Why Natalism is Fundamentalism (Logical Consistency of Anti-Natalism)

[@lovethyneibor22736]

It seems like people who don't have kids usually have bigger brain than people who have kids 😢

[@webernprophecies]

Better looking, bigger brains, more charismatic, great senses of humor, you name it. Anti-natalists have it all. They make the perfect mates!

[@lovethyneibor22736]

@@webernprophecies yes

[@webernprophecies]

No, though, we shouldn't reproduce/mate with anti-natalists. That is, anti-natalists reproducing to produce more anti-natalists to end natalist reproduction would be... The answer?! My God, what have I done/argued... If I promote anti-natalism, which can only promote the disappearance of the logical+ethical human minority, and which will never be embraced wholly by humanity... Oh well. It'll all be over soon enough.

[@lovethyneibor22736]

@@webernprophecies or ... just reproduce in another dimension where it is better than here on earth

[@turtleanton6539]

Faxx

[@judithpriestess7781]

"This is just obvious shit..." Is my favorite yet (likely) most ineffective "argument" for Antinatalism. I'm grateful for whatever logic, predisposition to accepting the truth that I inherently have because it really just effortlessly makes sense to me.

[@bsatyam]

Benatar has written some great stuff. I am yet to read "The Human Predicament". As you rightly pointed out, humanity will inevitably go extinct at some point. There's no denying that fact. While it seems that life is incredibly rare and were all life on earth should go extinct (whether deliberate or indeliberate), suffering would end. This is a fallacy. Sentient life capable of suffering definitely will remerge, given the vastness of our universe and that the laws of physics allow life despite the 2nd law of thermodynamics because, it turns out, is a MORE efficient way of incresing entropy! I like to imagine that there was possibly at least one earth-like planet with intelligent aliens capable of reasoning having gone extinct due to discovering the anti-natalist position, yet here we are. It might seem incredibly tempting to deny this simply on an evidence basis, but realize that there is no way to know for sure that this is not the case. I am not making a scientific arguement which is falsifiable, but a highly likely possibility from what I know. So in summary, while I logically agree with the anti-natalist position, I don't think it's a "solution" of any kind. In my view, I much prefer the truth that pain and suffering is inevitable, whether as a human or an animal or a plant, on earth or some other planet. As long as the laws of the universe allow for sufficient complexity so that self-organizing systems capable of self-reference can emerge, there will be sentient life having an experience, whether good or bad. You cannot escape this fact. The only way you can 'escape' this is by becoming content with it, then it seems to not be a problem anymore. PS: I forgot to mention this but very interesting take! Looking at it mathematically.

[@webernprophecies]

@@bsatyam I agree with much of what you said. My own assumption is that existence is a "meta-fractal", and that there are infinite re-instantiations of unknowably vast causality patterns/flows. Thus, there is no escaping the fractal at any scaleless instantiation of the whole, indeed. But this is an unfalsifiable claim, right. The probability of life either re-emerging or existing parallel to our own (dimensionally, in another "branchial space" of the "ruliad", say, to use Wolfram's framework) seems very high to me as well. The Big Bang as a singularity seems awfully similar to the idea of an inverse Black Hole, and "naked singularities" may exist all over the universe, for all we know, regurgitating the stuff of universes into further emergent self-referential consciousness nodes. Cosmic loops seem very probable! And, indeed, if so, there is no escaping this overall pattern. BUT... :) It's all in the math. The mathematical approach is the only appropriate approach, with anti-natalism (or any scientific question, of course). It is a counting problem. It is less versus more. 1 person > 0 people. Anti-natalism is a "solution" to the problem of conscious suffering in the knowable immediate sense, as much as slaying a sabertooth tiger charging at you is an immediate solution to the problem of not wanting to be mauled to death by that animal. That is, your big-picture claim pertains to all facets of existence and thus to all proposed problem-solving. If anti-natalism isn't a "solution" in the obvious knowable, immediate sense of this counting problem (fewer unsolvable problems is better than more unsolvable problems), then neither is, say, hitting the brake to avoid colliding with another car a solution to not getting in a car accident. After all, hitting the brake doesn't limit the probability of the re-emergence of life and cars and traffic and the re-presentation of this problem. But it does keep you from getting in a car accident in the here and now. This applies to anything. Why not actively make your life worse, after all, if there's no avoiding the probability of the infinite re-emergence of conscious suffering? Anti-natalism is a brake, basically. Not a "fix". The earlier earthly humans go extinct, the sooner there will cease (for now) to be all forms of earthly human problems. If you consider Nietzsche's argument regarding eternal recurrence: if we are in an actual loop, existentially, then this is only all the more reason to limit the length of horrid suffering in the loop iteration. Hunter-gatherer humans had around 15,000 years of, in some cases, pretty decent ways of life on earth. We're rapidly manifesting more and more outright intolerable hell on earth. Would we want to exist in a loop where humans drag on this hellish interval as long as possible, or where we can start looping back to "the good stuff" as soon as possible? You feel me? It is always a good idea to not make life as awful as it can possibly be, I find.

