If you can cherry-pick your assumptions, you can reason to almost any result.
Which is a tactic for manipulating people to change their beliefs that I see often: don't argue for your position directly, but focus on more distant propositions that your target isn't as guarded about.
dusted · 27m ago
Granted.
I didn't mean this as a complete framework, only as an additional perspective or "mod" to amend the weakest part of Benetar's asymmetry. Also, I'm not personally interested in changing peoples views, only to contribute the idea of value-null, or that the discussion really ends with the existing.
csb6 · 3h ago
> Every moral duty is owed to a real, identifiable someone. You can’t have a duty to “a possible person” who does not yet exist.
This doesn’t hold up. It is effectively denying that people will be born in the future, which of course they will be since antinatalism is not universal and fertility rates are above zero. There are valuable things that can be done today that will help those people but not anyone alive today (e.g. preservation of media that is well-known and widely distributed today but may not be in the future when it is more historically valuable).
It is safe to assume that new people will be born at some point in the future (given current conditions) and will then be “identifiable”, so you have to account for their future existences when making moral decisions with future consequences.
dusted · 24m ago
I'm not arguing against the moral duty of making the future better for those that are created in the future, I agree with that perspective.
I only try to enhance the argument that there is no moral duty to create them.
Moral value is for those who exist, and given that we know more will come to exist, even though their creation itself is (in my view) morally negative, it does not conflict with acknowledging that they will, and to make the world as good as possible for them.
dragonwriter · 3h ago
> This doesn’t hold up. It is effectively denying that people will be born in the future
No, it merely denies that people that do not exist can have moral duties owed to them.
esafak · 3h ago
We could destroy the planet leaving all future generations screwed and that's okay because they are owed nothing? If that thinking passed muster we wouldn't be having this conversation. It's obviously maladaptive.
csb6 · 3h ago
If the actions I take now will affect someone I know will exist in the future and who will be owed duties, I effectively have a moral duty. You can say the moral duty is not in existence until the person is actually born, but my duty to that future person has to be taken into account now so it already exists in a meaningful sense.
ChrisGranger · 10h ago
I've felt this way for decades and almost invariably get negative push-back when I raise these points. I've stopped worrying about it.
wahern · 6h ago
A huge number of people feel this way, especially post Gen-X generations--Millennials, etc.
From the paper:
> moral authorisation has to come before the imposition.
What's the expression... tell me you're a Millennial without telling me you're a Millennial...?
The anti-natalist movement and it's reactionary natalist counterpart are perfect case studies in how people's beliefs are shaped by their cultural environment.
efilife · 6h ago
Maybe we should consider whether the ideology is logically correct, not who it comes from. Also, what you said are just baseless assumptions where you assign ideas you don't like to people you don't like
wahern · 5h ago
I never said I didn't like the idea. I neither like it nor dislike it. I just meant to point out that the conclusions are in large part a consequence of the the way the question is framed, and the framing is largely cultural determined, in particular by generational beliefs and concerns. Indeed, the entire question of natalism/anti-natalism is generationally specific; older generations would find it an odd thing to have an "ideology" about, notwithstanding small cohorts in earlier generations, or the fact that in the abstract it had long been discussed.
Given all that, it's expected that a large number of people--in particular, those of the same or adjacent generations--would share these beliefs and even analysis; and an even larger number sharing similar framing, even if coming to opposite conclusions.
It's disquieting when you come to the realization that so many of one's beliefs are, in a sense, predetermined, or at least channeled by a cultural experience shared with millions of other people. This of course applies to myself no less than any other. I long ago stopped considering any of my thoughts rare, let alone original. I read half of the literary output of people from my generation and think, "gee, I was saying that 20 years ago"; and the other half, "gee, I was arguing the opposite 20 years ago". Well, of course I was, and so were they.
