Please note: Professor Benatar requested that we film a brief followup conversation to clarify some points, which can be found here: th-cam.com/video/YGL2r8PNb8c/w-d-xo.html What a great way to resume the Cosmic Skeptic Podcast! I have some episodes lined up to record and to release, let me know if you have any suggestions for guests.
Thanks Alex, looking forward to the conversation! I would really like to see David Pearce on your podcast. Look up his stuff about wild animal suffering. Cheers
Markus Gabriel is very popular in europe. Also (as has been suggested) David Pearce would make a great guest to introduce topics related to transhumanism and the philosophy of technology.
I love how Alex isn't afraid to challenge those who he interviews, even when he ultimately agrees with them, this makes them think on the spot, which is sth you don't see very often in this kind of respectful encounters.
unfortunately just like with Singer, they're not as quickl/smart as he is, luckyly this time the guest came back to clarify after having had more time to understand Alex's points! :)
To all the people asking why David Benatar does not reveal his face- just imagine the amount of scrutiny regarding his persona and remember that there are religious wackos out there sending threats . It is totally understandable imho.
Not just religious wackos. To take such a stance is a huge affront to women. The entire premise of most womens existence is having children. I've had this discussion with both men and women and women become very severe and reactionary.
Alex, if you see this, you are an inspiration to all of us out there. Many of us who studied philosophy have nowhere near the level of understanding, frame of reference or general intellect and comprehension to speak on these subjects with a moderate degree of confidence. You're an undergrad(I believe) pursuing a double major and, are able to challenge a Head of a Philosophy department on his arguments in a meaningful way. Not just some trivial quib about their point or stance. You can genuinely from a philosophical and intellectual perspective make great points and its inspiring to watch. That being said no one is an absolute authority and just because it comes out of your mouth doesnt make it true or correct. I must admit im partial and tend to find your arguments mostly convincing. You are a precocious young man and a joy to learn from.
I am of different dispostion, so I will ask should it be the confidence, intellect and comprehension to make him inspirational how are you to know you are to believe him by his arguments and not by his charisma?
@@voxsvoxs4261 because although he is charismatic, in philosophy we judge peoples arguments on their arguments and not how charming they are. I judge his arguments on their own merit. He is inspirational because he is so young and passionate about philosophy with a great understanding.
@@wifi2166 isn't the difference that in one case there's suffering for your own pleasure and in the other case there's caring for and loving another for pleasure?
@@JamieTwells ye, I did respond but looks like it got deleted? I basically said that just because you love and care for something, it doesn't make it ok.
@Abu Amanah Of the 3000 religions available, how many have you looked into? Seems intellectually dishonest for you to just select from the ones in your local environment.
@Abu Amanah I use the word Cosmos here, or simply Being. Some thing has always existed, and we are a part of it. When we die, it takes away our atoms to construct other shapes and organisms. There is no division between everything that we are and everything that IT is. Even now, you are a piece of the Cosmos...
@Abu Amanah I think that morality is objective. Life floods the physical and psychological 'spaces' of existence with variation (genes and memes) and 'discovers' the Truths to be found there.
@Abu Amanah The most real of all things is the structure that the genes and the memes survive. The things that are really True, all the time, are not context dependent.
@Abu Amanah Things are morally right or wrong whether you know them or not. The Truth is there nonetheless. You and I are an imperfect attempt at that truth. But it is there, always. Always true. We are variants of that discovery.
@Mary Whiterabbit If all your other experiences have been bad or neutral, how is it possible for you to think that being born was the best thing that happened to you, or are you being ironic?
I got my tubes removed because I’m not sure if I even want children, but if I do, I want adopt. I don’t honestly see any reason to bring another kid into this world, when there are so many that need love.
But aren’t you assuming implicitly that you have it within your power as a parent to reduce the suffering of the child you’ve adopted with the love you give that child? If you don’t have it within your power to reduce that child’s suffering then what’s the point in adopting the child, if not for your own selfish interest to have a child. In which case, how’s that different from bringing your own child into the world and then giving the child the love you believe will reduce their suffering overall?
@@pascal8306 why wouldnt they have the power to reduce a childs suffering? If that child doesnt get adopted, itll fare much worse (for the most part). Youre kidding me if you dont see the difference between adopting a child and bringing a new life in.
@@userblame632 no I’m saying if they do have the power to reduce the adopted child’s suffering which I think they do, then why assume you wouldn’t have the power to do the same for a child of your own you brought into the world? Because the argument is that bringing a child into the world condemns them to suffering, and it’s implied aswell that that suffering is unredeemable, which makes it immoral to have children. But it’s clearly not unredeemable suffering if you’re capable of reducing the suffering of an adopted child.
I like your face to face conversations because you get so much from body language. I also think that having travelled out to you vs just sitting at a computer your interlocutor might be more invested. But if I had to pick between your content existing in this format or never having existed I'm glad your content exists.
One of the best interviews I've heard in a long time. Your questions were excellent, and really helped to clarify the more subtle points of the argument.
I’m not having kids, not just because I find them very annoying but also because I can’t stand for someone else to experience mental illness, that’s runs in my genes. I’m also likely to be a bad parent, through the ways I’ve been brought up. My kids would have my genes. I wish that I was never born and I don’t want anyone else to go through that torment.
I do hope that you cover some more of the antinatalist arguments - consent, risk, etc. - in the future. I would like to hear your overall thoughts and analysis of these arguments.
Kill another human if you must. Just don't kill an animal to eat and admit that around here. You would be canceled quicker than you could say: "thin and pale"
@@michaelmagdy6647 Yea, you could classify this particular comment as a troll, that's fair. However the rating you gave it is obviously skewed heavily by your bias. It's a 6 at the very minimum.
@@kenhiett5266 Not really, you just think so high of yourself. Thin and pale is just a lame stereotype carnists like yourself like to describe vegans. You can obviously find thin and pale vegans and carnists alike. Obviously too there are more obese carnists than vegans and more thin vegans than carnists but whether one eats less or more than 2000 calories per day and whether they eat enough iron doesn't have anything to do with their moral position on killing animals and eating their carcasses. You're misinformed at best and dishonest at worst so 2/10 is pretty generous for your weak troll.
These are tough ethical questions, and they really have to be addressed. Thank you. It's one thing to vehemently disagree with Benatar, it's another to completely dismiss his arguments as ludicrous or "obviously wrong" based on reflexive moral intuition
Any actual present moral intuition would never disagree with Benatar. Everyone initially considers themselves moral, self awareness will always suggest your own desires don't get to warp reality. Actual morality is always larger than yourself.
@@pritamlaskar Yes I know but what makes one acceptable and the other not? If you say because justifying killing is ludicrous or obviously immoral, you just beg the question against the anti-humanism guy.
I was born into a family that was miserable, abusive, and constantly anxious. I was not a happy child. In the end, I transformed my experience into something meaningful and fulfilling through years of psychotherapy, leading to me studying psychology and working with abuse survivors. I can totally get the antinatalist side, even though I'm happy to exist after decades of mostly misery and dread. I honestly don't want to have kids, though.
You should make some videos about your experience and how you overcame your childhood and what you learnt through psychotherapy and in psychology that helped you to do so.
Dude, I need to thank you. I am not exactly an atheist (complicated), but your videos have really helped me really consider my views sensibly as I was raised pretty much to be a radical Christian, and have just in general helped me to be a better person. I forgot about this channel, but I remember watching your videos a few years ago. I don't agree with everything you've ever said, but nobody will, will they. Thanks again.
I don't believe in nothing, but I dont believe in God like Christianity or Islam. And by nobody will they I mean no two people will agree over literally everything
@@ShayAviv1000 by radical Christian I mean like taking the bible really seriously and making everything an issue to do with God and taking the Christian stance on literal everything
I was a very sensitive child…, and came into a dreary pain filled household. . I would never take the chance my child would have to endure a repeat of that in any way. I was not selfish, I was aware of benetars view wo knowing it!! Bless him for bringing the question to the forefront for each of us to make on our own.
That's pessimism..in not having a child you might also be ensuring that someone misses the most love filled fulfilling life ever..af the end of the day we simply don't know...
Imagine being so weak you call yourself a sensitive child and you believe you’d make a horrible parent, and that you’d be so bad at parenting, and that anyone related to you would be so bad at living that you think it’s a better not to have a kid.
@@metamaggot I don't believe in anti-natalism but something good not happening is by definition not immoral, it's neutral. if there were no children to be born from now on that still wouldn't be as bad as 1 person dying. ofc adults want to have children as part of their lifes which they wouldn't be able to have in that case, which is bad, but there are also people who are infertile. by your definition everyone would have to have children even if they didn't want to, which is just ridicules honestly. once again I believe that giving birth and affirming life is a good thing but Im simply pointing out where you're mixed up.
@@SpicyBacon And if he dies through no fault of his own, damning his kid to live with an evil uncle or such - then what? You're playing Russian roulette with a child's future.
“If ye unto your sons would prove, By act how dearly them ye love, Then every voice of wisdom joins To bid ye leave them in your loins.” - Abu Al-Ala Al-Ma’arri, syrian poet-philosopher from the Islamic golden age, 10th century (just sharing some ancient and old poetry in the comments)
Omg thanks letting me know that this badass existed, as an Arab ex Muslim vegan anti-natalist, I can finally look up to a philosopher from antiquity that I can identify with that isn’t western
A.S.M Oh, you hit the jackpot. Al-Ma’arri was a brilliant mind, way ahead of his time, and one of the people I look up to the most. I can send you more links with his texts, even in arabic. I can’t understand classical arabic, but it probably sounds much more beautiful in the original tongue. Here are some translations: www.humanistictexts.org/al_ma%27arri.htm PS: This coming from a vegan AN who is learning arabic
I don't know if I can claim to have a sound philosophical basis for my position on this topic, but I can't help but feel very strongly that is wrong to bring children into the world. Purely on an emotional level, I don't think I could conceive a child with a clear conscience, which I suspect is mostly a result of personal experience. I admit that this makes it very hard for me to be convinced by arguments that are based on abstract reasoning or semantics, as I see them. As someone who has struggled with depression and anxiety, I would feel unbelievably guilty and sad if my child felt anything resembling the pain and terror that I have felt in my worst moments. For me, the potential that a person brought into the world might feel those unspeakably terrible feelings, even if it were true that most people wouldn't suffer to that extent, is enough to convince me that children shouldn't be brought into the world. I just can't feel that it is right to just gamble, roll the dice, take that chance, when there is the potential for an outcome involving such acute suffering, however small the odds. Definitely not a position that I'd feel confident defending in a rational way, but it's so difficult for me to feel any other way.
@c B Thanks for your reply! I do wonder how much our ability to rationally evaluate this topic is affected by personal life experiences and genetic disposition. It would be interesting to know what percentage of people who disagree with antinatalism are people like yourself and what percentage of antinatalists are people like myself, if there were a way to measure that. If it is the case that most antinatalists have had a negative experience of life or are more depressive by nature, while most anti-antinatalists have a positive outlook on life and more cheerful dispositions, then surely that would throw into question whether either of their positions are actually founded on a solid epistemology? I can't help but suspect that emotion and intuition play a disproportionately large role when it comes to this topic.
@c B That's an interesting idea. If it's inevitable that humans will continue to be born, then at the very least it would be good for more of them to be genetically predisposed to being happy, so perhaps that would be one positive outcome of the antinatalist position, even from your point of view? That is, if it is the case that antinatalists are more prone to depression and whatnot.
Weak and nihilist point of view. Life is suffering. Your children will suffer no matter what. Your job as parent is to help them survive the fragility of life on Earth.
c B life is suffering in the sense it’s inevitable. This was said in response to a remark made about how they wouldn’t want there hypothetical children to suffer like they had. Although you could argue from navigating a tight birth canal, being born, growing teeth, hungry from wanting milk, the falls you have when learning to walk, the awkward stumbling through puberty and lessons you learn in adulthood is a whole lot of suffering with some intense happiness in between. That happens to most and that’s without the unexpected loss of a love one, long term illness or all the bad things that happen throughout our lives. Baring in mind your coming from a 21st century perspective. The humans before suffered a lot more for a lot less.
@@leonie3317 I'm confused by what you're trying to say. If you acknowledge that life involves suffering, then why would it be unreasonable for me to not want to bring a person into existence to experience that suffering, especially if there is the potential for that suffering to be extremely acute? Certainly I don't see how it is a weak and nihilistic point of view, although you haven't shown why nihilism is inherently bad or wrong anyways. I consider it to be quite an empathetic point of view, actually. And I don't have a job as a parent because I am not a parent and do not intend to be a parent? I will say life would be more pleasant if people like yourself had a bit more empathy and tact in online discussions :)
@@Amor_fati.Memento_Mori if you enjoy this video, you'll appreciate true detective season 1. Any other show would mislead you by comparison. It is quite philosophical..and nihilistic, but also much more.
"[Being born is] a matter of growing up and realising you're expelled from your mother's uterus as if shot from a cannon, towards a barn door studded with old nail files and rusty hooks. It's a matter of how you use the intervening time in an intelligent and ironic way." /// Christopher Hitchens
I think of that quote quite often, given in such casual surroundings. He didn't present such sentiments much in his lectures and debates, though. I wonder what he would have made of the antinatalist/anti-existence argument more comprehensively expressed. Nowhere do I think he ever referred to Schopenhauer for example. But Hitch is the person I think I most would want still to be alive, in all the world.
I'm from South Africa and have never heard of David well to be fair I haven't really looked into the morality of having children. I'm glad this came up because now I have an interest and need to start digging 😋
I think it's great you're still continuing the podcast in a safe way. I hope maybe next time there could be a pic with the interviewees name in the corner; I noticed that it helps me during similar situations on news interviews, especially with people I've only just learned about. Edit: I'm seeing comments about the guest choosing to not show his face in general; I would support any guest who feels that way, despite my preference.
My girlfriend, soon to be fiance then wife, can't have any kids and that's one of the reasons I want to marry her. I see kids as a burden and have no desire to have them and I'm also very very pessimistic when it comes to the quality of life for future generations.
Just because she can't give birth to children doesn't mean she doesn't want children, it's still going to be worth talking about so you are on the same page
@@henryginn7490 I neglected to mention that we did talk about and she does have kids already that are in college at this point. She also stated that she didn't want kids either so we've definitely talked about it as kids is something I definitely do not want at all.
IMHO the future generations will have much better life than current and past generations. Just compare the life of people in mediveal age with people today especially in the developped world.
All the good steps we have made as a society can be destroyed in one day by a man with loose lips and a platform. Look at how Andrew Tate effected young men in a few weeks.
Brilliant, thought provoking episode! Thank you very much. Also thank you very much for fighting just the right amount for your points, Alex. Diligent but not impolite.
I am continually frustrated by the approach taken by analytic philosophy. So much focus on language, though never grounded in a clean understanding of a deep mind-body connection which can offer so much more understanding. Pain IS NOT “intrinsically bad.” Pain is intrinsically painful. We have to use that tautology to reveal the mental-emotional evaluation inherent in the word “bad.” Evaluating something as good/bad automatically positions us towards particular action. Generally speaking, most of us want to rid ourselves of “bad” things. The problem with this approach is that we can evaluate something as bad that should NOT be gotten rid of, but rather understood more deeply and therefore related to in a healthier way. Alex, you are awesome. This interview is great.
