What would be considered a "forced" situation?
Let's say an evil villain knabbed you from your couch one fine day either watching a football game, reading the latest science book, taking a nap, whatever, and he plunked you into an obstacle course and said that this is your new life now. You will find food along the way, and amenities, etc, but to access these items, you must earn it by moving through the obstacles the villain set up.
Let's say over time, people actually begin to find the course not so bad. In fact, the villain allows all his contestants to enter into relationships and procreate. However, these children are now forced to play the obstacle course. However, the parents teach the children that in fact, the obstacle course isn't that bad..
At first, one might say that this situation is bad because the contestants were "forced" into the game. However, many of the contestants eventually don't mind it, and down the generations have adapted their children to not mind it either. What may then come to mind as what is so bad is not (only) the forced game, but the limitations of the obstacle course. The villain is "limiting" the contestants' choices to just being in his obstacle course.
But let's change the circumstances a bit.. The villain decides that the course is too restrictive.. This villain has billions upon billions of dollars and doesn't mind simply using it for this cause of the obstacle course. Let's say in his expansion, he essentially allows the contestants the same degree of choices as one might find in what we call "life". People can choose their careers, they can choose who they want to have relations with. They can choose their hobbies, etc. The only stipulation is if the contestants don't contribute to the game, they will be homeless, be exiled to the wilderness, or he allows them to commit suicide. But wait a minute.. This is starting to look simply like life itself!
Many questions here but let me start:
1) What counts as "forcing" people into a game? Certainly the villain is doing this, but how is birth not any different besides the fact that prior to the birth, the person didn't exist? Does that really matter when the outcome is the same (the person plays the game of life?).
2) What counts as "freedom"? I mean the villain's game, and life's game (after the expansion) is pretty much identical. But many people might still say what the villain did was wrong, whereas the life game is not. How so? It is almost if not exactly the same in terms of amount of choices allotted (play the game, or die of depredation, suicide, and poverty.
3) Are the contestants like the "happy slave" that might not mind the game (being a slave in the slave's case), but don't realize their options are more limited than they think? What makes life itself so different? Life itself doesn't offer much beyond it's own game, homelessness, and suicide.
Let's say over time, people actually begin to find the course not so bad. In fact, the villain allows all his contestants to enter into relationships and procreate. However, these children are now forced to play the obstacle course. However, the parents teach the children that in fact, the obstacle course isn't that bad..
At first, one might say that this situation is bad because the contestants were "forced" into the game. However, many of the contestants eventually don't mind it, and down the generations have adapted their children to not mind it either. What may then come to mind as what is so bad is not (only) the forced game, but the limitations of the obstacle course. The villain is "limiting" the contestants' choices to just being in his obstacle course.
But let's change the circumstances a bit.. The villain decides that the course is too restrictive.. This villain has billions upon billions of dollars and doesn't mind simply using it for this cause of the obstacle course. Let's say in his expansion, he essentially allows the contestants the same degree of choices as one might find in what we call "life". People can choose their careers, they can choose who they want to have relations with. They can choose their hobbies, etc. The only stipulation is if the contestants don't contribute to the game, they will be homeless, be exiled to the wilderness, or he allows them to commit suicide. But wait a minute.. This is starting to look simply like life itself!
Many questions here but let me start:
1) What counts as "forcing" people into a game? Certainly the villain is doing this, but how is birth not any different besides the fact that prior to the birth, the person didn't exist? Does that really matter when the outcome is the same (the person plays the game of life?).
2) What counts as "freedom"? I mean the villain's game, and life's game (after the expansion) is pretty much identical. But many people might still say what the villain did was wrong, whereas the life game is not. How so? It is almost if not exactly the same in terms of amount of choices allotted (play the game, or die of depredation, suicide, and poverty.
3) Are the contestants like the "happy slave" that might not mind the game (being a slave in the slave's case), but don't realize their options are more limited than they think? What makes life itself so different? Life itself doesn't offer much beyond it's own game, homelessness, and suicide.
Comments (95)
What if we simply stop framing ourselves as helpless victims of a malign reality and instead embrace the responsibility of navigating our lives in a way that seems intelligent?
What are your answers to all of this?
Quoting schopenhauer1
You can’t be asking for a definition and also be certain that something follows the definition you don’t know.
Quoting schopenhauer1
I’ll try a different argument this time. Yes: Because in the case of someone being forced to play a game, there is a life they’re missing out on. There is a consequence to them being kidnapped by the villain. Not so if they never existed.
The villain is taking away a pretty good game (life) and substituting it with something worse or equal. If the “villain” was kidnapping people who were living miserable lives and “imposed” a life a comfort on them, I’m not sure he’d be a villain. He’s a villain because he’s putting you in a likely worse or at best equal situation.
Quoting schopenhauer1
Because he took people from a situation to another situation that is identical to it, without consent. Best case scenario: They don’t miss anything (neutral). Worst case scenario: They were pretty successful in life and so miss out on a lot (bad).
Quoting schopenhauer1
Again, in absence of a definition of what constitutes a non trivial imposition, you can’t be sure that life itself is a non trivial imposition.
