/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.22962709]

If human life is on balance so awful, then the antinatalists would seem to be doing us all a favor by literally putting us out of our misery.

[Anonymous No.22962718]

>>22962709
Antinatalism is a cope. For incels, or people whose woman is unwilling to bear their children. Once you have a knowledge and capacity for suicide, you exist by your own consent, there is no need to bother everyone else with your messianic rantings.

[Anonymous No.22963045]

for the umpteenth time, antinatalism does not assert that life is bad. It asserts that pain is bad, and that the badness of pain outweighs the goodness of pleasure.

to procreate is to tip the balance toward badness.

Thus we are morally obligated not to do it. To leave nonexistent beings in peace and enjoy our existent lives until we die.

[Anonymous No.22963052]

>>22963045
>nonexistent beings
No such thing

[Anonymous No.22963064]

>>22962709
life is much more complex than that

[Anonymous No.22963080]

>>22963045
To not procreate increases pain for those who are still alive, since there are less people to help them.

[Anonymous No.22963195]

>>22962709
Reminder that anti-natalists are likely to be mentally ill and have a personality disorder.

[Anonymous No.22963201]

>>22963195
This doesn't mean that anti-natalist arguments can be dismissed solely due to this fact; it does however add context to why autists make these threads and are completely unable to understand why they are wrong. It also has direct implications regarding Benatar's quality of life argument (i.e. anti-natalists are stuck in a rigid ideological system as a cope for to sustain their defective worldview)

[Anonymous No.22963208]

>>22963195
Anti-natalists are at a complete poverty when it comes to weighing quality of life. Their defective nature simply precludes them from accepting any rationalization outside of their own self-indoctrination. They don't necessarily mean to be disingenuous because such is simply written into their nature.

[Anonymous No.22963212]

>>22963195
Benatar is a mentally unstable weasel. No wonder he mostly avoids interviews:
>they go for a walk in the park
>interviewer forwards the idea that life can be improved
>Benatar raises his voice and starts sperging that life never improves (objectively false by the way)
>Benatar literally starts crying and basically says "life is unacceptable"
>interviewer is taken aback by his outburst and at a loss for words (Benatar is inconsolable)
Benatar is pretty unstable. On top of that he admits that his ideas are damaging while using the excuse that his work is academic and only meant for those that seek it out (note that these people are likely to have personality disorders and mental illness). Benatar objectively creates suffering and given that he's under the delusion that his work is toward the opposite: he's delusional and irrational.

[Anonymous No.22963213]

>>22963201
if anti natalists were dark triad they wouldn't be incels kek

[Anonymous No.22963273]

Anti-natalism isn't complicated. There are basically two core arguments you have to contend with: the asymmetry argument and the quality of life argument. The asymmetry argument is flawed methodologically (it can't be proven; even Benatar admits it's only "vaguely true") and the quality of life argument is subjective (and when you take into account the proclivity anti-natalists have toward mental illness and personality disorder the fact their conclusions are rooted in a negativity bias becomes obvious).

The real problem is that anti-natalism is so simplistic at its core that it's easy to become ideologically possessed by it. One can give well-thought out reasons to reject the asymmetry argument and anti-natalists will just retreat to asserting its basic form which is tautological. You can explain the subjectivity of the quality of life argument but anti-natalists with just do one of two things: they'll insist that it's objective without responding to detailed arguments as to why it's subjective and/or minimize its importance in regard to their position as a whole (note that for the latter you can also make a good faith argument as to why it's central to accepting their conclusion and they will just insist it is not without directly addressing what you say).

That's the problem with these threads. When you have a discussion with an anti-natalist you're speaking to someone who has self-indoctrinated into an ideology they believe cannot be disproven. They can't understand when their core principle is being criticized so they will deflect by asserting a tautology while attempting to monopolize how outcomes related to it must be interpreted. Even after you point out this behaviour to them they won't address it because ideologues are incapable of arguing in good faith. They get BTFO every single time they make one of these stupid threads but will always come back again and fall into the same insufferable pattern.

[Anonymous No.22963312]

>>22962709
>If human life is on balance so awful
I don't feel that way.

[Anonymous No.22963391]

>>22963045
Anyone who takes the theory of antinatalism seriously enough to act on it, I think, would have to be among the most inhuman monsters conceivable

[Anonymous No.22963406]

>>22963391
This is true but when it's pointed out their beliefs cohere with amoral practices they just fall back to their version of the "not real x" fallacy.