[@bsatyam]

​@@webernprophecies I agree with your analogy, about it being a brake and not a 'fix'. Sure, it makes sense to look at problems in the context of differing time scales. But my claim about the re-emergence of life is not that far off from the point of view of the subjective. There is no such thing as experiencing non-existence, which seems obvious but it's implications are wild.

[@NiaEsto]

I have thought of this very argument you present. I would say the indeterminate is really ♾️ all over again although we call it indeterminate as a solution. By this argument it is very easy to be an antinatalist. There is no need to explain it further although there will be some in the tribe that will flock to claim your assumptions incorrect or some other folly that tickles their feathers. Excellent video🎉

[@webernprophecies]

Thanks for sharing your thoughts! Encountering anyone who understands these things is like encountering long-lost relatives. "Hey! This shit, am I right?"

[@veganequilibrium7866]

What about the negative of wild animals suffering that could be mitigated by human existence?

[@webernprophecies]

@@veganequilibrium7866 I think the fact that humans are the main causal factor for the present/on-going 6th Mass Extinction event (and the tidal wave of suffering involved) has to be considered. Our help comes at a considerable price. Also, the anti-natalist realization is available to all beings, even (in a sense) single cells (which are capable of suiciding and reproduction avoidance). But I'm all for humans aiding other animals to the extent this is possible.

[@veganequilibrium7866]

@@webernprophecies the mass extinction my actually be decreasing the disutility. There is an idea that humans are the only ones that can solve the problem of wild animals suffering and that there will just be more of it if humans are gone. Perhaps it is possible for some animals to unalive themselves but the majority of animals can't make the decision to go extinct

[@webernprophecies]

@@veganequilibrium7866 Do you mean "solve the problem of suffering" in the sense of cause-extinction? That humans are driving everything on earth to extinction and therefore humans should be reproduced to ensure that we take out all other forms of earthly suffering with us? We have to delineate "S-risk" (suffering risk) and "X-risk" (exstinction risk) with such considerations. There are high S-risk forms of extinction, and low S-risk forms. Extinction, once realized, implies zero S-risk, but the path toward it matters. We should also consider: (1) global extinction is inevitable, regardless, and (2) there are many much more efficient ways of pursuing that as a low S-risk goal? Say, a "benevolent world exploder"? The utility of humans as far as "solving the problem of suffering" is deeply suspect, even in the extinction causing sense, in that we tend to manifest horrible (not peaceful, suffering-minimizing) forms of extinction. We have to at least consider the suffering caused by humans, anyway. I would support a human-realized benevolent world explosion, in theory, but that seems impossible in practice, sadly. Anti-natalism is the nearest option. One could invert your argument, as well, considering that non-humans have proven collectively capable of more sustainable ways of life, in saying that humans would need the stewardship-by-example of the very animals we are driving extinct to justify our own going-on (we would have to learn from them, imitating their examples). If our going-on implies their extinction, though, then our going-on is aimless, unsustainable anyway.

[@drinkwater9891]

trust yo tubers to complicate something so basic lol, but rock on brother im sure your formulae are valuable for some reason or the other

[@turtleanton6539]

Yes😊😊😊🎉

[@Mdeil20]

I've made the choice to have more children.

[@Dr.TejasviJhamb]

Your future kids are the victim of your choice.

