This isn't the same scenario, because the person being raped exists beforehand and therefore already has ethical position that would be violated. But what ethical standing to non-existant potential people have? — Echarmion

None. Then again, I’m not claiming having kids harms non existent ghost babies. I’m claiming it risks harming real people. That the real person didn’t exist at the time the action that would harm said real person in the future took place is of no consequence. To demonstrate: I’m pretty sure you’d agree that genetically modifying children to suffer more (extra limbs, blindness, etc) is wrong no? Explain to me why that is wrong then you will find that the same explanation could be used to explain why having children with the normal number of limbs is still wrong.

The phrase "being imposed upon to exist" doesn't make grammatical sense to me. — Echarmion

Grammar doesn’t make or not make sense to individual people first of all, and as far as I know “being imposed upon to exist” makes grammatical sense. Doesn’t “being imposed upon to eat” or “go to school” make sense?

If I’m sounding like a douche it’s because I have shamshir to reply to after this so some of it spilled over sorry.

There are justifiable grounds to reject that conclusion. I do think that it's obvious to most what those grounds are. It's probably obvious to anti-natalists, too, although they'd of course deny that it's justifiable grounds. — S

I’d like to hear those. I don’t mean this in a challenging or standoffish way, I’m just curious if there’s any I haven’t heard before.

Why it is an immaterial object, not a material one as my arguments demonstrate. — Bartricks

And panpsychism is saying that every material object has such an immaterial object attached to it. It then becomes a problem how these immaterial objects combine or split up but that doesn’t falsify the whole position.

So your rights outweigh the rights of the child you were so vehemently defending moments ago. — Shamshir

No and you’re being willfully blind. In the scenario in question the choice is between 100% chance of severe suffering (and death) or a slight chance of severe suffering for someone else. In this case it is permissible to procreate.

His rights don’t outweigh the child’s but they do have some weight

And if it isn't worth living - it can stop living and spare itself and its offspring further injury. — Shamshir

Let’s expand on this logic a bit. “If getting raped isn’t worth going through, she can just stop living and spare herself further injury, after all she MIGHT enjoy the experience no? I’ll rape her and give her a chance to make the verdict herself. After all, not raping her would he forcing her to not get raped when she could enjoy it”

Disgusting to even read isn’t it?

Then I'm not imposing natalism — Shamshir

Yes you are because

Again, slowly this time: you can only impose something on someone who exists at some point. — Bartricks

Thus when someone exists without asking to exist, they have been imposed upon to exist. When no one exists, no one has been imposed upon not to exist.

If we do not have children (and bring them up to continue our good work), then we will not have fulfilled our moral obligation to the three starving people. — Isaac

First off, I don’t think feeding them is an obligation. You never have an obligation to help someone unless you harmed them yourself.

So you’re proposing controlled reproduction with the goal of eventually ending humanity? As in, we will ONLY have children to feed the starving people, after that, we’re done (and we’re obviously going to do it in such a way that the number of starving people keeps decreasing or else it would be a very dumb solution). Actually, I think there is some merit to this view. I’m fine with it. After all, if everyone stopped procreating tomorrow the result will be complete mayhem a few decades down the line, and what did the people who will live through that do to deserve it? They didn’t ask to be born themselves did they? So I think there is some merit in saying that they are then justified to procreate IN SUCH A WAY that annihilation is the final goal. They would be moral to procreate when they can show that they would suffer severely more alone and childless, then they+their child would suffer if they were together (or at least that the suffering is comparable both ways). This wouldn’t sustain the population however.

Although I shouldn’t be saying final goal but rather final destination. It is not a goal in and of itself per se

I’d just like to warn you that shamshir is going to devolve to personally insulting you when it comes to this topic.

Premise 1 has an 'other things being equal' clause. It isn't met in the case of the morality of procreative acts. — Bartricks

I don’t get why it wouldn’t be but then again, I didn’t think that clause had any significance whatsoever and I still don’t get what significance it might have. Could you explain that? What “things” are “equal”. Oftentimes when I hear “other things being equal” it is just there to add words to an essay.