This may be way too off-brand for this channel, but the manga for Attack on Titan is discussing a lot of these very same ideas in a very interesting way. It would be very interesting to hear Alex give a philosophical/moral analysis of that story.
@@fragrantbloom True. It also differs in that he only believes a specific minority of individuals should not reproduce. But, I think the story still grapples a bit with the core question of anti-natalism insofar as it touches on the idea that existence or being born exposes one to a great deal of pain, suffering and hardship that could be avoided otherwise.
Antinatalism has existed since antiquity (the Gnostics and Cathars were antinatalists for instance) and came to its own in the XIX century with the great Arthur Schopenhauer.
@@cainandabel7059 There were many viewpoints held by different gnostic sects but it appears that at least some of them were against procreation because it was the cause that some of the divine element became encapsulated in the material (evil) element. By abstaining from procreation, these Gnostics thought that they were opposing the evil "demiurge" who created matter. www2.kenyon.edu/Depts/Religion/Projects/Reln91/Gender/Gnosticism.htm There also were some who expressed antinatalist opinions within Judaism, such as the author of the "Book of Ecclesiastes"; as well as in the context of early Christianity (such as Augustine).
I wonder too what are the effects of our specific political, economic, and environmental circumstances on antinatalism. Right now I have no desire to bring a child into this world. But I could imagine a world where I'd consider it at least
If bring a child into existence is immoral, so is adoption. Buying a second-hand car is driving up demand and market volume for new cars due to the after-market effects. One equivalent argument in the children market is "don't get an abortion, you can always give it up for adoption", but there are a lot of more indirect ways in which the market works. To make things worse, adoption is _always_ traumatising for children (unlike for cars, which, as far as we know, don't have the ability to suffer). All other things being equal, adopted children are guaranteed to suffer more than non-adopted ones. I'm a sociopath, so I don't care either way, but if I were interested in reducing human suffering, I would certainly not support adoptions in any way or form.
Thomas S. Muhn I disagree. There is VERY low demand of adopted children, which is why orphanages are overrun all over the world. Adoption is one of the greatest ways to help orphans succeed in the world, have a support system in that family for life, and help them to lead a wholesome life into adulthood. If someone adopts an orphan, there is always a chance that the child could suffer in the new family. But I hardly see how they would fare better without a family in an orphanage that will make them homeless and have no support network once they turn 18. Plus,I really doubt people would ever think to have a kid just so that others could adopt them.
@@ThomasSMuhn When you adopt, you might be able to greatly improve the life of a person who is already exists. Of course, there should not be any financial interest for somebody to produce a child so it can be given away for adoption. But if the natural parents die or if they are not able to take care of the child, then adopting that child is a good thing. Still: The natural parents should not have procreated in the first place.
@@ThomasSMuhn Adoption doesn't cause harm to a child. if the child is already being put up for adoption then they could be an orphan, their parents may be unfit due to being in jail or on drugs, or the parents moght be unable to raise a child. the small harm in knowing you were adopted is greatly outweighed by the empirically better outcomes when children in these situations do get adopted.
@@God.sDaughter Great authors don't go looking for books in the woods, they write them. There won't be a meaning you find one day between your couch cushions or somewhere out there, you either have to create it yourself, or laugh in the face of just how meaningless life is.
Hats off to you once again, Alex! This is a brilliant episode and I love the depths to which you discuss such contentious and important topics with one of the finest minds embracing antinatalism as an actual branch of philosophy.
My first introduction to this as an actual, formalized concept, and I dig it immensely. Could never really resolve, internally, the typical justifications child-bearers would present, such as religious, social, traditional, species, romantic, to name a few...yet will hold off labeling myself until I conduct more research. The “Question Everything” philosophy rings many bells for me.
If the presence of suffering is bad for an existing person, and the absence of suffering in a non-existent person is good because neutral is better than bad, then absence of pleasure cannot be "not bad", it should be, by that same reference, considered bad because in that case it would be neutral versus good ( presence of pleausure being good ), and neutral is worse than good, just like it is better than bad
IMO not being born is neutral . being born is either good or bad . The reason you should not give birth is because you are making a gamble. The gamble is unnecessary because unborn babies don't desire existence
Amazing! I really like what you said about your future self being just like a potential child. I agree that death cant be a harm on its own. If you tell someone youre about to kill them painlessly and they start panicking. Their panic is the real harm youre causing.
@@ChickpeatheTortie most people are surprised by their fear of death when the time comes. But youre right, theres also lots of people who dont care about death, which is good because theyre probably living life well if theyre actually still alive
I really like how you don`t take practical application arguments at face value and tend to rely on propositions that could actually be show to have some truth value in a propositional logic sort of sense. The fact that you challenge your interviewee`s points in this manner and don`t accept intuition based arguments when they don`t address the inconsistencies is refreshing. This makes these interviews much more interesting to listen to than say having the guest summarize their view in the way that they feel comfortable.
Love Alex's way of dealing with new (for the video of course not him) arguments. He always works from the ground up. Not having accepted any of the premises at the start of the video, he tries to reason his way to them. Excellent!
It drives me nuts that I keep finding topics I agree with Alex on! Lol. Then again, the reasoning that leads us to the conclusion is also important. There's plenty of other channels I'm watching that disagree with me. I should just enjoy having at least one place where people agree with me. (Compared to, the Father is the "ultimate authority," that I grew up with, it feels odd.)
@@katie6384 I believe at 25:10 he states that he's not accepting it personally at the moment, but I might have misunderstood him (they were discussing different premises and he could have just been saying that he disagrees with the premises)
I find myself agreeing with a number of things that I once thought to be incorrect and now stand aside from many people I know on several different philosophical topics. However, no matter how often I give the antinationalist argument a chance and listen to it, I still can not accept all of their premises, nor their conclusion. I keep giving it a shot, but I think this is one philosophical stance I don't see myself taking anytime soon.
This was an engaging and interesting conversation in my opinion. My initial reaction to this, especially considering that I’ve read ‘Better Never to have been’ and Benatar’s more recent book ‘The Human Predicament’ and thought they were beautifully written and very well argued books, was that he came up short against Alex and did not represent his position well. However, upon listening to this conversation a 2nd time have recognized a couple of things, alongside having my perspective toward their conversation updated and ultimately changed. 1. This is an immensely difficult topic and our initial reaction will be very much guided by our personal bias for or against the position. In other words, your first impression, though strong and emotional, doesn’t account for much. You have to keep digging. 2. Alex’s patience in reiterating his points was not simply for the sake of being cordial or gentlemanly, but because professor Benatar’s objections were quite well founded and Alex’s follow up questions did indeed often deviate from there starting point of the topic at hand, and Benatar was simply trying to monitor this so as to avoid the discussion becoming too multilayered for its own good. 3. Professor Benatar’s argument style is quite different than Alex’s, giving the impression that they were not particularly well suited for a debate since their styles tended to jump around each other, but in reality (upon 2nd listen) they had a type of conversation that some of us are a bit impatient with and therefore rather dead to, i.e. nuanced and probing rather than knockdown and brutal. It’s disappointing to me that so many people who comment on these debates have never read Benatar’s work, and I, like Alex, urge you to do so if you haven’t. I haven’t really heard an argument (including most of Alex’s here) that he doesn’t address in his books and other works, so if you have a disagreement you will most likely be able to find them in his work. I’m not interested in debating here as it tends to be people just wanting to name call and put down, so my comment is more in favor of relistening to this episode if you felt frustrated by it on first exposure. It is in no way a stand in for Benatar’s books as I think we expect take down after take down when listening to a debate, especially when you consider the weight of the topic, but his books do exactly what they need to. That is, approach a profoundly difficult and heavy subject with careful consideration and respect for other views, while showing how they are deeply mislead, even though they are often more intuitive. Again, just a plea to actually read the work of a philosopher instead of listening to one podcast and assuming you know everything you need to know about the subject, thus strawmanning the position. Wonderful content and I learned quite a bit upon 2nd listen. Thank you
I find it interesting that Prof. Benatar at times appears to suggest you must either be anti-natalist or Ultra-Pro-Natalist (you must have all the children you could have). This comes from the times he challenges Alex with questions like: "Why are you not having kids right now?". Just because someone is not against having children, it does not logically follow that they must believe everyone should constantly be having children.
I've also come to the conclusion that Prof. Benatar has no views other than the core truth of anti-natalism... because he answers every question with: "Depends on what view point you hold." Even when Alex asks him directly what his view point is, he sidesteps the question. Seems rather cowardly, at least give us a: "My instincts would be X, but I haven't fully worked it out." rather than nothing...
If giving birth to children is intrinsically good and you consider yourself a good person, then why wouldn't you bring the highest amount of children into this world as possible? It begs the question; Do you bring life into this world out of the goodness of your heart or is it an expression of egotistical desires just to have a child? I'd argue it's the latter. That having a baby is essentially not about bringing a new person into life but the personal enjoyment you get from having that baby born.
@@lameduck3105 do you apply this same logic to all good things? It is good to give to those poorer then you (and there will almost always be someone poorer than you). Does that mean you are giving away everything all of the time to the maximum amount possible? Of course not. Because failing to do a good thing is not the same as doing a bad thing. Just because I think doing something is good to do, does not commit me to do it constantly as much as possible.
@@LoopFlare No I don't give away all my belongings to those less fortunate even though that woulld be seen as a good thing. Which just proves my point that we don't just procreate because it is intrisically good but because it fulfills some of our desires. That is, we ultimately create babies for our own personal pleasure and not because we want to see an independent human being come into existence. Giving birth is at it's core a selfish decision to enrich your life with someone else's being and not a matter of simply bringing someone into existence out of the goodness of your heart. Therefore, if giving birth is seen as a good thing and not an selfish act, you'd be motivated to bring as many children into the world as possible. If giving money to the poor wasn't about making you feel good about yourself I don't think anyone would give them money, food or shelter. In essence I believe we are all "narcissists" in that sense that we only do things to feel good about ourselves.
I feel like Alex was asking all the right questions, and instead of answering them David just resorted to ''well, through my own research I've arrived at a different conclusion'' instead of revealing what arguments made him arrive at said conclusion, or diverted by saying that '' there are too many issues brought up at once. '' That became apparent to me when they were discussing the Epicurean argument which, if correct, essentially undermines the assymetry argument. Instead of explaining why he doesn't agree with the argument, David just stated what I roughly quoted above, and kind of started going in circles without actually answering Alex's questions.
“There is but one truly serious philosophical problem and that is suicide. Judging whether life is or is not worth living amounts to answering the fundamental question of philosophy.” - Albert Camus The problem with this anti-natalism argument is that it begs the question, claiming that a life with any amount of pain isn’t worth living, without ever substantiating how it can prove that claim to be objectively true. It’s somewhat intuitive that no amount of pleasure can “justify” any amount of pain. What’s not intuitive is if there is or isn’t a sort of “purpose” that could justify pain. This is the questions Camus is proposing, “Does life have an intrinsic value that justifies the pain of living?” This anti-natalism argument assumes the answer to that question is “No.” without ever offering any proof of that being the case.
Daniel JP It utilizes the pin-prick analogy, unnecessary harm done to an unconsenting individual, and the pain does not serve any real purpose - it is an unnecessary need that did not need to exist.
Bfmvgirl2000 That would be a perfectly reasonable thing to say if life itself had no intrinsic value. But that has yet to be proven one way or the other. This is precisely the point I’m making in my comment.
Eagle Boy I think that’s a false analogy it. It assumes that there could be no possible purpose for the pinprick. The question we’re asking is, “Is there a purpose to life (that is not pleasure) which could justify life’s suffering.”
Static Charge Red Field I appreciate your thoughtful response, it’s very well articulated. I’m afraid that it misses the point of what I was trying to shed light on. Namely, that no one has offered up any proof that life has no purpose which might account for the suffering of life. There might very well not be a purpose. But unless you prove that there’s not it’s not fair to completely discount that as a possibility or at the very least, if you’re going to propose an idea like anti-natalism (which by the way I am not particularly against) you should preface it by saying, “By the way, this is assuming that life has no intrinsic purpose or value.” If the argument was prefaced by a clause like that then any reasonable person could agree, “Yes. IF that were true then anti-natalism would be a responsible conclusion. As a quick end note: DNA (nor any Science for that matter) can not explain consciousness, the state of living, or why there is something rather than nothing. These are the core mysteries that lead one to have a reasonable suspicion that perhaps “life” is more than just a balance of pain and pleasure.
Although i always agreed with this thought having it talked about throughly was rough to hear. Definitely gave me a mid life crisis kinda of vibe and honestly i needed that to truly look at what i am doing with it. Weirdly enough I appreciate this video
17:51 Alex you presented your argument clearly and concisely six or seven times over the course of the next SIXTEEN minutes that the lack of suffering of a person who doesn't exist is neutral; not a good thing. The professor refused to answer or even acknowledge your question time and again. Even at 30:40 where he finally says "No", his explanation doesn't address the question you're asking. Well done for persevering though.jj
It's a matter of perspective. The first time I read of the asymmetry, I couldn't wrap my head around it for a very long time. Alex's position considers individual states while Benatar's position considers two states simultaneously.
@@jamesrockybullin5250 not sure if he addressed it in this video specifically but he voiced the reasons why he chose not to portray it as neutral. It's a long video however so I'm just gonna say go watch the first few minutes of the addendum video. I think he dives right into why there iirc
@@ChowMeinChowdown I did, and I just relistened to it. He agrees with Alex that the absence of pain and the absence of pleasure in a non-existent person is neutral. He then says that the absence of pain (in a non-existant person) is good in a comparative sense. He says the absence of pain in a non-existing person is better than the presence of pain in an existing person. This is trivially true. But it does not prove that the absence of pain is good. It only says (tautologically) that it is better than the presence of pain, which could be less bad but still bad, neutral, or good. You're not going to convince me that pushing the fat man on the tracks is a good outcome. It's still a tragedy, it's just better than five people dying. If we can't establish that the absence of pleasure and pain is neutral, what the hell would neutral be?
That was exactly my problem with Benatar. His method of 'answering' Alex's questions was to be evasive. He kept dodging Alex's argument by stating it would be best to assume a special case which pretty much ended up being a cop out. He never supported why a special case was needed and an argument from the viewpoint of Occam's razor would state that if Alex could arrive to the antinatalist conclusion in far less steps and without creating a 'special situation' from which to arrive to his conclusion then it is better to argue from Alex's point of view. That is unless Benatar could demonstrate why his scenario had more ontological value. And as many times as Alex provided him to do so Benatar never stepped up to the plate to show why the antinatalist argument needed a 'special case' to justify his position. Rather he waffled on needlessly. I admire Alex for putting up with him. It was so painful watching to the end of this video after I realized how pedantic and how lacking in intellectual stimulation Benatar's argument was going to be. At least Alex kept it interesting with his hypotheticals.