[Anonymous No.22964193]

it’s just hedonism taken to its logical conclusion, maybe on steroids
antinatalists often value the absence of pain or the presence of pleasure more than they value the presence of life in the first place; they often just see conscious existence as a means to an end but not as an end in itself
harm mitigation is an anti-consciousness, anti-life concept

[Anonymous No.22964198]

>>22962709
Just don't have kids, that's all there is to it.

[Anonymous No.22964204]

There are preachers of death: and the earth is full of those to whom desistance from life must be preached.

Full is the earth of the superfluous; marred is life by the many-too-many. May they be decoyed out of this life by the “life eternal”!

“The yellow ones”: so are called the preachers of death, or “the black ones.” But I will show them unto you in other colours besides.

There are the terrible ones who carry about in themselves the beast of prey, and have no choice except lusts or self-laceration. And even their lusts are self-laceration.

They have not yet become men, those terrible ones: may they preach desistance from life, and pass away themselves!

There are the spiritually consumptive ones: hardly are they born when they begin to die, and long for doctrines of lassitude and renunciation.

They would fain be dead, and we should approve of their wish! Let us beware of awakening those dead ones, and of damaging those living coffins!

They meet an invalid, or an old man, or a corpse—and immediately they say: “Life is refuted!”

But they only are refuted, and their eye, which seeth only one aspect of existence.

Shrouded in thick melancholy, and eager for the little casualties that bring death: thus do they wait, and clench their teeth.

Or else, they grasp at sweetmeats, and mock at their childishness thereby: they cling to their straw of life, and mock at their still clinging to it.

Their wisdom speaketh thus: “A fool, he who remaineth alive; but so far are we fools! And that is the foolishest thing in life!”

“Life is only suffering”: so say others, and lie not. Then see to it that ye cease! See to it that the life ceaseth which is only suffering!

And let this be the teaching of your virtue: “Thou shalt slay thyself! Thou shalt steal away from thyself!”—

“Lust is sin,”—so say some who preach death—“let us go apart and beget no children!”

“Giving birth is troublesome,”—say others—“why still give birth? One beareth only the unfortunate!” And they also are preachers of death.

“Pity is necessary,”—so saith a third party. “Take what I have! Take what I am! So much less doth life bind me!”

Were they consistently pitiful, then would they make their neighbours sick of life. To be wicked—that would be their true goodness.

[Anonymous No.22964211]

But they want to be rid of life; what care they if they bind others still faster with their chains and gifts!—

And ye also, to whom life is rough labour and disquiet, are ye not very tired of life? Are ye not very ripe for the sermon of death?

All ye to whom rough labour is dear, and the rapid, new, and strange—ye put up with yourselves badly; your diligence is flight, and the will to self-forgetfulness.

If ye believed more in life, then would ye devote yourselves less to the momentary. But for waiting, ye have not enough of capacity in you—nor even for idling!

Everywhere resoundeth the voices of those who preach death; and the earth is full of those to whom death hath to be preached.

Or “life eternal”; it is all the same to me—if only they pass away quickly!—

Thus spake Zarathustra.

[Anonymous No.22964219]

>>22962709
I disagree on the imbalance between lack of pleasure and lack of pain, I hold both to be equally morally neutral. What really needs to be done is to engage in a radical plan of creating as much pleasure as possible to make up for billions of years of suffering outweighing pleasure in nature, it's this rather than nonexistence that should be strived for. I propose that we use self-replicating machines to turn as much of the universe's matter as possible into minds experiencing constant pleasure so as to outweigh the net negative pleasure that life has so far racked up. This rather than self-annihilation should be our goal.

[Anonymous No.22964240]

Antinatalists are missing out on the greatest joy life has to offer.

[Anonymous No.22964250]

>>22964219
How about pleasure and self annihilation at the same time? Maybe effective altruists should strive to make everyone on earth overdose on some drug that causes euphoria. Two birds with one stone.

[Anonymous No.22965800]

>>22962709
>absence of pain is good
There are infinitely many beings that don't exist and only a finite number who do. Theirfore the goodness of the universe is always infinite no matter how many children I have. Theirfore antinatilism is false

[Anonymous No.22965813]

>>22964204
>>22964211
not an argument

[Anonymous No.22966225]

Ironically antinatalism causes more pain (mental anguish, annoyance), therefore antinatalism is evil according to itself, thus you're morally obligated to not speak about antinatalism.

[Anonymous No.22966238]

>>22962709
how do we know if absence of pain doesn't exist?

[Anonymous No.22966603]

>>22963391
I've never heard of a murderous antinatalist, except maybe a school shooter. But i heard about of millions of ruthless murderers who were natalists. Does that tell you anything?