[@webernprophecies]

@@Mdeil20 I can't stop you. You're only human, doing as programmed. Their suffering is your illusory relief, etc.

[@bsatyam]

@@webernprophecies So are you, only human, doing as YOU were programmed to do. So am I.

[@webernprophecies]

@@bsatyam indeed! 🍻

[@NiekLodewijkx]

Drugs are bad, m'okay

[@webernprophecies]

F**k you, G*d. In the a**, mout*, and c*nt. But seriously... Without disease to begin with, there is no need for a cure. Anti-Natalism = Absolute Drug Prevention Natalism = Meth-Fueled Blood Orgies, etc. (But that's what we're into. Humans.)

[@morbloe4559]

Survival of the fittest

[@webernprophecies]

"Reproductive fitness"--what an evolutionary biologist means by "fit"--simply means number of reproductions, nothing more. Meaning, the "fit" die and go extinct the same as the "unfit", and in fact, are more likely to die tragic, untimely deaths due to things like "antagonistic pleitropy". There is no such thing as "survival", ultimately. "Survival of the fittest" as a competitive principle makes no sense. Whoever thinks they are surviving due to their fitness is deluded and, in reality, dying.

[@TheFettuck]

@@webernprophecies Stop being a hypocrite! There is no "survival" according to your own logic because you obviously don't want to admit that you are still relying on the existence of natalists for your own survival.

[@aetqo3u6]

This video doesn't really seem coherent - you go back and forth between different claims without making a clear argument, just citing different individual claims and generalizing them to natalism in some vague sense. So, could you concisely explain the main point/argument of the video? What is logically inconsistent about natalism (having kids)? Frankly I'd like a clear definition of what that even is to you - please avoid equivocating between natalism as 'the observation that people reproduce,' and 'a belief system (of sorts, you didn't specify)' as you did in the video.

[@webernprophecies]

