You say this is a good thing and should be carried out because that is just what happens. Again, this is an is ought problem.... — schopenhauer1

Nope. My actual argument starts pragmatically with the preference to be achieved - the purpose you might have in mind. You want life to be x. And so what would be the steps to reach that?

It is a given, a scientific fact, that we are social creatures who flourish through the give and take of some balance of competitive and co-operative behaviours. We must be both sufficiently differentiated and integrated to thrive as ... social creatures. And everything else I say follows from this basic picture of the human situation.

Now you can dispute that scientific account of things. But I am asking what is it that you hope to achieve, and what are the given conditions from which that preference would have to be expressed. Some reasonable plan of action then follows.

So nope. That is the advantage of pragmatism. It takes both the preference and the situation seriously enough that reason can operate properly. A path can be found without the kind of collapse into helpless absolutism your approach always leads you.

So basically this argument is about antinatalism and whether to expose new people into this dynamic of individual vs. group (or individual being integrated/subjegated into group roles/expectations/demands). Now, we both agree on what is the case, mainly (in your words):

We must be both sufficiently differentiated and integrated to thrive as ... social creatures. And everything else I say follows from this basic picture of the human situation. — apokrisis

Now from here, you take this IS and make it an OUGHT by PREFERRING to have future people that experience this dynamic of the individual and society. However, just because it is the case that there is this individual/group dynamic does not mean there SHOULD be more future people that experience this dynamic. That is what I mean by bridging the IS/OUGHT gap. You cannot presume or assume, you must justify why what is, is what ought to be or what ought to continue to be.

What I tried to say for justification was thus:

This is not a smooth process. Individuals have an inclination for freedom of their own thought. Thus, not recognizing people's tendency for their own freedom of thought, is tacitly just putting the "is" of group dynamics as the "ought" of individuals conforming to demands of the given. Rather, though people must acquiesce to the given, the situation is still the given. Why create more situations where individuals must encounter the given? — schopenhauer1

Now from here, you take this IS and make it an OUGHT by PREFERRING to have future people that experience this dynamic of the individual and society. — schopenhauer1

Huh? I am asking you to justify why your personal preference ought to be the metaphysically general preference. You are the one claiming that the reality is structurally intolerable and therefore all of us ought not to reproduce as an ethical fact.

I instead start with situational choices and end with them. We can each make our own personal choices on the issue. And collectively, as a society, we will make some general choice. Who could complain about that?

But the other issue here is what to do practically if you are personally miserable and depressed about life. That is where you need the psychology rather than the philosophy. You keep mixing the two up.

And collectively, as a society, we will make some general choice. Who could complain about that? — apokrisis

Because there is always tension between the individual and society (unless society's givens/expectations/roles are EXACTLY what the individual wants, which I would dare to say is never really the situation). Of course we conform to society's expectations/roles/givens, etc. We eventually learn to integrate. But why do we want this process to continue? What is it about this process that we want future people to experience it? Why force people into having to confront the given? Why force them to make situational choices in the first place?

I see the fact that individual needs/wants/goals, though being wrapped up in the social world, are also thwarted by the givens of the social world. There is always a negotiation. I say that to make people negotiate is a reality once born. To have new people that need to constantly negotiate through the world of the give, is questionable. What is it about seeing new people navigate the social/physical world that is valuable to you that this needs to be procreated to a next generation? It is a legitimate question, but so fundamental you seem to think it should not be asked. You will always "LOOK" the wiser in your "this is just how things are", but that is simply a rhetorical shell. The good questions come from fundamental question-asking. To question why procreate in the face of X, Y, Z (in this case individual-group dynamic) should not be shunned out of hand, as you seem to do.

Because there is always tension between the individual and society... — schopenhauer1

Yep. Life never runs smooth. There is always friction. And yet at some sensible level, we are indifferent to that. It ceases to matter ... probably because we have goals and hence a balanced and reasonable view of what it would take to negotiate their achievement.

If you want to take some other simplistic/absolutist position on the structural intolerability of existence, that's your personal choice. I merely point out that is bad psychology and thus a philosophy constructed on faulty premisses.

