reality check

Philosophy Forums Philosophy
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I havent seen one argument against anti-natalism that holds water, so to speak. I find it very easy, ridiculously so in fact, to justify things like abortion, suicide, euthanasia, etc. The nature of reality seems cruel and horrible; but, obviously, i understand that nature doesnt have any intentions; the universe cares not about petty human suffering. There seems to be no good reason to believe in any god; to paraphrase Russel, even if we knew one of the worlds religions was true (which we dont) then any believer can expect to go to hell as a matter of probability, on account of there being so many different religions. These things sadden me. When I first came here I was searching for a ‘‘sky-hook’’ (or at least some hope of one ever being found); alas, all i have found everywhere are cranes.
Somebody on here once told me that they didnt believe Homo sapiens would ever become extinct… If theres one thing we learn from the study of geology and paeleontology, it is that things never stay the same for very long; species evolve, dominate, and then become extinct (or else evolve into something else): our eventual extinction is inevitable!

Those who speak of ‘‘magic’’ (and other such fantastical bullshit) are either grossly misusing language, are deluding themselves, or are genuinely insane.

My philosophy is rather pessimistic, but at least its real; its not fantasy, hocus-pocus nonsense, like some.

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Given that in your philosophy there’s no benevolent figure looking after you, that you’re not a special sunbeam, and that nothing is going to last forever - all of which I’d agree with - what are you going to do about it? Put another way: what use is philosophy without action?

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dan25 I have a similar philosophy but I don’t call it pessimism. More like apathetic realism.

Abortion - what it comes down to is the rights of the mother vs the rights of the embryo or a fetus, and that’s why I’m pro-choice. Though I do have to say that I am annoyed by many of the pro-choicers (radical feminists who claim fetuses are nothing but a bunch of cells) and many of the pro-lifers (hypocritical Christians). I think that people should be responsible and ensure they have safe sex and that it’s a horrible thing to have an innocent life killed because of your own personal irresponsibility. And what bothers me about Christians is that they believe (or at least claim to believe) in stuff like Heaven, and if you abort a fetus that fetus is going to heaven, right? So from a Christian perspective the right thing to do would be to abort the fetus, because life in heaven > life in this shithole we call earth and we want the best for our children, right? Infact, that could also be an argument for suicide from a Christian perspective.

Suicide - Why would anybody provide an argument for that? If somebody really wants to commit suicide they’ll do it, you can hardly stop anybody from committing suicide.

Euthanasia - Like suicide, it’s completely subjective and depends on the person and the situation. Where most people fail when it comes to morality is that they search for an abstract moral rule which would be applicable with in every situation, but there simply is no such thing. IMO one must judge according to situation. I’ll give 2 examples.

  1. You’re on a battlefield and the legs of your brother in arms have been blown away by an explosion, he’s bleeding massively and asking you to shorten his torment and shoot him in the head. But he’s bound to die anyway in 30 seconds to a minute.
  2. Your friend is suffering from a terrible disease which constantly causes him huge amounts of pain and he’s bound to die in 10 months. Your friend says he can’t bear the pain anymore and wants to be relieved from his suffering and euthanised.

I think that in 1st case it’s alright not to shorten the suffering of your friend cause it could cause you significant psychological traumas to kill your friend and he’ll suffer for a very short time before he dies. And in 2nd cause I’d euthanise my friend because I think it’s immoral to make somebody suffer 10 months if they’re going to die anyway and there’s no chance for a recovery.

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So do you have a point to make, Dan? Sounds to me like you’re just expressing your views (which is fine) and maybe prepared to debate with anyone who disagrees with you, but what specifically is it you want to debate (if anything)? Give us a single sentence summary of what you’re trying to say.

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Then why would we, as parts of the universe, be any different?

Maybe we just do shit cause it’s fun at the time?

Human nature isn’t absolute, but…

It tends to be survival of the fittest, not survival of the most utilitarian (altruistic, egalitarian hedonism). If the human life is demonstrably, self-evidently more painful than pleasurable, which I’m not so sure that it is, and which no anti-natalist has demonstrated to me that it is, then we wouldn’t be here if we were utilitarians, would we? No. So if your premise is true, life is obviously more painful than pleasant, then we obviously don’t care, we obviously operate emotively, and/or on principles alongside or other than utilitarianism, such as gene maximization, which is what evolution’d suggest.

I mean, if morality is subjective, which it is, essentially, then your morality may differ from mine. We make it up as we go along, which is not to say morality has no basis in genes, but genes differ, your genes are not my genes, and gene expression fluctuates, so human nature doesn’t operate on, greatest happiness for greatest number, our modus operandi are complex, dynamic, ephemeral, fluid, they can’t be summed up in a single sentence, greatest happiness for greatest number. Why greatest happiness for greatest number, why not, maximize survival of the human race? Or why not, maximize your own survival, or why not, maximize the survival of your friends and family? You are so completely and utterly out of touch with human nature and reality, supernatural nearly.

Here’s one, my parents didn’t care about me before they ‘brought me into the world’, so why should I care about my potential offspring? There, that’s my morality, try and prove me wrong, as if you could, you can’t, if that’s the way I, or someone feels, or thinks, so be it. My feelings/thoughts are - survival is just as important as happiness, and some peoples survival and happiness matters more to me than others. Great people suffer greatly.

