You seem to think they're not wrong to do, so I take it you think that if most people don't find a situation harmful, then it's not an imposition. Cool, so life isn't an imposition! — khaled

No, not at all.
1) The same may apply.. People can report one thing and experience another, but the main reason is
2) A surprise party lasts a certain duration with a set period of time. Life itself is a lifetime obviously. You cannot compare the two. And this is what you seem to do, is force me into these analogies and then try to say, "Gotcha!" and etc. I've said before, this particular analogy (and probably most others too) are not analogous to the situation of life itself, being that it is all experiences over a span of a life time.

No Buddhist ever claimed life is suffering. The original quote is more like "Life has suffering". Not a groundbreaking discovery. "Life is suffering" is a problem not a serious philosophical position. — khaled

This has too much to unpack and requires its own discussion. If you want to do that, start a new thread.

Again, most people relish in the burden of life. Few find it a thing they must endure. — khaled

Enduring and "finding it a thing they must endure" is almost the same as the experience and the report later of the experience so this is just restating what we are arguing as far as I see.

How do you know if a surprise party was burdensome or not? You ask the recipient right? And each recipient will give a different answer but most will likely agree the party was good. — khaled

Again, I don't believe this is analogous to life itself because of the vast difference in duration and the fact that one is one experience while the other is a lifetime of all experiences.

And like the "endure" and "report of endure" this suffers from the same problem, though I would agree that this particular experience would most likely fall under not suffering or being negative. I never claimed life has no good experiences.

Why exactly? They're both post facto reports. Why should one be dismissed in favor of "Actually, you're wrong, life is at best an inconvenience and at worst a terrible burden and harm" while the other should be trusted? — khaled

Technically same response as above, experience vs. report. But I would agree that a particular event of a surprise party might align the experience and report as good. Being that this is disanalogous to life itself, being that life is the sum of all experiences, this really doesn't matter though as explained above.

This is an extent argument. You're saying life is "too bad" while surprise parties aren't bad enough. You are in the minority in thinking this. Yet you want to make a global statement, that having children is wrong (at least in 99% of cases) and that life is suffering despite you thinking it's fine (at least in 99% of cases). You have provided no support for this. Because extent arguments can't be true for everyone.

Not everyone is going to think that vanilla is too sweet and chocolate isn't sweet enough like you do. You telling them that they're wrong and actually both are too sweet, just doesn't apply. Your position is just as valid as theirs when it comes to this. — khaled

Even if this was correct, one major difference is I am not forcing the ice cream on others. But see again, here you are sneaking in a dis-analogous analogy, so yeah ice cream flavors and surprise parties would make the whole thing seem pretty absurd. At least if you are going to be talking of extent, try to make an analogy of things that are daily X set of multiple experiences that are continuous and non-stop until death.. Oh wait, there's really not much to analogize to that.

One is still subject to all possible harms even during a surprise party, it's not different in that sense. So the only difference is the length of the imposition.

All analogies break down at some point. However this isn't relevant. The length of the imposition shouldn't matter for what we're discussing. — khaled

But it does, especially if we are talking about an extent argument.

Again, this is an extent argument. Most people wouldn't say that life is "at least an inconvenience". They would say something like "At best an incredible joy, at worst a terrible burden (leaning more towards the former)". Again, the statement you're making is your view of life, and it is the minority view. Yet you want to say that this view is true of everyone, and that their post facto evaluations should be dismissed. Yet you don't dismiss post facto evaluations when it comes to surprise parties (you don't tell people "Actually you're wrong, and surprise parties are absolutely Satanic"). Why is that? — khaled

Because I can probably agree that actual lived experience and reported experience are more aligned in the case of surprise parties. Again, back to the dis-analogy objection. I am simply repeating now but you are presenting the same thing.

I mean objective as in: True of everybody. Do you think that having kids is wrong for everybody or at least the vast majority? — khaled

No. I mean objective as in, I cannot make my argument "THE ARGUMENT" because it is an argument. It is not a chair. It is not the laws of gravity, etc. I can simply provide ideas. Again, it's a meta-ethics thing about where it fits into the world of phenomena. I can't recall the exact conversation, but I think it was about the "airtight" case of the argument. But no argument is going to be airtight. Things resembling this would be empirical physical phenomena, and even this can at least be questioned like Hume's Induction Problem. Ethics is dealing with the human condition and human behaviors.

However, to the point of "objectivity", you may be referring more to "universality in belief" which you seem to refer back to over and over for why antinatalism is wrong. But in an ironic way, this is yet another example of the majority not necessarily dictating what is right and wrong. Think of veganism, and other things seen as on the "fringe". Think of times when mass groups of people did things we now consider barbaric or misguided. Perhaps there are universal appeals to wrongs- things like murder and theft. But then there are things more subtle and ingrained in cultural practice. It takes different perspectives to question what is often viewed as a given.

Unless we are talking about surprise parties then they are to be trusted :up:

See the problem? — khaled

No, because as repeated over and over, the analogy is dis-analogous.

Yes. Since you didn't consent to it for obvious reasons. — khaled

A lot of this debate will fall on this. I am not sure I would classify it as an imposition if people like it. Presumably there are aspects of life which are harmful, and life itself can be classified as suffering from a Buddhist standpoint. If a surprise party is harmful then it is an imposition. If it is simply unexpected, I wouldn't necessarily say it's an imposition. A burden, a thing one must "endure" (not relish in). It is an inconvenience at the least and a terrible burden at most. A surprise party at its worst might be an inconvenience for someone, but then that is situational to the person.. However, with what I was saying earlier, much of life is full of burdens and inconveniences and harms etc etc. and its simply the post-facto reports that say, "Life is good" or "Good to be born", etc.