@@aronchai I don't care specifically about that, but I like the idea that more people choose not to have children, and therefore create less human pressure on the planet. I think there is a non-freewill argument here. i.e. most people believe they want/should have children, largely driven by reproductive drives. For whatever reason, I "choose" not to want to have children. Most people will not have that choice.
Seems you’re talking past each other on the axiological asymmetry bit. Maybe the example to go to to tease out the disagreement is the case of the baby who will experience net pleasure in its life - David is committed to saying it’s still wrong to bring it into existence whereas you aren’t. Maybe you do later on but there’s a few frustrating minutes where no progress is being made. Great interview though :))
@@mindlander Yes Alex does say this at about the 31:00 mark. It's incredibly frustrating to see the professor not acknowledging Alex's question which he puts so well as always. I would have lost my temper after reframing the question three or four times!
@YexaC Sounded like they covered the same ground to me. JP made most of the same main points Alex made in his debate, and Benetar gave his speil. He even complained about Alex not being focused enough and jumping to different questions improperly lol He said the exact same thing to Peterson. Only difference was the tone. Benetar seemed quite a bit more frustrated with JP. But in terms of substance, not very different. Though i still have another 15 minutes or so to watch and i have been doing chores while listening so idk whatever
Suffering and pleasure are subjective for each individual (and most animals) based on their own personal experiences. A conscious being born with a defect doesn't know what they are missing (or have gained) from that defect or how a 'normal' being of the same species feels in comparison. More specifically, my normal for thirty seven years of my life was being able to walk and run and hike whenever I wanted. Back then before my cancer I would have thought my current life of hobbling along unable to run more than a few steps if my life depended on it would've been soul crushing. Fortunately animals through some evolutionary trait are capable of adapting not only changing environments, but also to the changes within our own bodies. Now nearly fifteen years later my range of pain endurance is far greater than it was, my ability to derive pleasure from mundane things I used to overlook is also far greater. I am not depressed nearly to the extent of what I thought I would be, merely briefly saddened occasionally. Given this understanding, I cannot agree that there is an inherent net suffering as compared to pleasure. I could however do an imagination thought experiment like Einstein has been said to have done, coming to the conclusion that if I had only lived in a three by eight cell my entire life, I wouldn't know any experience where that would be less than normal in my range of suffering and pleasure. I an also imagine a scenario where a person of monetary and social privilege might get into a situation of having some of their privilege removed where they would become depressed enough to contemplate suicide, even though folk like myself when I was young would have loved to be in that position. Eating lobster once or twice a year can be considered a delicacy, eat it for dinner over a hundred times a year and the lobster dinner is just another dinner. If the good professor truly believes he is suffering (& therefore every other conscious being should be too), maybe he should get checked by a neurologist or psychiatrist for borderline clinical depression. It is my understanding that people with clinical depression do not have this adaptive feature set to the same extent as 'normals'.
@Peace Prevails Atheists should not ignore the following truths, regarding the source of evil, respectively why here is not Heaven: God/Jesus is not a dictator, but the opposite. That is why this reality (this Universe) has been created intentionally so that freedom to be offered 100%. Most unbelievers of the truth do not know the *"Parable of the weeds".* The fallen angels have created all the evil living things such as: parasites, viruses, bad bacteria ..., besides all insects and animals that kill other insects or animals, also the bad instincts in humans (the reptilian brain), by altering our DNA (since the "apple" event mentioned in the Bible). *Initially all insects, animals etc. were feeding only with plants (plants products, such as fruits, nectar, seeds etc.).* Humans had to continue living after betraying the Creator, by listening to His enemy, Satan, who is actually the god of this world, in a Creation corrupted by the fallen angels, after the Creator "has abandoned" this planet to let us see how evil, humans without God/Jesus, can be. We see this everyday and suffer the bad consequences of the stupid=evil people's deeds, tools of Satan. The fallen angels, being sadistic, have altered the DNA of most living things (including us) to do as default both: reproduce uncontrollably (as much as they can) and fight (kill) each other. Unfortunately, they love to see living things suffering, especially human beings suffering. The Bible mentions clearly that Satan is the god of this world (for example in Corinthians). Therefore, all havoc, all stupidity=evilness, respectively all the useless suffering etc. and immorality/promiscuity are sustained by the fallen angels, ruled by Satan. We still can live and even be happy sometimes, in this short earthly life, because of God's mercy and love for us, which keeps some limitations for the fallen angels, otherwise Apocalypse will happen. *The fallen angels want to destroy us since our conception (actually, all the time in any way possible). That is why they make us suffer, as much as possible, by using our stupidity and the stupidity of the other people around us.* Satan, the one who deceives the whole world (Rev. 12:9), wants to corrupt, pervert, and twist everything what God has made. Anyone should know already the main commandment from Jesus Christ (the human form of Divinity), *besides to love / respect our Heavenly Father, to love / respect (care for) the other humans as we love / respect (care for) ourselves, besides the 10 commandments. Also the commandment from God to not use freedom wrongly (for evil), **_"For it is God’s will that by doing good you should silence the ignorance of foolish men. Live in freedom, but do not use your freedom as a cover-up for evil; live as servants of God."_** 1* Peter 2,15 *In addition, God (the Creator) is perfect. **_"Be perfect therefore, as your Heavenly Father is perfect"_* Matthew 5, 48 *All the parts that contradict the above truths are alterations done by the tools of Satan, over the last about 2000 years, to manipulate humans.* Satan, who is the god of this world (as mentioned in 2 Corinthians 4, 4), has deceived too many people, unfortunately. *Most unbelievers fight against the truth because they want to remain able to continue with their bad addictions.* Demons are glad whenever we are stupid enough to sin, to produce useless suffering (any damage) to others and to ourselves, to lose our holiness, to not be forgiven/saved anymore, in this way they gaining our soul in hell. Not all humans who ever lived on Earth had knowledge about the truth from the Bible. *Our deeds matter* (are the most important for saving our immortal soul) not the labels assigned to us, such as: Atheists, Christians, Muslims, Jews, Hindu... *_"For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive his due for the things done in the body, whether good or bad."_* 2 Corinthians 5, 10 _"O foolish man, do you want evidence that faith without deeds is worthless?"_ James 2, 20 _"In the same way, faith by itself, if it does not prove itself with actions, is dead."_ James 2, 17 _"You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone."_ James 2, 24 *_"For it is God’s will that by doing good you should silence the ignorance of foolish men. Live in freedom, but do not use your freedom as a cover-up for evil; live as servants of God."_* 1 Peter 2,15 In addition, Jesus Christ has warned us: _"Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; _*_depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’"_* Matthew 7, 21-23 Watch entirely and carefully the following two testimonies (those two men tell the truth): "NDE- ATHEIST PROFESSOR (Berkeley Grad) dies, sees HELL! Best testimony EVER! Howard Storm Interview". "Man Sees Unthinkable Horrors in Hell - Christians Being Tortured! (Mario Martinez)". Therefore, the believing of the truth revealed by God/Jesus will help/convince/determine... you to always strive to do only good for the rest of your earthly life, to be much easier for you at the Judgment, to go into Heaven before many others, to never taste hell, to be more loved by Divinity, but *ALL humans will be judged for their deeds* (watch entirely those two videos mentioned above).
Someone keeps deleting my explanatory message about the deceiving done by Satan. I will post only the beginning of it, maybe it will not be removed again. _"Satan, who is the god of this world, has blinded the minds of those who don't believe."_ 2 Corinthians 4, 4 _Satan, the one who deceives the whole world (Rev. 12:9), wants to corrupt, pervert, and twist everything what God has made._
I will try to post the next parts of it in smaller messages to not be deleted again by that "someone". However, Satan has been already stopped, but we live in our time and that is why mankind has to live until we arrive to that moment of Apocalypse (when Satan and all the fallen angels are defeated, in our perception/time). That is why the Bible has exact prophecies, like the followings listed below:
@Peace Prevails This is the third smaller message / part from the one which has been deleted (hopefully these smaller ones will not be deleted): - The future will be like in the days of Sodom. Luke 17, 28-30 This is exactly what we see happening today with gay marriage laws and strong public support for the homosexual lifestyle. - People will deny that GOD created the universe. 2 Peter 3:3-9 This is exactly what we see happening. Atheists are now claiming that the universe created itself out of nothing.
@Peace Prevails Next smaller part: - The message of the Gospel will reach all the nations. Matthew 24,14 Remember that Christianity started out with only a few dozen followers. The Bible prophesying that its message will reach the world is proof of its divine inspiration. - TRUE Christians will be hated and killed just because of their faith. Matthew 24, 9 - The future will become frightening. Luke 21, 26 (just few examples: the global warming terrific effects, the third world war final preparations, Corona virus etc.)
i have feeling you have to be really rigorous as antinatalist in your poursuit of compassion if not you are huge hipocrat and i think most antinatalist are hipocrats in that regards
A need machine that spreads pain and confusion wherever it goes, and we've spent the last two thousand years trying to fix nature's pathetic "creation". It's time to let it end. Life is the cancer of the universe.
I think it's strange to come to the conclusion that you know people have more suffering in their life than happiness, even though they might say otherwise and might say that they are glad that they lived their life. It reminds me of Jordan Peterson when he says "Life is about suffering", and I think it would be just as correct to say that "Life is about happiness". In the end it only says something about the person who makes the statement and how they experience life themselves.
@@mindlander But we wouldn't exist if everyone thought that way. No one would. It's just impossible for people to have a say in the matter for whether their existence gets to begin or not. So why do you think it's immoral? Do you think it's because it's safe to assume that the average life has more suffering than pleasure/happiness or well-being?
@@mindlander In your first reply you mentioned that it's immoral no matter the outcome. If we imagine a case where we are well informed, and we can expect a future child to lead a good life if they are brought to this world, and they are brought to the world and leads a good life, where is the immorality? Can you elaborate on that?
@@Kanzu999 first, you can't know that. Second, a good life does not necessarily mean a happy life. Rich people are miserable and commit suicide all the time.
I save most of Alex videos for future references when discussing atheism with Christians and Muslims, the proselytizing religions. There is a cornucopia of misinformation about atheism out there and Alex is particularly well informed which informs me with very useful information I use to debunk arguments about what atheism is defined by the religious. Good job bud, keep it up because we need desperately a voice of reason like yours
It's a wonderful work you're doing Alex. Bringing Benatar is definitely a high on this show. I've listened to his last discuss with Jordan Peterson but that's about 3 years ago, so it's wonderful to hear him again on one of my favorite podcasts. He's sort of a hero to me.
Even being lucky and privileged I have never saw life as a net positive for myself. I honestly never got why people are so hype to be alive. It's MOSTLY tedious. And the happiest I've ever felt isn't worth the worst I've ever felt. I'd have chosen not to be born looking back lol. I'm to scared to end it tho so I just suck it up
i think at the end of the day, in the grand scheme of things, life is meaningless. because of that i appreciate life and shit. it dosen't matter anyway, so i just try and enjoy it.
To me, Whatever happens, happens, but I will not put another human being on this planet and condemn him/her to the pains and horrors of life. The first two decades of life are fun, but after that, life is shitty for almost everyone. You have to be really really lucky to lead a life devoid of any painful situations in life. Given those odds, it's definitely morally wrong to reproduce.
The basic is to understand suffering. Is suffering actually an inherent aspect of life? That is not an idealistic question, but one which comes from actuality itself. Suffering has few causes, from ignorance, to comparison, to total self indulgence. Ignorance is my preferred word, as it sums up every aspect of suffering. From wandering around in a daze and stubbing one's toe, to endlessly reacting emotionally to triviality of all sorts due to a desire for control, to grief to heartbreak, etc. If we look at our lives, we see we are indeed the origin of our own suffering. That is not denying aspects of purely physical pain, as in toothache, which is usually a result of ignorance again, neglecting to feed the body the correct nutrients, not cleaning the teeth, etc. Sure, we can break a bone, and that may or may not hurt, but is that really a cause of suffering? It's the same with so many so-called diseases or illnesses, which are a direct result of accumulated years of neglect due to ignorance; dementia, heart disease, diabetes, MS, ME, parkinson's, etc... and yes, that may indeed be the result of parental/ancestral ignorance too. There really is no cause of suffering unless we make our own suffering. I may be immobile for whatever reason, that does not mean I have to suffer. I may have no money, that does not mean I have to suffer. I may not have a Rolls Royce and drive an old Fiat 500, that does not mean I have to suffer. Someone close has just died, that does not mean I have to suffer. I may be imprisoned, but that does not mean I have to suffer. As for the child issue. I would consider it cruel to have a child if I considered life to be purely physical, and for us to be mere machines as some believe. All suffering is optional and entirely needless.
EDIT: After listening further, I realize that this is the argument which Alex toys with for the next 12 minutes. I'm amazed by the way that Benatar dances around this point, despite Alex's highly articulate statements and restatements of the objection. My response to the scenario that David Benatar presents around 21:50 is that yes, it's immoral to reproduce if you have good reason to believe that their life will be utterly miserable. However, it's also immoral to avoid reproduction if you have good reason to believe that their life will be good. This is why I find his axiological asymmetry argument unconvincing.
It's not immoral to avoid reproduction if you have good reason to believe they'll have a good life. "Good reason" isn't sound logic, and "good reason" isn't certainty - if you don't have an impossible level of certainty, you risk bringing a child into the world who has a risk of suffering; you're playing Russian roulette. The only way to win is to not play.
@@acex222Determining, with a high amount of logic and certainty, that the child will be happy, even though it’s not completely certain or even if the likelihood of the child being unhappy is there to a smaller degree, is good enough (given more specific likelihoods of the amount of happiness and unhappiness that is at stake as well). The upsides are greater than the downsides, so it’s worth it.
@Survivalist395 Nor did I say, he said anything about purpose. I do accept however, my word choice failed to adequately articulate my position. As I understand it, Professor Benstars' argument is based on non existence in order to avoid suffering. In my opinion, if existence is not just the primary but (only) objective, all considerations after the subject is said to exist, may be disregarded. Especially subjective considerations such as suffering or the lack there of. Existence is part of the universal equation and well beyond the ethical regard or reproach of those that equate to nothing more than its variables.
But he never said this. He acknowledges that life is meaningless. What he is discussing is the value of existence for the individual brought into existence.
I can’t formulate a short and simple answer as to why, but I have a deep knee-jerk reaction to such ideas as: better not to exist than exist. The ideology that we would be better to simply not exist haunts a part of me to my core. How could a human being rationalise such an idea and want to project that idea upon other people. There are circumstances where I’d prefer not to exist, that I can accept. But it seems to go against the very human instinct that got us to the moon. To push on despite adversity. In an age where suffering is at its lowest, it’s your duty to stand on the shoulders of your ancestors, who suffered so much so you could be here, and scream defiance against such an idea. The idea seems weak and there’s nothing wrong with coming to that conclusion. But to try and convince others it’s morale to not have kids is immoral IMO.
