the stresses of life are something people need help to cope with. The fact that there is propositional content associated with these conditions is not a moral fact to be taken into account; it's a side-effect. — Srap Tasmaner

I just find this to be where the disagreement in intuitions lie. Most ANs would say that this is akin to creating the game for someone else, and then trying to ameliorate the very deprivation that was placed upon them. There is no escape except indeed unintentional death (starvation.. not functioning well in life) or intentional death (suicide.. which as you point out may only occur due to mental illness.. another contingent form of harm, if that is the case).

We wouldn't presume to decide on behalf of someone suffering that they should die; we respect their decision. Then what are we to say about the hypothetical person? We can't respect their views and their decisions, for they have none. — Srap Tasmaner

This is equivalent to saying that you know someone who will encounter immediate torture upon birth shouldn't be considered, because they are not born yet.. No, in this view, you'd wait for the person to be tortured for you to say, "NOW, we can consider that person". Doesn't make sense.

So we go around that and make it an epistemic problem for us. I can't know whether my hypothetical child wants to become real, whatever that could mean. I can't know whether, once living, they will always want to go on living. I can't know whether they will at some point wish they had never been born. And then we switch it all around and construct a duty out of things that I cannot know not because they are private but because they are not facts at all. — Srap Tasmaner

No you are not understanding the argument. There is no violation of anything to anyone prior to birth. That is recognized. No ONE exists.. therefore now harm, no foul (literally). Once born, consent has been violated, and not causing unnecessary conditions of harm has been violated. If you don't believe in those two things.. that would be where the argument ends, that I will give you.

But then those non-facts are treated as somehow determinate, as if having a child is drawing a world-line from the proverbial urn of marbles. My child's life will be a red or a blue, it's just a matter of probability, and we can confidently assign probabilities to the different results, probabilities of a very vague sort like "> 0". What justification is ever offered for this absurd formalization? — Srap Tasmaner

This kind of argument only make sense if we are talking about possibilities that affect no one. You can't equate this with something like "The pink unicorns should be prevented from existing because they might kill the green leprechauns".. Yeah since none of those things actually exist or ever will.. then that is indeed nonsensical to talk about as if it is real.. But an act that WILL create an ACTUAL person if it is followed, DOES have considerations for a future being, so your rebuttal is null.

Oh and "suck it up buttercup" is actually a terrible phrase.. just thought it was funny when juxtoposed with your value-signalling pearl-clutching remarks of odiousness against antinatalism.. In fact, I think many anti-antinatalist philosophies just come down to that.. "So why are you creating known conditions of harm for someone else..""

Answer: I don't know people are too sensitive to harm.. they got it suck it up buttercup.. is essentially the answer. That's what you pretty much said here:

The only reason I can think of for such a practice is the hope of 'recruiting' people who've not noticed this hidden premise, or griping about the world without actually having to bear any responsibilty for doing anything about it. Either I find reprehensible. — Isaac

Oh and because it might lead to paths that are counterintuitive to what you find to be respectable doesn't make it not so because YOU think it isn't and it is odious, or whatever bullshit you're peddling as a defense to the "nefarious" antinatalists.

The only reason I can think of for such a practice is the hope of 'recruiting' people who've not noticed this hidden premise, or griping about the world without actually having to bear any responsibilty for doing anything about it. Either I find reprehensible. — Isaac

You keep thinking, clutching your pearls that this isn't what most people think, is a philosophical argument. Most of philosophical debate, especially on something like a philosophy forum convincing people about the validity and soundness of an argument with reasoning and having a general dialectic about a line of reasoning. It is also about explaining ideas. Suck it up buttercup.

Again, it's not 'because you feel like it' any more than the moral code in the first place was 'because you felt like it'. From where are you getting this sharp distinction such that 'not harming others' is some objective moral code divorced from your personal preferences, but continuing the human race is some trivial preference akin to preferring vanilla to chocolate ice-cream. There's no sense at all in humanity that people feel this way about those two things. They are on a par at least. either they're both trivial preferences, or they're both really important moral intuitions. — Isaac

I don't speak for Khaled, so I am not answering for him, but I will explain what I see. He may have a different response. But you would have to answer why causing the conditions for others being harmed is acceptable when considering your preference for "humanity" (what I am going to deem a third-party/abstract cause).