Of course we conform to society's expectations/roles/givens, etc. We eventually learn to integrate. — schopenhauer1

Why always stuck with the one side of what I say? We also conform to an expectation that we are differentiated as well. And it is precisely that modern Romantic/Existential social expectation - you are a special flower - which is a primary source of much of the angst (for the average person in a developed country with food in their bellies, a roof over their heads, time to waste on the internet).

I say rebel against that conformist role! Rebel against being a rebel. Wise up to the self-absolving meme that is antinatalism. Fight back against the expectations of differentiation. :)

But why do we want this process to continue? — schopenhauer1

You might not. But why should I want what you want? Why should everyone have to serve your preference in this matter?

What is it about seeing new people navigate the social/physical world that is valuable to you that this needs to be procreated to a next generation? It is a legitimate question, but so fundamental you seem to think it should not be asked. — schopenhauer1

You just never listen to the answers. I don't think there is an ought involved. I've said it is fine as a personal choice. My reply to the OP was that one justification is that having kids makes you less selfish, more socially responsible and involved. And that in itself is fun and healthy for good natural reasons.

It is not as if there is some world shortage of humans. In the end, we can shrug our shoulders at antinatalism as a moral philosophy. So the only thing to object to is that it is a bad idea from a psychological health viewpoint. It becomes a rationale to hide behind.

You might not. But why should I want what you want? Why should everyone have to serve your preference in this matter? — apokrisis

My outcome leads to no negative outcome for a future individual.

My reply to the OP was that one justification is that having kids makes you less selfish, more socially responsible and involved. — apokrisis

Can't one do this without kids? Anyways, what makes these three things you mention valuable/worthwhile/good? This is indeed your preference, as you admitted. Preferences aren't necessarily good ethical justifications. But, I'll see if perhaps you do have a justification that your preference for some outcome (which may or may not happen from someone being born, but that's a different argument) of less selfish/more socially responsible/ and involved is good enough reasons to start a new life for someone new. What is it about putting forth a new life that you value? X reason= Achievement? X reason = Accomplishment? X reason = relationships? Etc. etc. With structural and contingent sufferings what possibly justifies any X reason as a justification for starting another person's life? Nothing is lost. Nothing misses out. Nothing even existed to deal with whatever burdens of life there are whether structural or contingent.

Or do you propose it about power? The power to see some sort of outcome from your efforts? Or perhaps it was unthinking- just a simple outcome from one act.

What are we really trying to achieve here by procreating an individual's life? Do you see yourself as a vessel for continuing society through progeny? Do you see this as a necessity? What possible reason is it justified other than its possible to procreate? What is it about the word "flourishing" that draws people like a moth to a flame? Is this word and concept really the nail you hang your hat on for why it is good to put forth a future person? What is it about life that needs to be carried forth by another individual? If we know of the sufferings, why are the "positives" worth it when nothing had to be created at all? Is it an ideation of a future without a person to experience the positives?

My outcome leads to no negative outcome for a future individual. — schopenhauer1

....is not an answer to the question: "Why should everyone have to serve your preference in this matter?"

What is it about the word "flourishing" that draws people like a moth to a flame? — schopenhauer1

Yeah. Why on earth would flourishing be a preference? Why would you want anything standing in the way of misery?

If we know of the "sufferings", why are the positives worth it when nothing had to be created at all? — schopenhauer1

Again, you have simply failed to answer on the issue. Why should your personal "is" be society's collective "ought"?

....is not an answer to the question: "Why should everyone have to serve your preference in this matter?" — apokrisis

Again, my preference leads to no negative outcomes for a future individual. No structural or contingent suffering experienced by a future person. De facto, the outcomes of AN don't harm a new person. More precisely, there is no new person to be harmed. Also, more to the OP's point @Thorongil, by having the new person, there is no reason prior to their birth that would be a justified reason for the child's sake. The child didn't exist to need any X, Y, Z projection that is hoped for it. It has to be created first and then, would those X, Y, Z projections apply. Even you mentioned, the self-interested reasons of less selfish and more socially responsible would simply be a self-interested reason and thus not for the child's sake (again, because the child doesn't exist to need interests taken care of in the first place).