Exactly. The entire argument has innumerable flaws. One cannot think of asking for "consent" from a non-existent entity. Extreme suffering had reduced over time. The argument also places a higher value to suffering, and the so called asymmetry is taken to be a fact. I don't think the absence of happiness and progress is good, even if nobody experiences that. Glad to see sensible people here. Hope you have a great day!
your logical fallacy is appeal to emotion. You attempted to manipulate an emotional response in place of a valid or compelling argument. "it is your duty to stand on the shoulders of your ancestors", what is that supposed to mean anyway? I see, logical fallacy. stop watching disney movies. also just because you cannot get consent does not mean you do not need it.
This "muh ancestors" argument is always the last bullet pro-natalists have in their guns. Who gives a shit about our ancestors ? They're dead and buried and are not going to pad me on the back for anything.
@@gvis3880 exactly, not only are they already dead, whatever they did, they did not do it thinking about liquidloue. they could not care less about liquidloue or anyone from the future that does not exist. if they did anything was to improve their current situation, not to save a non existent someone from the future. people are really selfish by nature. we owe nothing to the long gone people from the past, we owe nothing to no one. we just appear here, without our consent, and then they want to make you think you owe what to who the F who? that sounds pretty logical. regarding the consent of the non existent, well, apparently justin hau thinks is not needed because they do not exist. the fact you cannot get consent does not mean you do not need it. if we use that logic, that means, anyone can have sex with a person that is unconscious because, unable to get consent, yolo. but for some reason that is considered bad, i wonder why. there are no lines of people waiting and begging to be born. the minute someone decide to force existence, for sure you will have someone here that never asked or begged to come to this place. you will have someone here that will be directly affected by your unilateral decision. you will be deciding everything for that person, you will be gambling with that person's well being. a gamble in which you lose nothing but, the other person, can lose everything. and all for what? for what exactly? so that they can stand on the shoulders of their ancestors (whatever that means)?? so that they can admire a sunset?? if they are not born blind that is. no one is begging to come to this place. regarding the, uh, oh, the suffering is greatly reduced, does that mean that percentage of the population that is suffering, living under a bridge, eating shit.... does not matter? fuck them right? as long as you are not part of that percentage, life if wonderful and great.Feel free to ignore the suffering of the minority. No different from what you do every day while peddling your instagram lifestyles & proclaiming “positive vibes only”. Ignoring them is how you can tell yourselves that life is “good”.
It's honestly quite frightening how quickly people dismiss what David says and how adamantly they'll defend having children as if it's actually immoral not to. Very strange.
Perhaps it's because David's arguments are weak and when put under scrutiny he just deflects every time or just straight up says "nah, I feel like what I think is true" without elaborating. It's wild how utilitarian his views are while claiming they aren't.
I disagree with some points but im agnostic on his end point. There are fairly good pushbacks (Alex levels many) but most responses against benatar seem to be childish and are made by people that seem to have no understanding of his points.
How on earth is it strange behavior? Most biological organisms including humans are hardwired to want to reproduce. Definitionally, it’s a quite normal behavior and or line of thought
It's because biologically we all know that discouraging child baring is disadvantageous to the continuation of the species so claiming it to be immoral is essentially an attack on our very own existence it's no simple philosophical discussion about bread and butter we are talking about life itself here.
I really don't care about the suffering vs pleasure argument. The problem is that existence is involuntary. I did not consent to my own existence. I cannot ask my potential child if they want to exist. Thats why I am an antinatalist.
This is an interesting point because it has caused me to have vehement arguments with my sister. Once you are born, you can either consent or not consent to your birth. If you consent, no rights have been violated. If you do not consent, then your right has been violated. However, if you are never born, there is no being to consent or non-consent. A non-being cannot not consent to not being born (if you catch my drift). I have two questions about this argument, though. Can you consent retroactively to something? At the moment of your conception, were any rights violated if you were a non-being at that very moment? The other question I have is how to talk to people who won't entertain the counterfactual, the idea of not existing. My sister contends that she is alive now and wants to be, so not bringing her into existence would be a wrong. How would you respond to such a position?
I can answer the asymmetry: you can always regret being born but you can never regret not existing because you didn't exist in the first place Also, that was good point about it. If you think NOT creating someone deprives them of pleasure AND that is a bad thing, how can you justify not creating as many people as possible? So you either accept the asymmetry that deprivation of pleasure on potential existence is neutral and that deprivation of harm on potential existence is good, OR you realize you've done wrong by not reproducing to the maximum
Counterpoint to that statement: It would be that reproducing past a certain point would lead to an increase in suffering for the potential person because of a decline in resources. The correct answer would be reproduce to the largest amount that the new individuals would receive a certain quality in life.
I'm almost grateful to those who are nihilistic towards life in the comments section because your lack of inspiration fills me with resolve to bare the pain I shall face in the future and fills me with courage that I shall bare it successfully for I have something you all lack; hope.
I would say, just based on a lifetime of experience, that most pain in life is caused by others forcing us to live their preconceived way. If we were truly free, I feel we would all have a MORE happy life than we currently do. Just my opinion of course.
I considered antinatalism for a while, but in my personal opinion, all the suffering in the world was something no one else asked for either, and all sorts of people have done amazing things in spite of their suffering--and they have helped alleviate the suffering of others. It's a personal choice, and I have no problem with others choosing the opposite side of mine.
"all the suffering in the world was something no one else asked for either", yes but that is no justification for why it is ok to continue to perpetuate the same suffering. Just because everyone else in your society owns slaves does not justify you continuing the suffering it causes. When someone has a child, no matter how much you may because or intend to give them the best possible life, you have absolutely no idea if that is going to happen. You don't know that as you walk out of the hospital you could be hit by a car, your child put up for adoption, and given to abusive adoptive parents who cause them to commit suicide, or a near infinite host of unimaginable possibilities which are entirely out of your control. And to take that risk in a world with increasing issues such as global warming, wealth inequality etc, it is far more likely they will suffer than not. You are forcing someone to potentially go through something bad when there is absolutely no reason for them to. And your justification is "well I never asked to suffer, so therefore I can perpetuate the suffering"? Or that because there is the potential that it will bring someone something good, it is worth taking the risk of causing them harm? No. You would not accept that justification when applied to existing humans, so why does it justify bringing someone into existence? Unless you believe it is ok to force something upon someone without their consent, just because you believe there is a chance it might be good for them?
Antinatalism seems to presuppose that existence is a choice. Nobody asked to be born, yet we all were. No other animal on the planet would as these kinds of questions because they know that suffering is just necessary to existence. The very idea that suffering can be avoided was invented by humans so spoiled by societal decadence and so devoid of self reflection that they came to believe such a thing is possible. The people who don't exist don't factor into the equation because they don't exist. There's no "avoided suffering" just avoided existence.
How do you compare an amount of suffering to an amount of pleasure and say which one is greater than the other? They are more like apples and oranges, not apples and negative apples. Or maybe even more like different sorts of apples and different sorts of oranges. Also one could argue that life is not a pursuit of pleasure but a pursuit of meaning (e.g. as per Viktor Frankl). In that case one would prefer to live as long as they see meaning in their life despite all the suffering. And that suffering can only be an obstacle to the meaning, not some anti-meaning that negates all meaning if there's more of it.
"Pleasure is never as pleasant as we expected it to be and pain is always more painful. The pain in the world always outweighs the pleasure. If you don't believe it, compare the respective feelings of two animals, one of which is eating the other."
Both antinatalist and the Epicurean view of death can be related to a question of consent. That, even if it is better to die than live, you still shouldn't kill someone without their consent. Whereas all people are forced to exist without giving consent. (But yes, I agree with you that death being neutral + better to avoid future suffering = pro painless suicide)
I'm an antinatalist, yet there was a time when I saw the value of me being born. The latest years of my mother's life I took care for her. Had I not been born, she would have spend them much more miserable. I fulfilled the goal of my life, that was: to outlive my parents. Although I miss them, my life is easier now, because that responsibility isn't there anymore.
On the flip side of your situation - my mother is an abusive alcoholic and because of that she will die alone and miserable if it's left up to me. So, there has never been and will never be value to my existence.
Way too many unjustified assertions, maybe there are justifications which couldn't be explored within 1 hour, however I found this entirely unconvincing. Definitely dealing with interesting questions, but I'm extremely unsatisfied by the assertions and answers. I'll give a brief example, Alex asked if painful extermination could be good because it ends far more future suffering, this is a hypothetical question which was rejected because we can't be certain that humans know this. The entire point of a hypothetical like this is to evaluate the morality within a specific scenario, if you think the hypothetical is too vague, fair enough, ask to change the premises, but you can't plead ignorance within a hypothetical which both of you control entirely. This did not hold up to scrutiny within this interview.
I think there is a difference between pain and suffering. suffering is unnecessarily painful in one way or another. pain is an informational tool to let us know there is a problem.
Please note: Professor Benatar requested that we film a brief followup conversation to clarify some points, which can be found here: th-cam.com/video/YGL2r8PNb8c/w-d-xo.html
What a great way to resume the Cosmic Skeptic Podcast! I have some episodes lined up to record and to release, let me know if you have any suggestions for guests.
Thanks Alex, looking forward to the conversation!
I would really like to see David Pearce on your podcast. Look up his stuff about wild animal suffering. Cheers
Would love for you to somehow get Julia Annas or Rosalind Hursthouse in to discuss virtue ethics.
Markus Gabriel is very popular in europe. Also (as has been suggested) David Pearce would make a great guest to introduce topics related to transhumanism and the philosophy of technology.
Count me supportive of remote podcasts ASAP vs waiting for in-person. Thanks, and peace.. and bSAFE!
I think an interview with Herman Daly on the ethics and morality of degrowth and ecology would be right up your ally
I love how Alex isn't afraid to challenge those who he interviews, even when he ultimately agrees with them, this makes them think on the spot, which is sth you don't see very often in this kind of respectful encounters.
unfortunately just like with Singer, they're not as quickl/smart as he is, luckyly this time the guest came back to clarify after having had more time to understand Alex's points! :)
Do we know what Alex's opinions are on antinatalism? I know he finds it an interesting idea but do we know if he's swayed by it?
@@katie6384 in another video I remember him saying if he was logical he would push the button... but who knows indeed, and who cares?
@@remitemmos9165 oh interesting, thank you. And I'm just curious to know if he was playing devil's advocate or actually disagreed with David Benatar
@@katie6384 I think he's smart enough to play devil's advocate and to me that makes no difference because of that ;) (in a good way)
To all the people asking why David Benatar does not reveal his face- just imagine the amount of scrutiny regarding his persona and remember that there are religious wackos out there sending threats . It is totally understandable imho.
I think hes shown it before?
Eh, what ideas don’t get you threatened nowadays? Especially over the internet.
All you have to do is Google David Benatar images and you'll see his face.
I've met Christians who were antinatalist actually. But it's true that the general religious theist will repel this idea. Lol
Not just religious wackos. To take such a stance is a huge affront to women. The entire premise of most womens existence is having children. I've had this discussion with both men and women and women become very severe and reactionary.
Alex: Can you explain why we shouldn't commit suicide?
TH-cam: This is probably a good time for a commercial break
"We'll be right back"
Doesn’t the TH-camr decide where the ads go?
manifold I’d love to have one. Which one works for an iPad though?
You joke, but this is exactly what veganism/self-loathing leads to.
@@kenhiett5266 how does veganism lead to that? Veganism rejects exploiting sentient life as commodities. There are plenty of vegan parents lol
I decided it was not a good idea to have children when I was 18, I'm now 74 and have not had any children!
You're a hero! ❤️
@@justamoteofdust You're a depressed person who thinks his depressive mindset is universal.
well done
@@lollll9932 seek help
@@lollll9932 lmao why
Alex, if you see this, you are an inspiration to all of us out there. Many of us who studied philosophy have nowhere near the level of understanding, frame of reference or general intellect and comprehension to speak on these subjects with a moderate degree of confidence. You're an undergrad(I believe) pursuing a double major and, are able to challenge a Head of a Philosophy department on his arguments in a meaningful way. Not just some trivial quib about their point or stance. You can genuinely from a philosophical and intellectual perspective make great points and its inspiring to watch. That being said no one is an absolute authority and just because it comes out of your mouth doesnt make it true or correct. I must admit im partial and tend to find your arguments mostly convincing. You are a precocious young man and a joy to learn from.
I am of different dispostion, so I will ask should it be the confidence, intellect and comprehension to make him inspirational how are you to know you are to believe him by his arguments and not by his charisma?
@@voxsvoxs4261 because although he is charismatic, in philosophy we judge peoples arguments on their arguments and not how charming they are. I judge his arguments on their own merit. He is inspirational because he is so young and passionate about philosophy with a great understanding.
Ugh
Well said.
well said.
Ecclesiastes 4:3 - "But better than both is the one who has never been born, who has not seen the evil that is done under the sun."
Suggestion for a video: Alex? Why don't you give us a tour of your book shelf?
He's done several book recommendation videos, I'm sure there would be a huge amount of overlap
Yes please
I'm not sure if Alex has the time to do a 19 hour video, but hey, I'm all for it :D I got plenty of coffee and food :D
He did it
Your wish may be granted.
Would love to hear your thoughts on the ethics of pet ownership.
I second this!
We shouldn't own another life, no difference to slavery
@@wifi2166 isn't the difference that in one case there's suffering for your own pleasure and in the other case there's caring for and loving another for pleasure?
@@wifi2166 I got a notification that you respond to my question but unfortunately I can't see it. I'm not ignoring your response deliberately!
@@JamieTwells ye, I did respond but looks like it got deleted? I basically said that just because you love and care for something, it doesn't make it ok.
Im cool with the remote podcasts. It doesn’t matter to me.
@Abu Amanah Of the 3000 religions available, how many have you looked into? Seems intellectually dishonest for you to just select from the ones in your local environment.
@Abu Amanah I use the word Cosmos here, or simply Being. Some thing has always existed, and we are a part of it. When we die, it takes away our atoms to construct other shapes and organisms. There is no division between everything that we are and everything that IT is. Even now, you are a piece of the Cosmos...
@Abu Amanah I think that morality is objective. Life floods the physical and psychological 'spaces' of existence with variation (genes and memes) and 'discovers' the Truths to be found there.
@Abu Amanah The most real of all things is the structure that the genes and the memes survive. The things that are really True, all the time, are not context dependent.
@Abu Amanah Things are morally right or wrong whether you know them or not. The Truth is there nonetheless. You and I are an imperfect attempt at that truth. But it is there, always. Always true. We are variants of that discovery.
Imo yes i wish i wasnt born but im not suicidal if that makes any sense
dont be silly
Of course it does.
@Mary Whiterabbit If all your other experiences have been bad or neutral, how is it possible for you to think that being born was the best thing that happened to you, or are you being ironic?
NM JC makes plenty sense
@Mary Whiterabbit Then being born was not the only good thing that ever happened to you.
Dude, you're the best. You really have a genuine approach to learning and considering challenging ideas concerning ethics.
I got my tubes removed because I’m not sure if I even want children, but if I do, I want adopt. I don’t honestly see any reason to bring another kid into this world, when there are so many that need love.