Humans don't just reproduce by instinct alone, so this would be a false narrative. Rather, people can make a choice and do. Thus the contest creator can very much be a human agent putting more people into the game (of life or otherwise). The fact that nature itself is the origin of human agency is a different matter.
You are changing the premises. The people (mostly) like the game, have taught their children to like it, and are comfortable in it. In fact, the degrees of decisions by the generations that came after resemble life in all but origin.
Quoting khaled
See above, I have given you the reactions over time. This is probably true of the original people maybe, other than that, the subsequent expanded edition looks and feels exactly the same. The next generation didn't even think about it. So you are now going down that slippery slope it looks like that if someone didn't exist at time X, it's okay to do something in time Y to them when they will exist. I mean in this logic, as long as a slave was born into conditions of slavery, it's okay because the slave knows nothing else. I think you are missing the forest for the trees in that the question is supposed to highlight as to what degree of freedom a human must experience in order for a forced situation to be legitimate. You aren't answering that one.
Quoting khaled
I answered you that it can be subjective.. But I am trying to get at something here, if you stop making this about yourself, and actually be a charitable arguer rather than a constant combatant. I haven't seen you in any other mode when dealing with me. A troll is also a hard definition to define, but constant engagement with only combative tone without any letup seems to be part of it. Try engaging other posters too. Seem to be particularly targeting my posts..
Why these draconian measures?
It's not healthy to think about the same thing all the time. Antinatalist neurons start burning out from over use. They are lost forever. And besides, somebody forced those neurons to spend so much time thinking about antinatalism that they short circuited.
But honestly.. would you be willing to answer those three or at least one of those questions based on the scenario?
Like I said. We get to make choices ... as a direct result of being constrained by a game. We are free not despite some malign intelligence, but because we can understand reality in terms of obstacles to be overcome.
The constraints and the freedoms are the two sides of the one game. Each is the "force" that shapes its "other".
The more obstacles you can identify in life, the more choices you are also producing. So it is not a game imposed on the self. It is the game in which a selfhood is constructed as an opposition to "the world".
If you are perpetually moaning about finding yourself in a world "not of your making", you don't really get what being "a self" is all about at a deep metaphysical level.
Even if that metaphysical level were true, at my epistemological engagement with the world, I can evaluate the situation as negative. A really pedestrian example: "These new shoes feel weird.. I didn't think that was the case when I tried them on.. I can't take them back.. That was a bad choice.. I can live with these uncomfortable shoes.. drive back and try to get them returned.. etc." I mean really really boring example of just unpleasantness, choices galore.. At every decision there is an annoying outcome. One might lament that one should try shoes on better next time.. One can focus on that, but that doesn't change the uncomfortable shoes right now.. Anyways, there's always places to moan and evaluate, even if one can calibrate for a better decision next time. Yes the world is dynamic and iterative... doesn't mean one isn't annoyed, harmed, pained, suffering, etc.. The main point is we know of more ideal situations, even if they are not the current reality (whether of our own doing, nature's causation, social realities, or anything other cause). Our degrees of limitations are more limited than we think if we zoom out just a bit.. We are in a game.
Yes, you are free to frame your reality as if you are the helpless victim of a malign intelligence. You can choose to perpetuate that self-image. No one can stop you starting yet another thread on the same old topic.
Quoting schopenhauer1
Oh the cosmic tragedy! The inhumanity! Shoes that pinch.
Quoting schopenhauer1
Yes, don't even mention the unbearable burden of having to make a choice on shoe colour as well. Those bastard shoe manufacturers and their 30 colourways on the sneaker you wanted to buy.
Right, the point was to give you a pedestrian example (feet get it..:D). Anyways, you predictably wanted to focus on its triviality, but my point is even trivialities are slightly annoying.. Shall we go into heavier shit that happens in life? We adapt, sure, but we can evaluate and do all the time.. It isn't just nature "happening to us" it's very much us having to process and deal with situations all the time, slight, moderate, or severe. Someone dying of a horrible disease doesn't need to be used here to prove that point. The question remains, why should we put more people into this game? Yes there are choices, but they are limited. We can think of more ideal circumstances, but that is not the reality. We play a game. There is a paternalism underlying all of it. There is also a political agenda. apokrisis thinks the game must be played, so people must play it right? People just got to stop their bitching and/or accept the (non-inevitable) outcome that one must play the game.. one MUST play the game, because see circular argument here.. apokrisis says it MUST be so. That's not an excuse, and you know it. A game is forced, you haven't addressed this, only tried to red herring or ad hom about me complaining. Answer the three questions perhaps in the OP and then I'll see if you are really engaged with what I'm saying.
If you have time to be bothered by mild discomfort, that suggests you actually have bugger all to complain about.
Your point argues against you.
Quoting schopenhauer1
Who is forcing you too?
Quoting schopenhauer1
But it is you who is inventing an unnatural story to frame a political response. I merely point out that choice arises because there are limits. The two go together as the essential structure of any natural game.
Quoting schopenhauer1
What can one say about a game enforced by an evil villain when there ain’t no evil villain?
Quoting schopenhauer1
Don’t forget the uncomfortable shoes. The final outrage.