That's not to say there aren't novel exceptional moments, cases, and people. Just very few and far between. And the whole natalism debate is definitely not the exception.
boston_clone · 4m ago
Isn't the dismissal of this idea as nothing more than a generationally "odd thing" just another common and unoriginal thought?
Anyway, here's Schopenhauer channelling his American millennial in 1850s Europe:
"If children were brought into the world by an act of pure reason alone, would the human race continue to exist? Would not a man rather have so much sympathy with the coming generation as to spare it the burden of existence?"
The wikipedia article from where I snagged that quote has a few more examples that go back to like, ancient Greece. Check it out!
efilife · 6h ago
And now you will get dismissed as being a post gen-x or a millenial
kazinator · 3h ago
> JC: Intentionally creating a new rights-bearer S is permissible only if it is necessary to discharge a duty owed to S
That pontification just feels pulled out of thin air.
Suppose I just need S to take over the family fortune? Also pulled out of thin air.
Heliodex · 5h ago
Interesting to find one of my closely-held philosophical beliefs on HN. I'd recommend looking at Aponism <https://aponism.org/manifesto> for a set of beliefs that include this + others relating to reduction of suffering, or Negative Utilitarianism for similar ideas built upon the same building blocks.
xyzzy9563 · 6h ago
The people who believe this stuff don't have kids, so they lose out in the Darwinian race, and the people with pro-natalist beliefs continue the human existence and more often pass down those beliefs. So regardless of who thinks they're right, evolution wins in the end.
dusted · 15m ago
I am a parent. The amount of responsibility I feel towards my child is all encompassing and absolute.
The love I feel for them is immeasurable, as is the joy they bring me.
The guilt of this selfishness, however, is not entirely weightless either.
My child being created is, 50% my doing, I created them into a world I cannot control, without their consent. Every pain they will experience, will rest on my shoulders, until I die, and even from beyond my death, it will be due to me.
I will do everything in my power to prepare them to achieve a good life, this does not mean shielding them from pain, because experiencing pain is part of life, and learning how to deal with it appropriately, increases the quality of life they can have. This is the worst from both worlds, it is the parent who feels all their pain, and it is the parent that recognizes that it is part of becoming a full human.
My parents were very loving and caring, they wanted to have me, they wanted a child, and they gave me life. I am not grateful for them giving me life, in fact, that they did that is something I do not appreciate. But I am grateful for the love and care they showed me, and I love them very much, despite them creating me.
If you feel there are contradictions here, think harder.
"Evolution wins in the end", well, in the end I guess entropy wins.. But, you attribute a goal to evolution, but evolution, as a concept, really boils down to "the laws of physics also apply to life", it's not like we know it to be trying to do something in particular.. the life that continues is the life that continues, it's not that life really finds a way, it's just that there's enough variance that some of it will likely survive a change, not that every species does that.. but I don't really think that matters to whether knowingly creating life is moral or not.. it's not like nature or life is inherently moral.. it'd probably be a stretch, but one could say that, at least when perfectly executed, the least moral are most likely to succeed.
palmotea · 2h ago
> The people who believe this stuff don't have kids, so they lose out in the Darwinian race, and the people with pro-natalist beliefs continue the human existence and more often pass down those beliefs. So regardless of who thinks they're right, evolution wins in the end.
Not necessarily. Parents aren't the only source of beliefs: as an extreme example indoctrination in forced boarding schools for young children can nearly totally eliminate parental influence.
So if anti-natalists want to beat evolution, they've got a window right now to crank up the indoctrination to keep humanity on a glide path towards extinction. IMHO, procreation has historically driven by a desire for sex, but technology has decoupled those. It'll take some time for explicitly pro-natal psychology to get equivalently powerful.
Which is a tactic for manipulating people to change their beliefs that I see often: don't argue for your position directly, but focus on more distant propositions that your target isn't as guarded about.