So is life.... — khaled

Okay, so the lifetime of the subject a lifetime of all such possible harms small and large vs. one temporary event within that lifetime. These are the types of things that make this non-analogous in the first place.

I don't think so. You have to show it, you can't just say "Oh you can come up with a definition that suits my view". My definition of an imposition is something that is done to you without your consent. I think this is reasonable. You think this isn't sufficient so present your definition of imposition that makes life an imposition and surprise parties not. — khaled

Yes as stated earlier, at the least inconvenience at most terrible burden and harm.

Depends on how bad the position is and why the magician is doing it. — khaled

He was trying to give the non-existent argument. If no one exists, then no one is harmed, but then this is refuted by saying, but they will be harmed. Yes people can be harmed in the future from present events and the rest.

Also I'm assuming you went back on this?:

I never claimed there was any "objectivity". You seem to ignore that. The case is made and people either find it compelling or not. — khaled

This was a meta-argument about ethical arguments. There is no way I can "prove" to you "objectively" any of my claims like pointing to something and say, "That is a chair".

:up: Hence why I consider procreation to be an act of blameless wrongdoing. — darthbarracuda

I can maybe agree with that. What is your own justification for that? What I don't get is wanting a child is a discursive, deliberative thought. It is not an immediate need, nor even something as compelling as pleasure or the aversion/reflex away from pain. The statement, "I want a car" and "I want a baby" are absolutely the same as far as I see. One does not have any more unconscious pull than another. The wanting of something is simply the wanting of something.

I guess you can make the case that the "heat of the moment" outweighed the thought for whether or not to have a baby, but with the ubiquity of all sorts of birth control, this isn't as big a deal either.

So really, it is more of a cultural and personal want than a universal biological drive.. unless you want to argue that wanting anything is a drive itself, but then we are speaking about wants and not this specific wants.. Wants then can be mitigated like all other wants.. I want this Ferrari but I cannot afford it, best not try to buy it. I want X but...

It is unjust to force or coerce another to make a choice. But you cannot force or coerce another to make a choice if that other doesn’t already exist. The question arises as to who it is we’re being unjust to. — NOS4A2

If a magician can snap his fingers and bring a person into a situation that they would not want, knowing the outcome will be a future person in harmful/unwanted situation, what say you then? Is the magician justified to make that choice for someone else?

Another way of determining "bad enough" is how most people would react to the options. — khaled

So going back to the extent argument, "bad enough" for surprise parties is similar to "bad enough" for birth?

Also, with all the other things I explained, I think there are reasons other than "most people might want this" but what makes this hard to analogize to anything else is it is creating someone from scratch and then allowing the situation to be 'good or bad". A lot of times when people are already born, there is no choice except to try to make the least worst choice.

So yes, sometimes impositions of this nature are ok. It depends on whether or not the options given are "bad enough". This was what you said 3 months ago. As to what determines "bad enough": It's a subjective feeling according to you, and there is no objective way to determine it — khaled

Well I might be rethinking it and think there's a case for both kind and extent. It's just that I was accepting things like "surprise parties" as impositions, but there may need to be more context as stated here:

I can make a case similar to above that surprise parties are not analogous to not being born. Presumably, it would be a bad idea if you knew the person made it known they hate surprise parties or they can easily get a heart attack.. You do know the person presumably. However, if we go to the extent argument- the surprise is temporary, a set period of time, and is it an imposition really? That definition can be debated for the kind argument but it can also work for the extent argument that it is finite, temporary and very little in the imposition scale. — schopenhauer1

Not: the state of the world, our finances, the possibility of passing on an illness, that the baby may resent what is seen as a selfish act given our simple desire for a baby compared to the eventual impact on them, etc? A category of consideration for what it would mean to be just in this case seems to be: weighing having the child against our situation (including our desires and opinions). That someone asks the parents (or they ask themselves) "Why would you want to bring a child into this world?" Taking into consideration all that and more, if we say to the parents "But the baby has no choice!", what difference would it make? i.e., why say that? — Antony Nickles

All of those are considerations too and I have discussed those at length in other discussions. I specifically want to talk about the injustice of having no choice. I think because it is a fact of the situation, doesn't mean it is a good fact to begin with. Yes, it is a truisim that procreating means the procreated have no choice. But it is the very fact that so many people have no qualms about the lack of choice that I want to examine. If someone cannot make a choice by default of not existing, yet the resultant action would lead to something affecting another person none-the-less, why does the "default of not existing, thus cannot make a choice" get a "pass" as justifiable rather than the possible injustice of "the resultant action would lead to something affecting another person none-the-less? And we are not just talking doctor visits, vaccines, chores, and schooling.. We are talking making the decision that another person must endure all of life itself. This isn't a small thing. This isn't ameliorating a greater harm with a lesser harm. This is creating someone else and they would have no choice. The irony is that often people jump to, "But once born then they can have a choice.. But the biggest choice can never be made. By the way, if you think that I am trying to make an argument to "convince" parents, I am not. I am just pointing out something that is right under our noses.

I csn’t make sense of your additions. — apokrisis

Whence/What the Apeiron? You answered

Vagueness is defined by the principle of contradiction finally giving out and failing to apply. — apokrisis

Vagueness vagueing is pretty vague if that's your answer, but it's just as oddly metaphysical as any other metaphysics.