Premise 1 can't reasonably be denied. For if you've got an argument for its falsity, then you just confirm it. — Bartricks

How so? If most people thought the sun revolves around the earth would that be evidence for the hypothesis? No it wouldn’t be, that doesn’t make the hypothesis true or false, I’m just saying that people’s rational beliefs do not constitute evidence for anything. Empirical observation does.

One thing is 'evidence' for the truth of a proposition only insofar as it appears to be providing us with some epistemic reason to believe that other thing, which is something only our reason can tell us about. — Bartricks

Agreed so far

Hence why the principle is true. If you deny it, you'll find you don't have any evidence for anything. — Bartricks

Disagree. The fact that evidence is as you described (something that gives us reason to believe a hypothesis is true with some epistemic reason) does not mean that MOST PEOPLE’S rational intuitions constitute evidence. I can deny the proposition that having a majority with the same rational conclusion about something constitutes evidence and instead say something like: Only my own rational conclusions constitute evidence, the number of people who share them has nothing to do with it. That’s what I think, I don’t think the number of people who rationally believe in any proposition is evidence for that proposition. I only care about what I see, not the number of people who see the same thing

Your last point commits a category error. I am talking about the mind - the object, whatever it may be, that is bearing our conscious states. You're conflating conscious states with the object they're the states of. — Bartricks

I haven’t mentioned “conscious states” though. Panpsychism proposes that the object called “mind” actually exists in everything everywhere. That is not inconsistent with physical objects being indivisible but it poses the “combination problem”, (I’m not sure if this is the actual name) which is asking how exactly these “minds” of all the different constituents of a larger thing (say a human or animal) “come together” to form a unified consciousness.

So back to your argument, according to panpsychism, conscious you IS divisible in a sense, it just wouldn’t be you anymore. Think of consciousness in panpsychism as a jigsaw piece. Sometimes the pieces come together to form a Bartricks but if the pieces break apart Bartricks will cease to exist, although the individual pieces, in themselves conscious will continue to.

Also have to sleep now bye

first off, you might want to press the arrow under peoples posts so they get a notification you replied to them otherwise they might not notice you replied (like what just happened to me for example)

Why else do we consider someone insane who takes seriously that that their tea may be thinking something? — Bartricks

First off, we don’t, we consider them a panpsychist. We consider people insane if they report talking tea (if thinking something is treaded as synonymous with having an experience of some sort)

1. If the reason of most people represents something to be the case, that is good evidence that it is the case other things being equal — Bartricks

Is false. You should know this considering you’re an antinatalist.... What most people intuitively think presents no evidence something is the case. Evidence of something being the case is evidence of something being the case.

1. If an object is material, then it is divisible
2. My mind is not divisible
3. Therefore my mind is not material — Bartricks

The conclusion isn’t inconsistent with panpsychism though. Panpsychism proposes consciousness as a property of matter. The fact that consciousness isn’t divisible when matter is doesn’t go against that at all, because consciousness is not identical to matter according to panpsychism.

At that point, they could also have said: "Hey, the sky is falling. Stop making kids right now!" — alcontali

And I think that would've made much more sense.

the way you're wording it, it seems your confusing "self evident" with "very intuitive". Self evident is something that must be true for anything to make sense. Something like if A= B and B= C then A= C

In that sense, it is not self evident that extended objects don't have mental properties. If they did, there would be no inconsistency with anything

So, where's the evidence my brain thinks? — Bartricks

Do you understand what panpsychism is? According to panpsychism your mind would be the mental property attached to your body. However it also proposes everything has such mental properties. So a cup could have a mental life for all we know. There is no proof for or against that. Because having a mental life doesn't require or cause any behavior logically speaking. It is possible that a cup could have a mental life and it's possible it doesn't, the fact that it doesn't move doesn't favor either of those hypothesis if you believe a mental life is an epiphenomenon of a physical world.