Now, you could make a sidestep move and say having children in general promotes the continuation of scientific discoveries, keeps the economy going/developing, keeps the concept of human "flourishing" alive. These would all be using the individual for a means to another end. Being that the individual didn't even need to exist in the first place, you are directly affecting an individual to carry out a third-party consequence that you want to see carried out (whatever general social welfare reason you chose).

Now, you say that the child will flourish. I say that this is perhaps misinterpretation of what is going on. Perhaps it is systemic futility, aggressive circularity, instrumentality, deprivation of needs and wants, bumpiness of individual vs. the physical/social givens, and the myriad of innumerable and unpredictable contingent harms that befall an individual. Are the positive goods worth these ideas? Even if we were in a situation where it is unknown whether my perspective or your perspective was right, my outcome lead to no actual suffering for a new person.

Thus, whereby my preference literally leads to no loss (no human to have loss), yours would be
a) Creating a situation where systemic and contingent harm would take place in the first place
b) Using the new person for self-interested means
c) Using the person for a third-party means

If my perspective is "wrong" no ONE is hurt by it. If your perspective is wrong, someone is always hurt by it.

Once more, you have simply ducked the question. Why should your personal "is" be society's collective "ought"?

If my perspective is "wrong" no ONE is hurt by it. If your perspective is wrong, someone is always hurt by it. — schopenhauer1

Yes, in the absence of a soteriological or metaphysical framework in which procreation would be viewed as a supererogatory good (which I myself don't rule out but don't presently believe in fully), this is an irrefutable piece of metanormative reasoning, it seems to me. I say "metanormative," as it doesn't presuppose or commit one to the normative position of antinatalism and yet still conforms to the praxeological implications of antinatalism, namely, childlessness. It is the precautious, morally humble stance to take.

If we are reasonable people, we could make reasonable judgements about whether on average those babies will later feel grateful.

And being reasonable, it would be on average rather than absolutely. Practical reason also includes the principle of indifference. Near enough is good enough. We don’t have to be fanatics about these things.

If we are reasonable people, we could make reasonable judgements about whether on average those babies will later feel grateful.

And being reasonable, it would be on average rather than absolutely. Practical reason also includes the principle of indifference. Near enough is good enough. We don’t have to be fanatics about these things. — apokrisis

It's not fanatical to abstain from having children. People do it all the time.

And I think you are using the term "reasonable" illicitly here, in that you effectively monopolize the term to refer to anything you agree with. I can just as easily say that reasonable people do not take unnecessary risks, especially when other people (who cannot consent) are directly involved. In this form antinatalism is the logical extension of the common ethical categories (common-sense morality), and it's only because of the affirmative assumption that life and reason must never intersect that antinatalism is seen as unreasonable.

The reason as to why this assumption is so prevalent is probably evolution and the basic biological drive to survive.

It's not fanatical to abstain from having children. People do it all the time. — darthbarracuda

What I said was that it is fanatical to take up absolutist positions. Not having kids can be a perfectly reasonable choice - "reasonable" meaning "on the balance of probabilities".

And I think you are using the term "reasonable" illicitly here, in that you effectively monopolize the term to refer to anything you agree with. — darthbarracuda

Huh? I used a general definition of reasonable - the pragmatist one.

I can just as easily say that reasonable people do not take unnecessary risks, — darthbarracuda

And that is what I actually said. We make pragmatic risk/reward choices based on a balance of probabilities.

In this form antinatalism is the logical extension of the common ethical categories (common-sense morality), and it's only because of the affirmative assumption that life and reason must never intersect that antinatalism is seen as unreasonable. — darthbarracuda

No. It is unreasonable because the facts are that the majority of people don't go through life wishing they had never been born.

Antinatalism is only logical to those who take a black and white absolutist stance on things. Any pain or suffering - even a papercut - makes existence structurally intolerable.

For most people, life is a mixed bag. And yet overall, they don't regret living. So if you are going to take on moral guardianship for the unborn, deal with the facts as they actually are out there in the world.

The reason as to why this assumption is so prevalent is probably evolution and the basic biological drive to survive. — darthbarracuda

No. Most folk can just see that antinatalism is another of those extremist points of view that are essentially unreasonable.