Antinatalism respects the individual person that will be created. That is what is being considered. It is not an abstracted third-party. Even if one doesn't mean it, one is then using the individual for some abstract reason. It is no longer about the person who will actually be affected by the decision, but for a cause. Antinatalism respects the fact that the person who will be born will inevitably experience suffering, and therefore, with NO negative consequences for that individual (by abstaining to have them), has prevented any negative conditions that will befall that individual. I don't see how obligations of not causing harm are not really a consideration and that obligations to a third-party cause like "humanity" would be.

odd starting place is also not sufficient justification for trying to convince others of it. — Isaac

This is essentially your argument over and over. They also ridiculed Galileo.

Since you don't seem to find anything logically suspect in non-existent entities, let's look at a related case.

You arrive on the scene of a car wreck. There is before you on the ground a young man whose heart has stopped. As he is unconscious, he cannot give consent for you to perform CPR.

Your position suggests that there is no issue here at all, that it is absolutely immoral to perform CPR. — Srap Tasmaner

This is why it's not just about consent, but about what the consent is about. This person was ALREADY created. Thus, you are harming him, by waiting for consent. But that's not the case of birth. It's more like.. If I put you in a deadly, harmful, difficult, game without your consent, and then I saved you from some of the pitfalls that I have put you in in the first place, without your consent.

From where did you get this notion of what morality really is? — Isaac

You have to start somewhere. I get the notion that morality is based on a foundation and at some point you can't go much further. I will say this though- where if you follow my argument's premises, you literally create no new lives of suffering in the world. If you follow your argument's premises, more people who will suffer will be created. To then say, "But in an interview, the person born said 51% of their life was good, not bad!" is not a justification for thus creating the conditions for suffering for someone else. We can go into that if you want.

We start with the intuition that I have a moral duty to respect the autonomy of others and take actions that affect them only if I have their consent.

We then infer that if I do not have the consent of an entity, I must do nothing to them.

If an entity cannot give consent? Children and animals for instance? We make special rules. Rocks and trees? We make different special rules.

Beings that don't exist? No rule needed, since I can't do anything to them.

But, you argue, I could cause the non-existent entity to exist; the entity I cause to exist could not possibly give consent, because at the time I cause them to exist, they don't exist.

To you that might look like an absolute moral truth but to most people, I submit, this will look like a bit of sophistry, or dorm-room philosophy, or stoner profundity, or, in the best case, a paradox. However it's taken, it doesn't look like the foundation for an ethical position, nothing on the order of respecting the autonomy of others.

My point was that the way you're relying on consent in this argument may be logically defensible (or may not -- there are logical challenges I'm not bothering to mount) but it is not persuasive. — Srap Tasmaner

I don't see the problem here. You cannot ask for consent, yet you go ahead and make the decision for them that it would be okay to cause the conditions whereby suffering takes place.

If we were to go the other direction, essentially your argument is: "In order to consent to be tortured or not, one must be born to be tortured, so they can consent not to be tortured".. So the inverse of your argument is essentially, "As long as no one exists at the time of the decision that affects them, the decision is justified on behalf of that person". However, you probably agree that certain decisions on other people's behalf are wrong, like the decision that they will be born into direct and immediate torture. However, the antinatalist, recognizes that life spread over a whole lifetime, has many instances of pain and suffering, and (in my version at least), there is always some inherent suffering no matter what (that's another debate though). Either way, these are decisions that have no consent that are affecting (majorly!) another person's whole state of being. You cannot get consent, that is the case. Yes or no? The next move that you seem to disagree with is, when you cannot get consent, you are not then permitted to affect a person's state of being. Rather, by not procreating, de facto, no ONE is being affected, and thus consent is not being violated.