Because it is self-evident that extended objects do not have mental properties — Bartricks

How is that self evident? I don't think it's self evident at all. Can you "see" minds? How then can you say that cup of tea has no mental properties

2. We do some things freely (not Q) — Bartricks

How do you define "freely" in a way that doesn't just boil down to "a mix of random and deterministic" though?

And clearly the reason of most people tells them that they have free will — Bartricks

It's not so much reason as intuition I think. If there was a reasonable argument for free will as you're presenting it and everyone knew we wouldn't be talking about it

for humans have believed in free will for as long as they have had powers of rational reflection — Bartricks

For as long as laws and punishment existed and needed to be justified*

Now, perhaps the intuitions that support 2 are false. But the burden of proof is on the person who makes this claim — Bartricks

The proof is simply that in EVERY OTHER CAUSAL CHAIN in the world, an event happens either randomly or deterministically. I'm pretty sure that puts the burden of proof on the one proposing the magical third method of causation "free"

It's the hatred for humankind that is implicit that sickens me. — T Clark

It has nothing to do with that necessarily. It's just a desire to protect someone from unnecessary harm.

No for me. I refer you to the "On Antinatalism" post but if you don't want to scroll through 40 pages for me, here is the gist of it:

1: Creating happy people is not good
I'll just start with the most controvertial bit, creating happy people is not good and is different from making people happy. To demonstrate: (I've typed this so many times) You have 3 starving people and 2 solutions which do you employ

A: feed them
B: create 100 satiated people such that you create more pleasure/happiness than in A

I think most people would pick A, because B doesn't actually help anyone. That means that creating happy people is not a good in and of itself or at least is considered negligably good by most (100 vs 3) when compared to the good of actually helping someone

2: Having kids risks harming someone in the future (pretty self explanatory)
3: Having kids also risks making someone happy in the future but as shown in (1) no one actually thinks this is a good thing.

So don't have kids, because if your kid is perfectly happy, you haven't actually done anything good and if your kid is miserable you have harmed someone for no reason, whereas you could have just avoided taking the risk for someone else in the first place and not risked harming anyone.

"Natural" and "Unnatural" often just translate to "Do this" and "Don't do this" respectively. They have nothing to do with nature. We are part of nature so obviously everything we do is "natural". People often call things they dislike unnatural

"has a property which I personally feel but which cannot be measured in others" — Isaac

It’s more “the property to be able to personally feel, which cannot be measured in others for now”

By that definition we can't possibly know if a computer is conscious — Isaac

No because the statement “cannot be measured in others” doesn’t express a property of consciousness, there may come a day when we can, we just don’t have the consciousness-o-meter yet. It’s just an observation not a property of consciousness

using the extremely common definition of consciousness that is something like "responds to stimuli in such a way as to give the impression that the response itself is being sensed, rather than just the initial sensation" — Isaac

I have no idea what that even means. “The response is being sensed”. Can you define “sensed”? Because it seems to me like “sensed” = “has subjective experience” which is a phrase you refuse to acknowledge you understand yet I keep seeing you use it

Not all definitions are verbal — Isaac

So why were you repeatedly asking for a definition of “subjective experiences” when I know you know what that means (unless you’re not conscious).

It has not worked with 'subjective experience' or consciousness' — Isaac

Has it not? You haven’t even tried to have a discussion of it without a verbal definition. Imagine if a person refuses to take geometry class until the teacher defines what “shape” means verbally.

Consciousness can be said to be the capacity to feel something if you really want a verbal definition. Can your couch feel something? Can your phone feel something? Can AI feel something? These are questions we cannot answer unless we have a way to directly measure subjective experiences which we don’t. I can’t actually know if you feel something. Because you feeling something has no logical implications on your actions.

You are describing something which you claim cannot be measured — Isaac

No, I’m describing something and then saying we cannot measure it. It is not a property of said thing but an observation. It is you who chooses to read anything I say as mysticism because I don’t agree with you.

