Comments

  • What would be considered a "forced" situation?
    Isn’t this literally what I asked you? I’m interested in how this pans out.

    What are your answers to all of this?

    What counts as "forcing" people into a game? Certainly the villain is doing thisschopenhauer1

    You can’t be asking for a definition and also be certain that something follows the definition you don’t know.

    Does that really matter when the outcome is the same (the person plays the game of life?).schopenhauer1

    I’ll try a different argument this time. Yes: Because in the case of someone being forced to play a game, there is a life they’re missing out on. There is a consequence to them being kidnapped by the villain. Not so if they never existed.

    The villain is taking away a pretty good game (life) and substituting it with something worse or equal. If the “villain” was kidnapping people who were living miserable lives and “imposed” a life a comfort on them, I’m not sure he’d be a villain. He’s a villain because he’s putting you in a likely worse or at best equal situation.

    I mean the villain's game, and life's game (after the expansion) is pretty much identical. But many people might still say what the villain did was wrongschopenhauer1

    Because he took people from a situation to another situation that is identical to it, without consent. Best case scenario: They don’t miss anything (neutral). Worst case scenario: They were pretty successful in life and so miss out on a lot (bad).

    Are the contestants like the "happy slave" that might not mind the game (being a slave in the slave's case), but don't realize their options are more limited than they think? What makes life itself so different?schopenhauer1

    Again, in absence of a definition of what constitutes a non trivial imposition, you can’t be sure that life itself is a non trivial imposition.
  • Your thoughts on Efilism?
    If you are intent on ignoring the latter half of every comment I write there is no point. I hope you figure it out.
  • Your thoughts on Efilism?
    You really disagree with that fact, now with me. I didn't invent it, I don't like it, but it's there. How much ones eyes will be opened standing in front of this "monster" and how far one is ready to go in terms of the solution, depends on the individual obviously. You or the majority just isn't willing (some perhaps unable to for other reasons) to face the fact and accept the most ethical solution.RAW

    Yup:

    doesn't seem like something you actually have support for. Just something you'll proudly and loudly restate.khaled

    Please, no more, I'm leaving the discussion, I do get people like you, it's fine, I know it's hard to accept the scary truth and all, it is what it is.RAW

    And I get people like you too. People with too much time on their hands who want to have the identity of the "unbiased stoic truth seeker". He who shoulders the world's terrible truths while the rest of us poor sheep cower in fear. So they look for the most pessimistic outlook they can and pick that one thinking that makes it true. I think it's very sad. But all that is irrelevant to the topic at hand.

    I had given you a topic we can argue about regardless of our view on the world. It was literally half of the comment, and you ignored it:

    If you think the amount of suffering is the only thing that matters when it comes to evaluating ethics
    — khaled

    You need this premise. There are plenty of people with your doomer attitude that nonetheless aren't efilists. Where did you get the premise that the amount of suffering is the only thing that matters?
    khaled

    As I said: Logic needs premises. "The world is mostly suffering" does not logically lead to efilism. You need other premises, like the one I highlighted above, which have no support for (not that you have support for this one either).

    But instead of discussing this you chose to characterize me as delusional. As if that dismisses my argument at all. Wasn't it you who said:

    Ok but this is not an argument. It's just lame. I don't care if a particular philosophy comes from a drunk guy on a toilet seat, if it's sound it's sound.RAW

    This shows me you never cared to discuss your view. You pretended like you wanted someone to argue against it, when what you really wanted was to maintain your stoic image of yourself.
  • Your thoughts on Efilism?

    As you are unable to accept this "weird" (the word you've chosen here is revealing ) premise, this simple fact, any further conversation is pointless. You too have fun living inside that beautiful bubble of delusions until it pops. It's something to envy in a way, wish I could turn off like that and ignore the cold cruel reality.RAW

    Ah yes. The infamous "You disagree with me therefore you are deluded" defense. One that is known for promoting truth seeking and unbiased investigation. Agreed, it is impossible to argue with someone who believes that the opposition is wrong by virtue of them disagreeing with him. I won't bother asking you what makes you so certain the whole world is deluded and the select few efilists aren't because it doesn't seem like something you actually have support for. Just something you'll proudly and loudly restate.

