Submitted by BernardJOrtcutt t3_1118wno in philosophy
Maximus_En_Minimus t1_j92zzfs wrote
Reply to comment by Qawali in /r/philosophy Open Discussion Thread | February 13, 2023 by BernardJOrtcutt
-
Life is suffering and life has suffering are not mutually exclusive, however the latter is a predicate of the former. I think you are confusing anti-natalism with Pessimism, which is not a predicate of its believing. Only because many anti-natalists are also pessimist, and derive their natalist views from their pessimism, does not mean it is necessary to be one. Is also doesn’t exactly follow that if one is a pessimist, one thus has to be an anti-natalist. Nietzsche was originally a pessimist, due to Schopenhauer, and - in his later writings - still held heavily to a metaphysics of strife (in the periphery of suffering), yet I don’t believe he was anti-natalist.
-
I discuss a Metaphysics of Suffering, of which Schopenhauer held, at the end of the Well-being Argument, of which it is a substratum off. Itis important to note that Schopenhauer was not the ‘OG’ anti-natalist, as the position goes all the way back to early christianity, buddhism, and ascetic anti-demiurgicalists (often referred to non-academically as ‘Gnostics’).
-
I don’t agree with the phrasing of the question, it is skewed to disfavour anti-natalists. Anti-natalism is about whether or not you should bring someone into existence. Not whether it is worth living once you are within it. If I was to re-write it:
‘Is it selfish to believe one does not have the right and should not bring new people into existence, because it has suffering within it; further, to persuade others to also do the same and, if sufficiently successful, lead humanities extinction within a generation?’
Then: No.
You ask: ‘who am I to even decide if life is worth living?’ - well, there is no life beyond your own, whence you perish, so you are literally the one to decide if your life is worth living or not.
As for the non-existent, I would ask: who are you to bring them into the world? - especially if you don’t know if it is worthwhile?
Viewing a single comment thread. View all comments