Oh, I was dead fucking serious, though. Please remain on-topic, Mr. Moderator.
You either agree or you disagree with that statement, but only one of them is the reality.
only one of them is the reality
That's what philosophy is. It's a description of reality. You can either have an accurate description of reality, or an inaccurate description of reality. That's what it's all about. If it's too much thinking for you, then please, I could wholly do without your responses.And I'm not faulting you, necessarily--this is heavy shit, and I understand that. But I mean, to say that you can't take me seriously? Well, go away, then! Bye bye!
I kind of have the same view, but not nearly as extreme as you do. Most of the time I even think about this sort of stuff is when I see the images of Africans with those shrunken, skeletal bodies (you know the ones I'm talking about) and then you see the kids with ribs showing and skin stretched across their bones.And I think to myself: "Why the fuck would you want to add an extra burden on you and the environment by having a kid in this god-forsaken place?"And also people living in trailer parks and ghetto areas. They should probably think about themselves before bringing a kid into the world.
I mean people who think their outlook on life is more correct than others, have no right to go around telling people that their opinions are wrong, but whatever floats your boat, you live life as you feel like it.
How would you go about enforcing anti-natalism? Would you even enforce it? Is it a passive moral stance or an active one? If you enforce it, would it not be an act of aggression to restrict a mother from bearing a child?
Well, first and foremost I feel the need to point out that we're not overpopulated by any stretch of the imagination.
Secondly, it seems that if you ground your argument in a lack of consent then you always and everywhere have to oppose coercion of any sort.
Thirdly, why the assumption that suffering is axiomatically bad?
Well, you're not supposed to question axioms
Suffering is bad because suffering isn't good. I mean... I don't really know how else to say it. I'd have to ask you, do you not consider suffering to be axiomatically bad? Would you not personally rather live in a world with no suffering? If not, why?
Quote from: Meta Cognition on December 30, 2014, 06:16:23 PMWell, first and foremost I feel the need to point out that we're not overpopulated by any stretch of the imagination. With the way our resources are distributed on Earth, certain areas would likely be considered it.
Quote from: Fagcicle on December 30, 2014, 06:31:37 PMQuote from: Meta Cognition on December 30, 2014, 06:16:23 PMWell, first and foremost I feel the need to point out that we're not overpopulated by any stretch of the imagination. With the way our resources are distributed on Earth, certain areas would likely be considered it.Poor access to resource is not a demographics issue.
Overpopulation is a function of the number of individuals compared to the relevant resources, such as the water and essential nutrients they need to survive.
If you have two groups, Group A with 5,000,000 people and adequate amounts of fresh water, food, etc., and Group B with 5,000,000 people living without the necessary amount of those resources - Group B is going to be considered overpopulated, as there is not enough of a resource to sustain the population.
In saying that, I recognised (and I'm sure you did too) long ago that you and I are coming from two fundamentally different perspectives. I mean, you don't get much further apart than the philosophy's of Schopenhauer and Nietzsche. None of my arguments about the value of suffering will carry any weight, because you don't believe it needs to operate in a position of utility or disutility at all - it could just not exist, given a lack of sentient beings. I, on the other hand, embrace ideas like the Apollonian and Dionysian dichotomy, amor fati and the Will to Power. You see me as pointless, and I see you as Pyrrhonism--the ultimate scepticism.
I've always thought the consent argument was really silly, and Benatar's basic definitions of what is good and bad is flimsy and circular. Absence of bad is good regardless of whether an object of the good exist, but absence of good is bad only if there is an object for that badness, but there's no quantifiable way to measure these, and it's profoundly evident that the perceived goodness of existence is greater than the badness in the fact that only .1% of the population chooses to opt out of life via suicide.
Benatar's argument against suicide is equally flimsy. If the cumulative badness of existence outweighs the good, then there's no way you can argue that the bad of continuing existence doesn't outweigh the good, too.
QuoteBenatar's argument against suicide is equally flimsy. If the cumulative badness of existence outweighs the good, then there's no way you can argue that the bad of continuing existence doesn't outweigh the good, too.Umm... Explain.
Also, Verbatim, if you think it's preferable to just not act without some sort of prior consent as to avoid the possibility of coercion altogether, would you neglect to save an unconscious person on the street or otherwise scorn those who do?
Benatar says reproduction is bad because Suffering > Goodness, but that suicide isn't recommended because the goodness may be worth continuing living. This doesn't make sense; either it may be possible for the goodness of life to outweigh the suffering and make life worth living, or live is just so full of suffering that it can't possibly worth living and therefore procreation is evil. If anything, Benetar's arguments only support the acceptance of suicide in society as a way to end suffering in a simple, painless, maybe even enjoyable way (like in Soylent Green, for example.
I'm going to clear up some misconceptions about the philosophy on the next page. Doesn't really belong in the OP, but I don't want it to be at the bottom of page 1, either...
(☠) Anti-natalism