Quoting schopenhauer1
So let me get this straight: An evil, despicable, villain is kidnapping people and giving them lives that all of them like? I thought you said something about an obstacle course at first. You’re now saying even the first victims liked the move. I’m assuming this means they like it so much they don’t mind what they lost to get to it? As in this doesn’t happen:
Quoting khaled
In that case: no not a villain. I’d assume you have to hurt someone or attempt to do so to be a villain.
Quoting schopenhauer1
No. What I said was: The villain is taking you from situation X to situation Y, and Y is either worse or equal to X. That is not justified because X was pretty good. However, putting someone into situation X is fine, since situation X is pretty good.
If Y was much better than X, he wouldn’t be a villain.
Quoting schopenhauer1
If the slave doesn’t, and won’t mind the conditions, it’s absolutely ok.
Quoting schopenhauer1
I am. You can see me quoting each one, and responding. But again: There is no set amount. It depends purely on what the victim thinks of their situation. You don’t think this is the case. You think there is a required degree of freedom for an imposition to become trivial/non-trivial. So, again:
Quoting khaled
Quoting schopenhauer1
Maybe it simply seems combative to you because it attacks a core belief of yours. I haven’t cursed (really). Or accused you of sharing accounts. Or accused you of being a bot. Or accused you of being a troll. Or accused you of being uncharitable. And I’m the one that’s combative?
Maybe consider that when I get combative towards you it’s because you accuse me of ridiculous shit when I’m trying to be cordial.
Actually, please tell me what I should’ve edited in that last post to make it non combative and I’ll do so from now on. I don’t understand what makes it combative.
Quoting schopenhauer1
And you’re notorious for your presence in every part of the forum and you never ever ever spam the same topic?
I go for antinatalism posts. You post nothing but that. And when you don’t, surprise, I’m not there. And I also go to other posts occasionally. I’d bet money that the percentage of your posts relating to AN far exceeds mine.
Baseless accusations like these are what make it difficult to maintain cordiality.
What is life if not an illusion concocted by our brain? Neuroscientifically speaking, we could be cycloptic deranged purple monkeys under the thrall of our "brain" having an elaborate dream which is purely fictional. Philosophically speaking, nothing exists outside of our heads. We could talk about the concept of freedom, free will, pineapple milkshakes, or interior decor, but all of these are mere concepts that exist in our heads. WIth that being said, the villain is none other than an exemplary evidence of this concept of life. He creates an obstacle course that has evolved to accommodate the rudimentary institutions of our creation. Hence, in spite of being "placed" in the obstacle course, they either could be mere "happy slaves" blissfully ignoring or being unaware of life beyond the scope of the game, or they could be us, people who monotonously go through life to simply procreate and eventually decay into the ground. The only reason we believe they are "victims" of the villain or we even call that man a "villain" is because it surpasses our understanding of free will and freedom. But what is our understanding if not an illusion with arbitrary rules?
This captures my problem with the analogy. There is some experience to be made outside of the villain's game. As far as we know, that is not the case for life. Either you play the game of life, or you don't. There is no alternative, no game of mumbo jumbo which you get to play if you opt out of the game of life.
This then answers the question of freedom as well: If the only choices are to play or not to play, then with the ability to commit suicide, you have all the freedom in the world.
Quoting schopenhauer1
People have been forced into a game when they had no choice but to have been put there - so, yes, birth has forced people into life. I don't think this makes it automatically bad - for example it wouldn't be bad if you know everyone will be glad that they were forced, and that they will enjoy life.
I think it does matter whether the person existed prior to birth, as it would be bad to snatch them from a good life to something worse, and good to snatch them from a bad life to something better. This means when giving birth, it is good if the life is better than the neutrality of non-existence, but bad if it is worse than the neutrality of non-existence.
Quoting schopenhauer1
I think people that are born have more freedom than the unborn, as they have more choices. It demonstrates (most strongly when looking at people with lives of suffering) that the consequences are more important than freedom.
Quoting schopenhauer1
I think if being a slave makes someone happier, all things being equal, their being a slave is a good thing.
Your example of someone being snatched from one life and put into another requires calculation as to their amount of choices in each, but I don't see how it limits your options by being brought into existence from nothingness.
Ah yes, reading from the book of Apo as to what is bugger and what is not.
Quoting apokrisis
Granted, the point was to show annoyance at mere trivialities let alone things like homelessness, drug addictions, disease, disaster, death, non-success at work, and all the rest. You want to design life as an inevitable happy time, but it isn't, never was, never will. Not everyone will have the luxuries or care to be blissfully feeling nothing but pure enlightenment reading about the the triadic Peircean process philosophy.
So I think Hermeticus' quote here kind of sums up everyone else's response too give or take. How are we defining freedom?
Y'all's take: As long as there are sufficient choices in life (for surviving, entertaining, relationships with others, and even killing yourself) that is freedom.
Another take: Even if there seems to be choices (for surviving, entertaining, relationships with others, and even killing yourself), there really isn't. It's either follow the game (obstacle course with some choices there), homelessness, hack in the wilderness, or die. The option for suicide, homelessness, or dying in the wilderness, doesn't make the forced game any more fair or right to make people play. We are not "panning out" far enough to see the limited choice of the game of life.
