Why arent you antinatalist? Its the only logical position

Why arent you antinatalist? Its the only logical position.

It isn't logical as anyone unironically thinking that should already have killed themselves
If you haven't you're a hypocrite

Came to say something like this

Absence of pain is just not bad.

I'm not totally antinatalist, I just want to plan my parenthood.

Only cowards fear pain enough to sacrifice pleasure.

>prescense of pain is bad
youre just a hedonist

this

>AN: stop giving birth
>You: you havent killed yourself so youre a hypocrite
????
Can you not understand that anti means against and natalism means birth? Where in that does it say "pro-suicide?"

>acknowledging a basic truth makes you a hedonist

I didnt trip onto a knife and stab myself today. I consider that good. I didnt eat my favorite ice cream today. Im not harmed from that

?

I'm already here, it's too late for me.

But that still doesn't change the fact that no person's consent was ever broken in the first place. Besides parents have the right to put their children in a difficult situation if they think it's for the better.

Because they don't live in place where the average couple has five kids? What do you want them to do?

Most antinatalist activism is online where anyone around the world can read it anyway.

The person exists as potentiality. He may not be actual, but it does exist as a field of potentialities that we cannot fully uncover or communicate with.

>Besides parents have the right to put their children in a difficult situation if they think it's for the better.
What if the child one throws into existence endures warfare, famine, or tortured? Did the parent have the right to bring the child into that?

Spoken like a man who has felt great pains to enjoy some of life's finer pleasures. I hear you.

Ok, it's a simple question really: If your greatest fear were to happen to you in this lifetime (e.g., some crazy guy butchering your family in-front of you and then abducting you to torture every night), THEN would you wish you were never born or would you still think being born was worth it?

This is rewording the distinction between Schopenhauer's denial of servitude to Will-to-Live and Nietzschean affirmation in a more understandable way.

Only the naive who have not experienced true pain feign strength in the face of Ahriman's gaping mouth. It is better to be a coward than bring forth pain and misery to justify your delusions.

absence of pleasure is horrible. Who will bear witness to beauty

Only the naive who have not experienced true pain feign strength in the face of Ahriman's gaping abyssal mouth. It is better to be a coward than bring forth pain and misery to empower your delusions.

The parent has the right to do what is best for a child even if that includes some bad things.For example, a parent has the right to make their child do difficult exercise to make them lose weight, but they do not have the right to torture them because that is not in their best interests.

>Pain bad
>Pleasure good
God, absolutism is such a meme, how can you even believe in analytics if they don't allow nuance.

Of course not, but the chance of that is so low that it's not worth considering when dealing with procreation.

What is right or not is generally based on consent.

Also, what you call "interest" is not properly defined. There are parents out there who believe molesting their children is in their best interest. There are other people, like me, who believe no having children is in the best interest for them.

If the parent truly wished to minimize pain and ensure a happy life for children, he or she would look into history, the modern time-period, the environmental situation, and much more to determine having children is not ethical.

Furthermore, there is the more difficult question of whether or not life is "metaphysically desirable". It may well turn-out that the reductionists or nihilist are correct and reality becomes even more bleak in that regard, but I remain agnostic regarding metaphysical possibilities. There is most certainly no benevolent God though.

>the chance of that is so low
Only because your perspective is confined to the immediate present. If you read more history, you will come to the conclusion mankind is a very violent species. Cannibalism, rape, torture, and etc. are really mankind's forte.

In fact, mankind made an "art" out of torture: Look at Blood Eagle, Scaphism, Lingchi, Breast Ripper, and much more.

What is in the child's best interests can easily be decided through basic utilitarianism or any other ethical system for that matter. Molesting a child is a life scaring event with no benefits. It doesn't matter what the parent thinks in this case because it is objectively wrong using any ethical system. And while in the past it could have been argued that life was so bad that it was wrong to create a person that is not the case now.

That still doesn't change the fact that a supermajority of the populace will never experience any of what you've just listed and will most likely die a nonviolent death.

My argument is that you cannot get the consent of a child when you throw them into a world where the probability of life-scarring events are high. Is throwing a golden brick into your house ethical or not? It has 20% chance it will kill you, but it'll make you rich.

All civilizations and empires eventually collapse. You live with a kind of false progressivist mindset in that you believe we're moving towards some greater future, perhaps culminating in Transhumanism. I hate to break it to you, but there is no real teleological movement to mankind as a species, at least in that sense. Mankind, as a whole, is erratic, lost, and prone to violent outbursts on both a collective and individual level.