    On the other hand I highlighted another very important premise which maybe be more amenable to discussion:

    If you think the amount of suffering is the only thing that matters when it comes to evaluating ethicskhaled

    You need this premise. There are plenty of people with your doomer attitude that nonetheless aren't efilists. Where did you get the premise that the amount of suffering is the only thing that matters? Here you can't really appeal to doomer views. It is possible that most people suffer most of the time and are living in delusions. We can even measure this to some extent with surveys and such (though your view would require that the entire world is lying).

    However this premise is not factual. It is not about the amount of suffering in the world or anything like that, but rather the significance of said suffering. Whether or not suffering is the only thing that matters in ethical questions is not something you can empirically test for, unlike your other premise. So you can't appeal to people being deluded. You need to argue why suffering should be the only thing important in ethics.
  • Your thoughts on Efilism?
    He just bypassed a lot of possible middle ground, which I am thinking is wise. I was making sure this wasn't too quick a move though.schopenhauer1

    And when I do that I’m Isaac.

    My main question to ChatteringMonkey would then be why wouldn't he be convinced by the premises? I feel there was more there that he agrees with than he thinks, but the discussion has abruptly stopped.schopenhauer1

    Those were my questions to you. But it made me a debate class bot.

    I couldn’t care less about how you behave on the forum, just drop the stupid thing you do where you randomly start characterizing me as a dogged arguer with no interest in the conversation, especially when from my perspective you’re doing all the things I do to others.

    Nothing is more annoying to me when people start debating and then randomly decide to attack their interlocutor.

    And were you going to respond on the other thread?
  • Your thoughts on Efilism?
    So just don't debate anything? Why is this area so unique in that you can't debate if you disagree? Weird. Do you do this for everything else too? Politics, etc.?schopenhauer1

    The guy was saying "let's agree to disagree". Then you proceeded to try to push him back into an argument. When I did that you called me a debate club bot. At least have some shame and don't then go on to do the exact same thing to others.
  • Your thoughts on Efilism?
    If you think the amount of suffering is the only thing that matters when it comes to evaluating ethics, and you also think that life is mostly the former, then yea obviously you’ll end up with efilism which is why I find it so boring.

    Thing is though, I haven’t met anyone who holds such simple beliefs.

    if it's sound it's sound.RAW

    Well, it’s valid. Idk about sound.

    I accept logic no matter how unappealing it may be.RAW

    Logic needs premises. You picked weird premises and ended up with weird conclusions. Surprise!
  • Is it wrong to have children?

    And so now you ask what "trivial" means... And then I said, it doesn't matter to the argument.. All that matters is someone subjectively thinks that they are harmed non-trivially.schopenhauer1

    Agreed.

    Like if you gave them the surprise party, and they said "I felt non-trivially harmed" if you asked them.. then that is non-trivially harmed.schopenhauer1

    Ok. So what matters is that they think they are non-trivially harmed. And if you knew that, that makes it wrong to impose. Agreed.

    What do you do in situations where you don't know what they will think? Do we take a "best guess"? As in: "They probably won't feel non-trivially harmed, so it's ok". Note, I do still agree that if you know they will think it's a non-trivial harm that it's wrong. This is a separate question.

    which you excoriated me for attempting to do (which I still haven't given a definition of yet).schopenhauer1

    I literally asked you to give an objective definition that doesn't rely on reports. I am not criticizing you for attempting to do that, I am literally asking you to do it.
  • Is it wrong to have children?
    Do we agree that foisting non-trivial, unnecessary impositions/burdens/harms on someone else is wrong?schopenhauer1

    110% agreed in all situations ever.

    Now. By what standard shall we determine what a non-trivial unnecessary imposition is?

    I'll add in conditions of unnecessary harms if you need it.schopenhauer1

    Then no. This would make literally any imposition wrong. Because literally anything can be a condition of unnecessary harm. I can't give someone a gift because by stopping them I could be resulting in them getting into a car accident later. In that instance the gift was a condition for the accident, as the accident wouldn't have happened without it.