So a takeaway here, there is something about the forced game, similar to the "happy slave" that is not right, or suspect. I am starting to think it has something to do with a paternalistic, "But this is good for you".. The forced game of limited options (especially never having the option not to play) has the paternalistic air that this game needs to be played by someone else.. It's good for them.. But why is the evaluation correct for someone else? There seems to be an implicit political agenda of the game that needs to be played, by more players. Majority opinion, like the happy slave, doesn't really answer this, so be creative. Also, there is still something not quite right about "suicide" being a solution for the collateral damage of those who don't agree with the game's premises.
So what is it?
I don’t think anything’s wrong with a happy slave in the first place. Neither does @Down The Rabbit Hole either from the sound of it. Idk about the others.
Quoting schopenhauer1
Seems close enough.
Quoting schopenhauer1
So what does a fair game that’s ok to impose look like? And what does one that’s unfair look like? How do you tell the difference? Same ways of asking the question.
You asked everyone these questions but you haven’t answered them yourself.
Quoting khaled
You can stipulate than all the mentioned emotions are suffering, whereas I could counter and say that they're actually not suffering but pointlessness or anything else.
Given these assumptions then by definition you are forced to play, can go broke, live a miserable life, have a devil for a boss and on and on.
A more productive way to proceed would not be condemn, full stop, those who "force" you to play, but to try to involve yourself in situations in which solutions can be brought to the fore which alleviates the suffering of those alive, which is what matters.
Of course, these always leave out or marginalize (quite severely) pleasure, joy, challenge, discovery, laughter, fun, amazement, love, music and everything that's good in life.
I think it's an empirical point you ask most people, and they love life, they want to continue living or want a better life. It may be self-deception, but I don't think that matters.
Again, I have sympathies for existential pessimism and even pointlessness, but not AN. These AN arguments aren't convincing for a reason: they're not true for most people.
Simply what the question itself says: Any situation in which people are forced --i.e. do something against their will-- (by whatever power) to play a game.
Life is generally considered as one of them, although there’s is a widespread belief that we exist as spiritual beings and every once and then we want to play the "game of life" as a change, challenge or whatever. (I am not a proponent because I don't have a proof of that for myself.)
School attendance, serve as a classic example of such a game. In fact, any situation in which we are forced to obey or accept it. Including paying taxes! :smile:
Quoting schopenhauer1
There are two kinds of freedom: Freedom from and freedom to. The first is Epictetian (meaning detached from) and it is not involved here. The other means that I can apply my will to decide and act as I wish according to it. This is of course an absolute and of course it doesn't exist. To everything I try to do there can be an opposition, a counter action, an obstacle that will prevent me to succeed. In a game, freedom consists of all the actions one is allowed to do, according to the rules of the game, that will enable him [for brevity] to achieve the goal of the game. The game provides for obstacles, which consist of all the things that can act against this effort. There can't a game without freedoms and obstacles (and a goal, of course). Now, if the freedoms are too many and/or the obstacles too little, the game would be boringly easy. On the other hand, if there were too little freedoms and/or too many obstacles, the game would be boringly difficult.
Quoting schopenhauer1
I have never thought of a "happy slave", except for the (black) servants on the past who enjoyed a lot of privileges, good treatment, nice cloths and good food. Slaves had to accept the status quo. They couldn't do otherwise. Which means they had no options to realize. Likewise, I believe that most prisoners (punished by law or captured) do not think that they have any options and accept their imprisonment until they regain their freedom. On the other hand, there are some who think they have options and try to escape.
Well, not anything important ... I just answered the questions ... It's something I use to and like! :smile:
Quoting schopenhauer1
I'll go with a dictionary definition: "the power or right to act, speak, or think as one wants". I don't think this is abundant in the unborn.
Quoting schopenhauer1
I really do think this demonstrates, in the case of people with lives of suffering, the weakness of freedom as a moral principle. It would be better for these people if they were never born despite all of the freedoms they have gained by being born.
Quoting schopenhauer1
It just doesn't feel wrong to enslave someone and make them happy. It could be my consequentialist bias, but @khaled seems to agree.
I'll end on agreement though - suicide is a torturous experience for the person committing it, and all of their loved ones left behind. It can often cause more pain and suffering than the marginally bad life being ended, and it is definitely not an excuse in any way for bringing people into existence that have bad lives.
I would like to understand, what in your opinion, the alternative is?
To me, the game of life is full of choice. Yes, there are certain rules to it but I fail to understand how nonexistence is supposed to be an alternative that offers any kind of freedom. Either you exist, or you don't. How are you supposed to choose whether you want to partake if you do not exist? In this way too, it's a lot fairer to be born first and still have the choice to opt out, as to never having a choice at all.
And yes, life does have to sustain itself. From a human point of view, we who have engaged ourselves in such a complex system of ethics and morals - that we may fill whole online forums with them - may view some of these aspects of life as cruel, as painful, as suffering. But if you zoom out a little from the egocentric human perspective that we're stuck with and view the bigger picture, it's all perfectly fair. It's so fair that even if we ruin this planet and destroy ourselves, life will strive and allow everyone who lives to play the game.
Ultimately, what solution does not being born give? An absence of life.
What do we call an absence of life? Death.