This doesn’t hold up. It is effectively denying that people will be born in the future, which of course they will be since antinatalism is not universal and fertility rates are above zero. There are valuable things that can be done today that will help those people but not anyone alive today (e.g. preservation of media that is well-known and widely distributed today but may not be in the future when it is more historically valuable).
It is safe to assume that new people will be born at some point in the future (given current conditions) and will then be “identifiable”, so you have to account for their future existences when making moral decisions with future consequences.
I only try to enhance the argument that there is no moral duty to create them.
Moral value is for those who exist, and given that we know more will come to exist, even though their creation itself is (in my view) morally negative, it does not conflict with acknowledging that they will, and to make the world as good as possible for them.
No, it merely denies that people that do not exist can have moral duties owed to them.
From the paper:
> moral authorisation has to come before the imposition.
What's the expression... tell me you're a Millennial without telling me you're a Millennial...?
The anti-natalist movement and it's reactionary natalist counterpart are perfect case studies in how people's beliefs are shaped by their cultural environment.
Given all that, it's expected that a large number of people--in particular, those of the same or adjacent generations--would share these beliefs and even analysis; and an even larger number sharing similar framing, even if coming to opposite conclusions.
It's disquieting when you come to the realization that so many of one's beliefs are, in a sense, predetermined, or at least channeled by a cultural experience shared with millions of other people. This of course applies to myself no less than any other. I long ago stopped considering any of my thoughts rare, let alone original. I read half of the literary output of people from my generation and think, "gee, I was saying that 20 years ago"; and the other half, "gee, I was arguing the opposite 20 years ago". Well, of course I was, and so were they.
That's not to say there aren't novel exceptional moments, cases, and people. Just very few and far between. And the whole natalism debate is definitely not the exception.
Anyway, here's Schopenhauer channelling his American millennial in 1850s Europe: "If children were brought into the world by an act of pure reason alone, would the human race continue to exist? Would not a man rather have so much sympathy with the coming generation as to spare it the burden of existence?"
The wikipedia article from where I snagged that quote has a few more examples that go back to like, ancient Greece. Check it out!
That pontification just feels pulled out of thin air.
Suppose I just need S to take over the family fortune? Also pulled out of thin air.
The guilt of this selfishness, however, is not entirely weightless either.
My child being created is, 50% my doing, I created them into a world I cannot control, without their consent. Every pain they will experience, will rest on my shoulders, until I die, and even from beyond my death, it will be due to me.
I will do everything in my power to prepare them to achieve a good life, this does not mean shielding them from pain, because experiencing pain is part of life, and learning how to deal with it appropriately, increases the quality of life they can have. This is the worst from both worlds, it is the parent who feels all their pain, and it is the parent that recognizes that it is part of becoming a full human.
My parents were very loving and caring, they wanted to have me, they wanted a child, and they gave me life. I am not grateful for them giving me life, in fact, that they did that is something I do not appreciate. But I am grateful for the love and care they showed me, and I love them very much, despite them creating me.
If you feel there are contradictions here, think harder.
"Evolution wins in the end", well, in the end I guess entropy wins.. But, you attribute a goal to evolution, but evolution, as a concept, really boils down to "the laws of physics also apply to life", it's not like we know it to be trying to do something in particular.. the life that continues is the life that continues, it's not that life really finds a way, it's just that there's enough variance that some of it will likely survive a change, not that every species does that.. but I don't really think that matters to whether knowingly creating life is moral or not.. it's not like nature or life is inherently moral.. it'd probably be a stretch, but one could say that, at least when perfectly executed, the least moral are most likely to succeed.
Not necessarily. Parents aren't the only source of beliefs: as an extreme example indoctrination in forced boarding schools for young children can nearly totally eliminate parental influence.
So if anti-natalists want to beat evolution, they've got a window right now to crank up the indoctrination to keep humanity on a glide path towards extinction. IMHO, procreation has historically driven by a desire for sex, but technology has decoupled those. It'll take some time for explicitly pro-natal psychology to get equivalently powerful.