[Anonymous No.22966612]

>>22963045
>in peace
you don't know that supposed non-existence is better than existence

[Anonymous No.22966615]

>>22966603
>literally billions of natalists vs a handful of anti-natalists
>this is somehow a valid comparison

[Anonymous No.22966625]

>>22966612
Even if it were not, in practice antinatalism would cause less pain by default.

[Anonymous No.22966629]

>>22966625
speculation

[Anonymous No.22966634]

>>22964250
>Two birds with one stone.
Didn't read your post, but I've always hated this vulgar and cruel idiom. Saying "feeding two birds with one seed" or "two birds with one seed" is much better.
Since I am misanthrope, I also like "skewering two human heads with one spear". "Two human heads, one spear" is based. Your head can be included for your mortal sin in using such a shitty idiom.

[Anonymous No.22966640]

>>22966634
go to therapy retard

[Anonymous No.22966680]

>>22966603
>I've never heard of a murderous antinatalist
Sandy Hook shooter was an antinatalist and one of the few who actually acted on it

[Anonymous No.22966800]

>>22963391
>not knocking a woman up makes you a monster
satisfy your breeding kink on /d/ and stop shitting up this board

[Anonymous No.22966811]

>>22962718
>you can't complain that human existence is shit if you haven't killed yourself

[Anonymous No.22966843]

>>22966640
I have a friend who went to "therapy" and he came out as a tranny after they pushed experimental hormonal treatment on him. Therapy doesn't help.
I am mentally stable and doing all right.

[Anonymous No.22966848]

>>22964240
>Joy is... LE GOOD

[Anonymous No.22966863]

>>22966843
what did he go to therapy for?
>mentally stable
misanthropy is mental illness

[Anonymous No.22966886]

>>22966612
I do know because I used to not exist

[Anonymous No.22966892]

>>22966634
you sound like me in high school

[Anonymous No.22966896]

>>22966886
>he remembers the life before
sure you do

[Anonymous No.22967035]

>>22966843
>I have a friend who went to "therapy" and he came out as a tranny after they pushed experimental hormonal treatment on him.
Why would you go on the internet just to tell lies to strangers?

[Anonymous No.22967047]

>>22963391
abortion is already accepted by a majority of the first world, we've secretly admitted that life itself has no inherent value

[Anonymous No.22967056]

>>22966863
It's the opposite. Hating everyone is justified, most if not all living beings are scum.

[Anonymous No.22968034]

>>22962709
Benatar's papers are on philpapers and there is one response from a woman ethicist who was seething in her response paper saying that she takes great offense as a mother to the idea that it was morally wrong for her to have children. Benatar, of course, BTFOs all the papers criticizing his ideas including hers.

Verification not required.

[Anonymous No.22968060]

>>22963045
>still won’t stand by their beliefs by killings themselves
Lmaooo frauds

[Anonymous No.22968357]

Posting a letter I just wrote to David Benatar proposing an alternative to his system of antinatalism based on a different set of fundamental utilitarian principles:

Hello Dr. Benatar,

I'm writing because I want to propose what I see as an alternative to your project of human nonprocreation based on what I see as a more accurate utilitarian system regarding pleasure, suffering, and any imbalance between them.

First, I would like to contest the imbalance you propose between between the absence of pain and the absence of pleasure. You state as a brute fact that absence of pain is good, yet absence of pleasure is neutral. Since these are stated as axioms that the rest of your system is derived from, I would like to question them, and provide similar but subtly different axioms that I believe produce a completely different system when elaborated from. When we consider what we are to take as brute facts, I think we have to be like Descartes and rely on introspection to see the unquestionable absolutes that the rest of our system are built upon. While in epistemology it might be "cogito ergo sum," the introspective truths that we have to rely on are that by experience of pleasure, we can subjectively and immediately feel that pleasure is a good unto itself, and that by experience of pain, pain is an evil unto itself. When we take these as the foundations, we realize that absence of either is not a good unto itself as your system claims, but rather is morally neutral. If pleasure is an inherent good, then absence of pleasure is an ethical zero point, and if pain is an inherent evil, then absence of pain is also an ethical zero point. So, when we take these axioms derived from direct introspection, we can see that the imbalance principle you propose disappears, and what becomes good is the maximal level of net pleasure, that is to say pleasure minus pain. This means that while your system would consider a state of 0 utils better than a state of 6 utils and 4 disutils, my system would find the state of 6 utils and 4 disutils preferable to the state of 0 utils, because there is a net positive of 2 utils. This is the main difference between our systems, and I believe that mine is better founded because it relies purely on the direct experience of pleasure as good and pain as evil as its only brute facts, as opposed to making claims about the absence of pleasure and the absence of pain as neutral and good based on what seems to me to be a deontological, rather than purely utilitarian reasoning.