What is the root of all suffering? Death. It's either "I can't live like this." or "I will die from this."
So in conclusion, the idea of not being born serves the very poison it's trying to cure.
I prefer the idea that “forcing” is when you attempt to subvert and substitute another’s will with your own. But with birth and child rearing you are creating and nurturing a will.
In most cases there is no villain, but a loving parent.
In fact, life offers everything. It is only you that limits it.
The game was not chosen, period. The limits are playing the economic/survival game, lest you hack it in the wilderness, go homeless, or kill yourself. There seems to be something cruel in these alternatives. Like it or die. Most like it, so die.
Quoting Hermeticus
I just don't have any other perspective than human. Even me thinking as if I am Mother Earth, is just me thinking as if I am Mother Earth.
Quoting Hermeticus
Not being born is not death. It's not even the same as being born and then dying. It's never being at all.
Yet there was no choice for the person born. Why is someone not being around at X time, mean you can do something that affects them at Y time (affectively substituting another's will with your own, but with time displacement as to when the person is affected).
Quoting NOS4A2
Except it isn't. Life is not all possibilities, but a pretty known set of procedures that one needs to do in the first place (systemic) and in which others will have the inclination and capacity to be better at (contingent).
Again, why is not being around at time X, but being affected at time Y, not count as a force? Any number of things can be justified with this notion.
Quoting Down The Rabbit Hole
Interesting. Yet this seems at odds with how we think of autonomous agents as somehow valuable. I'm proposing we may be closer to autonomous, our options are really not as many as we might think.
Quoting Down The Rabbit Hole
And others might disagree. Paternalism seems an odd ethical stance. One MUST exist.
Quoting Down The Rabbit Hole
So is it only about amount of pain and pleasure for you? Is not the collateral damage something more than a statistic? It's easy to discount it when one is just philosophizing and abstracting.
Except all these examples happen when we are already born. Once born, some harm might be needed to ameliorate a greater harm. Birth has no people to ameliorate.. It would be in this case, completely unnecessary to create the harm for that person.
Quoting Alkis Piskas
But why should people play a game?
It's a philosophical idea that what if people were severely limited but people didn't realize it, and yet were still happy.. Plato's Cave might be another example of this.
I don't disagree with this, but no one has found a better way. The closest thing in a kind of scale that was massive were communist revolutions which just led to more suffering. I just think Chernobyl, Stalin, Mao, and the rest. The game is the game. One cannot escape the game.
Quoting Manuel
And collateral damage? Why does "missed happiness" matter (if no one exists to miss it)? What are people creating more people for? If you are alive.. Be HAPPY without forcing others into the game. Why must YOUR HAPPINESS be contingent on ANOTHER PLAYER?
Quoting Manuel
Yet, if people are individuals and are not some Borg (group-mind), why should your happiness be contingent on someone else playing the game? Are we not creative enough not to involve another person having to play the game?
And yet we keep adding more contestants.
Why shouldn't we? Life is beautiful. And contestants die. We need obstacles.
Why? This seems paternalistic.
What's got father to do with it? Without obstacles you float around like a lost spaceship. You need to get a grip. I think you see obstacles in a different light as I do. I like competition, fights, polemics.
Why should others go through obstacles because you think it's good (at the time you made the decision for that person at least). It's one thing to bring obstacles upon yourself, quite another to decide that you want to birth more people to experience obstacles.
I didnt say I turn them on other people. If they're not interested...let them be.
So I'm talking about procreation.. Procreation brings people which have to go through obstacles.. Ergo, procreation leads to creating in a fashion "an obstacle course" for other people. Why should we procreate people who will have to go through the obstacle course?
We can play this game. I think it is evident that there is no single capitalist society which exists in the world. Same with communism. As stated by Smith and Marx and later developed by different figures, such societies could not exist.
There are examples of real democracies like the Kibbutz in Israel, or the Spanish Civil War in which people decided to work affairs out for themselves, free of "Gods and masters". Orwell speaks about this insightfully in Homage to Catalonia.
But this would be a diversion from the main point, I suspect.
Quoting schopenhauer1
You are assuming by default that suffering is the end-point, be all of life. So If I tell you, where am I harming anybody by listening to a song or reading a novel? You can always say, they suffered tremendously to create such works, as they were based on frustration, sweat, disappointment, etc.
I don't think you can neatly and easily separate acts based on purity, as in this one activity involves no suffering at all. Or conversely, that this suffering can lead to happiness at the end of the process. I just say, that if you ask a random person if they would like to live life, they'd say yes. It's a miracle to be alive, given the available evidence.
But you think it's a curse. I don't think people think like this and I don't think they're deluded. You can say life is suffering. Sure. You can say life is a miracle. Yes as well. It's not a zero sum game.
Quoting schopenhauer1
I don't plan on having kids, not because of AN, I just think the cost of having them outweighs the benefits they provide, including love and care as well as suffering.
I do agree that we should not put our satisfaction solely on other people. We live and die our own lives. But I think social contact is necessary for everybody, even if it entails suffering.
Try writing one post focusing on the good things in life, unironically. It would be interesting to see. Cause I get the impression you would not be able to. Prove me wrong.