Yes. The arguments are made with black and white logic. But no. That is not reasonable.

'We're doomed': Mayer Hillman on the climate reality no one else will dare mention...

The 86-year-old social scientist says accepting the impending end of most life on Earth might be the very thing needed to help us prolong it.

We’re doomed,” says Mayer Hillman with such a beaming smile that it takes a moment for the words to sink in. “The outcome is death, and it’s the end of most life on the planet because we’re so dependent on the burning of fossil fuels. There are no means of reversing the process which is melting the polar ice caps. And very few appear to be prepared to say so.”

Hillman, an 86-year-old social scientist and senior fellow emeritus of the Policy Studies Institute, does say so. His bleak forecast of the consequence of runaway climate change, he says without fanfare, is his “last will and testament”. His last intervention in public life. “I’m not going to write anymore because there’s nothing more that can be said,” he says when I first hear him speak to a stunned audience at the University of East Anglia late last year.

If one can face the situation without holding on to the unlikelihood that everything will turn out just fine in the end, it seems obvious that we are doomed -- not tonight, not next week, not in a few years. But also not thousands of years into the future. Doom will arrive for many in this century, and more (maybe most) in the century after.

The combination of excess heat, erratic and previously unseen weather patterns, rising oceans, and much more will kill off hundreds of millions--and billions--through starvation, heat stroke, dehydration, illnesses, and such like.

What is the point of having children as we approach the cliff off of which we will collectively fall?

I think Meyer Hillman is right. We are doomed, and no one wants to acknowledge our eminent demise as a species with a future, never mind a bright one. We will take a lot of other species with us. Our legacy will be unvisited cultural shrines, unread books, unheard music, undiscussed philosophical questions, like, "Was this wretched conclusion to our history worth the glory we achieved by burning all the coal and oil?"

It wasn't, and now it's too late to do much about it.

What is the point of having children as we approach the cliff off of which we will collectively fall? — Bitter Crank

Now you are talking about the actual world - the one where we would take a pragmatic decision. :up:

If we are reasonable people, we could make reasonable judgements about whether on average those babies will later feel grateful. — apokrisis

Just as the torturer could make reasonable predictions about whether, on average, his victims will develop a Stockholm Syndrome such that they feel grateful to him. You dodge the salient point pessimists make about the world and which leads them to conclusions like antinatalism.

Just as the torturer could make reasonable predictions about whether, on average, his victims will develop a Stockholm Syndrome such that they feel grateful to him. — Thorongil

Finish the thought. What would that reasonable prediction actually be in real life?

10%?

1%?

0.001%?

And then ask yourself how good is an argument that must rely on extravagant hyperbole? Surely it must be facing desperate times if that is the best it can manage.

No. It is unreasonable because the facts are that the majority of people don't go through life wishing they had never been born.

Antinatalism is only logical to those who take a black and white absolutist stance on things. Any pain or suffering - even a papercut - makes existence structurally intolerable.

For most people, life is a mixed bag. And yet overall, they don't regret living. So if you are going to take on moral guardianship for the unborn, deal with the facts as they actually are out there in the world. — apokrisis

Once again, the fact that the majority of people do not often wish they had never been born (but actually claims about being glad you were born are often not about being born but continuing living) is not a counterargument to antinatalism. And once again antinatalism is not concerned about paper cuts and minor boo-boos.

Yes, it is true that many people irrationally find life to be something positive. Yet people can be profoundly misled. And there are many people who do not find life to be something positive. The latter are those whom I am most concerned with here. If you procreate, you make possible the existence of a suicidal person. The claim is that the possible good that may come from bringing someone into existence (such as their happiness, fulfillment, or whatever) does not justify the possible evil that may (and often does) come from doing the same.

Really, then, this particular argument is that the extinction of the human race is preferable to the existence of agony. Pain is the most real thing a person can experience. A billion happy people has no value when it depends on a single victim of torture. You may call that absolutist, and if that is so, then so be it. Every single person who exists is a possible suicide. That's a fact.