    You seemed to agree, even if for the sake of argument, that this could be the caseschopenhauer1

    Can you please just write what you mean? Instead of arguing that this is better than that which is better than the latter which is worse than the former?

    What exactly is it that I seem to agree to?

    Ok, I see a little bit where you are going here.. I don't think it's quite the same causation issue that Benkei argued..schopenhauer1

    So, you understand that "life contains/results in non-trivial harm" is not the same as "life is a non-trivial imposition"?

    I agree it's wrong to impose non-trivial impositions, not that it's wrong to impose things that result in non-trivial harms. Because, again, literally any imposition can result in a non-trivial harm.
  • On the possibility of a good life
    And you know my response to that. There are countless situations in real life where amelioration doesn't come into play either. Surprise parties and all. Do you really want to do this again? I don't like keeping two threads going with the same person.

    Your response to this was: "Yea but that's trivial imposition". And now we're trying to determine what exactly counts as trivial or non trivial imposition.

    I just find it really curious that any time I reply to you it's all "stop arguing for the sake of arguing you debate class bot" but here you are restating the same response...
  • Is it wrong to have children?
    Do you think that all life experiences subjective non-trivial harm?schopenhauer1

    Yes.

    If so, why wouldn't that be an example of the former?schopenhauer1

    What "former"? You mean this argument?

    "non trivial harm exists in life" = "Procreation is wrong"khaled

    It doesn't work for the same reason that "non trivial harm exists in sending people to school" =/= "sending people to school is wrong". It isn't sufficient for a non-trivial harm to exist due to an imposition, it has to also be the case that the imposition caused that in its entirety.

    If you had a time machine and discovered that by sending someone to school, that person will one day be late for school, try to jump the fence, and break their arm. Assume there is no way of changing this, if they go to school, they are fated to breaking their arm due to being late at one point. Breaking an arm is a non-trivial harm, agreed? Does it now become wrong to send them to school?

    I'd say no, because although it is the case that they will break their arm, it wasn't purely because of going to school. The imposition of having to go to school was a very small reason as to why they broke their arm. The main reason was because they were late.

    Similarly, you have to show that the imposition of life itself, IE requiring food, water, and a couple more things, is itself non-trivial, not just that it can lead to a non-trivial harm when combined with other factors.

    By your system, it would be wrong to have children even in a utopia where suffering is a choice. Because you don't know whether or not the next person will choose to suffer a non-trivial harm or not, and so their life could contain non-trivial harm, so it's wrong to impose. Basically any imposition becomes wrong, no matter how benign, simply because there is a chance it contributes to a non-trivial harm.
  • Is it wrong to have children?
    What is "it" that is valid?

    As long as you think non-trivial harm exists for all humans, the argument stands:
    — schopenhauer1

    What argument?

    Do you mean to say that "non trivial harm exists in life" = "Procreation is wrong"?

    Because that doesn't follow at all.
    khaled

    That is something you just implied, not what I stated.schopenhauer1
  • Is it wrong to have children?
    We can agree that imposing subjective, non trivial harm on people is wrong.

    It does not follow from this that having children is wrong.

    It will only be wrong if imposing life was subjectively non trivial.

    You can only determine whether or not life is a non trivial imposition once you have a criteria that separates trivial from non trivial.

    That’s the criteria I want to know. Doubly so since supposedly it doesn’t rely on the subjective evaluation at all.
  • Is it wrong to have children?
    but realize we are going to disagree on criterion. You will say that it's a summative report that only counts. I will say that the experiences in real time have to be considered.schopenhauer1

    I will pretend to think that summative reports and experiences don't count. That's exactly why I asked you to find a criteria that doesn't rely on these reports. I could've just said "Disagreed. Only the report matters" but I'm trying to understand how you can evaluate these things without the report, or the experience.