Why not. I'm glad I was procreated! I love life though I was depressed for a long time. People have made a mess of the world!
:ok:
It's not necessarily a diversion. My point is survival and the limitations of being humans in a world, make it a non-starter that one can change the game. Transhumanism, or whatever utopia, just doesn't seem to come about any time soon, if at all.
Quoting Manuel
But you didn't answer the question at hand which was about what you liking the game has to do with bringing more people into the game. Can't we be creative enough not to assume what others should want in such a drastic way?
Quoting Manuel
I have before discussed what might be deemed as "intrinsic goods".
You're good! :blush:
Ergo, another player should feel the same? Why is your happiness tied to someone else playing the game as well? Why are you the arbiter of what someone else should play?
Excuse me for sayin but what are "intrinsic goods"? Philo-babble, in my eyes...
Where did I say that? Ergo, you assign me things I don't want to.
Perhaps. It's plausible. I wouldn't hold my breathe for transhumanism. It's a noble goal. But I think they think science is like I don't know God or something. They tremendously exaggerate what we have achieved and have very confused notions of "uploading minds", that fall apart easily, I think.
Quoting schopenhauer1
You and I can, because we don't want children. You, because you are an AN. Me, because, I don't like them.
But it's a natural instinct in people. Like creativity or looking for patterns in nature or wanting company or doing something meaningful. Look, ask most teens (assuming they don't have severe mental deficiencies) if they want to live life even if life WILL include death, loss, frustration and anything you can think of. Most will say yes, they're grateful for being in the game.
You can call it delusion if you want. I call it life. But if life IS suffering, then what are we discussing here? We'll go back to you saying people are forcing others to play the game, whereas I'll reply by saying most people don't think life is "forced" on them. Granted, some do, like you, but you're an exception. Which is fine.
Quoting schopenhauer1
If you can provide a link or point me to a thread, I'd look at it.
Quoting Ozymandy
Thank you.
And welcome to the forums. May you have fun and share ideas.
Thank you! I like your style! Nice writing up here! Especially about that science stuff. I like to write myself. And a lot of other stuff as well. You'll get to know it. By my words only.
Sounds like a plan. :ok:
You are right about one thing though. Science is forced upkn people. From childhood on colorful young children are turned in its obedient slaves. These young ones gain power and make others play the game of loan slaves or they ruin the world with their inventions.
Yes! It's all planned in true wickedness. I'll let alloya know... :smile:
How appropiate your photograph. For this thread.
No, because your game is rigged in favor of very depressing conclusions:
Quoting schopenhauer1
Quoting schopenhauer1
Quoting schopenhauer1
On previous occasions I've acknowledged that your anti-natalist view of the world has some validity and merit. The world we are born into is no Big Rock Candy Mountains of hobo fame:
There's more, but you get the idea--some sort of paradise.
This world is mostly not paradisiacal. On the other hand, if one is even slightly lucky, life is not a living nightmare either, most of the time.
We are here, without having granted permission, suffering or not suffering because of everything that happened in the last 4 billion years (the history of the solar system, our planet, life, evolution, etc.
Plus, for those who don't like how they got here, it will all be over soon enough. It will all be over soon enough for those who LIKE the way they got here, too. So life sucks, but it is short.
I changed it today, funnily enough. Yeah, life feels like that often enough Sisyphean. But to go to anti-natalism to these extremes seems to me to color one's vison in a way that fundamentally distorts everything.
But isn't that the case with our reality? We are born as embryonic flesh bags on this planet and eventually, we become flesh bags and end up decomposing into the ground. That in itself is a game of sorts.
You are born, you do monotonous chores, earn money to survive and overcome the "obstacles", possibly procreate and eventually fall into the arms of the grim reaper.
The only way out of the game that is our reality is suicide. Transcending the superficial concepts of our making and accelerating the motion of our lives. The villain's idea was built in much the same way, you either prolong your life in the game or die, there is no in between much like life.
One could argue that being "forced" to do this by another entity or creature is injustice, but there is no justification as to why it truly is.
Of course. The question was "What counts as "forcing" people into a game?". If you are not born yet, you are not "people"! :grin:
Quoting schopenhauer1
If it's by their own will, I guess for fun, hobby, passtime, ... If forced, then they don't have a choice...
If on the other hand you mean why someone would force people to play a game instead of doing something else, e.g. labour, the I guess also for fun. I've seen a couple of movies where rich people captured a number of persons and let them free in a vast protected area and gave freedom as a price to anyone who kill another captured personon. There ara a lot of similar cases (Russian roulette, etc.) This is their perverted idea of game!
Quoting schopenhauer1
Indeed.
But this sounds quite logical. A harder case/test would be if you do realize that you are imprisoned! Can you be still happy (or at least not miserable)?
Some inmates enjoy prison! They have free shelter and food that they cannot find outside!
In fact, it is better to find ways to get allong well than to feel and act oppressed and imprisoned all the time. This is quite rational. It's better survival!
Can't procreating another person into the world, be considered this? The injustice happens once born. straight away, as a game was forced. Suicide is the only option out, which is also cruel. Best not start it for anyone.