Elsewhere I have tried to emphasize how antinatalism is but one perspective on procreation - an ethical perspective. Procreation can be seen in other perspectives that are more favorable to it, such as from the perspective of the continuation of the human species, or the perspective of a prospective parent who wishes to have an intimate relationship with their young. I don't think I'm being absolutist when I say procreation is morally wrong. I'm merely pronouncing a perspective on procreation that is based on moral categories. Feel free to take a different perspective - the argument is not that birth is absolutely bad from all perspectives, but rather that it is bad from the moral perspective.

Finish the thought. What would that reasonable prediction actually be in real life? — apokrisis

Quite reasonable.

And once again antinatalism is not concerned about paper cuts and minor boo-boos. — darthbarracuda

When I was a full throated antinatalist, I was concerned with such things, however ridiculous they may seem. Even the most remote and minute amount of suffering in the world is enough to ignite the problem of evil. An antinatalism based on the notion of a strict duty to reduce suffering in toto cannot countenance even trivial examples thereof.

Yes, it seems as though antinatalism can be but one manifestation of the problem of evil. Atheists can complain that God sits by idly, watching innocent people suffer. But parents are like gods in themselves with their creative capabilities. A consistent atheist committed to a logical problem of evil seems, on pain of inconsistency, to be required to endorse some form of antinatalism as well. It seems inconsistent to accuse God of being evil and yet turn a blind eye to the human imitators of God.

Minor boo-boos like paper cuts are so trivial that they can form a problem of evil in themselves. Forget the Holocaust for a second - what possible benefit would a person get from stubbing their toe? Is stubbing a toe a necessary part of God's great plan? Do papers cuts actually refine our moral character? Or are these "minor evils", as minor as they may be, simply useless?

These minor evils are still very minor and so are not something we ought to worry about. Instead they act more as indicators of the overall absurd quality of life.

Yes, it is true that many people irrationally find life to be something positive. Yet people can be profoundly misled. — darthbarracuda

A billion happy people has no value when it depends on a single victim of torture. — darthbarracuda

Every single person who exists is a possible suicide. That's a fact. — darthbarracuda

No words.

A consistent atheist committed to a logical problem of evil seems, on pain of inconsistency, to be required to endorse some form of antinatalism as well. — darthbarracuda

Indeed.

I don't see why anything I said would have left you speechless. Antinatalism, at least in the form I'm delivering here, is simply the consistent application of general ethical categories. It is the problem of evil, consistently applied not just to God but to his imitators.

One thing that seems to separate you and I are our views on the nature of reality. You seem to take reality to be a creative and ultimately playful process of development - a few cuts and burns here and there but who cares?, the world and the synergistic melody of the universe plays on. This is completely alien to me. Reason and life do not always parallel each other, and when they intersect it's not always beautiful. Probably the biggest obstacle antinatalism faces is providing people with a sense of beauty and meaning in the absence of a future society. Samuel Scheffler has a good take on the importance of the "afterlife" (future society that remembers us after we die).

Reason and life do not always parallel each other, and when they intersect it's not always beautiful. — darthbarracuda

Yep. It does come down to me being happy to let nauture tell us what reality is. You have some invented image of rationality that you won’t even questioin. You know the right answers despite what nature might say.

Quite reasonable. — Thorongil

You give up on your lines of argument rather easily.

Am I to see you as an oracle, proclaiming the truths of reality? Of course I believe what I think is reasonable.

Yep. It does come down to me being happy to let nauture tell us what reality is. You have some invented image of rationality that you won’t even questioin. You know the right answers despite what nature might say. — apokrisis

Seems to me YOU'RE the one who thinks they have special privilege to the whisperings of nature. The modern day prophet/soothsayer/NATURE whisperer. I've quoted this before, but I'll say it again, a quote from Inherit the Wind (with one minor change):

GodNature speaks to Bradyapokrisis, and aporkisis tells the world! aporkisis, aporkisis, aporkisis, Almighty!

Am I do see you as an oracle, proclaiming the truths of reality? Of course I believe what I think is reasonable. — darthbarracuda

Funny, I saw the same hubris there :grin:

Seems to me YOU'RE the one who thinks they have special privilege to the whisperings of nature. — schopenhauer1

LOL. I listen to the science. Sue me.