I am in love with this little book

He praises Zapffe a whole lot. The first part of the book is almost entirely based on The Last Messiah alone.
He also LOVES Poe and Lovecraft because of how bleak their works are and how they show how minimal and sad human existence is versus nature/reality.
He's that kinda guy.

im really not sure what that's a metaphor for, or do you mean that literally

A 100% fake quote. Ligotti says enough provocative stuff without that floating around. He also says in interviews he loves his family.

>>Buddhism BTFO
how?

I swear, nothing gets more infantile "faggot poopoo stupid bitchass fag aaaaaaaaa loser grrrrrr peeeeppeeeee!!!!!" reactions on Veeky Forums than threads about books like this.

The way I remember it, it was something along the lines of:

Are Buddhism and philosophical pessimism more or less the same? Nah, it's just like any other religion: It promises a form of reward/relief and sets a goal for his followers. Also, the many versions of Buddhism can't get in agreement what it even means to reach enlightenment, or what is the metric for how enlightened someone is, or how to solve the "shouldn't WANTING enlightenment prevent you from getting it? paradox.
Then he also brings up a couple of people who suffered "accidental ego death" and how Buddhism or any form of spirituality wont help you at all.

Seconding this request. I can't find it.

sounds like he would love ug krishnamurti

That's the guy he talks about, and also quotes extensively.
Him, and some John Wren Irwis and Suzanne Segal, 2 other fellas that also got accidentally ego death'd

i think i'll have to read it desu, i've been putting it off because i'm generally already bleak enough but it sounds interesting

Has a worse title ever seen the light of day?

Because it's phony.

Is Anti-Natalism the edgiest philosophical position?

No, the edgiest position is buying into all the arguments of antinatalism but being pronatalist anyway because you hate humans and want them to suffer.

This is an 18+ site, kiddo

Humans are shit. Most never shine, some -like 0.5%- can be decent, on a good day.

>People react to the book the way Ligotti knew they would
That doesn't mean they're wrong.

Literally 2smart4life

>Human life is pointless and bad
>WOW ALL OF HUMANITY BTFO

>suffering is bad

Isn't it Cosmic Horror? Been interested in Ligotti for a while and don't know where to start.

I agree with anti-natalism just because I'm an Aspie and despite my rampant desire for love or massive amounts of puss I would never want to bring another person into this world to suffer the same bullshit I have.

Does that make me edgy?

no that's compassionate

normies are actually edgy by bringing people into the world at great risk just because they feel like they'd enjoy having one.

it's like they treat pets, selfish and egotistically.

It's because life is generally seen as a miracle, a gift.

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH.. It isn't though, not unless your born to the best and brightest and even then its still pretty shit.

So how exactly does he "btfo" Christianity?

>how minimal and sad human existence is versus nature/reality
>human existence versus nature/reality

heh heh

>AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH..

..

Why should I or anyone else listen to the antinatalist idea about what life is? I doubt it can be proven more than any other version of what life is.

>tfw you realize only white people are smart enough to understand anti-natalism

>Life is a miraculous gift

Why does this happen then? If life is a gift, why do mental and physical disorders take place?

Doesn't seem like much of a gift to me, unless we're talking about the German word gift which seems more appropriate.

Don't look a gift horse in the mouth, user!!!!!!!! :))))))))) ;))))))))

I'm pretty sure Ligotti admits this in the book.

antinatalism is pretty retarded to claim just because we all get hurt existing means we shouldn't do it, as most people are fine with being alive and the antinatalists themselves wont kill themselves so I don't see why they get a pass over potential happy people.

The book actually touches on that too.
At the very beginning of the book, it mentions that neither pessimists nor optimists (used here as anyone who is not near suicidal) can be proved right, or that they will ever be "proved" right.
But damn, the guy gave it his all to show us how bad everything is.

Yeah it does

I don't think you know what edgy means.

Tragic life, I think, is better than no life. I would rather have a child miscarriage than to never have a child at all. Of course in the moment I find out about such a thing I would grieve and possibly regret, but that would be emotion driving me.