If you want to abandon the reliance on consent and just ask me if it's moral to bring a being into the world knowing with certainty they will be tortured continuously, that's a different question. — Srap Tasmaner

Sure, my argument doesn't even rely on consent, though I did use it in this example. The basic premise is that one can prevent the conditions of all harm for another person. One is not obligated to procreate for any X, Y, Z reason. By not affecting a future person, that is recognizing that there is suffering in the world as a living human being, and that the world for humans has a lot of "dealing with" situations. And to foist this burden and "dealing with" on another, would not be respecting that indeed an individual will be affected negatively by this decision.

Why is my view that humanity should be preserved "obstinate assertion and indignation", but your view that "cause[ing] harm to someone or a negative" must be avoided at all costs not similarly unsupported assertion?

They're both just moral assertions about what ought and ought not be done. — Isaac

The basis is on the idea that preventing harms are more important than whatever other excuse you have to procreate someone. In any other realm, this makes sense. No humans just seems like something of a panicky vision, but the actual operation of morality isn't "visions of humanity", but "What is this going to do to someone else?".

I'm not trying to argue with you here. We've already agreed that being inherently involves "suffering" and certainly the individual being subject to forces beyond their control (i.e. non-consensual forces), you're just much more sensitive to it than me.

I'm not trying to justify procreation here. I'm not sure if I need to. — BitconnectCarlos

Ok, I don't have any argument then. It's basically the Lucretius argument that we had eternity before and after our birth. I just don't see that as comforting during the actual being part, ha.

Actually now that I read your post again, you were saying it would not attract concern. That would make sense then. To groups that do surveys, there would be no interest to survey due to this. I see what you are saying.

I don't suppose anti-natalism attracts the kind of concern that QAnon or reactionary Republicans attract, so probably no reputable group like Pew Research or Gallop, et al, have surveyed the public about anti-natalist views. — Bitter Crank

I find it interesting though, what would the concerns be per se? I'd be fascinated with a public discussion on this, without it being grossly mischaracterized. There are no conspiracy theories, or calling for hate, or anything that you might have been implying by mentioning QAnon or reactionary Republicans.

intuitions like the ones you start from are to be taken seriously - in which case the clash involved in your conclusion should indicate that your logic has gone very wrong somewhere. — Isaac

Here is the thing.. I can agree with you conclusions can show something is wrong, if those conclusions actually indeed cause harm to someone or a negative. But quite the opposite and an example of obstinate assertion and indignation without reason behind it. Your objection is, "The conclusion would mean no humanity!!!". Then of course the response is:

"What obligation do we have to humanity as opposed to individual people?

But you see, you have no good answer to that except going back the obstinate assertion and indignation.

Sure.. But this sounds like justification for bringing people into being, because, well there was eternity before and after.. so why not ?-100 years of being, right?

It shows that we're both on the same page that the anti-natalism objection is less to do with society and more to do with just a general objection to being. — BitconnectCarlos

I'm not sure about all antinatalist philosophies, its not monolithic. The way I explain this version is to split up necessary and contingent suffering. You seem to be talking about getting rid of contingent (circumstantial) suffering. However, there is a necessary deprivation to being- that doesn't go away. That is the Suffering as discussed in Schopenhauer/Eastern philosophy: "Always becoming but never being".

The inference only holds because one or more of the premises fail, so it's vacuously true, which doesn't seem like much of a foundation for an ethical position.

If that's really it, then no wonder no one ever persuades you (your position is logically defensible) and you never persuade anyone else (the key inference is only vacuously valid, but not sound). — Srap Tasmaner

This is typically overwrought rhetoric. Your logic like others, goes something like this "Even if I was to know a being would be born into certain torture, I would not consider this future event because that being doesn't actually exist yet, so how can I consider a future being or event if they don't exist yet!" Thus, the person would have ONLY exist and be tortured in order to have any consideration for harm towards the being. Obviously there is something wrong there, no matter how crazy you say my claim is. This is philosophical gaslighting.

I think you're right on the money here, Isaac. I've always been a little suspicious of people who espouse views that they can't (or refuse to) actually live out. If someone really thinks that non-existence is the preferable state of being they're free to kill themselves (not that I am suggesting this.)