You are mixing together "condition" and "causality". We would say birth puts us in a condition, or position, but not that it determines or forces anything (or whatever you imagine causality to do). — Antony Nickles

Agreed, so no I'm not.

If you actually wanted to make the case, say: how parents are responsible for the choice they make in bringing a child into the world, this world, their inadequate world, and the possible justifications and qualifications, this is currently not that discussion. — Antony Nickles

That's the discussion I'm trying to have, but I am trying to connect it with the idea that:
Another person has made a decision for you. You had no decision to opt out. Every birth is a "never can opt out situation". How is that a just thing?

It ain’t my problem if you feel you must employ an inferior brand of metaphysics when better ones are available. — apokrisis

You missed my edit and additions, which I think is what I'm really interested in:

And then, what is the nature of the Apeiron? Is this not a "ground"? It just pushes the can back from ground in the mind to ground in the beginning of the universe and time.

The "fun" part of post-Kantian idealism is its antimonies... The first eye that opened was when time began, but empirically time goes further back than that, etc. The ground is the cognition. The infinite monads or the unified Thing-in-Itself(s) are the "behind the scenes" and "actual" reality.

With this sort of realism you propose, triadic form self-organizing is kicked off somehow from a distant past Apeiron. What is "this"? You describe the theoretical and postulated "form" but not whence or what, which is the leap of faith metaphysics part. — schopenhauer1

It can and very well might be that, but I think that you would then have to include that most nihilists have done so, which would be somewhat absurd. — thewonder

I don't know, I don't know "many" nihilists. I know more of real life "anarchists" perhaps or "punks" but except in The Big Lebowski have never seen an actual "nihilist" :D.

That's kind of an all too particular example, but the point I'm trying to make is that there is a difference between a definitional denotation of a particular philosophy and what said philosophy effectively turns out to be. — thewonder

That phrase "turns out to be" is where you are sidetracking. Unless you want to make a pragmatist case that the definition of a philosophy is only how a majority of people are using it, then it still holds, people are simply wrong about their label.

I'm not sure that there exists this pure abstract nihilism, devoid of the various weltanschauungs of the people who call themselves "nihilists". — thewonder

Possibly. I would simply say that "nihilism" in its most basic form is a denial of something, not a "positive" belief other than the positive belief that something "does not" exist.

If you want to cite Nietzsche as a classic "nihilist" you must realize that after proposing nihilism, he proposed to go "beyond" it by having a post-nihilist ethics (Beyond Good and Evil). That part though, I don't see as being nihilist, but a post-nihilist answer to nihilism.

But since Anaximander first argued for the spontaneous self-organisation of an Apeiron, a metaphysics of sense-making rationalisation - a dissipative structure - has been kicking about in the back room of organicism. We can certainly see it in Hegel and Peirce, as well as others, — apokrisis

And then, what is the nature of the Apeiron? Is this not a "ground"? It just pushes the can back from ground in the mind to ground in the beginning of the universe and time.

The "fun" part of post-Kantian idealism is its antimonies... The first eye that opened was when time began, but empirically time goes further back than that, etc. The ground is the cognition. The infinite monads or the unified Thing-in-Itself(s) are the "behind the scenes" and "actual" reality.

With this sort of realism you propose, triadic form self-organizing is kicked off somehow from a distant past Apeiron. What is "this"? You describe the theoretical and postulated "form" but not whence or what, which is the leap of faith metaphysics part.

What I am saying is that what nihilists say that nihilism is is distinct from philosophical pessimism, but that, when it comes to what it actually turns out to be, the distinction becomes blurred. — thewonder

Can it then be that your "nihilist" friends are confused as to what "nihilism" is? People mislabel themselves all the time. I don't think it's a matter of the definition being blurred, but how people label themselves. There is also the case one can be a "nihilist" and a "pessimist" but one does not entail the other and hence why good conceptual analysis can work out which falls under what and what is being unknowingly blurred.

Thus, your imposition (and continuing) idea of causality is manufactured as a backwards version of the part that responsibility plays in choice. If we take you seriously, the condition of being alive makes you responsible, as anyone is, but your choices are not caused by your birth. You are in the condition of answering for yourself (even if you do not choose); you may want to abdicate that responsibility, but then are you alive? are you (being) human? — Antony Nickles

The conditions of having choice (as any other condition, PERIOD), is from being born, so not sure about that underlined emphasis there. However, I get what you are saying, one may be what some existentialists refer to as being inauthentic by abdicating choice to social pressures, habits, unthinking roles, etc. And indeed one has made a subconscious choice to abdicate, if one is doing that..

However, this post-birth choice condition X, is not what I am referring to.. I am referring to the act made by the person's progenitors to create them...Was it just to make the decision to procreate for someone else who could not opt out of the choice? One is born, and has no choice in this. One can never decide to opt out (and suicide is NOT the same as not wanting it in the first place).

So here's my big takeaway... While people often refer to the ability to have choices as some sort of freedom and justice, the very condition for having these choices, (life itself) is glaringly NOT a choice. An injustice (perhaps) that one can NEVER have the choice for birth prior to birth (de facto part of reality), but just because this IS the case does not mean this fact is GOOD or JUST for the person who by the law of causality, could NEVER have the choice. So people change the debate to choices after birth and glaringly skip over the biggest choice that can never be made at all, one's own BIRTH.

I feel it misses that, ordinarily, selecting no option is just part of what a choice involves. — Antony Nickles

But your birth could never have been a choice you made. Is it just that that choice is made for you. There was no choice to opt out, and here is something more important possibly than any other decision and you could never have made it for yourself.