You've just contradicted yourself literally with neighbouring sentences. — Isaac

True that, excuse my silliness. What I meant was, you and I both know what consciousness feels like but not how it comes about. You contend it doesn’t “come about” of anything and IS literally the chemical reactions in your brain. I say it is a RESULT of said reactions. I cannot see how consciousness IS a chemical reaction. What is said reaction?
Chemical A (aq) + chemical B (aq) -> consciousness(?)

Please see my response to Coben above to save me rewriting the same response. I'm getting lazy writing out the full description of what I take conciousness to mean and have ended up confusing people. My apologies for that. — Isaac

I read that already. So if I made a self teaching AI that keeps strengthening the chances it does a certain action based on a past history of whether or not that action succeeded that AI is conscious?
So all deep learning AI is conscious?

but this doesn't mean that something non-physical is going on, nor that we can't generalise. — Isaac

No one has suggested something non physical is going on in the brain.

we can't determine that it is not also causally correlated with some other thing. Not without having tested all things. — Isaac

But in other areas of the sciences we have tested MANY MANY things before we said something is necessary for something. In the case of consciousness, we haven’t tested anything (unless you define it as strengthening of neural networks but as I’ve said no one defines it that way)

But it's easy to define 'shape' — Isaac

Could you please do so then?

I use the word in a consistent enough set of real word circumstances for you to understand the 'rule' about what the word does — Isaac

I do the same with “subjective experiences” or so I hope.

It's you here who is trying to use the word 'consciousness' outside of an actual need to describe something. — Isaac

I am describing the property of having subjective experiences... I don’t get why you keep accusing everyone who disagrees with you with implying something mystical or sublime or anything like that. You and I both know what subjective experiences are. You contend that they ARE the logging of memory which I very much disagree with. I think they may be CAUSED by the logging of memory not that they are it. I don’t understand how it makes sense to say they are it.

That could be it. How do you then account for the following:

Mr x (1976 to 2019). x has to first reach 1997 and before that he has to reach 1986 and before that 1981and before that 1971 each time interval can halved indefinitely. The math says so. Is the problem with math or a subset of math infinity? — TheMadFool

Neither. The problem is it could just simply be that there is a "smallest time". As in the smallest amount of time that could exist. Similar to how the smallest amount of an element that could exist is called an "atom". I'm not very knowledgeable on this but from what I understand there is such a time. It's called planck's time. Look it up.

For me it means something like the logging to memory of sensory inputs. — Isaac

So my computer logging the keyboard inputs into temporary memory then reproducing them on the screen makes it conscious? Also, if someone lost the ability to store short/long term memories that makes him unconscious? I doubt either of those statements are true.

That's not the point. Your argument is that science cannot say what it says about consciousness — Isaac

The evidence we have is that consciousness arises when certain biological processes are present
We don't have evidence it ONLY arises when certain biological processes are present

Describing means to put into other words to make more clear. At the moment we've been give 'subjective experience which is no more clear. — Isaac

I've already told you that consciousness and "subjective experience" are things you can't define further. I ask you to define the word "Shape" for example. You understand as well as I do what subjective experiences mean (hopefully), it's what you're having right now. What you're having right now may be caused by the logging of memory or whatever but that doesn't mean it is the only way it can arise.

As we see here, there is no way this type of thinking cannot be overcome as long as harm can be justified on behalf of a majority of people reporting they like life, and think that agendas are more important than causing individual harm unnecessarily. That seems to be the main themes here it seems with natalists. — schopenhauer1

But then those same people are apphaled by rapists, murderers, totaitarian governments, terrorist groups, etc..... That's the inconsistency here.

It is ONLY ever the main theme for them when it comes to birth as I’ve asked them to come up with one other example where they think this type of thinking is acceptable and they have yet to come up with one.