The world is bs for making adoption expensive, that’s some people prefer biological
@@withinofwhat1083 I agree, but it’s also extremely expensive to have bio babies too
But aren’t you assuming implicitly that you have it within your power as a parent to reduce the suffering of the child you’ve adopted with the love you give that child? If you don’t have it within your power to reduce that child’s suffering then what’s the point in adopting the child, if not for your own selfish interest to have a child. In which case, how’s that different from bringing your own child into the world and then giving the child the love you believe will reduce their suffering overall?
@@pascal8306 why wouldnt they have the power to reduce a childs suffering? If that child doesnt get adopted, itll fare much worse (for the most part). Youre kidding me if you dont see the difference between adopting a child and bringing a new life in.
@@userblame632 no I’m saying if they do have the power to reduce the adopted child’s suffering which I think they do, then why assume you wouldn’t have the power to do the same for a child of your own you brought into the world? Because the argument is that bringing a child into the world condemns them to suffering, and it’s implied aswell that that suffering is unredeemable, which makes it immoral to have children. But it’s clearly not unredeemable suffering if you’re capable of reducing the suffering of an adopted child.
I like your face to face conversations because you get so much from body language. I also think that having travelled out to you vs just sitting at a computer your interlocutor might be more invested. But if I had to pick between your content existing in this format or never having existed I'm glad your content exists.
i see what u did there haha
Clever!!
One of the best interviews I've heard in a long time. Your questions were excellent, and really helped to clarify the more subtle points of the argument.
I’m not having kids, not just because I find them very annoying but also because I can’t stand for someone else to experience mental illness, that’s runs in my genes.
I’m also likely to be a bad parent, through the ways I’ve been brought up.
My kids would have my genes. I wish that I was never born and I don’t want anyone else to go through that torment.
genes don't cause mental illness
@@blakeavila4409 wrong.
@@tonytagleone6557 Just because you have a gene doesn't mean you have to express it.
@@blakeavila4409 doesn’t mean you won’t. Not having children eliminates that possibility.
@@tonytagleone6557 Its not random. A healthy body will express zero of its genetic weaknesses. You don't think health falls out of the sky do you?
I do hope that you cover some more of the antinatalist arguments - consent, risk, etc. - in the future. I would like to hear your overall thoughts and analysis of these arguments.
Agreed, especially consent! Such an important concept, and it can also make the argument about net suffering & pleasure less important.
@@cpunykurde Yup. Nonconsent argument is pretty much a checkmate.
@John Toas any actual arguments? Otherwise I'm not gonna waste any time on you
John Toas No one ever said he was unhappy so stick to the arguments presented, not some ad hominem disguised in a syllogism.
John Toas Oh no, not an ad hominem! What will I ever do?..... An attack on my ego?! Say it isn’t so!
Wow! Benatar is not an easy person to get a hold of! I would kill to have a full conversation with him, but I'm glad you got him on
It's not that difficult tbh the antinatalist podcast had an interview with him not too long ago.
Kill another human if you must. Just don't kill an animal to eat and admit that around here. You would be canceled quicker than you could say: "thin and pale"
@@kenhiett5266 Gotta love Carnists' efforts to troll. 2/10 (for the effort).
@@michaelmagdy6647 Yea, you could classify this particular comment as a troll, that's fair. However the rating you gave it is obviously skewed heavily by your bias. It's a 6 at the very minimum.
@@kenhiett5266 Not really, you just think so high of yourself.
Thin and pale is just a lame stereotype carnists like yourself like to describe vegans.
You can obviously find thin and pale vegans and carnists alike. Obviously too there are more obese carnists than vegans and more thin vegans than carnists but whether one eats less or more than 2000 calories per day and whether they eat enough iron doesn't have anything to do with their moral position on killing animals and eating their carcasses.
You're misinformed at best and dishonest at worst so 2/10 is pretty generous for your weak troll.
These are tough ethical questions, and they really have to be addressed. Thank you. It's one thing to vehemently disagree with Benatar, it's another to completely dismiss his arguments as ludicrous or "obviously wrong" based on reflexive moral intuition
Any actual present moral intuition would never disagree with Benatar. Everyone initially considers themselves moral, self awareness will always suggest your own desires don't get to warp reality. Actual morality is always larger than yourself.
How about the intuition that "killing innocent people is wrong"?
@@akosikuyzak I hope you know antinatalism is not against killing people..only against making additional new ones.
@@pritamlaskar Yes I know but what makes one acceptable and the other not? If you say because justifying killing is ludicrous or obviously immoral, you just beg the question against the anti-humanism guy.
>I hope you know antinatalism is not against killing people
Did you mean to say it _is_ against killing people?
I was born into a family that was miserable, abusive, and constantly anxious. I was not a happy child. In the end, I transformed my experience into something meaningful and fulfilling through years of psychotherapy, leading to me studying psychology and working with abuse survivors. I can totally get the antinatalist side, even though I'm happy to exist after decades of mostly misery and dread. I honestly don't want to have kids, though.
you are very strong!
you are an antinatalist then! no antinatalist thinks people can't have happy lives, even atheists, they just can't assure it for their children
You should make some videos about your experience and how you overcame your childhood and what you learnt through psychotherapy and in psychology that helped you to do so.
@@antib_readerand yet his strength shall die with him. He had better make sure sacrificing everything is worth whatever his purpose is.
@@feartheghuswho cares if it dies? Are you that egotistical and selfish that you need to bring a kid into the world so that you can cope?
The most thought-provoking conversation I can remember ever witnessing.
I don't agree with antinatalism at all, but I think it's important to have debates around the topic for people to understand each other better.
I agree. Im at the point where im not convinced but i think procreation is something that warrants more concern than many people seem to show it.
Dude, I need to thank you. I am not exactly an atheist (complicated), but your videos have really helped me really consider my views sensibly as I was raised pretty much to be a radical Christian, and have just in general helped me to be a better person. I forgot about this channel, but I remember watching your videos a few years ago. I don't agree with everything you've ever said, but nobody will, will they. Thanks again.
What do you mean by not exactly an atheist?
I don't believe in nothing, but I dont believe in God like Christianity or Islam. And by nobody will they I mean no two people will agree over literally everything
@@ShayAviv1000 by radical Christian I mean like taking the bible really seriously and making everything an issue to do with God and taking the Christian stance on literal everything
@@douglasgibb6943 I suppose, I don't have to believe in nothing at all to be atheist
@Lucas Haefner I'm not 40 lol. Anyway though, you make a very good point. I won't edit my message though, so people can see why you're saying this.
I was a very sensitive child…, and came into a dreary pain filled household. . I would never take the chance my child would have to endure a repeat of that in any way. I was not selfish, I was aware of benetars view wo knowing it!! Bless him for bringing the question to the forefront for each of us to make on our own.
That's pessimism..in not having a child you might also be ensuring that someone misses the most love filled fulfilling life ever..af the end of the day we simply don't know...
Dont take the chance they end up in a similar household? They’re your kid. You make the household.
Imagine being so weak you call yourself a sensitive child and you believe you’d make a horrible parent, and that you’d be so bad at parenting, and that anyone related to you would be so bad at living that you think it’s a better not to have a kid.
@@metamaggot I don't believe in anti-natalism but something good not happening is by definition not immoral, it's neutral. if there were no children to be born from now on that still wouldn't be as bad as 1 person dying. ofc adults want to have children as part of their lifes which they wouldn't be able to have in that case, which is bad, but there are also people who are infertile. by your definition everyone would have to have children even if they didn't want to, which is just ridicules honestly. once again I believe that giving birth and affirming life is a good thing but Im simply pointing out where you're mixed up.
@@SpicyBacon And if he dies through no fault of his own, damning his kid to live with an evil uncle or such - then what? You're playing Russian roulette with a child's future.
Alex is so respectful, I like how he lets his guests complete their responses.
“If ye unto your sons would prove,
By act how dearly them ye love,
Then every voice of wisdom joins
To bid ye leave them in your loins.”
- Abu Al-Ala Al-Ma’arri, syrian poet-philosopher from the Islamic golden age, 10th century
(just sharing some ancient and old poetry in the comments)
Lol thank you for sharing this
I like that. AlMa'arri was also one of the first well known vegans and antinatalists.
Omg thanks letting me know that this badass existed, as an Arab ex Muslim vegan anti-natalist, I can finally look up to a philosopher from antiquity that I can identify with that isn’t western
A.S.M Oh, you hit the jackpot. Al-Ma’arri was a brilliant mind, way ahead of his time, and one of the people I look up to the most. I can send you more links with his texts, even in arabic. I can’t understand classical arabic, but it probably sounds much more beautiful in the original tongue. Here are some translations: www.humanistictexts.org/al_ma%27arri.htm
PS: This coming from a vegan AN who is learning arabic
Lea D Thanks for the link! I’m actually reading some of his poems in Arabic and I’m getting goose bumps, ahead of his time is an understatement!!
I don't know if I can claim to have a sound philosophical basis for my position on this topic, but I can't help but feel very strongly that is wrong to bring children into the world. Purely on an emotional level, I don't think I could conceive a child with a clear conscience, which I suspect is mostly a result of personal experience. I admit that this makes it very hard for me to be convinced by arguments that are based on abstract reasoning or semantics, as I see them. As someone who has struggled with depression and anxiety, I would feel unbelievably guilty and sad if my child felt anything resembling the pain and terror that I have felt in my worst moments. For me, the potential that a person brought into the world might feel those unspeakably terrible feelings, even if it were true that most people wouldn't suffer to that extent, is enough to convince me that children shouldn't be brought into the world. I just can't feel that it is right to just gamble, roll the dice, take that chance, when there is the potential for an outcome involving such acute suffering, however small the odds. Definitely not a position that I'd feel confident defending in a rational way, but it's so difficult for me to feel any other way.
@c B Thanks for your reply! I do wonder how much our ability to rationally evaluate this topic is affected by personal life experiences and genetic disposition. It would be interesting to know what percentage of people who disagree with antinatalism are people like yourself and what percentage of antinatalists are people like myself, if there were a way to measure that. If it is the case that most antinatalists have had a negative experience of life or are more depressive by nature, while most anti-antinatalists have a positive outlook on life and more cheerful dispositions, then surely that would throw into question whether either of their positions are actually founded on a solid epistemology? I can't help but suspect that emotion and intuition play a disproportionately large role when it comes to this topic.
@c B That's an interesting idea. If it's inevitable that humans will continue to be born, then at the very least it would be good for more of them to be genetically predisposed to being happy, so perhaps that would be one positive outcome of the antinatalist position, even from your point of view? That is, if it is the case that antinatalists are more prone to depression and whatnot.
Weak and nihilist point of view.
Life is suffering. Your children will suffer no matter what. Your job as parent is to help them survive the fragility of life on Earth.
c B life is suffering in the sense it’s inevitable. This was said in response to a remark made about how they wouldn’t want there hypothetical children to suffer like they had.
Although you could argue from navigating a tight birth canal, being born, growing teeth, hungry from wanting milk, the falls you have when learning to walk, the awkward stumbling through puberty and lessons you learn in adulthood is a whole lot of suffering with some intense happiness in between. That happens to most and that’s without the unexpected loss of a love one, long term illness or all the bad things that happen throughout our lives.
Baring in mind your coming from a 21st century perspective. The humans before suffered a lot more for a lot less.
@@leonie3317 I'm confused by what you're trying to say. If you acknowledge that life involves suffering, then why would it be unreasonable for me to not want to bring a person into existence to experience that suffering, especially if there is the potential for that suffering to be extremely acute? Certainly I don't see how it is a weak and nihilistic point of view, although you haven't shown why nihilism is inherently bad or wrong anyways. I consider it to be quite an empathetic point of view, actually. And I don't have a job as a parent because I am not a parent and do not intend to be a parent? I will say life would be more pleasant if people like yourself had a bit more empathy and tact in online discussions :)
What wonderful timing for this, I just finished True Detective Season 1
What's it about? Is it worth watching? Give me examples of shows you like so that I can get an Idea about you taste.
Thanks 😇
@@Amor_fati.Memento_Mori if you enjoy this video, you'll appreciate true detective season 1. Any other show would mislead you by comparison. It is quite philosophical..and nihilistic, but also much more.
@@mindlander
I see. Thanks.
Just watch season 1.
"[Being born is] a matter of growing up and realising you're expelled from your mother's uterus as if shot from a cannon, towards a barn door studded with old nail files and rusty hooks. It's a matter of how you use the intervening time in an intelligent and ironic way." /// Christopher Hitchens
I think of that quote quite often, given in such casual surroundings. He didn't present such sentiments much in his lectures and debates, though. I wonder what he would have made of the antinatalist/anti-existence argument more comprehensively expressed. Nowhere do I think he ever referred to Schopenhauer for example. But Hitch is the person I think I most would want still to be alive, in all the world.
Been thinking of this Topic Alex thanks for tackling it.
I'm from South Africa and have never heard of David well to be fair I haven't really looked into the morality of having children. I'm glad this came up because now I have an interest and need to start digging 😋
Yoh yoh😆😂 Imagine explaining this to traditional parents and grandparents🤣.
Hey,another fellow South African!
@@simphiwe4930 yha that wouldn't be easy hey😬😬😬.
I think what's currently happening in South Africa is enough to make most people anti-natalist.
@@sphumelelesijadu as only as they're of the right... race 😏
I think it's great you're still continuing the podcast in a safe way. I hope maybe next time there could be a pic with the interviewees name in the corner; I noticed that it helps me during similar situations on news interviews, especially with people I've only just learned about.
Edit: I'm seeing comments about the guest choosing to not show his face in general; I would support any guest who feels that way, despite my preference.
My girlfriend, soon to be fiance then wife, can't have any kids and that's one of the reasons I want to marry her. I see kids as a burden and have no desire to have them and I'm also very very pessimistic when it comes to the quality of life for future generations.
Just because she can't give birth to children doesn't mean she doesn't want children, it's still going to be worth talking about so you are on the same page
@@henryginn7490 I neglected to mention that we did talk about and she does have kids already that are in college at this point. She also stated that she didn't want kids either so we've definitely talked about it as kids is something I definitely do not want at all.
IMHO the future generations will have much better life than current and past generations. Just compare the life of people in mediveal age with people today especially in the developped world.
All the good steps we have made as a society can be destroyed in one day by a man with loose lips and a platform. Look at how Andrew Tate effected young men in a few weeks.
Brilliant, thought provoking episode! Thank you very much. Also thank you very much for fighting just the right amount for your points, Alex. Diligent but not impolite.
I am continually frustrated by the approach taken by analytic philosophy. So much focus on language, though never grounded in a clean understanding of a deep mind-body connection which can offer so much more understanding.
Pain IS NOT “intrinsically bad.” Pain is intrinsically painful. We have to use that tautology to reveal the mental-emotional evaluation inherent in the word “bad.”
Evaluating something as good/bad automatically positions us towards particular action. Generally speaking, most of us want to rid ourselves of “bad” things. The problem with this approach is that we can evaluate something as bad that should NOT be gotten rid of, but rather understood more deeply and therefore related to in a healthier way.
Alex, you are awesome. This interview is great.