It brings up another question: Just because all choices X are due to the condition of being born B- does having choices X as a consequence of B, justify B which itself was a condition that did not even allow for choice? Is simply having the ability to make choices X override the first (possible) injustice of B (never having a choice for the whole course of life itself, which granted have subsequent choices one can make)?

Why would Schopenhauer say only causality is a category of the mind. Kant admitted that the self is will ("free will) and since such is apart from space and time the relationship to the world from it is paradoxical — Gregory

Schopenhauer thought the 12 categories were unnecessary and arbitrary I believe. In Schopenhauer's system, time, space, and causality in the general a priori cognitive limits of how the Will is represented creating the subject-object "illusion" which is the realm of the phenomenal world we "think" is going on (but is only represented or cognized). From there he goes on to explain the fourfold "root" of the Principle of Sufficient Reason. Of course, this itself doesn't necessarily answer the question of how such a perceiver exists in the first place (the first "eye" that sees the world, if you will). Mark Linsenmayer from the podcast The Partially Examined Life has the best critique on this aspect of Schopenhauer, which I will quote below. It is also something I have brought up here in TPF in previous threads. I can give you those links if you want, but I'd have to dig back a little.

You may recall that for Kant, whether or not time has a beginning or not is an antinomy: There are equally good reasons on both sides, and so the correct answer it to say that we just can't know and/or that the question somehow doesn't make sense. Temporal sequence only applies to phenomena, which depend on minds, so asking whether things in themselves are in an infinite or finite temporal series is attempting to use the concept of time outside of the realm in which it was developed, which is the realm of our experience. It does not follow from this that the Thing-In-Itself is atemporal, but simply that the Thing-In-Itself is not something we're in any position to make a judgment either way about. Compare to the question "Is God green?" You might say qua Maimonides that no, of course God is not green; colors apply to finite things. But neither can we positively say that God has the positive property of not being green, or not having color. Maybe He does have color, but in some higher way that we can't understand. We are in the same position regarding the Thing-In-Itself: by definition it's something we can't perceive or even really conceive of in its wholeness, in its essence, in its positive aspects.

Schopenhauer thinks that Kant is in no position to decide this issue "by definition," and thinks he has other reasons (mystical and artistic experience, i.e. the verdict of genius, plus the philosophy of science considerations surrounding "force" belabored in our discussion) for thinking we can know some positive things about the Thing-In-Itself, but he still fundamentally doesn't give us a reason for insisting on its lack of plurality and hence its non-temporal, non-spatial status. So why does he insist on this? I think he's just adhering to the heuristic (Kant might call it a regulative principle of Reason) to seek simplicity/unity. Saying that ultimately existence is One is supposed to be more satisfying somehow than saying that it's irreducibly Many. It's somewhat ironic that Schopenhauer dismisses this principle when it comes to science (in his rejection of reductionism) only to assert such unity at the metaphysical level.

Setting that aside, and granting Schopenhauer the point about the Thing-In-Itself's unified, atemporal character, and granting him the (contentious) proposition that differentiation within the Thing-In-Itself (the Will) only happens because perceivers pop up to perceive some part of the Will, haven't we just pushed the antinomy back one level? Schopenhauer is able to answer the question "does time have a beginning of not" by saying "no, not on the level of representation, but yes, before the first perceiver, there was no time," but he is then faced with a similarly insoluble question: "How could the first perceiver perceive something unless there was something already there to perceive?" This is to ask "why the principium individuationis?" which is in Schopenhauer's system the tragic question of Being. — Mark Linsenmayer

Well this is news to population geneticists and actuaries! Explain why we still exist after two hundred-odd millennia if, as a species, h. sapiens in the aggregate isn't "just reflexively breeding". — 180 Proof

Asserting that humans tend to breed doesn't address this above:

Can you explain this? Presumably we know where babies come from and can prevent it. I'm not trying to be sarcastic or anything, but just countering the idea that procreation (not even saying sex) is so determined. The brain-states involved in "Wanting X" isn't necessarily the same as immediate physical gratification. Wanting X (Like "Sally wants a baby") is a very deliberate and personality-contingent-based thing (similar to "Sally wants a new house"). — schopenhauer1

Just as a reference or some talking points, here is a Wiki article on Cabrera:

Cabrera develops an ethical theory, negative ethics, that is informed by this phenomenological analysis. He argues that there has been an unwarranted prejudice in ethics against non-being, a view he calls "affirmativity". Because affirmative views take being as good, they always view things that threaten this hegemony as bad; particularly things like abstention from procreation or suicide. Cabrera criticizes affirmative ethics for asking how people should live without asking the radical question of whether people should live tout court. He argues that, because of the structural negativity of being, there is a fundamental "moral disqualification" of human beings due to the impossibility of nonharming and nonmanipulating others. Nonharming and nonmanipulating others is called by him the "Minimal Ethical Articulation" ("MEA"; previously translated into English as "Fundamental Ethical Articulation" and "FEA"). The MEA is violated by our structural "moral impediment", by the worldly discomforts – notably pain and discouragement – imposed on us that prevent us from acting ethically. Cabrera argues that an affirmative morality is a self-contradiction because it accepts the MEA and conceives a human existence that precludes the possibility of not-harming or not-manipulating others. Thus he believes that affirmative societies, through their politics, require the common suspension of the MEA to even function.