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It’s all so convenient, I mean, it’s funny how there’s lots of antinatalists out there, but no philosophical justifications for mass homicide/suicide, and these are the same people who’re against hunting. Well fuck, I’m just putting animals out of their misery, is all.

If you don’t want to have kids cause you’re too busy playing World of Warcraft, just say so.

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Reality is of questionable merit nowadays , as is the measure between optimism and pessimism
So how are we to determine what is off the hook, or, the effect of what we have set up ? Maybe the answer lies in trying to discern where one begins and the other one ends or if the relationship is of functional utility, more towards as a service toward aggregate humanity in
general , rather then by the measure of singular circumstance.

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People think it’s so hardcore to be an atheist, but it’s not, it’s the easiest thing in the world. People just replace religion with something else, like with humanity, or nature, the way alcoholics replace booze with loads of coffee and cigarettes. They deify aspects of humanity - morality, reason, and then we end up with ideologies like Marxism, and Randism, that deny our psychopathic and sociopathic inclinations, which are legion, totally abstracting human nature from reality, eliminating our earthiness, our variability.

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When it comes to positions on religion in most Western countries it’s definitely the hardest to be an atheist considering the social pressure of religions. Though, being an atheist is hardest in Islamic countries where you can get killed for it.

Some people do search for a new purpose in life but few atheists pursue one “religiously” (and by that, I mean fanatically and without questioning). I know about 20-30 atheists and only one of them is a Marxist, and none of them are Ayn Rand fans (tbh I’ve never met an Ayn Rand fan, and I’m quite thankful for that :stuck_out_tongue: ). Most of us just continue living our lives without any replacement, of course that our worldviews do change but an atheist is hardly going to be as uncritical and fanatical about his worldview as a theist.

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Thanks for your posts.

Antithesis: that all seems very angry, kind of ‘ranty’; but my OP wasnt much better, so im not really one to talk. Maybe we should both calm down.
You made several assumptions that were dead wrong. Let me correct a few points for you…

Firstly, you seem to think im an atheist, im not. Nor do i believe things because i judge them to be ‘‘hardcore’’… im not really sure what this stupidity even means.

Secondly, you babbled some semi-coherent shit about my being too busy playing video games to procreate. As it happens, i already have two beautiful children whom i love very much. im not a big fan of video games; you seem to be mistaking me for a foolish college kid with too much time on his hands (one of your class-mates, perhaps).

Lastly, you said that no anti-natalist has demonstrated that life is more suffering than pleasure, or words to that effect. that isnt an argument i have ever seen advanced in favour of anti-natalism. Anti-natalism (at least my brand of it) says this: suffering is always bad. pleasure, or happiness, or well-being (philosophers are such ‘hair-splitters’) is certainly good for those already living creatures that experience it; but if a creature is never born, never exists, then there is nothing to miss the pleasure, well-being, whatever; so the absence of pleasure, in these circumstances, is no bad thing. Also, deliberately having kids is taking potential suffering, and turning it into actual suffering… and without the individuals permission: this is morally inexcusable!

PS: im not anti-hunting; i will enjoy going rabbiting tomorrow, as it happens.

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The congregation bought their pastor a rifle when they found out he once liked hunting. Excited, he went out the next day into the forest to hunt. Along the way, he spotted a bear coming for him and in his nervousness dropped his rifle in a pile of leaves. He quickly prayed that the bear be a Christian bear. Just then the bear was upon him and it knelt down, placed its paws together, looked up to heaven and said, ‘Thank you for this gift I’m about to receive.’

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Dannie

Are you an agnostic?

If you’re a theist, what sort of a theist are you?

Certainly not the conventional kind.

Nor do I, I just meant that it takes more than intelligence to believe in some truths, truths that’re unpleasant, it takes bravery, courage, and often individuality, the capacity to think for oneself.

I never attended postsecondary indoctrination.

I’ve heard this one before, did you ever examine it critically?, it doesn’t add up.

Firstly, what makes you think people have children to maximize happiness? Perhaps this is your experience, so you have anecdotal evidence, but is that all you have? Different strokes… someday I’d like to have children, not to maximize happiness, primarily, but to immortalize myself as much as possible, to leave a genetic/mimetic legacy, to preserve and propagate my bloodline.

Secondly, be clear, state your reason(s) for being an antinatalist extremely carefully, cautiously, methodically, why is it always better not to have kids, than to have them? Be as detailed in your argument as you can possibly be.

The suffering of my enemies is not bad to me. Suffering isn’t bad if you’re a sadist/masochist. However, let’s assume your premise is true. If Suffering is always bad, then isn’t happiness always good? We can turn this delicious little piece of UN propaganda on its head, can’t we? We can - pain is certainly bad for those already living, but if a creature is nonexistent, then there is no pain to avoid, elude, evade, correct? So the absence of pain, is no good thing.

Furthermore, 1 could just as easily argue - 7 000 000 0001 relatively happy people is better than 7 000 000 000, from a utilitarian perspective.

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I saw antinatalists fail to adequately be consistant or admit that they were making value judgments - rather than what they seemed to think were simply drawing the only logical conclusions possible.

Even if this was true, and saying it does not make it so, it does not mean that anti-natalism is correct.

I don’t think it is real in anyone who continues to live and value their life by protecting. I have read a number of arguments why this can be the case, but they did not seem convincing. It seems to me that arguing in favor of anti-natalism is an act in the world rather than the defense of a belief. It is trying to do something in the guise of arguing a philosophical position.