Even if society was perfect and we had eliminated war, poverty, and disease humans would still be subject to terrible, non-consensual forces outside of their control, like having to wake up from a pleasant sleep or go to the bathroom. We solve fix these problems by destroying humanity. /s. — BitconnectCarlos

So I stated before, that it is perhaps not worth being brought into a world that is not a paradise or utopia. So, you seem to be describing one that isn't even if more flagrant forms of suffering are eliminated. Actually, I still think it would be bad to a certain extent as the way this often works is that more "refined" versions of suffering will simply become the biggest forms of suffering and be the new "standard" for suffering.

I often acknowledged, a utopia or paradise would probably be akin to some sort of Buddhist nirvana, a nothingness or complete fullness of being, which one cannot really imagine in our current something, or non-complete state.

Respecting "what could be"? But that's not an individual, and they have no consent to give or withhold. — Srap Tasmaner

You can repeat it like I don't understand, I get it. You can respect someone by NOT doing something to them. Because they don't exist YET, doesn't negate this principle. For example, if someone was to be born into KNOWN horrifying circumstances.. like literally a woman gives birth to a baby and the baby falls in a pit of doom or something... would you not consider that? Now extend this idea to a lifetime of known and unknown suffering. It's as if your capacity to understand future circumstances (like a future existing being) STOPS only when it comes to this argument, because you don't like it.

At any rate, it turns out you don't need a extra principle to block mass mercy killing, because you start from respect for the individual life, and believe anti-natalism can be derived from that. Yes? — Srap Tasmaner

No rather, not foisting a game without consent (cause as you acknowledged, cannot do this de facto), and not causing conditions of all suffering, is recognizing the dignity. Once born, certainly there is a being for which consent can be had, and thus mercy killing would be not respecting this aspect, yes.

The dignity of a person who doesn't exist and cannot give or withhold consent? — Srap Tasmaner

Yes respecting what could be by NOT foisting a game on them without their consent nor "gifting" them the conditions whereby they have the (known and unknown) capacity for suffering. Correct.

I'm sure you don't consider the argument against procreating to be an argument for murder, but you must rely on some other principle right? Without something else you have an argument for mercy killing on a global scale. — Srap Tasmaner

Ah, but the procreational decision is the only one where one would be recognizing the dignity of the person, without doing something against their consent.

You're not compelled by unassailable logic to look at things the way you do. Absolutely every single one of your arguments proceeds from some unusual axiom which you have simply chosen to hold despite being free to choose otherwise There are any of a dozen different ways to interpret that silly 'life on Mars' intuition, for example. — Isaac

Dude, I JUST said above what you are objecting to, thus anticipating it:

Rather, I have a different perspective on how to look at ethics than what you have stated. The way you phrased it right there is that human life is some kind of mission, and by having new people, we are fulfilling this mission. Rather, at least this form of antinatalism that I am discussing, would look at the individual's worth and dignity rather than a cause (e.g. humanity, human life). How so, you say? Because in the procreational decision, one can prevent all future harm from befalling a future individual, without any negative consequences to that future individual. That would be actually affirming the worth, by considering that one is not foisting negative consequences, or perhaps a game that the future person would not want to play (or even have a tendency to play poorly). [And these are the reasons why I make these threads, to change perspectives on these things which only SEEM counter-intuitive. Luckily something like a PHILOSOPHY FORUM would be the place to posit these kind of counterintuitive notions.] — schopenhauer1

There are any of a dozen different ways to interpret that silly 'life on Mars' intuition, for example. You've chosen a set of frames which leads you to the annihilation if the human race as an answer. — Isaac

It's called an argument. Almost no argument posited, even "This is my hand" has ever been uncontested. So the fact that you can say something otherwise, is not news, and is AGAIN ARGUING IN BAD FAITH. You just find my philosophy and my frequency of posts odious to you, and thus you pick on this argument more than others. It is literally the stock-and-trade of philosophical arguments to present what SEEM to be counterintuitive arguments that are contested back-and-forth over many articles, over many years over many posts, or whatever the forum of communication.

Anyone in their right mind would see that as a sign they might have taken a wrong turn somewhere. — Isaac

That is just, like, your opinion man.