Cabrera's negative ethics is supposed to be a response to the negative structure of being, acutely aware of the morally disqualifying nature of being. Cabrera believes children are usually considered as mere aesthetic objects, are not created for their own sake but for the sake of their parents, and are thrown into a structurally negative life by the act of procreation. Procreation is, Cabrera argues, a harm and a supreme act of manipulation. He believes that the consistent application of normal moral concepts – like duty, virtue or respect – present in most affirmative moralities entails antinatalism. Cabrera also argues that a human being adopting negative ethics should not only abstain from procreation, but also should have a complete willingness for an ethical death, by immediate suspension of all personal projects in benefit of a political fight[5] or an altruistic suicide, when it becomes the least immoral course of action.

Cabrera's Critique is one of his most systematic defenses of negative ethics, but he has also explored the same ideas in other works, such as Projeto de Ética Negativa,[6] Ética Negativa: problemas e discussões,[7] Porque te amo, não nascerás! Nascituri te salutant,[8] Discomfort and Moral Impediment: The Human Situation, Radical Bioethics and Procreation,[9] and A moral do começo: sobre a ética do nascimento.[10]

Species breed – reproduce (biology 101). Natality, in that sentence, means viably at birth. — 180 Proof

Oh but c'mon, we know that humans aren't just reflexively breeding and thus room for debate in the first place.

How to live with each other with as little gratuitous harm or misery is the infinite task and daily grind of the vast majority of the already born. Amor fati, brothers & sisters! :death::flower: — 180 Proof

But with the idea of "thrownness", we have all but lost already. Work work work, grind grind grind away.. Die die die away.

"Justification" is besides the point for 'a priori biological programming'. — 180 Proof

Can you explain this? Presumably we know where babies come from and can prevent it. I'm not trying to be sarcastic or anything, but just countering the idea that procreation (not even saying sex) is so determined. The brain-states involved in "Wanting X" isn't necessarily the same as immediate physical gratification. Wanting X (Like "Sally wants a baby") is a very deliberate and personality-contingent-based thing (similar to "Sally wants a new house").

Ethical concern begins with natality which, therefore, perpetually raises the question of "justifying" whether one has prevented increasing and reduced the misery of offspring or one has not. — 180 Proof

I'd like to know how you are using the word "natality" here and pairing it with misery of offspring.

So, since we're beasts rather than angels, "structurally it's messed up to just to exist" because most of us can't act like, or will not pretend to be, angels enough to voluntarily refrain from breeding like beasts? — 180 Proof

Well, I don't know if it's just the breeding part. By existing at all as humans, we are bound to disappoint, transgress ethically other people, etc. It's the inevitability of humans capacity to transgress and perhaps a necessity in order to live with other people. I think Cabrera's point might be that just because it is a feature, doesn't mean it's a good feature. Clearly we get by through it, but "my oh my how we get by" sort of thing.

I guess there seems to be a difference between what nihilists say that nihilism is and what it more often than not turns out to be. It usually turns out to be a philosophy of despair and somehow ultimate within philosophical pessimism, generally connoting something like that existence is suffering. Perhaps, it's just because of that so many philosophical pessimists also happen to be existential nihilists that I feel confused. — thewonder

Perhaps, I think it is just a lot of confusion that people have around the term "nihilism".. It is more of a negation form than it is about content. It is denying the existence of "something" (ethics, meaning, knowledge, etc.). There is no judgement of content attached to a nihilist thought usually, as there is with philosophical pessimism. So a nihilist might think there is no ground to ethics or meaning in the world, but a true "nihilist" just leaves it at that. A Philosophical Pessimist sees a lot of implications in the world having suffering and judges it so through usually something akin to intuition or a moral sense (I'm being very broad here). Thus there is a sort of general aesthetic view from the pessimist philosophy. There are ethical implications for philosophical pessimists too (compassion and alleviation for fellow-sufferers, extirpation of one's own source of suffering, not putting more people into the world to suffer, etc.).

Can't choose parents, can't choose parents circumstances, can't choose your physical characteristics, potential for illness or disease, etc. One cannot choose the hand one is dealt. One can make the best of it, or not. The choice is theirs. — MikeF

Yes, the throwness of existence.. discussed much in Existentialism: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thrownness

"Why be thrown into anything at all?" is the question or rather, "Why throw anybody into anything at all?".. Once you answer this, you have some justifications to do.. My point was that "Most people would want this.." isn't just "Okay, cool, let's wash our hands as we have a winner of a justification here!". See what I'm getting at?

Just as a note, I think Schopenhauer did a great job dismantling Kant's 12 categories. He was inspired by the transcendental idealism but did not buy all aspects.

Here's only SOME of the many critiques Schop had of Kant (as sourced from Wikipedia). I bolded the m most relevant to this particular discussion. You can do whole threads on each critique alone!

According to Schopenhauer, there is a difference between an object-in-itself and a thing-in-itself. There is no object-in-itself. An object is always an object for a subject. An object is really a representation of an object. On the other hand, a thing-in-itself, for Kant, is completely unknown. It cannot be spoken of at all without employing categories (pure concepts of the understanding). A thing-in-itself is that which appears to an observer when the observer experiences a representation .

Kant altered his first edition to: claim that the spatially external thing-in-itself causes sensations in the sense organs of the knowing subject.

Kant tried to explain how: a perceived object, not mere raw sensation, is given to the mind by sensibility (sensation, space, and time), and how the human understanding produces an experienced object by thinking twelve categories.

Kant doesn't explain how something external causes sensation in a sense organ.

He didn't explain whether the object of experience (the object of knowledge which is the result of the application of the categories) is a perceptual representation or an abstract concept.