What would “subjective experience” stand in contrast to — javra

Not having it

I’m preferential to using “the property of being aware” — javra

Sure

Were one to ascribe the capacity of will to consciousness—this as per common sense understandings—then the issue would be resolved for all intended purposes. — javra

Yes, but I don't think ascribing will is per common sense understanding. That's the point

as 'consciousness' is a word — Isaac

It's a word describing a phenomena we're looking for.

If I say, "no one has yet identified hjyhfdrddf" — Isaac

If hjyhfdfddf is a phenomena with a specific definition it's an empirical claim.

By defining consciousness as a set of observable phenomena and then observing those phenomena. — Isaac

But that's not the definition most people you disagree with are using

No. That is an extremely complicated and vague definition. What are 'subjective experiences'? — Isaac

What you're having right now. (Assuming you are conscious) Also you seem to know what it means considering this:

All I can say is "I don't get it." Biology doesn't describe subjective experience, that's what psychology is for.
— T Clark

Exactly. — Isaac

You wouldn't have replied "exactly" unless you knew what subjective experience meant

Yeah, but there's still a ball in the box. — T Clark

But not a red one

Forget that. I don't want to get into another one of our nitpicky arguments about this — T Clark

I’ll just leave it at that then

why not?

Claim: A red ball exists in this box
Fact (if you’re taking what he’s saying as true): If a ball existed in this box, it would be blue
Conclusion: The claim is false (although a ball can still exist in the box)

the Christian god is all good. If you confirm god, if he exists is not good, then whatever god may or may not exist is not the Christian god. Or the god of any of the Abrahamic religions. Or any other religion that claims god is all good.

cool. Also I didn’t even start this post.

Whether or not God is good has no impact on whether or not he exists. — T Clark

It has everything to do with whether or not the Christian god exists though.

They make a word (like consciousness) and then say because we have that word, there must be an accompanying concept. They search for the pure concept attached to the word, but there is none, the word was just doing a job, and a different job in different contexts. There's no sublime concept attached to it — Isaac

I gave a very simple definition though right? “Something is conscious if it has subjective experiences”

It's what leads to nonsense philosophical dilemmas like...

No. Consciousness has never been found.
— khaled — Isaac

First off, nothing about this claim is philosophical, it is empirical. Also nothing about it suggests a dilemma (obviously I meant consciousness hasn’t been found by me except in me).

Second, can you say someone else is conscious with the same degree of certainty you can say the length of a 1 m long rod is 1 m? Where is your measuring instrument?

cannot be absolutely certain. We cannot be absolutely certain of anything. Our knowledge, to count as knowledge, does not need to be absolutely certain. On the contrary all non-tautologous and/ or non-analytic knowledge is fallibilistic. — Janus

This isn’t the same degree of uncertainty we’re talking here. We’re talking “let’s make an entire scientific theory about the necessary conditions for something we cannot confirm is there”. Find me one other situation where that would be acceptable scientifically. The problem is, consciousness doesn’t have any logical impacts on the world. By that I mean, a rock may or may not be conscious and not display any change in behavior (or lake thereof). That’s why we can’t detect it.

No “let’s make a scientific theory about the sufficient conditions for something to be there, and we’re gonna reasonably assume it’s there” seems much more modest but it doesn’t then imply that the only way said thing can arise is through said sufficient conditions (because that’s what a sufficient condition means)

We have every reason to think, and no cogent reason not to think, that other humans and animals are conscious, and that their behavior manifests their consciousness. — Janus

But we have no reason to think, based on that, that rocks aren’t conscious. We have “found” (assumed) a way in which consciousness arises. We cannot go from that to saying it’s the only way

consciousness has been found in organisms — Janus

If you’re going to define consciousness behaviorally then you’ll obviously only find it in organisms. But that will be a definition that has nothing to do with what most people think of consciousness which is “can this thing have subjective experiences”. The problem is, whether or not it can has nothing to do with its behavior as far as we know. In other words, if panpsychism was true, you wouldn’t notice any difference than if it wasn’t.

in any of the ways we associate with being conscious. — Janus

Again, we have found that certain chemical interactions cause consciousness
We cannot go from there to saying that they are necessary for consciousness, we can say they’re sufficient

Other examples include: if we find that kicking a box leads to it moving it is reasonable to assume that the kick is sufficient to produce movement, but not that it is necessary. To confirm whether it is necessary, we would have to have good reason to believe that we have seem most of the ways a box can move AND see most of them begin with a kick.