Agreed. This seems like a specific instance of the broader asymmetry and deprivationalist account (re: intra-worldly balance) of pleasure and pain. Is it better to be put in a situation where there is a right choice and a wrong choice, or to not be put in that situation to begin with? If there is no reason or need for someone to make choices, why give them this burden? — darthbarracuda

Yes, exactly!

It seems clear that someone who makes a very bad choice would have been better off had they either made a different choice (an empirical truth), or never had to make that choice to begin with (a metaphysical truth). — darthbarracuda

I like the way you categorized the empirical outcome vs. the very decision-making situation itself as a more metaphysical aspect of having to be in the situation at all.

I'm just curious as to what you would say if someone said the inevitable, "But we can learn from bad decisions, ergo, they must be good". I know there are many things wrong with that statement, but that seems to be the kind of argument that would put forth as a response. I think I know what your answer would be, but just wanted to put it out there.

EDIT: @khaled@Isaac

Actually I'd like to amend what I said above. I should say, what is SEEMINGLY counterintuitive (antinatalist) stance, comes from very intuitive understandings of harm and positive states (like happiness). I wanted to say this so as not to create a performative contradiction. I don't think I made that clear when I mentioned "counterintuitive". I meant, what SEEMS counterintuitive.

That either implies that avoiding birth is the only way to alleviate suffering, or the human life is so trivial a thing that we need not consider its extinction a good reason to seek alternative methods. — Isaac

That is not an either/or. Rather, I have a different perspective on how to look at ethics than what you have stated. The way you phrased it right there is that human life is some kind of mission, and by having new people, we are fulfilling this mission. Rather, at least this form of antinatalism that I am discussing, would look at the individual's worth and dignity rather than a cause (e.g. humanity, human life). How so, you say? Because in the procreational decision, one can prevent all future harm from befalling a future individual, without any negative consequences to that future individual. That would be actually affirming the worth, by considering that one is not foisting negative consequences, or perhaps a game that the future person would not want to play (or even have a tendency to play poorly). [And these are the reasons why I make these threads, to change perspectives on these things which only SEEM counter-intuitive. Luckily something like a PHILOSOPHY FORUM would be the place to posit these kind of counterintuitive notions.]

Anyways, under your perspective as written here, we would be affirming a cause (i.e. humanity), over and above the consideration of suffering of the future life. And here is another perspective change I would like to propose. Even if the future life wouldn't be agony all of the time [which who knows, there could be pretty bad lives created inadvertently anyways, so there's an argument there as well], it is that we should consider that if an alternative is not creating conditions/capacities for suffering to creating conditions/capacities of known and unknown quantities of suffering for a future individual, then the moral choice is to always prevent creating conditions/capacities of suffering when one is able.

Even further you might say.. How is negatives weighted so heavily? I'd go back to the idea that it doesn't seem intuitively bad that no beings exist on Mars. We don't hold vigils for the non-happiness situation there. However, if we were to learn Martians exist and live tortuous lives, then we might feel some empathy for this and start some advocacy group or something. But why? Because not creating a new situation of happiness is not weighted as much as not creating new situations of harm. It is moral to prevent harm, but there is no obligation to create beings who experience things like happiness.

Nor would I claim it is, that detracts neither from the point I made nor the justification for posting it. If you'd have posted neo-Nazi propaganda I would have responded likewise with a non-philosophical opposition. — Isaac

Antinatalism is not a hate group. It advocates no discrimination, harm, or violence on any particular group of people. And passively arguing for not procreating is not any of those things, so don't even try with that. If you are implying it's causing teen suicide, that seems a straw man you pulled out of your ass.

It's already been made, yet you persist, are you suggesting that your previous (I'm going to go with hundreds) of posts on the subject have gone uncontested? An argument with which you do not agree doesn't cease to be an argument simply by virtue of your disapproval. — Isaac

Uncontested? I never said that. I am well aware of the many many interlocutors who disagree. And I have rarely started threads that I never defended over and over. So I would never say it is uncontested. Rather, I am focused on the many arguments people make for why people should keep procreating and taking various angles to dispute these commonly held notions and to chip away at them. It is also to present things people might not consider.