    Non-trivial can be subjective, but it would have to be understood that all human life will have subjectively non-trivial harm.schopenhauer1

    But there is a very crucial difference here. "Will have non-trivial harm" is not a sufficient condition for making something wrong, nor is that your argument as I understand it. It has to be a non-trivial harm overall. I will agree to:

    Foisting non-trivial, unnecessary impositions/burdens/harms on someone else is wrongschopenhauer1

    I won't agree that having children is non-trivial, unnecessary imposition. You must show that using whatever your criteria is.
  • Is it wrong to have children?
    I'd like to add the idea of "trivial harm" vs. "non-trivial harm". Trivial harm would be things like getting a papercut from a friend giving you a five dollar bill. Non-trivial harm are burdens one would not want, even if one looked back and was okay later on. It's things to a degree of threshold that they are no longer practically negligent to consider anymore.schopenhauer1

    Which reminds me, did you come up with some criteria to distinguish the two? So far you've just given examples. If someone were to say that life is a trivial harm, or not a harm at all, why would they be wrong?

    From here, as long as we agree on the terms, AN has good footing to stand on.schopenhauer1

    As long as we agree that life is a non-trivial harm. Which is precisely what most people disagree with you on.
  • Against Stupidity
    an affliction of all at one time or another, for most to a lesser degree, but for some a career. Characterized by insistence on ignorance against reason, sense, evidence, experience, and all entreaties, appeals, and proofs.tim wood

    I think you forgot the most important characteristic. It appears to the afflicted that they're perfectly healthy. Which is why the way to deal with stupid is not to point it out, but to entertain it fairly. When you point it out, it will seem to the afflicted that you're the one exuding stupidity, which will end all conversation.

    Problem is most people don't so much want to remove stupidity, as much as they want to revel in attacking who they perceive to be stupid. Some people have developed a dependence on "Destroying idiots with facts and logic". It's sustenance to them, a requirement for their identity to remain intact. I was like that once, and occasionally catch myself falling into old habits.

    Care that you are actually trying to mitigate stupidity, not simply trying to affirm your superiority. Because it's always one or the other, and we have too many doing the latter, which only reinforces the stupidity.
  • You are not your body!
    I'm an idealist. I think there is only mind and thought. That makes more sense than assuming there is only physical stuff. You can be wrong about physical stuff existing. I cannot be wrong about mind and thought existing.RogueAI

    So what is a rock, in your view? Does it exist independently from my thoughts about rocks? And how does it do so? I think there is merit in investigating your view as well as mine.

    Are you denying mental states and subjective experiences exist?RogueAI

    I am denying that they are any more than a pattern.

    I'll use an analogy: A computer program is no more than a specific arrangement of ones and zeros. In the same way a mind is no more than a specific arrangement of matter.

    In both cases, you can't pick the thing up, it has no mass (computer program or mind, arrangements have no mass), yet that doesn't make it its own substance, rather a pattern of physical stuff.

    Think of a sunset. Is there a sunset in your brain? Then mental states aren't the same thing as brain states. When you were a child, and you didn't know anything about brains, you knew what anger was. Do you think an alien race that can't feel anger can know what it's like to be angry just by studying our brains?RogueAI

    Please explain why what I said necessitates the existence of sunsets in our brain.

    Imagine if someone told you: "Programs are definitely more than patterns of 0s and 1s, that's absurd. When you shoot someone in a video game, is there a gun in your computer? When you were a child you didn't know anything about programming, yet you could still play videogames" How would you respond to them?

    When you were a child, and you didn't know anything about brains, you knew what anger was.RogueAI

    That's debatable, but shouldn't be in opposition to my position anyways.

    Isn't the essence of pain not nerves firing, but rather it feels bad?RogueAI

    Those are the same thing.

    Imagine that same person saying: "Isn't the essence of shooting someone in a video game the blood and gore? Definitely not just a couple of 1s and 0s flipping, that's absurd".

    Why is electricity necessary for experience? What is it about moving electrons that is required for the feeling of pain to exist? Of course you don't know, so there are two moves you can make: there's no such thing as the "feeling of pain" or "we don't know but we'll eventually find out". Both are unsatisfying answers. Your theory produces absurdities and suffers from explanatory gaps.RogueAI

    "Why is electricity necessary for computer programs? What is it about moving electrons that is required for video games to exist? Of course you don't know, so there are two moves you can make: There's no such thing as "video games" or "we don't know but we'll eventually find out". Both are unsatisfying answers. Your theory produces absurdities and suffers from explanatory gaps."