So your argument is that because people die, and are stillborn, and born with birth defects that somehow God should have prevented all of these things?

Can you possibly be more retarded? I would like to hear some better arguments presented, please.

>normies
This is when I stopped reading your post.

Get the fuck off Veeky Forums, nerd.

Why shouldn't he?

Tell me what would be the point of reality if God prevented every tragedy that occurred? I posit that everything has a reason. Perhaps that baby was born the woman was doing something particularly sinful, or even cursed against God. God makes things happen to whom he will. When your judgment comes in this life, it will be swift just like that baby's condition. I would not be resting so easy.

Remember, God has literally killed his own creation just to prove his points. You are nothing, just someone he has created, so show some fucking respect.

How is life with a severe crutch a gift? Can you possibly more retarded?

>I don't care about bringing suffering into the world as long as it makes me happy.
>I only think about my feelings, not those of the kid I decided to make out of pure egoism
Shit argument.

Well, if God is all powerful and omniprescent, and supposedly a good guy, why wouldn't he?
The kid did literally nothing to be born like that, yet it happened. The parents could be the most devout Christians , and it happens.
Why would God give anyone a ""gift"" so horrible?

How about you suck my cock, God apologist faggot.

How does the child suffering for the parents mistakes just?

It's not selfish if life is a gift, and I don't need to get consent from a non-entity.

*is* not does

Confirmed Satan. Ignoring bullshit opinion.

Easy.
He first posits that humanity was an "accident" of nature, that we are things so separate from nature that the world cannot live to our needs.
So we created god/s to give meaning to the world, to give ourselves a relief from the constant pain of living, and from the absolute fear of death.
He then goes to say that Jesus Christ is a "Frankenstein" made out of a bunch of different messiah figures from other cultures.

You are trolling, aren't you?
You have made made an argument on why life should be considered a gift at all.
Also, it sounds devilish how you don't give a fuck about your would be kid. When you bring life to the world, you are playing Russian Roulette with the gun aimed at the head of the kid, not yours.

You're mad. You've lost this debate, atheist.

Is or how does? These are similar questions either way, God killed the firstborns of the Egyptians for the way their parents acted.

I will tell you this: spiritually the child and infant is devoid of reason. His spirit, his soul, the part of God that is given him will not be tormented any when he passes.

>Why would God give anyone a ""gift"" so horrible?
Life is not horrible, and Satan comes in the way of its enjoyments frequently. You can see there are various material defects caused by evil or the absence of good. This in no way shows God to be evil, but shows that the world exists as God has created it.

Holy shit. Christfags are utterly fucking insane.

Humanity needs new religions fucking pronto.

"Life is a gift" is just a foundational axiom I believe just like almost everyone else does. I don't think it can be proven or disproven, but I think if you adopted the opposite axiom life would become much worse in turn. It's also highly likely my child will turn out normal or well-enough to live a justified life, and I have faith that will happen, so I'm not so worried about that. It might be irrational to worry about unlikely odds as well. It's would also be my duty as a father to care for and raise my child in a way that makes their life worth living; both in their immediate childhood and by raising them to become the kind of person that can withstand living on their own feet.

I'm not a Christian, however.

Keep being wrong. I love how atheistfags assume things, it's how their whole deluded view of the world exists.

>everyone else is insane in the world except me and a small group of others that think the same as me

Fine, you sound like a kike anyway. Christfag, Kike, Sandnigger. You're all the same sort of critter.

And yes, I know your just being a shitposting edgelord so you can fuck off now.

If you don't think the Judeo-Christian-Islamic faiths are deeply flawed that's on you. Sorry I think otherwise, faggot.

You're just mad.

My mom had 2 miscarraiges before me, and I'm happy she kept trying.

Life is pretty dece, I honestly greatly enjoy it. Now if I could stop fearing death it would be even better.

>LOL U MAD

Yes, le ebin troll. You sure got me.

>I think otherwise, faggot
You think, but you don't know. Neither do I, but I have faith. Do you have anything different?