Just what I need, currently dying of boredom in quarantine.
same
Do something then. People are working their ass off to sustain society. Help would be appreciated instead of complaining online
@D-O dont make it weird man
@D-O just let people be bored. stop looking into it
John Cena
Do I even need to touch on how ignorant and laughable that statement is?😂
This may be way too off-brand for this channel, but the manga for Attack on Titan is discussing a lot of these very same ideas in a very interesting way. It would be very interesting to hear Alex give a philosophical/moral analysis of that story.
Oooh imagine Alex talking about SnK 🤓
True Men of Culture.
David Benatar is Zeke Yeagaaar
But Zeke wants to do that just to eldians and without their consent. That is where it differs.
@@fragrantbloom True. It also differs in that he only believes a specific minority of individuals should not reproduce. But, I think the story still grapples a bit with the core question of anti-natalism insofar as it touches on the idea that existence or being born exposes one to a great deal of pain, suffering and hardship that could be avoided otherwise.
Antinatalism has existed since antiquity (the Gnostics and Cathars were antinatalists for instance) and came to its own in the XIX century with the great Arthur Schopenhauer.
Al maari as well. Its totally understandeable from any religious perspective especially christianity
@@eg4848 Al Maari too? Interesting.
@@paulheinrichdietrich9518 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Ma%27arri#Antinatalism
@@lucioh1575 Thanks.
@@cainandabel7059 There were many viewpoints held by different gnostic sects but it appears that at least some of them were against procreation because it was the cause that some of the divine element became encapsulated in the material (evil) element. By abstaining from procreation, these Gnostics thought that they were opposing the evil "demiurge" who created matter. www2.kenyon.edu/Depts/Religion/Projects/Reln91/Gender/Gnosticism.htm
There also were some who expressed antinatalist opinions within Judaism, such as the author of the "Book of Ecclesiastes"; as well as in the context of early Christianity (such as Augustine).
Being an antinatalist (even without knowing that was a whole thing) is the reason that for years now I’ve only ever wanted to adopt
I wonder too what are the effects of our specific political, economic, and environmental circumstances on antinatalism. Right now I have no desire to bring a child into this world. But I could imagine a world where I'd consider it at least
If bring a child into existence is immoral, so is adoption. Buying a second-hand car is driving up demand and market volume for new cars due to the after-market effects. One equivalent argument in the children market is "don't get an abortion, you can always give it up for adoption", but there are a lot of more indirect ways in which the market works.
To make things worse, adoption is _always_ traumatising for children (unlike for cars, which, as far as we know, don't have the ability to suffer). All other things being equal, adopted children are guaranteed to suffer more than non-adopted ones. I'm a sociopath, so I don't care either way, but if I were interested in reducing human suffering, I would certainly not support adoptions in any way or form.
Thomas S. Muhn I disagree. There is VERY low demand of adopted children, which is why orphanages are overrun all over the world. Adoption is one of the greatest ways to help orphans succeed in the world, have a support system in that family for life, and help them to lead a wholesome life into adulthood. If someone adopts an orphan, there is always a chance that the child could suffer in the new family. But I hardly see how they would fare better without a family in an orphanage that will make them homeless and have no support network once they turn 18.
Plus,I really doubt people would ever think to have a kid just so that others could adopt them.
@@ThomasSMuhn When you adopt, you might be able to greatly improve the life of a person who is already exists. Of course, there should not be any financial interest for somebody to produce a child so it can be given away for adoption. But if the natural parents die or if they are not able to take care of the child, then adopting that child is a good thing. Still: The natural parents should not have procreated in the first place.
@@ThomasSMuhn Adoption doesn't cause harm to a child. if the child is already being put up for adoption then they could be an orphan, their parents may be unfit due to being in jail or on drugs, or the parents moght be unable to raise a child. the small harm in knowing you were adopted is greatly outweighed by the empirically better outcomes when children in these situations do get adopted.
If i can go back in time and make my self not be born, i would do it in a heart beat.
@John Toas
I'm not sad, i just don't want to be here.
@John Toas
4 NOBILE TRUTHS.
th-cam.com/video/Vjm2zdQ5ll0/w-d-xo.html
@John Toas
Know life know pain.
No life no pain.
howtostopthecycleofpain.blogspot.sg/2009/05/why-do-you-feel-pain.html?m=1
Hi are you ok?
I’m in the same shoes as you. I’m really bored of life and haven’t found the meaning of it. 🙁
@@God.sDaughter Great authors don't go looking for books in the woods, they write them. There won't be a meaning you find one day between your couch cushions or somewhere out there, you either have to create it yourself, or laugh in the face of just how meaningless life is.
Loved the discussion and all the interesting points brought up. A part 2 would be amazing for this.
Hats off to you once again, Alex! This is a brilliant episode and I love the depths to which you discuss such contentious and important topics with one of the finest minds embracing antinatalism as an actual branch of philosophy.
My first introduction to this as an actual, formalized concept, and I dig it immensely.
Could never really resolve, internally, the typical justifications child-bearers would present, such as religious, social, traditional, species, romantic, to name a few...yet will hold off labeling myself until I conduct more research.
The “Question Everything” philosophy rings many bells for me.
If the presence of suffering is bad for an existing person, and the absence of suffering in a non-existent person is good because neutral is better than bad, then absence of pleasure cannot be "not bad", it should be, by that same reference, considered bad because in that case it would be neutral versus good ( presence of pleausure being good ), and neutral is worse than good, just like it is better than bad
IMO not being born is neutral . being born is either good or bad .
The reason you should not give birth is because you are making a gamble. The gamble is unnecessary because unborn babies don't desire existence
@@testacals Yeah that's how I see it too
Amazing! I really like what you said about your future self being just like a potential child. I agree that death cant be a harm on its own. If you tell someone youre about to kill them painlessly and they start panicking. Their panic is the real harm youre causing.
They could be fearing their whole life coming to an end...
@@aidangerson287 that makes sense.
How do you know that people panic - my gran didn't.
@@ChickpeatheTortie most people are surprised by their fear of death when the time comes. But youre right, theres also lots of people who dont care about death, which is good because theyre probably living life well if theyre actually still alive
@A.J. no, not sure why I said that
I don't understand it completely in English, but I am trying, because it's so interesting! Thanks 😊
I really like how you don`t take practical application arguments at face value and tend to rely on propositions that could actually be show to have some truth value in a propositional logic sort of sense. The fact that you challenge your interviewee`s points in this manner and don`t accept intuition based arguments when they don`t address the inconsistencies is refreshing. This makes these interviews much more interesting to listen to than say having the guest summarize their view in the way that they feel comfortable.
Quarantine season - sound quality is lower, but has historical value.
Love Alex's way of dealing with new (for the video of course not him) arguments. He always works from the ground up. Not having accepted any of the premises at the start of the video, he tries to reason his way to them. Excellent!
Great choice of guest. Delighted to hear these ideas discussed on your platform. Bravo sir skeptic 👏
It drives me nuts that I keep finding topics I agree with Alex on! Lol. Then again, the reasoning that leads us to the conclusion is also important. There's plenty of other channels I'm watching that disagree with me.
I should just enjoy having at least one place where people agree with me. (Compared to, the Father is the "ultimate authority," that I grew up with, it feels odd.)
Do you know what his views are on antinatalism? I know he's interested in it but do we know if he's swayed by it?
@@katie6384 I believe at 25:10 he states that he's not accepting it personally at the moment, but I might have misunderstood him (they were discussing different premises and he could have just been saying that he disagrees with the premises)
I find myself agreeing with a number of things that I once thought to be incorrect and now stand aside from many people I know on several different philosophical topics. However, no matter how often I give the antinationalist argument a chance and listen to it, I still can not accept all of their premises, nor their conclusion. I keep giving it a shot, but I think this is one philosophical stance I don't see myself taking anytime soon.
4 NOBILE TRUTHS.
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This was an engaging and interesting conversation in my opinion. My initial reaction to this, especially considering that I’ve read ‘Better Never to have been’ and Benatar’s more recent book ‘The Human Predicament’ and thought they were beautifully written and very well argued books, was that he came up short against Alex and did not represent his position well. However, upon listening to this conversation a 2nd time have recognized a couple of things, alongside having my perspective toward their conversation updated and ultimately changed.
1. This is an immensely difficult topic and our initial reaction will be very much guided by our personal bias for or against the position. In other words, your first impression, though strong and emotional, doesn’t account for much. You have to keep digging.
2. Alex’s patience in reiterating his points was not simply for the sake of being cordial or gentlemanly, but because professor Benatar’s objections were quite well founded and Alex’s follow up questions did indeed often deviate from there starting point of the topic at hand, and Benatar was simply trying to monitor this so as to avoid the discussion becoming too multilayered for its own good.
3. Professor Benatar’s argument style is quite different than Alex’s, giving the impression that they were not particularly well suited for a debate since their styles tended to jump around each other, but in reality (upon 2nd listen) they had a type of conversation that some of us are a bit impatient with and therefore rather dead to, i.e. nuanced and probing rather than knockdown and brutal.
It’s disappointing to me that so many people who comment on these debates have never read Benatar’s work, and I, like Alex, urge you to do so if you haven’t. I haven’t really heard an argument (including most of Alex’s here) that he doesn’t address in his books and other works, so if you have a disagreement you will most likely be able to find them in his work.
I’m not interested in debating here as it tends to be people just wanting to name call and put down, so my comment is more in favor of relistening to this episode if you felt frustrated by it on first exposure.
It is in no way a stand in for Benatar’s books as I think we expect take down after take down when listening to a debate, especially when you consider the weight of the topic, but his books do exactly what they need to. That is, approach a profoundly difficult and heavy subject with careful consideration and respect for other views, while showing how they are deeply mislead, even though they are often more intuitive.
Again, just a plea to actually read the work of a philosopher instead of listening to one podcast and assuming you know everything you need to know about the subject, thus strawmanning the position.
Wonderful content and I learned quite a bit upon 2nd listen. Thank you
The New Yorker magazine did a profile on Banatar awhile back, quite good. Have you read it?
@@ludwigbeethoven3119 No but thanks for the recommendation. I'll check it out.
"In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
😐
I find it interesting that Prof. Benatar at times appears to suggest you must either be anti-natalist or Ultra-Pro-Natalist (you must have all the children you could have). This comes from the times he challenges Alex with questions like: "Why are you not having kids right now?". Just because someone is not against having children, it does not logically follow that they must believe everyone should constantly be having children.
I've also come to the conclusion that Prof. Benatar has no views other than the core truth of anti-natalism... because he answers every question with: "Depends on what view point you hold." Even when Alex asks him directly what his view point is, he sidesteps the question. Seems rather cowardly, at least give us a: "My instincts would be X, but I haven't fully worked it out." rather than nothing...
If giving birth to children is intrinsically good and you consider yourself a good person, then why wouldn't you bring the highest amount of children into this world as possible? It begs the question; Do you bring life into this world out of the goodness of your heart or is it an expression of egotistical desires just to have a child? I'd argue it's the latter. That having a baby is essentially not about bringing a new person into life but the personal enjoyment you get from having that baby born.
@@lameduck3105 do you apply this same logic to all good things? It is good to give to those poorer then you (and there will almost always be someone poorer than you). Does that mean you are giving away everything all of the time to the maximum amount possible? Of course not. Because failing to do a good thing is not the same as doing a bad thing. Just because I think doing something is good to do, does not commit me to do it constantly as much as possible.
@@LoopFlare No I don't give away all my belongings to those less fortunate even though that woulld be seen as a good thing.
Which just proves my point that we don't just procreate because it is intrisically good but because it fulfills some of our desires. That is, we ultimately create babies for our own personal pleasure and not because we want to see an independent human being come into existence. Giving birth is at it's core a selfish decision to enrich your life with someone else's being and not a matter of simply bringing someone into existence out of the goodness of your heart.
Therefore, if giving birth is seen as a good thing and not an selfish act, you'd be motivated to bring as many children into the world as possible. If giving money to the poor wasn't about making you feel good about yourself I don't think anyone would give them money, food or shelter. In essence I believe we are all "narcissists" in that sense that we only do things to feel good about ourselves.
Right? Because having children involves body changes, it doesn't make sense for even a natalist to not want them.
The subscriber count of this channel is rising in thousands each day!
I feel like Alex was asking all the right questions, and instead of answering them David just resorted to ''well, through my own research I've arrived at a different conclusion'' instead of revealing what arguments made him arrive at said conclusion, or diverted by saying that '' there are too many issues brought up at once. '' That became apparent to me when they were discussing the Epicurean argument which, if correct, essentially undermines the assymetry argument. Instead of explaining why he doesn't agree with the argument, David just stated what I roughly quoted above, and kind of started going in circles without actually answering Alex's questions.
He did say there is no knockdown argument against epicureanism. Precisely because there isn't.
I like the discussions where one can just listen - no viewing required, they rest your eyes.
Excited to see a new episode! I hope you’re enjoying your time in quarantine, Alex.
“There is but one truly serious philosophical problem and that is suicide. Judging whether life is or is not worth living amounts to answering the fundamental question of philosophy.”
- Albert Camus
The problem with this anti-natalism argument is that it begs the question, claiming that a life with any amount of pain isn’t worth living, without ever substantiating how it can prove that claim to be objectively true. It’s somewhat intuitive that no amount of pleasure can “justify” any amount of pain. What’s not intuitive is if there is or isn’t a sort of “purpose” that could justify pain. This is the questions Camus is proposing, “Does life have an intrinsic value that justifies the pain of living?”
This anti-natalism argument assumes the answer to that question is “No.” without ever offering any proof of that being the case.
Daniel JP It utilizes the pin-prick analogy, unnecessary harm done to an unconsenting individual, and the pain does not serve any real purpose - it is an unnecessary need that did not need to exist.
Bfmvgirl2000 That would be a perfectly reasonable thing to say if life itself had no intrinsic value. But that has yet to be proven one way or the other. This is precisely the point I’m making in my comment.
Eagle Boy I think that’s a false analogy it. It assumes that there could be no possible purpose for the pinprick. The question we’re asking is, “Is there a purpose to life (that is not pleasure) which could justify life’s suffering.”
Bfmvgirl2000 but they do have a choice, sort of; suicide.
Static Charge Red Field I appreciate your thoughtful response, it’s very well articulated. I’m afraid that it misses the point of what I was trying to shed light on. Namely, that no one has offered up any proof that life has no purpose which might account for the suffering of life. There might very well not be a purpose. But unless you prove that there’s not it’s not fair to completely discount that as a possibility or at the very least, if you’re going to propose an idea like anti-natalism (which by the way I am not particularly against) you should preface it by saying, “By the way, this is assuming that life has no intrinsic purpose or value.”
If the argument was prefaced by a clause like that then any reasonable person could agree, “Yes. IF that were true then anti-natalism would be a responsible conclusion.
As a quick end note: DNA (nor any Science for that matter) can not explain consciousness, the state of living, or why there is something rather than nothing. These are the core mysteries that lead one to have a reasonable suspicion that perhaps “life” is more than just a balance of pain and pleasure.