It's not your intentions I'm imputing it's your presentation of genocide as a solution to teenage angst. — Isaac

This is where you are arguing out of bad faith. Clearly none of my posts have anything to do with "teenage angst". That is the presentation YOU are imputing, and its just a way to delegitimize with labeling. I am not sure if this is a joke to be funny or real. If real:
A) Genocide is not passively not having children.
B) Solution to suffering isn't a solution to teenage angst.

But you knew this and are being a troll it seems which is very much what an angsty teenager would do :wink:.

If I see the world as a dark and cruel place where I suffer no matter what I do I won't do anything, which will only confirm my paranoia. So I choose to not think that way. It is the only way to play the game well now that I'm stuck in it. However that doesn't justify me forcing other people to play just because I found a way to make the game bearable which may or may not work for them. — khaled

No, I agree. My main point is that people often view suffering as external, and exclude suffering made by oneself through poor decision-making. There is an idea that if the result is something from a deliberative act, that it was justified, since it came from the person. All suffering is part of the picture. As far as how this understanding affects daily life, I agree, one doesn't have to make it color everything, it is more descriptive of the ecology than trying to be prescriptive of any way to think of it daily.

I (and others) have provided 'good' arguments against the kind if crap you're peddling already - many times over. You just ignore them and start another tiresome thread on exactly the same fucking topic, again. It's like you're recruiting and that pisses me off. Teenagers have a high enough suicide rate as it is without being exposed to "you're better off not being alive" death cults masquerading as philosophy. — Isaac

Playing the role of concerned mother at a PTA meeting, isn't philosophy. Make an argument or don't. I give you credit for being concerned (if that really is the case rather than rhetorical tactics). Rather, I am trying to chip away at oft-used arguments. It's not recruiting but making a slow, plodding case with various examples. Just ignore if you don't like and answer threads about whether mind is matter or matter is mind, or something about physics.. the ones you think have an air of legitimacy (precisely the type point I have been making if you pay attention regarding minutia-mongering). But ultimately, sometimes the truth is indeed something that can be hard to hear. Even if that is the case, it doesn't mean it must be hushed. It's not meant for any demographic to commit suicide to anymore than any other philosophy or art or form of communication that may convey negative views of existence.

I think most people who are optimistic have less of an overview justificaiton for their optimism. Rather they are focused on day to day life, with a kind of built in sense/belief that their lives can (and probably will) get better. A kind of prognostic confimation bias. They can see the improved future, so they believe it is more likely than others. They are not, generally looking all the way down the pike at their own deaths, let alone at their children's deaths. They focus, if they focus beyond the near future, in the middle distance. — Coben

Yes, I was mostly aiming this at the academic types. People who tend to hangout in these forums perhaps, or similar.

I am not saying that people don't justify their optimism the way you say, and I think you are correct that it is more likely that academics think that way, especially since they are in the propogation of ideas game. Doing that well at that affects their salaries, their customers' (students', for example) respect for them, and they are reading and thinking about idea propogation all the time. Even there I think most who are optimistic are immersed in life and following what I describe above. I think the animal in us is also powerful. — Coben

True enough.

I think the animal in us is also powerful. We are life, we want to live, if we are alive and not suffering immensely, we are looking for improvement/pleasure/connection/accomplishments and focused on shorter term acquisitions of these things, with some theater of the mind confimation bias. It is inherent, I think, in organisms to move forward with some positivity. They are counterpatterns and suffering and problems and frustration but even people living much worse lives than most people writing in an online philosophy forums generally are living often are pretty optimistic. They reset their goals, enjoy what they can, and try to improve via increments, some managing only the shortest term hedonistic versions of this, but still focused on that. — Coben

Ok.

So, I am not sure I buy the mission statement theory. My guess is people are much more cognitively messy than that implies and much more driven by specific goals and varied focus. — Coben

Yes, they need to survive, get comfortable, and entertain themselves, an this takes a variety of nuanced and contingent forms. However, the mission statement was one that a lot of academic-types or science-oriented might take- its the humanist mission statement. It's the Star Trek themed statement: To boldly go where no man has gone before! But more importantly, its the haughty idea that because we have all these cultural ways of surviving, there must be some purpose to it. The fact that we have HVAC, physics, sewers, computers, refrigerators, engineering feats, arts, architecture, and every manner of technological, artistic, and cultural feat that we do, there is a purpose and meaning there. There must be a there there, because look what we can do!!