[Anonymous No.22968362]

>>22968357
However, there is another imbalance you talk about, and that is the much greater level of pain than pleasure within the course of natural life. This I completely agree with you on, however, based on our different axioms regarding the first type of imbalance, I draw a radically different conclusion. As Schopenhauer said, we only have to consider the pleasure of an animal getting a meal versus the pain of an animal being eaten to conclude that nature produces a net suffering total of utility/disutility. This means that as long as life exists anywhere in the universe, there is almost certainly an ever growing net negative of pleasure being produced every second, for billions of years straight. This is why voluntary nonprocreation of humanity would be only a drop in the bucket, as the net suffering of nature would continue unabated even with total human voluntary nonprocreation. Even if we were to make all life go extinct, there would still be all of the previous net suffering which would have added up, as well as the continued net suffering of life anywhere else it may exist in the universe. However, there is hope. Under my system where net pleasure minus pain is all that matters, if an even greater quantity of pleasure would be produced, it would justify all the suffering that had occurred up until its production by outweighing it and making the suffering of evolution necessary to its coming about worthwhile.

I propose that what we should do to outweigh the massive net suffering of life in the universe is to create a system of self-replicating machines that spread throughout the universe and convert as much of its matter into minds experiencing constant pleasure as possible. These minds would be engineered so that they never tire of the pleasure as humans do, and each moment is as full of joy as those rare moments you may have felt where you have thought "I wish that this moment could last forever." Instead of voluntary extinction, which would leave unjustified net suffering on the table, this would render all the previous suffering as a necessary evil to eventually produce something that could by its sheer magnitude dwarf even billions of years of evolutionary suffering by its scale of engineered bliss. I know this might sound like sci-fi, but I believe it is a serious philosophical proposal, and is what humanity (and any superintelligences created by humanity) should work towards as a way to make our suffering up until this point worthwhile. I propose that we advocate and seek to bring about this great utilitarian redemption, something the system of antinatalism could never accomplish in its passive reaction to the problem of net suffering.

[Anonymous No.22968371]

>>22968362
I hope you find this idea interesting and convincing, it's something that I have thought about for a long time. Despite its seeming single-mindedness, I honestly think that using some highly advanced technological system to produce trillions of minds experiencing pleasure is the great utilitarian idea that has been left on the table when it comes to proposals to maximize net utility, and I hope that serious philosophers can start picking up and discussing this idea as a long-term trajectory for human technological progress. Rather than voluntarily withering away, I think that this is instead something heroic we can do to make the billions of years of suffering that brought us about not be in vain. I know that my own life has had a net total of suffering, so this idea takes on a rather personal importance to me, as if I could play some part in making this system come about, I feel it would make my own sufferings justified. I really just hope that you can take this idea seriously, even if just to argue against or refute it, instead of dismissing it out of hand. I would be deeply interested to hear what your thoughts are on this alternative utilitarian system in relation to your own, and if you find it at all convincing.

Yours truly,

Anon Anonson

[Anonymous No.22968504]

>>22966811
Yes

[Anonymous No.22968547]

>>22963052
So where is democracy? I was told to have faith in it... is that why? Because it doesn't exist? Fuck

[Anonymous No.22968610]

>>22962709
Ask yourself why all billionaires such as Bezos and Musk are pro-natalist, its because they want more wage-slaves

[Anonymous No.22968687]

>>22968034
>Benatar, of course, BTFOs all the papers criticizing his ideas
Benatar got throttled by Jordan Peterson.

[Anonymous No.22968708]

>>22968687
My genuine condolences if you actually believe that.

[Anonymous No.22969027]

>>22968371
Good letter and I hope you actually send it.
Are you the hamster guy?

[Anonymous No.22969040]

>>22969027
I already sent it, waiting on a response. And no, I don't know who the "hamster guy" is you're talking about.

[Anonymous No.22969069]

>>22968610
i know it's just bait but i can't believe boomers were actually this retarded.

[Anonymous No.22969134]

>>22968708
It's 100% true. Benatar became confused and started accusing Peterson of jumping around. Peterson suggested he guide the conversation more to his liking to which Benatar repeated his complaint. Peterson asked him to give an example of what he was accusing and Benatar said "uh, when you go back and listen to this..." Peterson said "no, give an example" and Benatar couldn't.