Moreover, Transhumanism is based on outlandish and cartoonish views on scientific progress, and it also treats the children, one brings into life, as instrumental tools to achieve what may or may not be possible. Most people won't give a fuck about your children, they'll be disposable to the system and their carnal desires.

I can tell philosophy is not your forte. You missed my point. I made the point you never clarified what is "benefit". Simply referencing utilitarianism isn't a sufficient defense in that regard.

I don't know what it means to be "objectively wrong" without you specifying a meta-ethics and giving the metaphysical framework to ground it.

It's like me throwing a golden brick into your house. Even if it has 10% chance to kill you, would you like me to ask for your consent before throwing it?

because it is logically fallacious

>absence of pain is good
absence of pain is better than pain, but that doesn't mean it is "good"

alone it is not something good, it is neutral

there can be no good without existence so antinatalism is immoral

either you keep posting these threads because you have severe learning difficulties and can't understand something so simple or you are trolling of course

My argument is that a parent has the right to do what is best for their child and considering how 99% of the population is not suicidal you are acting in their favor. Also, your analogy is false because life does not incur such a high-risk rate and in the case of a parent and their offspring the parent could throw the brick and still be considered ethical.

The relationship between me and you is not the same as between a parent and their child. A parent does not need consent to do things to their child as long as it is for their greater interests. A parent does have the right to throw the brick though it could be argued that it is too risky. The problem there, however, is not consent but the consequences of her action.

logic is gay
kill urself if ur a serious antinatalist

>life does not incur such a high-risk rate
It, indeed, does when we look at the prevalence of war, crime rate, disease, and much more. You have optimism bias.

>A parent does not need consent to do things to their child as long as it is for their greater interests.
You are describing children like they are property or instrumental to the ends of what one considers "good". Ever heard of Tiger Mom? She let he kids stay out nude in the cold because "what doesn't kill us makes us stronger". We impose our values on kids for what?

Here is a poem from Philip Larkin:

They fuck you up, your mum and dad.
They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had
And add some extra, just for you.

But they were fucked up in their turn
By fools in old-style hats and coats,
Who half the time were soppy-stern
And half at one another’s throats.

Man hands on misery to man.
It deepens like a coastal shelf.
Get out as early as you can,
And don’t have any kids yourself.

I can derive meaning in life beyond having kids. Sorry you can't.

The simple fact is parents do not need to consent to act on their kids. The example of what you gave did not show a problem with consent rather it was a problem of consequences.

>I can derive meaning in life beyond having kids. Sorry you can't.

You don't want more people to be born (experience pain) but you're totally OK continuing in your own pain

Not changing goal posts. I'm making the point antinatalism does not logically entail suicide or omnicide. There were antinatalist religious figures, for example.

You can easily reject asymmetry and reject the worth of consent, saying that "it's okay that some people suffer - as a whole we're getting better." While I think that this is not intuitive to throw people under the bus just so we can keep going with our ice cream and iPods, I run out of arguments quite quickly when you start rejecting these critical kernels. After all, this is an ethics discussion - we can only prove each other inconsistent or intuitive.

>I'm a rock star and live in opulent splendor but I stubbed my toe the other day and it hurt so it is better that I had never lived at all

>I'm making the point antinatalism does not logically entail suicide or omnicide.
Yes it does.
>people shouldn't have kids because life is terrible
if life is so terrible that people shouldnt be alive then follow your values and end your life.

Then your argument is reducible to unjustified pessimism about the value of life. And I'm not rejecting consent outright I have just pointed out that consent is not something of great importance between a parent and child. Each day parents punish their kids, force them to study or do activities they don't like in order to do good for them and nobody considers them unethical because of consent.

I think its wrong to make that choice for others. My life isn't so bad, many others have it a lot worse than me though.

>Yes it does.
Maybe to your philistine, irrational mind it does. I don't really base my life on having children. Doesn't mean I want to die.

>if life is so terrible that people shouldnt be alive then follow your values and end your life.
If you followed my arguments, I'm making the point there is a probability that it could become very terrible. In that situation, I would wish I were never born. It has yet to happen though, thankfully, but the possibility is always there.

Watch the anime movie Midori: Shoujo Tsubaki and tell me life is worth birthing while horrors like that occur all around us. Who knows? Maybe one of your neighbors harbor such fantasies.

OP do you encourage suicidal people to end their life?