Its so nice listening to two philosophers clarifying terms and talking within frameworks about a single issue. Much respect to them
Although i always agreed with this thought having it talked about throughly was rough to hear. Definitely gave me a mid life crisis kinda of vibe and honestly i needed that to truly look at what i am doing with it. Weirdly enough I appreciate this video
17:51 Alex you presented your argument clearly and concisely six or seven times over the course of the next SIXTEEN minutes that the lack of suffering of a person who doesn't exist is neutral; not a good thing. The professor refused to answer or even acknowledge your question time and again. Even at 30:40 where he finally says "No", his explanation doesn't address the question you're asking. Well done for persevering though.jj
It's a matter of perspective. The first time I read of the asymmetry, I couldn't wrap my head around it for a very long time. Alex's position considers individual states while Benatar's position considers two states simultaneously.
@@ChowMeinChowdown Did he answer the question? If so when, and could you paraphrase his position please?
@@jamesrockybullin5250 not sure if he addressed it in this video specifically but he voiced the reasons why he chose not to portray it as neutral. It's a long video however so I'm just gonna say go watch the first few minutes of the addendum video. I think he dives right into why there iirc
@@ChowMeinChowdown I did, and I just relistened to it. He agrees with Alex that the absence of pain and the absence of pleasure in a non-existent person is neutral. He then says that the absence of pain (in a non-existant person) is good in a comparative sense. He says the absence of pain in a non-existing person is better than the presence of pain in an existing person. This is trivially true. But it does not prove that the absence of pain is good. It only says (tautologically) that it is better than the presence of pain, which could be less bad but still bad, neutral, or good.
You're not going to convince me that pushing the fat man on the tracks is a good outcome. It's still a tragedy, it's just better than five people dying.
If we can't establish that the absence of pleasure and pain is neutral, what the hell would neutral be?
That was exactly my problem with Benatar. His method of 'answering' Alex's questions was to be evasive. He kept dodging Alex's argument by stating it would be best to assume a special case which pretty much ended up being a cop out. He never supported why a special case was needed and an argument from the viewpoint of Occam's razor would state that if Alex could arrive to the antinatalist conclusion in far less steps and without creating a 'special situation' from which to arrive to his conclusion then it is better to argue from Alex's point of view. That is unless Benatar could demonstrate why his scenario had more ontological value. And as many times as Alex provided him to do so Benatar never stepped up to the plate to show why the antinatalist argument needed a 'special case' to justify his position. Rather he waffled on needlessly. I admire Alex for putting up with him. It was so painful watching to the end of this video after I realized how pedantic and how lacking in intellectual stimulation Benatar's argument was going to be. At least Alex kept it interesting with his hypotheticals.
Super interesting stuff. My wife and are childless for a lot of the reasons discussed
Respect to you and your wife, sir
are the two of you enjoying life?
@@AI3Dorinte yes indeedy :)
How do you feel about the fact that the future will be inherited by the descendants of people who didn't believe in these views?
@@aronchai I don't care specifically about that, but I like the idea that more people choose not to have children, and therefore create less human pressure on the planet.
I think there is a non-freewill argument here. i.e. most people believe they want/should have children, largely driven by reproductive drives. For whatever reason, I "choose" not to want to have children. Most people will not have that choice.
This deserves a second conversation after all these years
Seems you’re talking past each other on the axiological asymmetry bit. Maybe the example to go to to tease out the disagreement is the case of the baby who will experience net pleasure in its life - David is committed to saying it’s still wrong to bring it into existence whereas you aren’t. Maybe you do later on but there’s a few frustrating minutes where no progress is being made. Great interview though :))
Hard to get passed the consent argument. If you can, it's still hard to judge wether it's worth the risk.
@@mindlander Yes Alex does say this at about the 31:00 mark. It's incredibly frustrating to see the professor not acknowledging Alex's question which he puts so well as always. I would have lost my temper after reframing the question three or four times!
@YexaC Sounded like they covered the same ground to me. JP made most of the same main points Alex made in his debate, and Benetar gave his speil. He even complained about Alex not being focused enough and jumping to different questions improperly lol He said the exact same thing to Peterson. Only difference was the tone. Benetar seemed quite a bit more frustrated with JP. But in terms of substance, not very different. Though i still have another 15 minutes or so to watch and i have been doing chores while listening so idk whatever
@John Toas Such a silly comment. You should promote laughter as a cancer treatment. It does wonders I heard.
John Toas SiMP.
Suffering and pleasure are subjective for each individual (and most animals) based on their own personal experiences. A conscious being born with a defect doesn't know what they are missing (or have gained) from that defect or how a 'normal' being of the same species feels in comparison.
More specifically, my normal for thirty seven years of my life was being able to walk and run and hike whenever I wanted. Back then before my cancer I would have thought my current life of hobbling along unable to run more than a few steps if my life depended on it would've been soul crushing. Fortunately animals through some evolutionary trait are capable of adapting not only changing environments, but also to the changes within our own bodies. Now nearly fifteen years later my range of pain endurance is far greater than it was, my ability to derive pleasure from mundane things I used to overlook is also far greater. I am not depressed nearly to the extent of what I thought I would be, merely briefly saddened occasionally.
Given this understanding, I cannot agree that there is an inherent net suffering as compared to pleasure. I could however do an imagination thought experiment like Einstein has been said to have done, coming to the conclusion that if I had only lived in a three by eight cell my entire life, I wouldn't know any experience where that would be less than normal in my range of suffering and pleasure. I an also imagine a scenario where a person of monetary and social privilege might get into a situation of having some of their privilege removed where they would become depressed enough to contemplate suicide, even though folk like myself when I was young would have loved to be in that position. Eating lobster once or twice a year can be considered a delicacy, eat it for dinner over a hundred times a year and the lobster dinner is just another dinner.
If the good professor truly believes he is suffering (& therefore every other conscious being should be too), maybe he should get checked by a neurologist or psychiatrist for borderline clinical depression. It is my understanding that people with clinical depression do not have this adaptive feature set to the same extent as 'normals'.
Good point
I'm honestly in the opposite side of the spectrum to me life is so good and so worth living that I see being alive as a possitive good.
@Peace Prevails Atheists should not ignore the following truths, regarding the source of evil, respectively why here is not Heaven:
God/Jesus is not a dictator, but the opposite. That is why this reality (this Universe) has been created intentionally so that freedom to be offered 100%.
Most unbelievers of the truth do not know the *"Parable of the weeds".* The fallen angels have created all the evil living things such as: parasites, viruses, bad bacteria ..., besides all insects and animals that kill other insects or animals, also the bad instincts in humans (the reptilian brain), by altering our DNA (since the "apple" event mentioned in the Bible). *Initially all insects, animals etc. were feeding only with plants (plants products, such as fruits, nectar, seeds etc.).*
Humans had to continue living after betraying the Creator, by listening to His enemy, Satan, who is actually the god of this world, in a Creation corrupted by the fallen angels, after the Creator "has abandoned" this planet to let us see how evil, humans without God/Jesus, can be. We see this everyday and suffer the bad consequences of the stupid=evil people's deeds, tools of Satan. The fallen angels, being sadistic, have altered the DNA of most living things (including us) to do as default both: reproduce uncontrollably (as much as they can) and fight (kill) each other. Unfortunately, they love to see living things suffering, especially human beings suffering.
The Bible mentions clearly that Satan is the god of this world (for example in Corinthians). Therefore, all havoc, all stupidity=evilness, respectively all the useless suffering etc. and immorality/promiscuity are sustained by the fallen angels, ruled by Satan. We still can live and even be happy sometimes, in this short earthly life, because of God's mercy and love for us, which keeps some limitations for the fallen angels, otherwise Apocalypse will happen.
*The fallen angels want to destroy us since our conception (actually, all the time in any way possible). That is why they make us suffer, as much as possible, by using our stupidity and the stupidity of the other people around us.*
Satan, the one who deceives the whole world (Rev. 12:9), wants to corrupt, pervert, and twist everything what God has made.
Anyone should know already the main commandment from Jesus Christ (the human form of Divinity), *besides to love / respect our Heavenly Father, to love / respect (care for) the other humans as we love / respect (care for) ourselves, besides the 10 commandments. Also the commandment from God to not use freedom wrongly (for evil), **_"For it is God’s will that by doing good you should silence the ignorance of foolish men. Live in freedom, but do not use your freedom as a cover-up for evil; live as servants of God."_** 1* Peter 2,15 *In addition, God (the Creator) is perfect. **_"Be perfect therefore, as your Heavenly Father is perfect"_* Matthew 5, 48
*All the parts that contradict the above truths are alterations done by the tools of Satan, over the last about 2000 years, to manipulate humans.*
Satan, who is the god of this world (as mentioned in 2 Corinthians 4, 4), has deceived too many people, unfortunately.
*Most unbelievers fight against the truth because they want to remain able to continue with their bad addictions.*
Demons are glad whenever we are stupid enough to sin, to produce useless suffering (any damage) to others and to ourselves, to lose our holiness, to not be forgiven/saved anymore, in this way they gaining our soul in hell.
Not all humans who ever lived on Earth had knowledge about the truth from the Bible.
*Our deeds matter* (are the most important for saving our immortal soul) not the labels assigned to us, such as: Atheists, Christians, Muslims, Jews, Hindu... *_"For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive his due for the things done in the body, whether good or bad."_* 2 Corinthians 5, 10
_"O foolish man, do you want evidence that faith without deeds is worthless?"_ James 2, 20
_"In the same way, faith by itself, if it does not prove itself with actions, is dead."_ James 2, 17
_"You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone."_ James 2, 24
*_"For it is God’s will that by doing good you should silence the ignorance of foolish men. Live in freedom, but do not use your freedom as a cover-up for evil; live as servants of God."_* 1 Peter 2,15
In addition, Jesus Christ has warned us: _"Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; _*_depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’"_* Matthew 7, 21-23
Watch entirely and carefully the following two testimonies (those two men tell the truth):
"NDE- ATHEIST PROFESSOR (Berkeley Grad) dies, sees HELL! Best testimony EVER! Howard Storm Interview".
"Man Sees Unthinkable Horrors in Hell - Christians Being Tortured! (Mario Martinez)".
Therefore, the believing of the truth revealed by God/Jesus will help/convince/determine... you to always strive to do only good for the rest of your earthly life, to be much easier for you at the Judgment, to go into Heaven before many others, to never taste hell, to be more loved by Divinity, but *ALL humans will be judged for their deeds* (watch entirely those two videos mentioned above).
Someone keeps deleting my explanatory message about the deceiving done by Satan. I will post only the beginning of it, maybe it will not be removed again.
_"Satan, who is the god of this world, has blinded the minds of those who don't believe."_ 2 Corinthians 4, 4
_Satan, the one who deceives the whole world (Rev. 12:9), wants to corrupt, pervert, and twist everything what God has made._
I will try to post the next parts of it in smaller messages to not be deleted again by that "someone".
However, Satan has been already stopped, but we live in our time and that is why mankind has to live until we arrive to that moment of Apocalypse (when Satan and all the fallen angels are defeated, in our perception/time). That is why the Bible has exact prophecies, like the followings listed below:
@Peace Prevails This is the third smaller message / part from the one which has been deleted (hopefully these smaller ones will not be deleted):
- The future will be like in the days of Sodom. Luke 17, 28-30 This is exactly what we see happening today with gay marriage laws and strong public support for the homosexual lifestyle.
- People will deny that GOD created the universe. 2 Peter 3:3-9 This is exactly what we see happening. Atheists are now claiming that the universe created itself out of nothing.
@Peace Prevails Next smaller part:
- The message of the Gospel will reach all the nations. Matthew 24,14 Remember that Christianity started out with only a few dozen followers. The Bible prophesying that its message will reach the world is proof of its divine inspiration.
- TRUE Christians will be hated and killed just because of their faith. Matthew 24, 9
- The future will become frightening. Luke 21, 26 (just few examples: the global warming terrific effects, the third world war final preparations, Corona virus etc.)
It takes pure logic and compassion to have this philosophical position of life.
Uh, no - it is a very fallacious and ignorant position.
You know, if you wanted somebody to pat your back, just say so. You don't need to do it yourself.
i have feeling you have to be really rigorous as antinatalist in your poursuit of compassion if not you are huge hipocrat and i think most antinatalist are hipocrats in that regards
no.
This was such an insightful discussion!
The followup is crucial to hear.
Thank you !
This will be an interesting conversation to listen to. Keep it up my dude
David Benatar explained it well. Couldn't agree more.
Life = some form of suffering. Pain/suffering is subjective.
To create life, you have created death.
Death is part of life get over it and yourself
A need machine that spreads pain and confusion wherever it goes, and we've spent the last two thousand years trying to fix nature's pathetic "creation". It's time to let it end. Life is the cancer of the universe.
E. M. Cioran Are you much fun at parties ?
How is pain subjective 😶 ?
I think it's strange to come to the conclusion that you know people have more suffering in their life than happiness, even though they might say otherwise and might say that they are glad that they lived their life. It reminds me of Jordan Peterson when he says "Life is about suffering", and I think it would be just as correct to say that "Life is about happiness". In the end it only says something about the person who makes the statement and how they experience life themselves.
True. Its simply immoral to force existence on another. No matter the outcome (which is not well proven to be good.)
@@mindlander But we wouldn't exist if everyone thought that way. No one would. It's just impossible for people to have a say in the matter for whether their existence gets to begin or not.
So why do you think it's immoral? Do you think it's because it's safe to assume that the average life has more suffering than pleasure/happiness or well-being?
@@Kanzu999 if you care at all about this, you should think about it just a little bit. You are correct to say no one would exist.
@@mindlander In your first reply you mentioned that it's immoral no matter the outcome. If we imagine a case where we are well informed, and we can expect a future child to lead a good life if they are brought to this world, and they are brought to the world and leads a good life, where is the immorality? Can you elaborate on that?
@@Kanzu999 first, you can't know that. Second, a good life does not necessarily mean a happy life. Rich people are miserable and commit suicide all the time.
I save most of Alex videos for future references when discussing atheism with Christians and Muslims, the proselytizing religions. There is a cornucopia of misinformation about atheism out there and Alex is particularly well informed which informs me with very useful information I use to debunk arguments about what atheism is defined by the religious. Good job bud, keep it up because we need desperately a voice of reason like yours
It's a wonderful work you're doing Alex. Bringing Benatar is definitely a high on this show. I've listened to his last discuss with Jordan Peterson but that's about 3 years ago, so it's wonderful to hear him again on one of my favorite podcasts. He's sort of a hero to me.
The antinatalist podcast made a video with him recently
@John Toas So what's your justification for imposing suffering and death on all future generations, John?
ALEX YOU ARE THE BEST! THANK YOU FOR THIS AND PLEASE TRY TO GET HIM ON AGAIN FOR A PART 2!
JUST READ THAT THERES A PART 2. PART 3 NEXT IF YOU CAN MAKE IT HAPPEN!
Even being lucky and privileged I have never saw life as a net positive for myself. I honestly never got why people are so hype to be alive. It's MOSTLY tedious. And the happiest I've ever felt isn't worth the worst I've ever felt. I'd have chosen not to be born looking back lol. I'm to scared to end it tho so I just suck it up
The inevitable end point of atheism eh
I'm an atheist but I massively disagree with you, it is literally hard baked into you biologically to survive so your claim just seems silly to me.