I am beginning to think paternalistic "thinking this is good for someone else" may be an unjust reason. One's own sense of what is "right for another person" overlooks the entity that would be created's dignity. In the procreation scenario, the only thing that doesn't seem to be overlooking the dignity of the person playing the game, is thinking in terms of prevention of harms. One is not overlooking dignity by preventing all future harm for that person.. One is violating dignity once putting them into an inescapable game. Putting anyone in an inescapable game, because you think it is good, is a violation of sorts.
But why would putting someone into an inescapable game because YOU deem it to be a good game, just? How is this not a violation somewhere? Put someone in a game and if they want to opt out, they can commit suicide. Something seems off. Call it "paternalistic reasoning that violates dignity of new player". Anything assuming that a player MUST play an inescapable game, and does not put harm prevention above any other consideration, would be using that person. Why MUST someone be born because YOU deem life X, Y, Z? Mind you that question isn't asking what X, Y, Z is but how any reason can actually be legitimate.. I like something therefore, someone else SHOULD play the game too.
Quoting Down The Rabbit Hole
Quoting schopenhauer1
I was showing the lack of freedom in the unborn. As I have already acknowledged, the unborn are being forced into existence, but in the alternative the unborn are being forced not to exist. In the former, the unborn would end up with more freedom overall.
Quoting schopenhauer1
Yes, I don't feel anything other than good and bad feelings matter. At the end of the day, my moral foundation is no more objectively right or wrong than anyone else's, but it's still worth debating moral questions, as our positions may be inconsistent with our goals.
I don't think this is looking at it accurately. The alternative is NOT being forced to not exist, as in that scenario there is no "one" to not exist. In fact, there is no one "missing out" on the game by not existing. This goes back to that asymmetry. There doesn't seem to be anything wrong with "missed game" to anyone who doesn't exist. What "force" or "bad" is happening to anyone? What is a factual state of affairs, is no person will be forced, and that is where the issue lies.
Certainly, if it is done with the purpose of having fun! But we don't know that. We actually don't know under what circumstances (decisions, conditions, etc.) birth takes place,
BTW, to the question "Is life a joke?", I use to reply, "Not only it's a joke, it's a bad joke!"
(But in fact, we don't know who makes that joke and if he laughs! :smile:)
There is no will to substitute. There is no person to force. We might look upon our birth with regret and sorrow and lament our parent’s decision, but it is all retroactive. Looking at it, there is no act in conception, pregnancy and birth that should have required our consent, whereas in your evil demon scenario there is.
Besides, parents merely set the conditions within which pregnancy might occur. The worst that could be said of them is that they had intercourse. Your genetic material travelled, fertilized, and formed by its own efforts. You threw yourself in the game.
When someone is born, this is the force. No "one" needs to be there prior. Imagine if the situation was someone put in extremely dire circumstances. Just because at time X they didn't exist, doesn't mean it is okay to then put them in situation Y.
Quoting NOS4A2
It just makes no sense that moral actions that affect people make no difference as long as the person doesn't exist at time X. Again, makes no sense.
Quoting NOS4A2
Not by itself. Now you are debating a weird version of causation. Someone presses a trigger and it was the combustion that did the work.
It may be weird and cheeky but it at least considers extant things and activities, and isn’t a false analogy like pulling the trigger of a gun. The sperm travels to the ovary by flagellating its tail. It breaks through the ovary wall. It fertilizes the egg. It becomes a zygote, a fetus, a newborn, and so on. The only way a parent might stop the efforts of your genetic material is to intervene, or otherwise “force” it to stop without any consideration of the consent of those involved, no?
Anyways, it makes sense to me that “moral actions that affect [a person] make no difference as long as the person doesn't exist at time X” simply because there is no person to affect with the moral action. I just cannot follow your reasoning when I can see your conclusion in the premises. It becomes difficult to follow when these thought experiments always treat nothings as somethings, potential people as people, possible scenarios as extant ones. Would your evil villain be guilty of forcing someone into a game if there was no man to nab from the couch? if there was no one to force? Conversely, are the parents guilty of not seeking consent when there is no one to seek consent from? I don’t see how they can.
None of this is relevant. The agency is the parents, not proto-genetic material. What "caused" this sequence of events to take place. It is like the trigger.
Quoting NOS4A2
Would circumstances change if the birth was in clearly bad circumstances or situations? The baby was absolutely going to born into a lava pit and consumed by the lava, let's say. This isn't relevant, right? Cause there was no person at point X prior. But that makes no sense.
Quoting NOS4A2
Right, so when there can be no consent, who is being harmed by not having the child? Yet someone would (at the least be) forced by having them.
Parents do not control the activity of the spermatozoa, ovum, and their subsequent forms. Surely they can affect gestation, but they cannot make gestation occur through will alone.
Well yes it is immoral to birth your baby into a lava pit.
No one is being harmed by not having a child just as no one is being harmed by having one.
Why should that matter? According to your logic, if the person didn't exist at time X, then it doesn't matter the outcome at time Y?
A newborn does exist.
Yes it does, but someone just doesn't get to a lava pit by itself. Someone had to arrange that before hand.. Let's say the intent was there, and you had the ability to stop them from doing so. You actually changed the arrangement so that it led to a hospital. Did you actually affect anyone? Surely your logic would say you did nothing for no one, right?