    I'll say it again, but when someone says "There is no such thing as feelings of pain" they aren't saying that feelings don't exist, they're saying they're not what you think they are. They aren't an independent existence, they're a pattern. So far you keep saying that there is an explanatory gap, but I don't think there is one.

    On the other hand, if all that exists are really just thoughts of rocks, how come it seems like rocks stick around when no one is thinking of them? How come we can both look in the same area and spontaneously both think that there is a rock there at the same time! Quite a terrific coincidence that we chose to both daydream up a rock in the same place at the same time. What is the source of all this constancy?

    I was never an idealist, but I was at least a dualist at one point and idealism continues to make no sense to me.
  • Are psychological models discovered or enforced?
    You have to laugh! It's not that the theory is wrong, it's that people aren't trying hard enough!unenlightened

    To be honest I don’t see much wrong with that idea. Most Eastern countries are just Western countries with Eastern accessories now. I live in Japan for one, I could tell you most people don’t know anything about Zen, even though it originated there. They can tell you about the intricacies of the Marvel Cinematic Universe though.

    Not saying the model is correct, just saying that yes, in fact very few actually follow it so there may be merit in saying people aren’t trying enough. Or are trying cheap caricature.

    Anyways I’m interested in your thoughts on this:

    I’m wondering if there is such a bedrock in our mental landscape. Is there a model that underlies all these other models and explains them that we just haven’t found yet? The physics of the mind?khaled
  • Are psychological models discovered or enforced?
    but that empirical world is already shaped for each of us by our prior ways of modeling it.Joshs

    I don’t think the rock in Newton’s experiment got embarrassed so started falling faster. The only area where I can get what you’re saying is quantum physics.

    You can’t reduce the biology to the physics without losing much of value of the biology.Joshs

    But you can do it. There is a bedrock in the sciences from which you can derive everything and to which you can reduce everything. Physics. Biologists are doing physics, just at a much higher level.

    I’m wondering if there is such a bedrock in our mental landscape. Is there a model that underlies all these other models and explains them that we just haven’t found yet? The physics of the mind?
  • You are not your body!
    So, how does that work? How does configuring matter a certain way give rise to the subjective experience of being angry?RogueAI

    Just like last time, you assume dualism in your questions.

    What makes you think that there exists a subjective experience, a “mental stuff” of being angry?

    No, the certain configuration IS what we refer to when we refer to an experience. It’s not something that “brings about an experience”, it is it. This configuration = Anger.

    Any time we say “He was angry” it can be translated as “He had this specific physical configuration”. Usually including shallow breaths, frowns, and other things.

    Is electricity necessary?RogueAI

    Seems that way. Considering the ones that don’t have it display “dead” not “angry”.
  • Are psychological models discovered or enforced?
    But anyway, you don't get to choose your theory any more than you get to choose your form of insanity.unenlightened

    I say you do. It’s just really difficult.

    You get educated/socialised according to the current psychological theory, and that produces the kind of person and the kind of insanity that you, or I then theorise and use to bring up the next generation.unenlightened

    So just go to a society that will educate you in the model you want. Easy peasy.

    So the current theory is called 'trauma theory'. This seems to lead to a lot of complaining snowflakes who will probably neglect their children.unenlightened

    I can’t tell if you mean that abuse leads to complaining snowflakes or that a lack of it does.

    You heard wrong, unfortunately; there is heap plenty suffering in the Eastunenlightened

    Well they say that it’s because of people not fully committing to the model!
  • You are not your body!
    You take matter and arrange it in just the right way, run some electricity through it, and...anger?RogueAI

    Yes. This configuration can be brought about by cocaine for example.
  • Are psychological models discovered or enforced?
    The effect of a psychological theory on behaviour is not something that the psychological theory in question can possibly take account of. Thus one comes up with - for example - a theory of sexual repression of women leading to hysterical symptoms (Freud), and by the time the ideas have percolated through society, everyone is talking about sex all day long, the repression no longer exists and poor old Freud looks like a nutcase.unenlightened

    So what do do? How do we pick which model to use?