It's a problem with Humean "is-ought" gap. Without establishing some kind of convoluted metaphysical schema, you cannot really establish any kind of meta-ethics. Moreover, I do not believe it is possible to reconcile normativity with nature. Thus, neither natalism nor antinatalism are justified, since they become attitudes or preferences. It's better to say wanting children vs. child-free attitudes at this juncture. You want children, that's your preference, but my preference is not to have any and I gave my thoughts. Different strokes for different people.

It's a problem with Humean "is-ought" gap. Without establishing some kind of convoluted metaphysical schema, you cannot really establish any kind of meta-ethics. Moreover, I do not believe it is possible to reconcile normativity with naturalism**. Thus, neither natalism nor antinatalism are justified, since they become attitudes or preferences. It's better to say wanting children vs. child-free attitudes at this juncture. You want children, that's your preference, but my preference is not to have any and I gave my thoughts. Different strokes for different people.

when you say antinatalist do you mean that no one should have kids or just that you personally dont want to.

Yes, you could find it personally wrong, I have no issue with that, but you cannot justifiably argue that it is wrong regardless of what people think.

Technically, you could justifiably argue it is unethical via certain metaphysical systems (e.g., Gnosticism or some Vedic ones), but in general, those are dubious. If I were to be honest, neither natalism nor antinatalism have any plausible arguments. It really boils down to preference.

If you're fine with bringing children into this Universe whereby they can die any moment, in excruciating ways, then be my guest. It's not my problem.

So you're just resorting to moral relativism because you cant justify antinatalism under any modern ethical system? And yes the could die at any moment but more likely than not they'll see it coming after living a happy and fulfilling life.

Nobody is "persuaded" by the logic of antinatalism, they're already convinced of the conclusion before seeing any of the logic.

>David Benatar (born 1966) is a philosopher, academic and author. He is best known for his advocacy of antinatalism in his book Better Never to Have Been: The Harm of Coming into Existence, in which he argues that coming into existence is a serious harm, regardless of the feelings of the existing being once brought into existence, and that, as a consequence, it is always morally wrong to create more sentient beings.

>Benatar is the son of Solomon Benatar, a global-health expert who founded the Bioethics Centre at the University of Cape Town. Benatar deliberately guards his privacy. He has held antinatalist views since his childhood

Who comes to think this as a CHILD?

I personally do not believe you can reconcile normativity with naturalism due to is-ought gap, so natalist and antinatalist mindsets boil down to preference. However, I myself am agnostic about certain "metaphysical possibilities" because I see issues with physicalism/materialism/naturalism. Any attempt of devising a new metaphysics leads to dubious results though. Granted, I still choose to be "child-free" due to my personal sentiments regarding consent (e.g., golden brick thought-experiment I made). I agree with you, however, that my argument cannot be applied to others without establishing a metaphysics and meta-ethics first, yet this typically leads to doubtful claims; thus, it simply comes down to preference if we argue from the premises of naturalism or physicalism.

Plenty of people are "child-free" and decide not to have children due to their own personal sensibilities.

You could have just said I believe in moral relativism.

>Plenty of people are "child-free" and decide not to have children due to their own personal sensibilities.

Ok, what's your point? I'm just saying the logic is pointless and every single person who prescribes to antinatalism did so by their own subjective experiences and not through some system of logic. You're not going to convince any natalist with that retarded graph

>My favorite argument is simply how you cannot get consent of the unborn.
Shit argument.
You can't get the consent of the unborn not to be born either, so no matter what you're robbing them of consent.

I am not a moral relativist. If you read me carefully, I am not arguing for moral relativism.

>every single person who prescribes to antinatalism did so by their own subjective experiences and not through some system of logic.
There were plenty of religious and philosophical antinatalists.

>You're not going to convince any natalist with that retarded graph
I'm not out to convert people, brain let.

>There were plenty of religious and philosophical antinatalists.

And?

>I'm not out to convert people, brain let

Then why make this thread? Why claim "it's just logic" and post a graph with said logic? Do you really think people are this dumb?

>consent

I agree, it's a shit argument. However, your arguments for natalism will be shit too within a naturalist/physicalist/materialist worldview. That's cause you can't reconcile normativity with naturalism.

This is why I made it clear numerous times you need to establish a metaphysics in order to derive a meta-ethics and normative ethics, and since all metaphysics are ultimately dubious, we will never do this to a satisfactory degree.

After all this time, mankind still has not reached a consensus regarding how mind relates to matter, the problem of universals, and much more. It's debatable whether the scientific method can even answer them.

>And?
Do I have to spell everything out for you?