@@conehead4133 might seem silly but that doesn't mean it's not true. Not all people feel the same. Maybe a disorder on my part who knwos
i think at the end of the day, in the grand scheme of things, life is meaningless.
because of that i appreciate life and shit. it dosen't matter anyway, so i just try and enjoy it.
I'm very glad I found your channel, Alex. Your rationality is inspiring! Thank you!
To me, Whatever happens, happens, but I will not put another human being on this planet and condemn him/her to the pains and horrors of life.
The first two decades of life are fun, but after that, life is shitty for almost everyone.
You have to be really really lucky to lead a life devoid of any painful situations in life.
Given those odds, it's definitely morally wrong to reproduce.
You're absolutely right. The real tragedy is how few people will acknowledge this.
The basic is to understand suffering. Is suffering actually an inherent aspect of life? That is not an idealistic question, but one which comes from actuality itself. Suffering has few causes, from ignorance, to comparison, to total self indulgence.
Ignorance is my preferred word, as it sums up every aspect of suffering. From wandering around in a daze and stubbing one's toe, to endlessly reacting emotionally to triviality of all sorts due to a desire for control, to grief to heartbreak, etc. If we look at our lives, we see we are indeed the origin of our own suffering.
That is not denying aspects of purely physical pain, as in toothache, which is usually a result of ignorance again, neglecting to feed the body the correct nutrients, not cleaning the teeth, etc. Sure, we can break a bone, and that may or may not hurt, but is that really a cause of suffering? It's the same with so many so-called diseases or illnesses, which are a direct result of accumulated years of neglect due to ignorance; dementia, heart disease, diabetes, MS, ME, parkinson's, etc... and yes, that may indeed be the result of parental/ancestral ignorance too.
There really is no cause of suffering unless we make our own suffering. I may be immobile for whatever reason, that does not mean I have to suffer. I may have no money, that does not mean I have to suffer. I may not have a Rolls Royce and drive an old Fiat 500, that does not mean I have to suffer. Someone close has just died, that does not mean I have to suffer. I may be imprisoned, but that does not mean I have to suffer.
As for the child issue. I would consider it cruel to have a child if I considered life to be purely physical, and for us to be mere machines as some believe. All suffering is optional and entirely needless.
EDIT: After listening further, I realize that this is the argument which Alex toys with for the next 12 minutes. I'm amazed by the way that Benatar dances around this point, despite Alex's highly articulate statements and restatements of the objection.
My response to the scenario that David Benatar presents around 21:50 is that yes, it's immoral to reproduce if you have good reason to believe that their life will be utterly miserable. However, it's also immoral to avoid reproduction if you have good reason to believe that their life will be good. This is why I find his axiological asymmetry argument unconvincing.
It's not immoral to avoid reproduction if you have good reason to believe they'll have a good life. "Good reason" isn't sound logic, and "good reason" isn't certainty - if you don't have an impossible level of certainty, you risk bringing a child into the world who has a risk of suffering; you're playing Russian roulette. The only way to win is to not play.
@@acex222what an coward attitude. Dont Play cause you might Lose. Why do you live on? You might will suffer tomorow. Isnt it better not to risk it?
@@frankweiss335 you always, definitively lose
@@acex222 what is your Definition of loosing?
@@acex222Determining, with a high amount of logic and certainty, that the child will be happy, even though it’s not completely certain or even if the likelihood of the child being unhappy is there to a smaller degree, is good enough (given more specific likelihoods of the amount of happiness and unhappiness that is at stake as well). The upsides are greater than the downsides, so it’s worth it.
My primary objection with Professor Benatars argument is the assumption that life has any purpose other than... to exist.
@Survivalist395 Nor did I say, he said anything about purpose. I do accept however, my word choice failed to adequately articulate my position.
As I understand it, Professor Benstars' argument is based on non existence in order to avoid suffering. In my opinion, if existence is not just the primary but (only) objective, all considerations after the subject is said to exist, may be disregarded. Especially subjective considerations such as suffering or the lack there of.
Existence is part of the universal equation and well beyond the ethical regard or reproach of those that equate to nothing more than its variables.
But he never said this. He acknowledges that life is meaningless. What he is discussing is the value of existence for the individual brought into existence.
I can’t formulate a short and simple answer as to why, but I have a deep knee-jerk reaction to such ideas as: better not to exist than exist.
The ideology that we would be better to simply not exist haunts a part of me to my core. How could a human being rationalise such an idea and want to project that idea upon other people.
There are circumstances where I’d prefer not to exist, that I can accept. But it seems to go against the very human instinct that got us to the moon. To push on despite adversity. In an age where suffering is at its lowest, it’s your duty to stand on the shoulders of your ancestors, who suffered so much so you could be here, and scream defiance against such an idea.
The idea seems weak and there’s nothing wrong with coming to that conclusion. But to try and convince others it’s morale to not have kids is immoral IMO.
Exactly. The entire argument has innumerable flaws. One cannot think of asking for "consent" from a non-existent entity. Extreme suffering had reduced over time. The argument also places a higher value to suffering, and the so called asymmetry is taken to be a fact. I don't think the absence of happiness and progress is good, even if nobody experiences that. Glad to see sensible people here. Hope you have a great day!
your logical fallacy is appeal to emotion. You attempted to manipulate an emotional response in place of a valid or compelling argument.
"it is your duty to stand on the shoulders of your ancestors", what is that supposed to mean anyway? I see, logical fallacy. stop watching disney movies.
also just because you cannot get consent does not mean you do not need it.
This "muh ancestors" argument is always the last bullet pro-natalists have in their guns. Who gives a shit about our ancestors ? They're dead and buried and are not going to pad me on the back for anything.
@@gvis3880 exactly, not only are they already dead, whatever they did, they did not do it thinking about liquidloue. they could not care less about liquidloue or anyone from the future that does not exist. if they did anything was to improve their current situation, not to save a non existent someone from the future. people are really selfish by nature. we owe nothing to the long gone people from the past, we owe nothing to no one. we just appear here, without our consent, and then they want to make you think you owe what to who the F who? that sounds pretty logical.
regarding the consent of the non existent, well, apparently justin hau thinks is not needed because they do not exist. the fact you cannot get consent does not mean you do not need it. if we use that logic, that means, anyone can have sex with a person that is unconscious because, unable to get consent, yolo. but for some reason that is considered bad, i wonder why.
there are no lines of people waiting and begging to be born. the minute someone decide to force existence, for sure you will have someone here that never asked or begged to come to this place. you will have someone here that will be directly affected by your unilateral decision. you will be deciding everything for that person, you will be gambling with that person's well being. a gamble in which you lose nothing but, the other person, can lose everything. and all for what? for what exactly? so that they can stand on the shoulders of their ancestors (whatever that means)?? so that they can admire a sunset?? if they are not born blind that is. no one is begging to come to this place.
regarding the, uh, oh, the suffering is greatly reduced, does that mean that percentage of the population that is suffering, living under a bridge, eating shit.... does not matter? fuck them right? as long as you are not part of that percentage, life if wonderful and great.Feel free to ignore the suffering of the minority. No different from what you do every day while peddling your instagram lifestyles & proclaiming “positive vibes only”. Ignoring them is how you can tell yourselves that life is “good”.
@@justinhau7796 I guess we should let sadist people kill other people because that make them self happy
Love you CosmicSkeptic! Keep doing your thing it makes for phenomenal philosophical content.
It's honestly quite frightening how quickly people dismiss what David says and how adamantly they'll defend having children as if it's actually immoral not to. Very strange.
Brainwashed and irrational people
Perhaps it's because David's arguments are weak and when put under scrutiny he just deflects every time or just straight up says "nah, I feel like what I think is true" without elaborating. It's wild how utilitarian his views are while claiming they aren't.
I disagree with some points but im agnostic on his end point. There are fairly good pushbacks (Alex levels many) but most responses against benatar seem to be childish and are made by people that seem to have no understanding of his points.
How on earth is it strange behavior? Most biological organisms including humans are hardwired to want to reproduce. Definitionally, it’s a quite normal behavior and or line of thought
It's because biologically we all know that discouraging child baring is disadvantageous to the continuation of the species so claiming it to be immoral is essentially an attack on our very own existence it's no simple philosophical discussion about bread and butter we are talking about life itself here.
I really don't care about the suffering vs pleasure argument. The problem is that existence is involuntary. I did not consent to my own existence. I cannot ask my potential child if they want to exist. Thats why I am an antinatalist.
This is an interesting point because it has caused me to have vehement arguments with my sister. Once you are born, you can either consent or not consent to your birth. If you consent, no rights have been violated. If you do not consent, then your right has been violated.
However, if you are never born, there is no being to consent or non-consent. A non-being cannot not consent to not being born (if you catch my drift).
I have two questions about this argument, though. Can you consent retroactively to something? At the moment of your conception, were any rights violated if you were a non-being at that very moment?
The other question I have is how to talk to people who won't entertain the counterfactual, the idea of not existing. My sister contends that she is alive now and wants to be, so not bringing her into existence would be a wrong. How would you respond to such a position?
I can answer the asymmetry: you can always regret being born but you can never regret not existing because you didn't exist in the first place
Also, that was good point about it. If you think NOT creating someone deprives them of pleasure AND that is a bad thing, how can you justify not creating as many people as possible? So you either accept the asymmetry that deprivation of pleasure on potential existence is neutral and that deprivation of harm on potential existence is good, OR you realize you've done wrong by not reproducing to the maximum
Counterpoint to that statement: It would be that reproducing past a certain point would lead to an increase in suffering for the potential person because of a decline in resources. The correct answer would be reproduce to the largest amount that the new individuals would receive a certain quality in life.
Great discussion!
I live 5 km from the University of Cape Town. I‘ve unfortunately never gotten to meet Benatar...
I'm almost grateful to those who are nihilistic towards life in the comments section because your lack of inspiration fills me with resolve to bare the pain I shall face in the future and fills me with courage that I shall bare it successfully for I have something you all lack; hope.
I waited for new episode, and this looks like its gonna be great
life is all about coping and telling yourself how right and awesome it is to be alive
I would say, just based on a lifetime of experience, that most pain in life is caused by others forcing us to live their preconceived way. If we were truly free, I feel we would all have a MORE happy life than we currently do. Just my opinion of course.
I just can't get over the fact how handsome you are!
Looks kinda ill, would benefit from a Philly cheese steak sub
Why are you gay?
I agree, he does have a number of attractive traits.
April Cox Nah he's just a pasty brit
@@SoWhosGae
Who's also in quarantine. Lockdown can't be doing any of us any good other than the obvious good it's doing more generally.
I considered antinatalism for a while, but in my personal opinion, all the suffering in the world was something no one else asked for either, and all sorts of people have done amazing things in spite of their suffering--and they have helped alleviate the suffering of others. It's a personal choice, and I have no problem with others choosing the opposite side of mine.
U suffer because u weak dats set most of the ppl deal with it
"all the suffering in the world was something no one else asked for either", yes but that is no justification for why it is ok to continue to perpetuate the same suffering. Just because everyone else in your society owns slaves does not justify you continuing the suffering it causes. When someone has a child, no matter how much you may because or intend to give them the best possible life, you have absolutely no idea if that is going to happen. You don't know that as you walk out of the hospital you could be hit by a car, your child put up for adoption, and given to abusive adoptive parents who cause them to commit suicide, or a near infinite host of unimaginable possibilities which are entirely out of your control. And to take that risk in a world with increasing issues such as global warming, wealth inequality etc, it is far more likely they will suffer than not. You are forcing someone to potentially go through something bad when there is absolutely no reason for them to.
And your justification is "well I never asked to suffer, so therefore I can perpetuate the suffering"? Or that because there is the potential that it will bring someone something good, it is worth taking the risk of causing them harm? No. You would not accept that justification when applied to existing humans, so why does it justify bringing someone into existence? Unless you believe it is ok to force something upon someone without their consent, just because you believe there is a chance it might be good for them?
Antinatalism seems to presuppose that existence is a choice. Nobody asked to be born, yet we all were. No other animal on the planet would as these kinds of questions because they know that suffering is just necessary to existence.
The very idea that suffering can be avoided was invented by humans so spoiled by societal decadence and so devoid of self reflection that they came to believe such a thing is possible.
The people who don't exist don't factor into the equation because they don't exist. There's no "avoided suffering" just avoided existence.
How do you compare an amount of suffering to an amount of pleasure and say which one is greater than the other?
They are more like apples and oranges, not apples and negative apples.
Or maybe even more like different sorts of apples and different sorts of oranges.
Also one could argue that life is not a pursuit of pleasure but a pursuit of meaning (e.g. as per Viktor Frankl).
In that case one would prefer to live as long as they see meaning in their life despite all the suffering.
And that suffering can only be an obstacle to the meaning, not some anti-meaning that negates all meaning if there's more of it.
@Ya Tink sure, non-existence is a neutral choice. It's just not clear that existence is a negative.
"Pleasure is never as pleasant as we expected it to be and pain is always more painful. The pain in the world always outweighs the pleasure. If you don't believe it, compare the respective feelings of two animals, one of which is eating the other."
Yes! Please do more of these podcasts. This was an excelent conversation, thank you
Both antinatalist and the Epicurean view of death can be related to a question of consent. That, even if it is better to die than live, you still shouldn't kill someone without their consent. Whereas all people are forced to exist without giving consent.
(But yes, I agree with you that death being neutral + better to avoid future suffering = pro painless suicide)
I'm an antinatalist, yet there was a time when I saw the value of me being born. The latest years of my mother's life I took care for her. Had I not been born, she would have spend them much more miserable.
I fulfilled the goal of my life, that was: to outlive my parents. Although I miss them, my life is easier now, because that responsibility isn't there anymore.
That's something I hadn't considered, thank you for sharing that perspective.
On the flip side of your situation - my mother is an abusive alcoholic and because of that she will die alone and miserable if it's left up to me.
So, there has never been and will never be value to my existence.
Stop falling for the illusion of the flesh, the flesh is not the truth.
Sorry for your loss dude.
@@Othique What do you mean by: "value to my existence"
Way too many unjustified assertions, maybe there are justifications which couldn't be explored within 1 hour, however I found this entirely unconvincing. Definitely dealing with interesting questions, but I'm extremely unsatisfied by the assertions and answers. I'll give a brief example, Alex asked if painful extermination could be good because it ends far more future suffering, this is a hypothetical question which was rejected because we can't be certain that humans know this. The entire point of a hypothetical like this is to evaluate the morality within a specific scenario, if you think the hypothetical is too vague, fair enough, ask to change the premises, but you can't plead ignorance within a hypothetical which both of you control entirely. This did not hold up to scrutiny within this interview.
100%. Benatar was clearly uncomfortable with this hypothetical and dodged like a pro boxer.
I think there is a difference between pain and suffering. suffering is unnecessarily painful in one way or another. pain is an informational tool to let us know there is a problem.
They are used interchangeably in this case. But yes, suffering would be the better word to use.