He mixed up the perceptible and the abstract so that an absurd hybrid of the two resulted.

There is a contradiction between the object experienced by the senses and the object experienced by the understanding.

Kant claims that representation of an object occurs both through reception of one or more of the five senses, and through the activity of the understanding's twelve categories.

Sensation and understanding are separate and distinct abilities. Yet, for Kant, an object is known through each of them. This contradiction is the source of the obscurity of the Transcendental

Logic.
Kant's incorrect triple distinction:
Representation (given to one or more of the 5 senses, and to the sensibilities of space and time)
Object that is represented (thought through the 12 categories)
Thing-in-itself (cannot be known).

Schopenhauer claimed that Kant's represented object is false. The true distinction is only between the representation and the thing-in-itself. For Schopenhauer, the law of causality, which relates only to the representation and not to the thing-in-itself, is the real and only form of the understanding. The other 11 categories are therefore unnecessary because there is no represented object to be thought through them.

Kant sometimes spoke of the thing-in-itself as though it was an object that caused changes in a subject's senses. Schopenhauer affirmed that the thing-in-itself was totally different from phenomena and therefore had nothing to do with causality or being an object for a subject.

Excessive fondness for symmetry:
Origin of Kant's Transcendental Logic:
As pure intuitions (in the Transcendental Aesthetic) were the basis of empirical intuitions,
pure concepts (in the Transcendental Logic) were made the basis of empirical concepts.
As the Transcendental Aesthetic was the a priori basis of mathematics,
the Transcendental Logic was made the a priori basis of logic.
After discovering empirical perception is based on two forms of a priori perception (space and time), Kant tried to demonstrate that empirical knowledge is based on an analogous a priori knowledge (categories).

Schemata
He went too far when he claimed that the schemata of the pure concepts of the understanding (the categories) are analogous to a schema of empirically acquired concepts.
A schema of empirical perception is a sketchy, imagined perception. Thus, a schema is the mere imagined form or outline, so to speak, of a real perception. It is related to an empirical abstract concept to show that the concept is not mere word-play but has indeed been based on real perceptions. These perceptions are the actual, material content of the empirical abstract concept.

A schema of pure concepts is supposed to be a pure perception. There is supposed to be a schema for each of the pure concepts (categories). Kant overlooked the fact that these pure concepts, being pure, have no perceptual content. They gain this content from empirical perception. Kant's schemata of pure concepts are entirely undemonstrable and are a merely arbitrary assumption. This demonstrates Kant's purposeful intention to find a pure, a priori analogical basis for every empirical, a posteriori mental activity.

Judgments/categories
Derived all philosophical knowledge from the table of judgments.
Made the table of categories the basis for every assertion about the physical and the metaphysical.

Derived pure concepts of the understanding (categories) from reason. But the Transcendental Analytic was supposed to reference only the sensibility of the sense organs and also the mind's way of understanding objects. It was not supposed to be concerned with reason.

Categories of quantity were based on judgments of quantity. But these judgments relate to reason, not understanding. They involve logical inclusion or exclusion of concepts with each other, as follows:

Universal judgment: All A are x; Particular judgment: Some A are x; Singular judgment: This one A is x.

Note: The word "quantity" was poorly chosen to designate mutual relations between abstract concepts.

Categories of quality were based on judgments of quality. But these judgments also are related only to reason, not to understanding. Affirmation and denial are relations between concepts in a verbal judgment. They have nothing to do with perceptual reality for the understanding. Kant also included infinite judgments, but only for the sake of architectonic symmetry. They have no meaning in Kant's context.

The term "quality" was chosen because it has usually been opposed to "quantity." But here it means only affirmation and denial in a judgment.

The categorical relation (A is x) is simply the general connection of a subject concept with a predicate concept in a statement. It includes the hypothetical and disjunctive sub-relations. It also includes the judgments of quality (affirmation, negation) and judgments of quantity (inclusional relationships between concepts). Kant made separate categories from these sub-relations. He used indirect, abstract knowledge to analyze direct, perceptual knowledge.

Our certain knowledge of the physical persistence of substance, or the conservation of matter, is derived, by Kant, from the category of subsistence and inherence. But this is merely based on the connection of a linguistic subject with its predicate.
With judgments of relation, the hypothetical judgment (if A, then B) does not correspond only to the law of causality. This judgment is also associated with three other roots of the principle of sufficient reason. Abstract reasoning does not disclose the distinction between these four kinds of ground. Knowledge from perception is required.
reason of knowing (logical inference);
reason of acting (law of motivation);
reason of being (spatial and temporal relations, including the arithmetical sequences of numbers and the geometrical positions of points, lines, and surfaces).

Disjunctive judgments derive from the logical law of thought of the excluded middle (A is either A or not-A). This relates to reason, not to the understanding. For the purpose of symmetry, Kant asserted that the physical analog of this logical law was the category of community or reciprocal effect. However, it is the opposite, since the logical law refers to mutually exclusive predicates, not inclusive.

Schopenhauer asserted that there is no reciprocal effect. It is only a superfluous synonym for causality. For architectonic symmetry, Kant created a separate a priori function in the understanding for reciprocal effect. Actually, there is only an alternating succession of states, a chain of causes and effects.

Modal categories of possible, actual, and necessary are not special, original cognized forms. They are derived from the principle of sufficient reason (ground).
Possibility is a general, mental abstraction. It refers to abstract concepts, which are solely related to the ability to reason or logically infer.