>It's also highly likely
So you are still aware of the amount of harm that may befall your child, and you still go through with it just because of faith.
>It's would also be my duty as a father
You are forgetting there are way too many things you can't control or protect your kid from, you are throwing your child into a giant random number generator from the moment they draw their first breath to their last.

But then again your entire argument seems to be "faith", and that is no good for most people.

>LOL I have faith

Good for you, its never done me any good.

You have faith in tour ability to rationalize, I assume, and where has that gotten you?

>You have faith in tour ability to rationalize

Nice assumption jackass.

Yes my child COULD possibly maybe have some birth defect. If it's something they can survive I'm sure there's a way to live a justified life. If it's something fatal then that's a tragedy, but I won't curse all of existence for it. The likelihood of birth defects is low enough though that it's not rational to worry as much about them as antinatalists seem to. It would be like worrying about getting hit by a car and never leaving your house out of fear, and then questioning being for the danger of cars.

If you don't have faith in your rational ability then why are you an antinatalist? Because you feel like it's right or because you were convinced it was right through reason?

You were going to try and spin atheism into a religion with its own inherent faith and I wasn't going to lead you into making that point.

So in short, fuck you.

I wasn't going to spin it into a religion. I was pointing out that there are fundamental axioms that you have to take on faith essentially. The logical laws work this way and if life wasn't inherently good we'd just wipe ourselves out.

Bruh there is more to life than birth defects.
The means by which your kid could suffer are almost infinite. Regardless of how good a parent you are, or how well you are in life.

> It would be like worrying about getting hit by a car and never leaving your house out of fear, and then questioning being for the danger of cars.
The thing with anti-natalism is that instead of there being someone to feel fear of cars there is no one at all: no one to feel fear, no one to get hit, no one to run any danger.

>Life is inherently good

Prove it. Because if this is the best of all possible worlds that's absurdly fucking depressing because life is in fact, generally shitty.

>>>he thing with anti-natalism is that instead of there being someone to feel fear of cars there is no one at all: no one to feel fear, no one to get hit, no one to run any danger.

You make that sound like a bad thing. I don't necessarily see it as a bad thing.

I am arguing in favor of anti-natalism, yes.

I never said life was perfect, only that it was justified. I also said that I don't think you can prove that life is justified, or good. But I also don't think you can prove that life is unjustified either.

There are many ways to suffer. So what? A meaningful life that is justified is not necessarily one free from suffering in some physical sense.

yea it's god tier as far as philosophy/humanism goes, pretty much definitive
but Ligotti's real brilliance comes out in his short fiction
read Songs of a Dead Dreamer, and proceed from there
you can get his first 2 collections in a penguin classic now

>God makes things happen to whom he will. When your judgment comes in this life, it will be swift just like that baby's condition. I would not be resting so easy.

>Remember, God has literally killed his own creation just to prove his points. You are nothing, just someone he has created, so show some fucking respect.

Hmmm, seems like he's not a very loving, benevolent deity now does he?

If you reject Him and His love (all good things come from God), then God just gives you what you want. Not that user btw

>Only argument of natalists is muh god
I don't think I need to say more

>God just gives you what you want

God never gives me what I want though.

Its really the only argument that can be made.

oh and as a side note, Ligotti uses one particular section from Songs of a Dead Dreamer as the thesis for a number of arguments he makes in Conspiracy Against the Human Race
basically what i'm saying it he started writing CAtHR all the way back in the early 80's and just didn't bother finishing it until 2010 or whatever

...whoa. this guys a genius.

What is you truly want? If it's good, it can be found with God. Otherwise, you may reject Him and find all those other things you may be looking for.

Something I can never have. You uncaring FUCK.

So you want some kind of illusion? Sounds sad, user.

That's right, because you don't believe in him.

Now go to bed timmy, school starts tomorrow.

Man if only we could get africa on board with anti-natalism

>If there were less people on earth, things would be so much better for the ones remaining
>There are always more cannibals than pessimists

It's not fair, bros.

I want the illusion to be real. So yeah, it is sad.

Could it be that you're just wrong, and everyone having kids is a sign of that?