So, I see a value conflict and not one side having a naturalistic fallacy.

IOW you can have a negative naturalistic fallacy also. Life is painful therefore it is bad. Bad feeling means bad life.

I see jousting naturalistic fallacies if anything.

But could you expand on how you see their optimism as a naturalistic fallacy a bit more? — Coben

Yes, so negative views, aren't necessary thinking naturalistic. Life is painful, and pain is bad, not necessarily "therefore" it is bad. It is foundational for sure, but not because it is natural.

What I mean with the positive views falling into this (in regards to technology, civilization, and our inherited knowledge) is that cultural transmission of information is our species' main way of surviving. We don't have many instinctual skillsets. Rather we construct of cultural artifacts, storing of past cultural knowledge, building on that, etc. This is our mode of survival. To be in awe of this as thus some mission statement: "Look what we can do, thus we must be here for a purpose!" is just being enamored with how we get by in in the first place.

i would guess that optimism is probably a positive survival trait, though it might help the herd/pack/group to have some scattered pessimists. IOW optimism may be kind of hard wired with beliefs as constructions made after to justify what is already there, and in the sloppy way most people (including me) organize their generally conflicting motely beliefs. So its like you have this animal that can think. Yes, thoughts can affect attitudes and emotions and temperments, but I think temperments lay a base, then the thinking animal finds thoughts that fit their temperment. I don't think most go all the way to make it all organized aroudn a mission statement. They are focused on the day to day. But I don't see them as getting a meme and they having an attitude like pessimism or optimism. I think causation runs both ways, but temperment (and the animal temperments benefis around survival high up there) leading to cognitions and also FOCUS choices and bias. — Coben

Yeah, most people are just living in their social settings, trying to survive, get comfortable, and find entertainment. This is more aimed at those who think that because we can do what we do, there must be more to the picture.

I think your observation that everyone makes mistakes is a reasonable founding principle for a society that is more supportive and even forgiving. — Srap Tasmaner

Agreed, but we are generally our own harshest critic. No one else will know how much that decision affected you to the extent that it did.

Isn’t all pain and distress a result of being born? Because it seems to me like you’re saying all pain and distress is unjustified. — khaled

It's like the analogy you give about being thrown into a game you didn't ask for and perhaps can't play well (for a variety of reasons). Except this game is inescapable. Poor decisions are part of the ecological landscape of being born at all, just like natural disasters.

Have you ever heard a teenager complain "I never asked to be born!" when asked by their parents to carry out some chore? Schop has unfortunately found a medium for dragging this pubescent whine into four and a half thousand posts. — Isaac

Good one. You don't have a good answer to it, so you if you call it pubescent, and attack it by not having an argument, you feel you diffuse the argument. Nope. Cowards way.. I can just say all of philosophy is masturbatory rhetorical nothings being spewed by a bunch of (possibly?) grown adults who haven't gotten past the stage of trying to showoff their empty rhetoric to the rest of the (clearly pampered private school) class. Anything can be manipulated to look a certain way. The fact that you wanted to comment on it in that way, shows more about you.

Creating the conditions for pain isn't immoral in itself. Some cure could cause pain but it doesnt mean it is immoral since it has a good purpose. — Wigi

Setting up a game where people have to suffer to overcome it, when one could have set it up differently seems pretty immoral to me!

Yes you created some ridiculous scenarios, but that's not how these things usually go.

Let's say you decided to make a purchase. In the store, the purchase seemed something you would like. Your friend recommended it. You tried it in the store and it seemed good at the time. You brought it home and you realize you don't like it. You didn't read closely enough at the fine print and you cannot return it. You are stuck. You made a wrong decision.

Let's say you decided you made a decision that was much more detrimental. It can go on and on.

They are claiming that if you just made better decisions you wouldnt be so bad. Oh regret and remorse can be added too.