@@aetqo3u6 Sure thing. (I dare say your question is itself rather vague, but that's fine.) Reproduction for humans amounts to forcing a being into existence knowing they will suffer and die, without their consent, and then accepting little to no responsibility for this. If one is willing to defend cruelty on the grounds that it's worth distracting one's self from one's own misery by causing another being to suffer and/or die...sure, then natalism makes sense. However, as I say in the video, this is generally not what people actually say or consciously think. Officially, culturally, this isn't what anybody says without being scorned. Instead folks think/say things like: "I just felt like it's the right time to have some kids", whatever that means (irrational nonsense). Compassionate adoption makes ethical sense. Reproduction makes no ethical sense. (I'm pretty sure I say in the video that the "belief system" of natalism is premised on the belief that life/reproduction is good, and that it is a form of fundamentalism because it accepts no responsibility to defend this position consistently, and moreover accepts as valid obviously contradictory reasoning? That's what the belief system is, in a nutshell? I thought this much was rather obvious?) more people = more problems (more suffering, more death) less people = less problems no people = no (human, at least) problems many > 1 > 0 0 problems is best. I can be more concise if needed? Four words: life is a mistake. My point regarding transfinite cardinalities is simply that, whatever the perceived negative of non-reproduction may be, reproduction can never overcome this, because it's a limited process that is at most "countably infinite". Meaning, even if we assume that reproduction is "good" and non-reproduction is "bad", reproduction is still futile as a "solution". It's like that meme of the guy trying to mop up the ocean with a single mop and bucket. You dig? Except, in reality, they are causing children to suffer and die, not mopping up water. My point regarding logical consistency is that choosing to reproduce so that there is less suffering and death than there would be otherwise is logically consistent. It actually achieves the intended outcome. It makes sense. Choosing to reproduce for any life-affirming reason is logically inconsistent, as this affirmation does not necessarily extend to the being in question. We don't accept the sex-affirming reasoning of a sexual predator committing abuse against another without their consent. Why would we accept the same reasoning in the case of reproduction? Specifically, the idea that we have to continue to reproduce is contradictory. Reproduction results in more suffering and death, obviously. This does not make sense. Reproduction is a choice--even when coerced, someone is doing the coercing. "Natalism" is choosing to reproduce. "Anti-natalism" is choosing to not reproduce. Any other definitions of these terms seems irrelevant to me. My point regarding natalism being a fundamentalism is that people assert that reproduction is ethically defensible without actually giving any logically convincing defense. There is no rigorous, compelling argument for reproduction. "Natalists"/"breeders"/defenders of child abuse, child slavery, child suffering, child death, these folks simply assert that life is good and ignore the relevant consequentialist problems with this idea. ("Terror Management Theory" gives a compelling, likely account for why this is. Namely, humans are fearful of death and cling to illusory notions of immortality, which includes reproducing one's genetic spellings/inheritance--which does not amount to actually avoiding death; i.e., this clinging is irrational.) I didn't go into this in the video, but the very phrase "having kids" illustrates that reproduction amounts to slavery, also. That one would bring a being into existence without their consent knowing they will suffer and die and then claim to own them as property (not to mention the myriad forms of abuse that extend from this)...this is absurd, ethically. It makes no more sense than the arguments any "slave masters" have made throughout history. I may not be able to intervene into such abuse, try as I might, but one thing I don't have to do is accept the nonsense reasoning of abusers. Also, my channel is dedicated to unusual approaches to the topics I'm interested in. There are many videos covering the basic reasoning behind anti-natalism on youtube otherwise, though. I'd recommend, if you're unfamiliar, checking out: David Benatar's "Better Never to Have Been" (his "asymmetry argument", in particular--which has the defect of not emphasizing the issue of non-consent, as I see it, but it's still a strong argument), and Thomas Ligotti's "Conspiracy Against the Human Race". Schopenhauer makes the essential argument, though "The World As Will And Representation" is absurdly long for no good reason--though I see this as comparable to a Norm Macdonald joke (i.e., its length is darkly funny, a kind of joke). There is a youtuber called "T.Sizzle", a young person who shares very common sensical anti-natalist reasoning. Probably the best people to listen to on this topic would be young women anti-natalists, as they tend to receive the worst abuse for being open about their views. I'd be glad to clarify anything else, just let me know. I think it's worth considering, though, first: a train of extemporaneous thought can be coherent without it necessarily being easy to digest without prior awareness of the ideas discussed. You seem to simply not be aware of certain references, is all. Which is fine. But incoherence would mean I'm saying something illogical that you could actually point out, unambiguously. I don't claim to be the clearest communicator, but not understanding an idea doesn't equate to an argument against an idea. If you read the other exchange below this one, it's the same deal. The person says they reject the video, but they offer no clear objection and no consistent reasoning--which is precisely the point of my video, that this is why natalism is a form of fundamentalism, this reactionary blind faith tendency.

[@aetqo3u6]

@@webernprophecies Okay, thanks for the clarification. I just had trouble keeping track of the video, and text-form is much easier for me to digest than long, informationally-dense audio commentary. I am fairly dispassionate and detached on this issue (partly due to my meta-ethical views) so I'm letting you know I'm not here to antagonize. On coherence - I meant this not in the logical sense, but in the sense that the video didn't seem to have a clear direction at some parts that made it difficult to mentally sketch out what your argument was. I think if you had scripted at least a minimal outline of the points you wanted to make beforehand, and stuck to the bare essential points of the argument, it would've helped a lot in making it digestible. I understand you did this on-the-fly, though. On the definition of natalism - My understanding of the term was that reproduction is morally/ethically permissible, rather than 'good/obligatory.' I define the latter as pro-natalism, which seems rare outside of more political spheres. I'm not sure I actually know anyone who thinks it's (morally) good, merely that it's not morally bad. So this was an instance of definitional drift when I interpreted natalism as a 'belief system.' So no real issue here. ''Whatever the perceived negative of non-reproduction may be, reproduction can never overcome this'' - This is a very strange framing, people just reproduce because they want to, not because they perceive non-reproduction as negative. I don't think that belief (non-reproduction as bad) would be, say, implicit in the act, and don't see any reason for that to be true. They might think that non-reproduction is neutral. While I understand the argument now (thanks to the clarification), it just seems to be arguing against a claim that I've never seen anyone make. ''Choosing to reproduce for any life-affirming reason is logically inconsistent, as this affirmation does not necessarily extend to the being in question.' - It would really depend on what that meant. People might affirm life on the basis of their personal preference for living things and see the reduction of suffering/death as instrumental to maintaining or improving well-being of living things, not ends-in-themselves. In the end, though, these goals are essentially pre-rational intuitions (for both natalists and ANs), so that's bedrock right there. But I also just don't see the inconsistency in affirming life and thus procreating. Reduction of suffering could be instrumental to maintaining life. Death just marks the finity of life, and doesn't seem to obviously contradict its affirmation. ''My point regarding natalism being a fundamentalism is that people assert that reproduction is ethically defensible without actually giving any logically convincing defense. There is no rigorous, compelling argument for reproduction.'' - If we construe natalism as the idea that reproduction is merely permissible, then I don't think there needs to be an argument FOR reproduction. Rather, they would need to defeat the arguments that claim reproduction is wrong. This is under the presumption that actions are permissible (by default) unless they are wrong. Procreation doesn't need a positive case in this situation. But if we construe natalism as the idea that life/reproduction is always good/obligatory, that would need argument, since that'd be a positive claim.