>Then why make this thread?
You think we're the same people?

>Do you really think people are this dumb?
You are most certainly dumb.

There are no good arguments for natalism either.

If you cannot prescribe yourself to any ethical system and choose to remain in limbo what is the point of arguing about anything ethical with you?

all this word salad and bullshit to try to justify your feelings is gay.
Just say "I do what I want" instead of being a sperg

If an action cannot be proven to be unethical or ethical than it is not wrong to do said action. For example, there are no arguments for why punching a rock is morally wrong or right so we view it ambivalently

But what if that "I do what I want" amounts to being a Marquis de Sade, huh? What if that "I do what I want" leads to sadism?

The quest for a meta- and normative ethics is pretty damn important to me, and in fact, I'd argue it's the entire goal of philosophy.

I remain honest.

I am arguing how one can establish an ethics in the first place. I made it clear I do not believe we can reconcile normativity with naturalism.

Okay, you need to think deeply about what I'm saying because this is getting tiring.

1. I remain open to "metaphysical possibilities" because I subscribe to Richard Rorty's "Ironism". Explaining what is the nature of the Universe, what is the nature of mind's relation to matter, explaining whether enduring objects even exist, problem of induction, and all that jazz have yet to reach any consensus. All claims in this regards seem dubious.

2. I provisionally operated based on the assumption of naturalism, however. Granted, I do not believe we can reconcile normativity with naturalism.

C: Thus natalism and antinatalism both boil down to preference.

Also, you can't justify utilitarianism from a naturalist schema either.

Please explain how naturalism somehow makes normative ethical systems unjustifiable. Besides naturalism can never be proven true so why base ethics off such a presumption?

>However, your arguments for natalism will be shit too within a naturalist/physicalist/materialist worldview.

Natalism doesn't need an argument any more so than excretion does, it's an autonomous biological process that occurs independ of philosophy. The whole idea of "arguments" in the first place are metaphysical and have no connection to materialism, as the universe does not construct "arguments" to justify its positions, only Man does.

Okay, you need to think deeply about what I'm saying because this is getting tiring.

1. I remain open to "metaphysical possibilities" because I subscribe to Richard Rorty's "Ironism". Answering what is the nature of the Universe, what is the nature of mind's relation to matter, whether enduring objects even exist, problem of induction, and etc. are exceedingly difficult. All claims in this regard seem dubious.

2. I provisionally operate based on the assumption of naturalism, however. Granted, I do not believe we can reconcile normativity with naturalism.

C: Thus natalism and antinatalism both boil down to preference.

Also, you can't justify utilitarianism from a naturalist schema either.

OP never answered and I've lost track of who he is so heres my last post.
If you meant anti-natalism only as a personal value i dont care wat u think and that ur a pussy for not applying it to everyone.
If you meant anti-natalism for everyone and there should be no more births, the human race should end, then I think your a pussy for not doing something to make that happen other than posting on a japanese porn subform.

Existing is better than non-exsisting

...

Can you explain what any of what you've just listed has to do with an ethical system? I have no idea how the problem of induction relates to the morality of murder.

I don't base ethics on such a presumption. I do personally act based on the presupposition that there is something intrinsically special in life, so I try to be virtuous and such. Granted, since I am honest, I am making the point normativity cannot be reconciled with naturalism. Why? I feel if we look at Hume's "is-ought gap" within the context of "experience-dependent plasticity", then we'll come to this conclusion. Explaining that will take a couple of paragraphs, but it boils down to how one directionality of the brain's plasticity cannot be argued to be better than another possibility without some kind of eschatology (note, even most sects of Buddhism have an escahtology due to this problem).

Natalism is basically the view that view that "biological process" in either a positive or progressivist mindset. Within the contemporary understanding of evolution, there is no teleology. Therefore, one cannot cannot say procreation is either good or bad; it becomes a neutral process.

suffering is good

>Therefore, one cannot cannot say procreation is either good or bad; it becomes a neutral process.
Neutral from what perspective exactly?

So your essentially arguing that one version of a brain, say one that thinks pain is good, cannot be argued to better than one that thinks the opposite?

I was giving examples of how we haven't given satisfactory answers to metaphysical questions.

Let me explain through this example: What is a religion? A religion is a system of rituals, metaphysics, and morality. There are probably more elements, but if we strip away the rituals, we will typically be left with kernel metaphysical and meta-ethical + normative ethical claims. Those ethical claims get their basis in the metaphysics.