There is no difference between actuality (existence) and necessity.
Necessity is a consequence from a given ground (reason).[2] — Critique of Kantian Philosophy Wikipedia Article

Tell us, what do you think existentialism is? What are the actual tenets you find so unappealing? You seem to think it has something to do with meaning, but what? — Banno

Exactly.



So I think one of the core ideas of Existentialism is the idea of "authenticity". By this we mean that we are a species that has justifications for things. We identify with values and reasons, yet we don't necessarily have to. Are you lazily filling a role, or are you doing it because this is something that aligns with your own attitudes? Are you letting others think for you or are you choosing to agree because this conforms with your constructed values? There is a difference. Other animals much of the time must react according to instinct. We need linguistically-based frameworks for understanding the world, and with this, we can self-reflect on what we are doing as we are doing it. We are a species that can hate the concept of work while knowing we must work to survive. No other animal has this self-reflective burden of knowing but still doing and having to justify each day's efforts with their own self-reflective capabilities.. We don't have to do anything but we usually don't like the consequences if we don't follow our self-imposed justifications.

Also there is the idea of "thrownness". When born into the world, there are givens that one must contend with.. The social structures, the physical and social arrangements that have developed long before our individual existence. One cannot change them easily and often one must navigate that which one has no control over. We cannot remake the world in our own image, yet we have imaginations that can wish the world was arranged in a different way. One of the frustrations of life is the fact that the world cannot/would never conform to our own needs, and thus we are constantly aware of the rupture between what we might have wished and what is reality.

I feel so related to this. Not only with the fact of not being born I secure not suffer at all but not hurting others. If I never were born, then I would not be able to hurt, punch, rape, steal, disappoint, kill or betray you.
Not existing can produce benefits for both parts: the "persons" who never been born and all the people he never will met. — javi2541997

Exactly.. Didn't Julio Cabrera bring this idea up? By being born, we not only suffer, but we are bound to be unethical and cause others suffering in our very existing. Thus structurally it's messed up to just to exist, and exist in relation to others by almost necessity.

Excellent. Hats off to this good argument :100: — javi2541997

Thank you!

I'm not quite so sure that I see a clear distinction. Nihilism and philosophical pessimism both posit that the human experience, for the most part, is ultimately negative. Perhaps I'm confusing what people call philosophical pessimism with what they do "nihilism" however? — thewonder

Possibly? Nihilism means one has no values. Nothing is right, nothing is wrong except perhaps one's own interests and will to power. I think of The Big Lebowski's depiction, though that's obviously a caricature.

Philosophical pessimists are very rooted in traditional value systems. Existence itself is seen as having a generally negative quality. Suffering is inherent in being human, or being born, or perhaps existence itself (pace Schopenhauer's Will). Thus, the elimination of suffering would be akin to never being born or some type of ascetic practice or de-individuation where one can extirpate the suffering to some extent (pace Buddhism).

So, give an example of a time period where the majority of people thought something was right but it turns out to be wrong (ethically) — khaled

So you are turning this into historical analysis. Do I need to provide figures of when majority of Americans thought slavery to be at least tolerable, if not preferable? Cause that was the case from the 1600s- early 1800s. We can add in torture for blasphemy or wrong religion, torture in execution, literal eye for an eye, and a bunch of other ethics that were seen as permissible or desirable. It's a truism that historically, more violence, intolerance, etc. was tolerated.

Or does having children just occasionally happen to be the example with this phenomenon never occurring at any other time. Seems kind of suspicious. — khaled

Although I do think there are plenty of historical examples, I can make an argument that indeed birth is an exception amongst decisions, especially because of the nature of a person already existing doing something on behalf of something that could exist in the future. I think this is where you try to force me into giving examples, where I don't necessarily think it needs one, but hey, I try to accomadate your demands to "convince you" (a standin for "most people" you claim, ironically).

I thought we went over this already in previous threads. You and I said yes. Examples being surprise parties/gifts. Those impose a risk of harm and don’t alleviate anything. — khaled

That was directed to Isaac, but you are replying. Suspicious in light of the whole Khaled-Isaac complex.. Not making it a case that you aren't Isaac :lol:.

I can make a case similar to above that surprise parties are not analogous to not being born. Presumably, it would be a bad idea if you knew the person made it known they hate surprise parties or they can easily get a heart attack.. You do know the person presumably. However, if we go to the extent argument- the surprise is temporary, a set period of time, and is it an imposition really? That definition can be debated for the kind argument but it can also work for the extent argument that it is finite, temporary and very little in the imposition scale.

Whether or not the work environment is exploitive, or whether exploiting workers is ok, are both value judgements and subjective, yes. — MikeF

Well right, so let's say you judge "working at X" to be good. Why is it good for someone else? That's where the trickiness of it lies- when dealing with others. To go further, it's not that why is it good for someone else, but why should you then proceed to force the situation for someone else?

All that is fine.
Here's another idea: If we replace "most people" with "the other person", the proposition becomes "What the other person (or group) would want". Because your action is directed to a specific person (or group) and thus it is more direct and fair than considering what others in general would want ... — Alkis Piskas

Yes indeed. But then a parent doesn't have the benefit of knowing the specific person's experiences or evaluations in the world, so ergo the "most people" defense.

I'd like to see @Isaac's response to that.

So exploitation isn't a part of it because 'most people' don't like to be exploited. The question is only whether using that which 'most people' like is a sufficient justification for taking action on someone else's behalf. — Isaac

Is it sufficient if what action is being taken is imposing X things on another person, and doing so unnecessarily (not ameliorating greater with lesser harm)?