Basically, Peterson rejected Benatar's hypothesis and gave valid criticism of it. Benatar is an ideologue and became agitated and confused. The only way you don't see this is if you want to agree with Benatar and make excuses for him.

[Anonymous No.22969177]

>>22969040
Good. Let us know if/when you hear back.
there's this autist on youtube who builds underwater habitats for his hamsters. He talks a lot about self replicating machines and benevolent god AI. Your writing style reminded me of him.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rhd2WkQf4mQ

[Anonymous No.22969290]

>>22968357
I feel that Benstar's proposition is actually like Schopenhauer's: Pain>>>>>>> Pleasure
And he hides it in a very subtle way, because otherwise he would not be able to reach the masses.

[Anonymous No.22969318]

>>22968357
>>22968371
It seems you haven't even read Benatar. He mocks utilitarians. He also says that sacrificing our lives for the future is indecent.

[Anonymous No.22969321]

>>22969318
He also says that sacrificing our lives for future lives is indecent.

[Anonymous No.22969370]

>>22969290
Schopenhauers argument doesnt make sense on its own, since one can know pleasure without having previously suffered, like when engaging in pleasant activities for instance, youre not experiencing pleasure here by relieving a lack, but rather because you enjoy the thing in itself.

There is however another way of looking at this, which is not that pleasure has no subjective value and pain has, but rather that both pleasure and pain have no objective value, thus the absence of either is no worse than the presence of either in an objective sense.

This is where the real problem lies, not in pain being infinitely more valuable than pleasure, but rather in neither having any value at all, making the subjective experience in an objective sense useless.

I genuinely hope that I can find some way to address this, whether it be God or anything really, because I dont hate life, or think that its suffering in any way, because really in a subjective sense it isnt, its just the uselessness of it in an objective sense that is the problem.

[Anonymous No.22969393]

Some people shouldn’t have kids. That’s my flavour of anti natalism. Are you poor, irresponsible and likely a genetic defection physically or mentally? In my book it would be extremely immoral to reproduce in such scenario. Context always matters. To say that life is encompassing evil or unwanted is a bit extreme. I enjoy life most of the time and prefer not to die yet, but I know myself well enough to know that having kids is not something that I would be good at. So I make the conscious choice and look at the alternative lifestyle as an opportunity of living a different life than most people with emphasis on freedom and flexibility. Lots of parent seem deeply miserable honestly. They are in that web forever with no escape. The thought is claustrophobia inducing for me

[Anonymous No.22969463]

>>22969393
>DO YOU 'AV A LOISENSE FO' THAT PREGNINCEE?

[Anonymous No.22969526]

>>22969463
Yeah, that would be nice as people who shouldnt be having kids usually dont have the self awareness to regulate themselves

[Anonymous No.22969571]

>>22969526
This retard thinks governments licensing the use of genitals is a good idea! Fucking lol

[Anonymous No.22969573]

>>22962709
How do you know 3) and 4) in your diagram? No one knows what non-existence is like. It is completely unknown.

[Anonymous No.22969607]

>>22969571
Governments needs a horde of low-intelligence workers, so of course they wont stop retards from breeding. Dumbass

[Anonymous No.22969715]

>>22969607
>DURRRRRR
Who do you think would restrict access to breeding you absolute retard. Fuck you're stupid. I hope you're underage.

[Anonymous No.22969926]

>>22963195
sooooo aninanatalists are hot for women and get a lot of pussy?

[Anonymous No.22969930]

>>22969926
Sorry, dark triad only works when you have other things going for you (and depression isn't one of them).

[Anonymous No.22971165]

>>22969318
>It seems you haven't even read Benatar. He mocks utilitarians.
Isn't his system essentially based on negative utilitarianism, though? While it focuses on minimizing pain rather than maximizing pleasure, it still is ultimately a form of utilitarianism.

[Anonymous No.22971841]

>>22971165
It could be, but on a theoretical level what Benatar wants is the extermination of all sentient life and admits that on a practical level, antinatalism can only work on a small scale, that is, like negative utilitarianism. A curious thing is that he does not consider a violent revolt to subject everyone to extermination because he believes that it would never work.

[Anonymous No.22971871]

>>22962709
>be born
>teeth fucked by goyslop modern processed diet
>have to endure actual torture while also paying tens of thousands of dollars for dental procedures to fix what society broke because no one gives enough of a shit about you to prevent it and spare you the agony, anxiety, trauma, stress, and expenses

teeth are why i don't think god exists