing" and non-compelling adjectives.

Emotions don't constitute reason. Sure, just because one doesn't exist to ask for a good life, it's somehow not good to create someone in a blissful heaven wherein they could experience immense joy. Moving on. — DA671

I never claimed that.. I have said previously (look back!) that if it was always the case people were procreated into paradise, there wouldn't be a moral issue. But that is not the case. This very debate disqualifies that state of affairs :D.

At this point, I think that you have decided that you want close your mind off entirely whenever things become uncomfortable for you. You're the one who keeps talking about nobody being "deprived" of happiness when they don't exist, and this is not about the parents. It's about the parents not creating any happiness. This should not be this hard to grasp. — DA671

Oh boy, no no dude. You have FINALLY made it about the parents.. Congratulations.. Welcome to where you needed to be many posts ago...

So that is the question then.. Are the parents obligated to create "happiness" if they are creating "unnecessary collateral damage". Of course I think it is always wrong to create unnecessary collateral damage for someone else, as this will be the state of affairs if they exist. It is not wrong to not create happiness as this brings about no negative/bad state of affairs for anyone.

Unnecessary to whom? Death is necessary to life. Harm is necessary to life. Life is necessary to life. — unenlightened

Unnecessary to create it in the first place. You are either creating collateral damage for someone else or you are not. I am saying the moral choice is to not create collateral damage for someone when you didn't need to create it in the first place.

In isolation, the damage is obviously unethical. However, when the act can lead to greater happiness for a person, it can be justifiable to do so. I also don't think that one is acting for "someone else" when nobody exists at the time of the act, but I shall ignore that for the sake of the argument. — DA671

Sure, if someone spits out a kid in the mouth of a volcano, and makes the decision that this is okay..it's not making a decision on "behalf" of anything :roll:. Just spit it out into the volcano, right? This whole non-identity thing in relation to procreation is a different debate so moving on...

If it's necessary to prevent harms even though preventing them doesn't lead to a good for someone in an alternative state of affairs (in the form of fulfillment or relief), I think that it's also problematic to never create any joy. — DA671

WTF?? You JUST did it again!! We JUST spent all this time going over how this is about the fuckn parent's decision. And now you are reverting to you shitty strawman about "not good for an actual person"... It's about the PARENT NOT CREATING SUFFERING!!!!! DOES THAT COMPUTE??!!

I just slowed this down for you so you can see this is about states of affairs. In one case harm, in the other not. It's nothing to do with the "relief" of the non-existent child!!

If it leads to greater happiness, it is ethical, in my view. It's definitely about the ethical act committed by the parents of creating a good. — DA671

Right, so same question. Is it ever ethical to create unnecessary collateral damage? No. It would be unethical.

Benefits are also ethically relevant, particularly when one is not in an already satisfied state of affairs that they would be mostly happy with as long as serious harms are avoided. — DA671

Okay, so you are finally just putting your normative claim there. Everything is based on utility for you. I am claiming deontology that creating unnecessary collateral damage is always bad.

Here's an example..
If I made an obstacle course and said that you MUST go through the obstacles or you simply die of starvation.. Am I right to make you go through the obstacle course? No.

What happens if I said, hey, I have some tools and skills that I can provide for you to make the obstacle course a little easier.. Is that justified? No. Even though it was better to provide those, it was never good to create for that person in the first place.