    I heard the folk in the East have a nice model which supposedly eliminates all suffering and places you in a state of permanent bliss. It's called enlightenment or something. Let's all use their model!
  • Are psychological models discovered or enforced?
    And of inconsistencies, you simply trim and choose until you find one, or a blend, that works for youtim wood

    Do you think that a model that works for everyone is possible? Is it like the elephant story situation, where everyone touches a part of the elephant and and mistakenly says it's a different thing, or is there no elephant at all in this case?
  • Are psychological models discovered or enforced?
    Consider how we go through life, from our days in the cradle to our dying bed.
    We come to life as basically a blank slate.
    Hermeticus

    Doesn't seem very clear to me. It seems there are concepts that you just understand without explanation. Such as "shape". Haven't run into someone whose repertoire of concepts hasn't included "shape" yet.

    The experiences we make are what act as our basis for decisions in the future. These are psychological habits - the way we tend to act in certain situations, the way we tend to think, the way we tend to see the world.Hermeticus

    But a good bit of it is taught, not discovered. I for one, never discovered the split between conscious and unconscious mind. Among many other concepts that shape how I act and think today.

    isn't it reasonable to think that there must have been an experience where the individual made a choice to associate pleasure with pain?Hermeticus

    Don't see why that would be reasonable. I have no clue how masochists become masochists.

    And note: It took a huge experience to bring about this change. It wasn't by choice. You can't just pick and choose your mental model, but you don't entirely discover it either it seems.
  • Are psychological models discovered or enforced?
    But our minds aren't so malleable that you can just believe anything are they? You can't be a masochist by choice for instance.
  • Are psychological models discovered or enforced?
    Generally, I consider the psyche to be ever changing. It's too flexible, too impermanent to make a general sort of classification of "This person is of the type XYZ".Hermeticus
    A classification like that fails to capture the whole scope of the human psychology, as well as failing to acknowledge that our states of mind, our thoughts and moods, yes even our persona, our very idea of self, are not permanent.Hermeticus

    Is it like that because you think it's like that? Or is it actually like that?
  • Are psychological models discovered or enforced?
    Yes. Nor are they even consistent. According to the 5 factor model, there isn't much you can do to be more productive. According to others, there's plenty.
  • You are not your body!
    I doubt the majority believes your mind is your body although it's commonly depicted that way. What the majority on this site seem to me to believe is a monism. They reject the idea that there is a thing called a mind that is separate from a body, one you can remove and add. Rather, your mind is a certain configuration of your body. That seems to get past all the problems you cite without proposing a dualism. For instance: "He stormed out because he was angry".

    A dualist would struggle to explain how this non material mind made him storm out.
    A reductive materialist would struggle to explain what "anger" is, since it's not something that has mass.

    But if you consider anger as a specific configuration of physical stuff, "He stormed out because he was angry" makes sense. In this scheme, the mind is to a body what a program is to a computer. Minds are what bodies do, just like how programs are what computers run.

    That seems to me to be the majority position here, but since it doesn't accept a dualism, it often gets mistranslated. Someone says "Your mind doesn't exist as a separate entity" and people take that to mean "Your mind is your body".
  • Complete vs. Incomplete Reality
    I toy with the idea that there are many important phenomena in the world, which play a crucial causal influence in the way we view the world, but which we utterly fail to detect because we are human beingsManuel

    If they played a role, we’d accurately model them. Example: Electromagnetic waves. That doesn’t mean we “detect” them, rather, we see their effects and infer what they may be doing. These guesses will be as simple as possible in order to fit the observation, meaning we won’t know if we “really” got the right model of reality, but we will have something that works. Until new observations show it isn’t the right model either.

    And if it doesn’t play a role, who cares about it?
  • On the possibility of a good life
    It has not been established what the possibility of a good life is. The most that may be said is that there are lives, and that some lives are better than others.darthbarracuda

    So you want a percentage chance? Assume we can somehow do that. At what percentage change of having a good life does having kids become ok? 51%? 75%? 99%? 100%?