We have no good reason to believe we have seen most of the ways consciousness can arise, because we haven’t actually seen it arise with the same certainty required to make a scientific theory. We have no measure of whether or not something is having a subjective experience.

your arrogance is insufferable — leo

In my defense, the other guy is also quite insufferable. Shamshir or whatever his name was.

I do — leo

Let’s test that. You have 3 starving people And 2 solutions. Which do you employ

A: feed them
B: materialize 100 satiated and happy people so that you create more pleasure/happiness than in A

I’m pretty sure you’d say A is the better option right? Because B doesn’t actually help anyone. Doesn’t that show that creating happy people has no value in and of itself. Or at least negligible value.

More proof would be that I’m pretty sure everyone here considers having a child and dumping them on the street somewhere when the parents can afford to take care of them wrong. But why would that be the case? If creating happy people was good in itself then making sure your child is happy should have been an option not an obligation right? In the same way that charity is an option not an obligation. This is assuming one doesn’t have an obligation to do good but an obligation not to do bad. But we clearly think of keeping a child happy as an obligation to the parent not a charity. That implies that not keeping a child happy is bad, not that keeping the child happy is good. We don’t think someone is morally good just for being a decent parent do we? We EXPECT that. That’s not what we do with other good behaviors. You’re not expected to donate to charity for example but you’re encouraged.

I disagree, because inherently a bad experience isn't worth avoiding more than a good experience is worth having. — leo

Does that justify rape, theft, murder, etc? Sure inherently it is as you say, but ethics doesn’t deal with what actions are “inherently” good or bad (at least not the ethics I’m doing) it deals with what’s subjectively good or bad. Your statement can be used to critique any ethical position, so it’s not so much a problem with antinatalism.

I don't see anything that appeals to the parent's desire to have children as a good reason
— khaled

I do. — leo

Do you happen to see the rapist’s desire a good reason for rape? I don’t think so. So are you saying that you do because:

A: it’s a matter of degree, the parents can do whatever they want to someone without consent because what they’re doing isn’t that bad
B: it’s a matter of principle, anyone can do anything to anyone consent or not

I’m pretty sure A but just asking anyways

And I don't see anything appealing to greater entities such as "the world" or "God" or "the natural order" as a good reason
— khaled

I do. — leo

Your child might not. So why are you taking the risk for them? For “the world”? Would you be fine if a religious zealot raided your home for “God”? If you’re not fine with that, why risk putting a child in a position where similar to you they’re told that their suffering is for “the world”? Do you think they’ll be fine with that?

A non-existing being doesn't have an opinion. — leo

Does that make it ok to genetically engineer babies to suffer on purpose? They can’t say no can they?

Also the point is that they WILL become an existing being with opinions and their opinions of the world may be highly negative. So simply don’t take the risk for them when you can avoid it.

At the very least we each find our own consciousnesses — Janus

But never someone else’s. Which means you can’t assume WE find our own consciousness. You do (hopefully) and I do (definitely)

The fact that I can say we all find our own consciousnesses — Janus

You can’t say that though. How do you know others have found their own consciousness. I’m not implying solipsism here, just pointing out that we actually don’t have a way to measure consciousness. We assume everyone else is conscious for social reasons

behavior that shows consciousness — Janus

What is that behavior exactly? And, again, we have no evidence such behavior is necessary for consciousness. Such behavior could be possible without consciousness. And consciousness could be possible without such behavior. There is no reason to assume that having subjective experiences necessitates certain behavior

Your "box" analogy is kind of weak and seems inappropriate because we observe boxes moving lots of places not just at high altitudes — Janus

I said in parenthesis “assuming this is the only instance of a box moving that we do see” didn’t I (or something to that effect)

because consciousness has never been found anywhere other than in organisms — Janus

Again, it hasn’t been found in organisms either. It has been assumed to exist. If rocks were conscious would we have found a way to detect it? That’s my point.