[@webernprophecies]

@@aetqo3u6 Sorry for the delayed response. And thanks for sharing your thoughts. I agree regarding my free-associative lack of focus, certainly. To me, of course, subjectively, my thinking is "focused", but I wouldn't expect others to see it that way. I'm after confessional openness, rather than clarity per se. I'll try to focus, though, on what I see as the main point of disagreement I have with what you said. These convos tend to spiral out into hand-wavvy speculation, unproductively, whereas my intention is to focus everyone's attention on the clear suffering and death of children, point out the obvious, undeniable causal relationship between orgasm (or sperm extraction, artificial extensions of reproduction, etc) in a reproductive context and the suffering and death of children, and, basically, make all males' penises go limp from horror-salience and to convince all females' to be horrified by their "biological clock", rather than acquiesing thoughtlessly. Will I achieve this goal? No, pending statistical miracles. But convincing even one person is a victory, as I see it. "People just reproduce because they want to, not because they perceive non-reproduction to be negative." The first statement is true, indeed, but the second statement contradicts the first. If someone wants to reproduce, then they perceive non-reproduction to be, if only locally, negative, still. If you make a sandwich to eat, you may not have any meta-convictions regarding the universal goodness of sandwiches, fine, but you'd object to someone swatting the sandwich out of your hand. You want the sandwich. You think it's "good". You think not eating it is, to whatever extent, "bad". People do what they do because they think what they do is "good", to some extent, even if this conviction lasts but a moment, unsustainable big picture, even if this is unconscious to some degree. If someone points out to you that, say, the ingredients of your sandwich are contaminated with salmonella, or that a mouse pooped on your sandwich while you weren't looking or whatever, and if knowing this disgusted you, you wouldn't eat the sandwich--pending some locally "good" ulterior reason for doing so. People do what they do because they perceive something preferable, something "good" about any given behavior relative to alternatives. The consequence of reproduction occurs because humans perceive something desirable about the reproductive process. This could mean being only concerned with, say, orgasm, sure, and not being consciously concerned with the extended consequences. But sperm + egg + gestation, etc...oops. An abuser is generally not concerned with the long-term consequences of their actions. But they act on their immediate desire for what they perceive to be locally "good", all the same. More importantly, causality is not necessarily relevant regarding intervening into abuse. People reproduce because they want to just as people commit genocide because they have nothing better to do on a Tuesday, etc. Many Hitler-era Nazis

[@v.a.n.e.]

you are, dear sir, just endlessly confused. you obviously don't know how arguments and critical thinking work; instead of making hasty conclusions, maybe it would be better to devote some of your spare time to developing logic and rational thinking skills. I would also recommend considering changing your diet plan, that will hopefully influence you to stop taking antidepressants.

[@webernprophecies]

@@v.a.n.e. One of the main ways in which rationality "works" is to identify contradictions in pursuit of consistency of thought. Rather than merely declaring things wrong without argument, that is, one would generally have to prove one's claims. Yes? No? If there is illogic in my argument, you ought to be able to identify it directly, rationally. Rather than saying, "You're wrong because you're fat". Yes? No? Or do you subscribe to the Fat=False school of (il)logic?