But they wouldn’t be the only ones left to perceive such things. Even most Germans didn’t think what was going on was right. The people who thought the Nazis were right, weren’t even all the nazis. It was never the case that Nazism ever approached a majority in any population (except the population of nazis). So, an example please? — khaled

You're missing the point.. A majority of people can be wrong.. That was a hypothetical example... Also Nazis didn't win nor kill everyone else off, so to represent the example as being "historical" would be mixing up a thought-experiment with thinking I didn't know history.

You’re making a claim you can’t give an example for. Fine. At least give an argument as to why you think “the wrong” exists outside of the “perception of the wrong”

And besides, if you propose that the perception of what’s right or wrong isn’t a determining factor in finding what’s right or wrong then that cuts both ways. Your perception that having kids is wrong isn’t a determining factor to whether or not it is. How is anyone supposed to argue for anything being right or wrong then?

I think you got too busy trying to get around the fact that there is overwhelming evidence that AN makes no sense that you ended up making it impossible for any ethical position to be correct. First you dismiss majority vote as being indicative of what’s right. Then you dismiss expert opinion. And now you even dismiss subjective evaluations.

There is nothing left. You’ve made the right thing to do unknowable. You’re the one that’s made it “all subjective” — khaled

I'm not sure who the "experts" are in judging life's goodness or other qualities, I reflexively said the truism, that experts can have biases.. I didn't understand though in what context "experts" had to do with anything in this realm other than "experts" in judging what other people should want by having them in the first place but as far as judging right or wrong... a major point to consider is when doing it on behalf of someone else, maybe we shouldn't think we are the "experts".

Can we be imposed upon but not know it?

Can we give post-facto rationalizations for prior negative feelings?

Excellent distinction between the two ideas which most people mix up. Good for you for embracing the often misrepresented idea of philosophical pessimism. I too am a philosophical pessimist (see my profile). I am also an antinatalist and have several threads on the topic going on now if you would care to contribute. Suffering and dealing with are main parts of what happens when being born. Life is not a utopia, yet we are brought into it.. I have a thread about the "most people" defense. "Most people' people say, would have wanted to be born.. But can people misjudge life's negatives? Can they misjudge their own experiences? Can something be wrong and people not know it? That is being discussed in this thread: https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/11469/the-most-people-defense/p1

Also there's this thread about never having the option for no option: https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/11540/is-never-having-the-option-for-no-option-just-what-are-the-implications

To add to the misery of the world, don't forget the ire misery of the miserable people you often find in philosophy forums! Get ready for that if you write too much philosophical pessimism on here for sure!

You may also find my thread on why it is that humans suffer more than other animals interesting too
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/11441/why-humans-and-possibly-higher-cognition-animals-have-it-especially-bad

And this one about why it's bad to make someone have to work to survive in the first place (by procreating them):
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/11387/making-someone-work-or-feel-stress-unnecessarily-is-wrong

If you read through my threads, most of the themes are philosophical pessimism and antinatalism.

And besides, if God was omnibenevolent, there wouldn’t be any negative numbers at all. — khaled

Sure. But also that it’s better not to do any bad that you have to make up for in the first place — khaled

Good points, but makes a stronger case for AN arguments :razz:.

Until you embrace what you were given, you have neither freedom nor will, simply convenient or rather circumstantial will. And this, is what defines an animal and so differentiates a human. — Outlander

Freedom of will means more burdens on why we do anything at all.. Not so sure that's better that rote instinctual responses to stimuli and rather predictable behavior.

However, 5. Most people think life is good doesn't support the statement 4. Life is good unless you subscribe to the wisdom of the crowd (I'm not entirely sure if it's even relevant. You decide) and barring this curiosity, we have to justify 4. Life is good by resorting to an argument that proves that 4. Life is good.

I believe it is this latter part of the process (***) you're talking about. — TheMadFool

Indeed. Can "most people" be mistaken about how good something is? I brought up the idea of an exploited worker who cheerfully overlooks being exploited. He doesn't perceive the exploitation, but he is exploited. I also brought up notions of having generally negative experiences but then saying, "Life is good" or "Glad to be born" if asked the question. There is more than just what people want you to hear going on. Psychological mechanisms can distort ones ability to evaluate something (not wanting to get oneself depressed, always looking on the bright side, Pollyannaism, adapting to lowered ideals, etc). Certainly culturally ingrained ideas can do this as well (superstition, don't look a "gift horse" in the mouth, religion, not looking negative to others, etc.). All this worry and coping and dealing with, and then suck it up because that's life.. but "that's life" is not inevitable!!

I am not familiarized with the subjects of "natalism" and "antinatalism". But what you say makes sense to me. Otherwise, I think we can conclude that there are cases where the principle of "most people" is or can be justified and other in which it isn't or can't. And certainly, we have to exclude the case of "always being justifiable and/or wise or ethical"! — Alkis Piskas

Indeed. You make a decision on another's behalf because you think a majority of people would want this decision made for them... but I'm saying:
1) Most people could be wrong in the assessment of harm done or imposition done
2) The minority has been screwed over with callous ideas of what they can do if the don't like life
3) A life is not a surprise party or a color on a house.. it is too important to think one should "do" for someone else, when that "do" means the consequence is a whole lifetime of having to stay alive, thrive, and generally "deal with" situations of harms great and small and cope in general.. It's quite paternalistic to think that someone else just "shouldn't mind this arrangement". Life itself is quite an imposition to put on someone else.