What has been observed is that biological processes are always present wherever consciousness is to be found. — Janus

No. Consciousness has never been found. It has been assumed so far. We don't have a consciousness-o-metre. What has actually been observed is that (assuming humans are conscious), whenever a human was conscious, there happened to be certain biological processes at play.

and even if we take your statement as true.

What has been observed is that biological processes are always present wherever consciousness is to be found. This shows that biological processes appear to be necessary to produce consciousness. — Janus

This is still an incorrect inference. "It has been observed that whenever a box moves, it is at a high altitude. That means that a high altitude is necessary for a box to move" (assuming we actually never see boxes move in any other cirucumstance) would be wrong

If A causes B. A is sufficient for B
If !A means !B. A is necessary for B

So far we know that certain mental processes cause consciousness (A causes B)
We do not know that not having those mental processes results in no consciousness (!A means !B)
Why do we not know this? Because we have no actual measure of consciousness

biological processes appear to be necessary for consciousness — Janus

How has this been observed? What HAS been observed is that, when consciousness arises, certain biological processes are required. This does not imply that those processes are necessary for consciousness to arise

Claim: When certain biological processes are occurring, something is conscious
You can’t go from that to:
When those biological processes are not occurring, something is not conscious

The inverse of a true statement is not always true

From that it does not follow that they are sufficient. — Janus

When I say “biological processes” I’m referring to the ones we suspect cause consciousness not just all biological processes.

Yes I understand that, but in our discussion we when I referred to your having feelings, you dismissed that as being incorrect as a means of identifying consciousness, — Isaac

Did I? My bad then

I would say that the 'feeling' something is what the logging is, — Isaac

And I’m saying that from there, you cannot say that the only way to feel something is through the logging

I wasn't asking if you had feelings. I was asking how you identify the capacity to have feelings distinct from feelings themselves (which you already dismissed as your measure). — Isaac

The capacity to do X is distinct from X. If something has a feeling, it obviously has the capacity for feeling right? My capacity to raise my arm is distinct from the experience of raising my arm for example. But if I raise my arm I have demonstrated the capacity to raise my arm.

I think what you've referring to here is more like Wittgenstein's hinge propositions — Isaac

“Hinge propositions” certainly sounds like it but I’m not familiar with them exactly. I’ll look it up later.

But what I take to be an 'experience' is the logging of some sensory input into memory, but you've dismissed that as not constituting 'experience — Isaac

Do you feel anything when the information is being logged that is caused by the logging of the information? I say no, an example would be sleep (logging short to long term). The logging of information can happen without any feeling involved.

are you willing to argue or no?

you can't commit. — Shamshir

You’re projecting. It’s you who can’t commit to your own moral premises all the way to end.

Are you that convinced that what you personally mean by 'experience' is the same thing everyone else means by it? — Isaac

Pretty sure yea. I'll take ANYTHING as long as it can be labeled "experience" in some reasonable manner

This sort of nonsense only ever seems to get by in philosophy. Do you realise any contradiction at all in you explaining to me a concept which is self-evident? — Isaac

There would be a contradiciton had I attempted to explain it.

Also I don't think this is a philosophy only thing. What would you tell someone if they asked you to "prove" that if A=B and B=C that A=C. Every field has to start with certain "packets of sense" like these.