If you shift the metaphysics a little bit, then you'd have to shift your ethical claims in order to justify them. For example, pick a Buddhist metaphysical system and the rhetoric will change.

That kind of stuff.

Physicalism and naturalism lead to processes as inherently being neutral. One's subjective responses do not affect their neutrality.

I'm confused in what you're saying. I'm saying that within a naturalist or physicalist framework, the possibility of certain trajectories of experience-dependent plasticity leads to undermining claims of moral realism or ethical naturalism. It will take more time to go in-depth in that.

I disagree with Sam Harris' Ethical Naturalism, and I find him dishonest.

>neutral
>neutrality
Perhaps saying "blind indifference" would be more precise?

Because of the agon and the will to courage. The best we have is to lie to ourselves within oursleves in our deepest unconscious, but the lie itself is an expression of our being, so we might as well embrace that which exercises our inner courage, rather than inner despair.

I'm trying to explain how in a naturalist worldview "value-terms and prescriptive moral language are not reducible to descriptive terms".

If it makes you feel better, the naturalists and physicalists are lying to themselves too.

>uses the words "only" and "logical" in a subjective argument thereby utilizing the false dilemma fallacy combined with an argument from ignorance

How about the fact that subjectivity exists, mate?

Yes, that's what I was saying. However, your dealing with a hypothetical here. Every human being on earth thinks pleasure is good and suffering is bad and what your proposing may never happen. Therefore a system based on that would be relevant and for any intents and purposes justifiable. Yes, it suffers from the is-ought gap but since every human crosses that gap in the same way it became practically justifiable.

I believe we have a moral duty to create a better world even if that means occasionally someone is born with bone cancer and dies horribly with pain and no happiness.

One day we will cure bone cancer.

Thoughts?

>Physicalism and naturalism lead to processes as inherently being neutral.
>One's subjective responses do not affect their neutrality.
This seems to be inconsistent to me as "neutrality" is an informative state yet you seem to be rejecting the idea of observed information itself.

>Every human being on earth thinks pleasure is good and suffering is bad
I disagree. There exists (∃) a human being that does not think pleasure is good or suffering is bad. That existential quantification is a refutation of your universal quantification right there.

>Therefore a system based on that would be relevant and for any intents and purposes justifiable.
Let's say empathy & consolation, prosocial tendencies, and reciprocity & fairness exist in a biological system (e.g., OXT systems) that precedes culture. HOWEVER, the way they express themselves can be drastically different depending on experience-dependent plasticity and broader context of one's life.

Moreover, let's say you're put into a hypothetical difficult situation (e.g., maximize profits of your company by outsourcing labor or lower quality of services, save the life of another versus yourself, and etc.) and your neural systems are working optimally. You have to make a moral decision, but both decisions seem equally viable and rational depending on perspective. What do you then? The point is humans can form values that heavily alter the course of their behavior in future situations. You cannot consult empirical science to figure what those values ought to be, as I pointed out clearly. There is nothing in science that can do so because we are telling him what is a better ought.

You cannot simply jump from a descriptive ethics to a normative one within the naturalist worldview.

>Yes, it suffers from the is-ought gap but since every human crosses that gap in the same way it became practically justifiable.
But metaphysical systems that have some kind of eschatology do not suffer from the is-ought gap.

I corrected myself by saying they are blind and indifferent processes within a naturalist or physicalist worldview.

It is logical if you're a pussy. 100% of people spinning anti-natalist drivel have never felt any serious suffering.

They think peak suffering is being dumped for being a gloomy fuck.

Well, I did watch gore videos, disturbing artwork, and have some insane nightmares. So long as nothing disturbing happens to my loved ones or myself, I'm pretty fine, but the fact such a risk exists does unnerve me.

I think the problem with modern academic philosophy is how certain topics are shoehorned as "unscientific" or "unacceptable". One such topic is eschatology. It is, indeed, unfalsifiable, but then why do many "scholars" presume eternal oblivion to be the answer?

You do realize, if eternal oblivion is all that awaits us after the cessation of bodily functions, then all normative ethics is undermined? It's why some people breakdown and become religious, especially after they have kids.

I simply remain "open to the possibility" because I can't know either way.

Yea, but you haven't lived them. Anti-natalism is just another expression of simply having too much free time on your hands. It is no coincidence that people living in truly atrocious conditions breed like rabbits. It's a primal instinct to reproduce asap and amap when life is actually dangerous.

Only people whose needs have been largely or completely saturated get to wonder gee wait why should i even have kids, let me do some more hedonism instead.