Nope

I agree, of course, that suffering is suffering, no matter the origin; I'm just not convinced there's a common sense view that it's different if you brought it on yourself. That looks to me like assessing responsibility, nothing more. It's even perfectly consistent to say, "It's a damn shame what he's going through, but he brought it on himself." — Srap Tasmaner

And so his suffering is justified? I guess the price of being a human born in existence right? Shame indeed.

But why should I not feel responsible for this poor decision just because it's a certainty that some of the decisions I make in my life will be poor ones? If, in this specific case, I could have acted otherwise, I'm responsible, whether it goes in the good-decision bucket or the poor-decision bucket. — Srap Tasmaner

I was not saying the individual wasn't accountable for that decision, just that the very fact of bad consequences in decision-making are a thing, are just one more thing to add to the suffering. It is not necessarily justified that poor-decisions are a thing, though in moral matters, it can be said to be the basis for the locus of moral accountability.

If, up to this point in my life, I have only made good decisions, whether I now make a good decision or a poor decision will determine whether I have made only good decisions or not, but that is not the choice I face. Responsibility doesn't simply attach to the conjunction of all my decisions, but to each according to the circumstances and my capacity to act freely in each case. — Srap Tasmaner

And again, not disputing accountability, just that suffering from bad decisions, when looking at the bigger picture, is a part of the overall suffering and can lead to bad consequences. As far as being a part of the whole suffering ecology, it is just one more facet that humans face. Suffering can be brought about from contingent external forces or our own detrimental decisions. The origin of the suffering doesn't negate the suffering and certainly doesn't make one more justified. Again, not saying people aren't responsible for their moral actions, just that if those actions lead to detrimental outcomes, it is bad in the same way as other bads. It's just one more negative part of life that humans face.

It's like if I threw you in a game and you didn't ask to play it, can't escape, and aren't particularly good at it. In fact, you have a defect that can prevent you from playing well in many ways. Then I say, "Well, it's justified that you are suffering based on your poor ability to play this game". Yeah, no.

I’m sure what you mean in that last bit there, if I came across as rude I apologize. After reading your response, I think I can agree to an extent since I understand what you meant better. I’d have to agree that we do tend to have a rosy view on our species when it comes to decision making. We can barely get our shit together in this pandemic that’s going on thanks to the god awful planning. The United States is pretty much a complete disaster, and climate chaos is starting to rear its ugly head. Unfortunately, one man’s horrible decision is another man’s lucky strike (the Trump supporters seem to be pretty chipper despite fascism being seen as a pretty bad idea) — Albero

Yes, I think you got the gist. Sometimes we are callous to ourselves. We have our own pathologies, tendencies, bad information, indecision. Life can be hard in all regards. Some times more decisions is more stultification, not more freedom.. The more choices in beds, the more choices you have to be discomforted with the wrong choice. It's a very first-world example, but just shows you that there is no escaping bad decisions via technology and output- it may increase overall micro-dissatisfactions. In corporate environments, you may say the wrong thing to a client, customer, or boss-wrong decision. You swerved left instead of right-wrong decision. Make a wrong decision in a tribal society, you are liable to simply die or get seriously injured. This too is part of the suffering of human existence. Though we may say that the locus of our ethics is indeed based on individual accountability, decisions themselves aren't exempt from the very causes of suffering, just because moral loci are based on them. The very fact that bad decisions lead to poor consequences, whether accountable to someone's actions or not, are still negative realities humans face.

Yes, so my point was don't be too hard on yourself or others, as your examples point out, we can barely make heads or tales sometimes. We get by and make do.

To me, it may imply that if something terrible happens the event can all be traced back to your parents for being responsible since they brought you here in the first place. — Albero

Its not meant to blame parents per se, just point out that poor decisions are part of the process of being human, and that people will make them is part of the inevitable suffering of existence. It should be taken into consideration as much as natural disasters or pandemics, for the misery or negative that can (will inevitably) characterize life.

I think biting that bullet is fair, but I’m part of the more stoic camp that whatever is justified or unjustified in my life is dependant on my judgements alone. — Albero

Cool, make sure you rub it in your own face in your next bad decision :lol:!

What is the definition of good and evil here?