That's even worse. How do you identify the capacity to have a feeling without actually having a feeling? — Isaac

Uhhhhh wot? I have feelings very much T.T

I'm not sure what this is aimed at. I didn't say that disagreements about concepts do change the world, so I'm not sure why you would be refuting it. — Isaac

Nevermind then. Must have misunderstood you somewhere

The argument is you equating risk with loss, while being blind to anything and everything potentially good. — Shamshir

Yes. And as I've shown, neither you nor anyone actually believes creating happy people is good in and of itself. If you want to debate that you're welcome, but judging by the rest of your post, the debate won't be very productive as you seem to be incapable saying anything relevant.

And risking harming other people without their consent for no good reason IS A LOSS. I don't see anything that appeals to the parent's desire to have children as a good reason. And I don't see anything appealing to greather entities such as "the world" or "God" or "the natural order" as a good reason.

Is there anything in the above paragraph you disagree with?

I've stated quite clearly that having a child is a risk you're not obliged to, but that it is the only rewarding choice. — Shamshir

Ohhhhhhh. Have a kid because it's "rewarding". Ohhhhhh. I guess we just don't care about the kid's opinion then. "Let's risk giving someone every sort of harm possible because I find it rewarding". I would like to inform you that I find this reasoning absolutely apphaling. Hey, I heard rapists say rape is pretty rewarding. Might be something you're into with that kind of reasoning. (Trying a new approach here as you seem to be incapable of following logical arguments and want to devolve this conversation to using emotional appeals and ad hominem, have it your way sir)

Your idea that not having children is in any way beneficial is a fraudulent justification of your irresponsibility and sloth. — Shamshir

Again. I wouldn't be looking to adopt then would I? You're being willfully blind to the point that it's getting pretty irritating actually. I'm getting close to calling you a moron and leaving it at that. Like, seriouly, I have had to write everything to you at least twice (I feel like terrapin talking to myself). You seem to need a refresher on every single point every 2 comments. Or you're being willfully blind which is what I suspect.

Considering your current state of mind, perhaps as a natural irony, it would be best that you didn't have children as you'd be an inept parent, more harmful than beneficial. — Shamshir

Ad hominem is garbage. Just like the rest of your comment.

You say you can't harm nonexistent children? Very well.
But if you accept that, follow through and realise you can't spare them harm. — Shamshir

I agree completely. Not giving birth is not sparing anyone harm. It is not a good thing. I have never claimed that antinatalism means that not having children is good. You and NO4S... (sorry don’t know ur name) for some reason thought the same thing. I never once claimed not having children is good. What I did claim is that having children is bad.

Not having children doesn’t spare anyone and it doesn’t harm anyone. So it has a neutral value.
Having children risks harming someone. So it has a negative value.

So obviously don’t have children. Simple. You are being willfully blind to the fact that the argument makes logical sense.

Your idea is void by your own rebuttal. — Shamshir

No it isn’t, and I’ve just shown why.

You're just afraid and if you'd commit to that — Shamshir

No I’m not as I’ve just shown. In fact, I think YOU'RE afraid to committing to saying that not having children is harming someone because you refused to reply to any of the ridiculous consequences of such a belief, such as that it would make you almost as guilty as an antinatalist for having 2 kids instead of 200. Because of all the happiness you’re denying non existent people (as if that’s a problem)

instead of putting up this idiotic front, this conversation wouldn't be so needlessly dragged out. — Shamshir

Isn’t saying your child will do the world a great good an equally idiotic front? You’re the one that started evaluating the potential impact of children on others not me. Your literal first comment was “and what if the child will do the world a magnanimous good”. I’m pointing out that there isn’t also a chance they do a magnanimous evil.

Your entire argument seemed to rest on saying that I’m harming someone by not giving birth to children. Since you just conceded that isn’t the case, where does antinatalism not make logical sense?

That's correct, I don't believe a reasoned logic can be used to determine whether humans should be born or not. — staticphoton

You could’ve said that at the start m8. I take back calling you a hypocrite. If you believe that you’re Gucci. I don’t agree with it, think it’s bogus, and think this belief will so much more harm than good but I can’t judge.

Have a good day.