    It’s not really uncommon in day to day life to be unsure of the chances something will hurt someone and to do it to them anyways.

    For instance: Your whole argument can be repurposed to argue against sending people to school. Mostly just replace “life” with “school life” and “procreate” with “send kids to school” with a few more minor tweaks. Seeing as I doubt you consider sending people to school wrong, the argument must not be valid.

    Worst part is it can also be used to argue FOR sending people to school by pointing out that not doing so is a risk, and that we need to be sure before taking risks with others. It just leads to paralysis.
  • Is it wrong to have children?
    Ok. So enslavement is a case of a non trivial imposition. Why? What features of enslavement make it non trivial? What features in general make an imposition non trivial? Without reference to the subjective experience or reports of the recipients.

    Edit: I’m taking a break from this site, probably won’t be responding for a while. Have a good day!
  • Is it wrong to have children?
    For Christ sake, yes. Stop wasting space spamming the same stuff.
  • Is it wrong to have children?

    I am helping you out here by delineating the arguments...schopenhauer1

    Even though I clearly already did....

    You agreed that every human experiences non-trivial harm. That we agreed upon. So this debate is tangential to that fact, right?schopenhauer1

    For the 3rd time. Yes. Will you or will you not answer the question?
  • Is it wrong to have children?
    The major premise is more important to me than this argument which I am not as invested inschopenhauer1

    So, I assume you won't answer? I would think that how you determine "non trivial" is very crucial considering literally everyone on planet earth would agree to "foisting non-trivial, unnecessary impositions/burdens/harms on someone else is wrong".

    If you don't want to discuss it that's fine, just don't make a whole play about how I'm a high school debate bot or whatever, drama queen.
  • Is it wrong to have children?
    Look, if you don't want to answer just say so. This whole debate class bot bs is tiring.

    No, I think it is important though to dileneate the major from the tangential and to have some resolve somewhere.schopenhauer1

    Which was done here:

    This would’ve been a point in our last discussion but I got tired and deleted it. Yes, do please go back to those examples. Show me how you can derive that Willy wonka’s forced game is a non trivial imposition, without referring in any way to the victims opinions of their situation. I just don’t see how you “objectively” measure how bad an imposition is with no reference to the person being imposed upon. What’s the “set of features” that go into making an imposition non trivial? A certain duration? A certain number of work hours?khaled

    I literally explained that this was a tangent from the outset. What's got you so worked up?
  • Is it wrong to have children?
    This is the main justification (at least in our dialectic context) for antinatalism.schopenhauer1

    Well aside from the fact that I don't think it leads to AN, yes I agree with your general premise

    I think now you are indeed arguing for argument's sake.schopenhauer1

    No I'm picking up something I asked on the other thread we didn't go into. You have some standard by which you decide that some imposition is non trivial and that standard doesn't take into account the subjective experience of the recipient. What is that standard?

    This is tangential to that major claim, and doesn't need to be argued to support it.schopenhauer1

    Yes.... I am aware it is tangential. Or do you wanna go over the same grounds over and over?
  • Is it wrong to have children?

    Because that's the major claim I am advocatingschopenhauer1

    Which I agreed with forever ago. But that's not what I asked you in any way shape or form.

    I asked:

    Ok, now, how do you determine what non trivial harm is without reference to experiences or reports?khaled

    You said:

    I admitted it can even be subjective, instead of some objective list of wrongs.schopenhauer1

    So then I asked:

    So if a slave was fine with his conditions then we classify his enslavement as a non-trivial imposition?khaled

    And you said you'll answer my question but you need me to answer first. I have answered. Now. If a slave was fine with his conditions then we classify his enslavement as a non-trivial imposition?

    Because you clearly don't think it's purely subjective.
  • Is it wrong to have children?
    Then I think we should be done arguing.schopenhauer1

    How so?
  • Is it wrong to have children?
    Do we agree that foisting non-trivial, unnecessary impositions/burdens/harms on someone else is wrong?schopenhauer1

    I already answered yes though.