[@v.a.n.e.]

sorry, I couldn't watch to the end. you make big mistakes from the very beginning, and a cursory glance at your notes is only proof of your insufficient education in the field of argumentation. your first mistake was the wrong definition of antinatalism. antinatalism is not a free decision about reproduction, but an active stance against reproduction. most of the anti-natalist arguments are not worth the paper they are written on, and it seems that you are not bothered to present any. your main objection to natalists is -- they are not familiar with or do not acknowledge your definition of natalism! at the same time, you are declaring something that modern science has not yet confirmed, positive infinity can be greater than negative infinity, whatever that means. I am sure that if I continued with the video, I would find much more of your similar brilliant statements. P.S. I never said you're fat. I just drew your attention to the fact that diet can affect mood.

[@webernprophecies]

@@v.a.n.e. To anyone who may be reading this exchange: this is the quality of "argument" you can expect from people "challenging" anti-natalism--i.e., no argumentation whatsoever. This is why natalism is a form of fundamentalism (the point of the video). It is simply asserted presuppositionally as a belief system with no serious defense. Anyway: there is no meaningful difference between "a free [negative] choice regarding reproduction" and being "actively against reproduction". Any instance of someone consciously choosing to not reproduce is an instance of anti-natalism. Whatever difference you assume exists between these notions is illusory, trivial. Natalism, similarly, is very easy to define. It's the opposite: any instance of someone consciously choosing to reproduce. A natalist is very obviously definable by this, no matter what reasoning lead them to their choice. Any definition of "natalism" contrary to this would, again, be trivial, as the consequence of birth is the only relevant factor here. Regarding infinity: I'm referring to set theory (which is closely related to the study of--since you bring it up--logic), and, yes, science has not affirmed the existence of completed infinities and I don't expect it ever will. The point is to analyze the formal consistency/inconsistency of the anti-natalist versus natalist positions in terms of their infinite extensions (infinite reproduction, infinite non-reproduction), hypothetically. You didn't watch the video, as you say, and you don't seem familiar with formal logic, so I don't expect you to follow this argument. However, what I'm saying is fairly obvious to many: you can't overwhelm an uncountable infinity with a countable infinity due to what Cantor demonstrates in his diagonal argument regarding transfinite cardinalities. Also, refer to the "indispensability argument" for a serious treatment of the role of infinities and infinity paradoxes in physics. Also, the "finitist" position, which I take very seriously, does not negate the point of my argument. We can discuss the same argument in terms of finite sets of positive integers for instances of consciously choosing reproduction and negative integers for instances of consciously choosing non-reproduction, and everything I'm saying still holds. The anti-natalist argument is extremely simple: Birth causes suffering and death. Suffering and death are undesirable. Therefore, non-reproduction is desirable. 2 people's suffering and death > 1 person's suffering and death > 0 people's suffering and death Pretty simple. By all means, if you want to challenge this argument, I have no problem with that. But you haven't offered any serious challenge. And yes, I realize you didn't say that I'm fat directly, but (1) what else could you be drawing on to infer what I'm eating, other than my appearance--since nowhere on my channel do I discuss diet? If you're implying that depression or a pessimistic worldview directly indicates poor diet alone, you are yourself very confused about the underlying neurobiology of depression and are committing a cliche fallacy of ignoring the logical consistency of pessimist reasoning by assuming emotional disregulation is the only reason to come to pessimistic conclusions (which is nonsensical); (2) more importantly, you didn't say anything whatsoever as to why my argument is wrong. I'm making a joke as to your absence of a counter-argument and that I may as well conclude you are using a fat=false illogic, which would go like this: a given person is depressed, therefore said person has poor diet and their reasoning is inherently illogical, and if they fixed their diet then they wouldn't be depressed and thus wouldn't be an anti-natalist (all of which is a nonsensical diversion from my argument). By all means, point out an actual contradiction in what I'm saying. But you haven't yet. You're simply making my argument for me by displaying fundamentalist prejudice rather than consistent reasoning.

[@jajlertil]

Lmao 😂