I don’t get it. Am I stopping someone from giving birth into a lava pit?
Quoting Down The Rabbit Hole
Quoting schopenhauer1
Bloody asymmetry! :lol:
Would you say the violation occurs, with the act that gives rise to a birth, or the birth itself? And an example demonstrating violating the rights of the not yet existent is planting a bomb that will kill a future generation (that hasn't been born yet), but their right to life (when they have been born) etc will have been violated?
Quoting Down The Rabbit Hole
Right, there is a way that preventing the planting of a bomb that would hurt a future person(s) is "good", even if there was no person alive to be aware that there was a prevention of this terrible thing that could have affected them.
And that would be a fair point for the first generation of victims. But the ones that follow later, say the 5th or 7th generation would not have the slightest idea that this is an inescapable game and that they are in fact victims of false play. Eventually, the truth of their reality would be forgotten or be credited as fiction or a legend. No one would actually believe that their lives were in fact coerced.
Going with evidence, it’d be safe to assume that anyone who believes otherwise would be considered either a conspiracy theorist or a rather mentally unstable person. Hence your justification holds good only for the early generations. We could go as far to say that there is a possibility that our reality is a simulated one and that either it has gotten lost in history or that it is considered a legend.
Quoting schopenhauer1
Makes sense to me.
Interesting sci-fi spin on it. However, let me bring it back to the main point.. What is it about forcing people to play a game, with various obstacles to overcome, that seems wrong. KEEP IN MIND though, I am not talking about games which strengthen oneself in the present to bring about a better future state (like vaccines, schooling, self defense, etc.).. But rather, in this case, one doesn't have to play the game in the first place. There was no person beforehand to need to have a better future state. This would purely be creating someone in order that they experience the obstacle course. Independently of whether the player (new person) might eventually identify with the obstacles and report that they "like the game", something seems off here. Maybe you can help me point out the "wrong" in creating unnecessary obstacles for others (independent of their post-facto reports of liking the game). I am thinking there is something wrong with the paternalistic political assumption that people need to overcome obstacles for no reason other than they want to see it happen.
@Down The Rabbit Hole What do you think? What is it that seems to be unjust here that I am not quite verbalizing other than "paternalistic unnecessary harm".. Is there something else that can describe this unnecessary creation of the obstacle course for another, and deeming it "good" because YOU want to see this take place for another person? It starts to become a political decision. You want to see an agenda enacted of game playing.. This isn't innocently defending yourself by saying, "Oh well, we need to provide obstacles to prevent even greater obstacles".. This is creating all obstacles in the first place.
@Bitter Crank Maybe you can bring to bear some of your down-to-earth perspective on this.
Preventing the planting of a bomb is good. But you’d be saving no one if those potential victims were never born.
Right, but there is some way that this state of affairs is good or better than the other.
Yes.
Well, that would be a fair point considering the fact that initially they did not have to nor want to enter this game of obstacles and unnecessary challenges. But would it particularly matter later? Now, the paternalistic political assumption that people need to overcome obstacles for no other reason than to see it happen is quite an interesting perspective. And I must say that those assumptions are albeit futile but they have been built into the core of our society.
But that begs a question that needs to be addressed before further discussion, what are the arbitrary rules of the society and who gets to decide just and unjust?
I might consider Socrates to be a wise man with much to contribute but the people of Athens disagreed and considered his intellectual tidbits to be unjust and venomous. What precisely is justified in the world? The world is a purely subjective with multiple contradictory perspectives and that is something that needs to be taken into account in this discussion.
And this is the basis of the asymmetry.
Quoting schopenhauer1
It makes perfect sense that doing something now to affect a future person (such as planting a bomb to kill them or having sex and forcing them to be alive) can be unethical. Though it doesn't feel right to me to say that it's okay to force non-existence, but it's wrong to force a happy existence, based solely on the fact that in the latter case someone will exist.
I'm stuck with one argument - that the lives of suffering (even 3% of the population is hundreds of millions) are not a reasonable sacrifice for everything else life has to offer. I guess this argument is just part of your collection?
There could be an argument made that not procreating is the most just because there could never be something enacted upon someone else unnecessarily and/or harmful or paternalistic. When someone is born all these things will befall that person. Thus the logic always tends to the "not procreate" as the collateral damage/unnecessary damage is never put forth. A political agenda on someone else's behalf is NOT happening, where it would be if one did go ahead and enacted it.
I'll sum this up this way:
Making someone go through an obstacle course of varying degrees of harm is not good. Even if post-facto, people might go along with it because it's all they know, or would say, they "like" or "don't mind" it, this political agenda of making people have to play a game is wrong due to the harms that could have been avoided.
With this idea comes the fact that the universe is not being "edified" by people playing a game. In other words, I can imagine a response being that, playing games is just intrinsically good and MUST happen. The universe would be worse without it. That is ridiculous. The rings of Saturn, the stars in Alpha Centuri and the rest don't give a damn about people playing the game or not playing the game. Nothing loses out on anything.
Also keep in mind that no person is in non-existence prior to birth crying about not playing the game. What matters is the game was not enacted for someone else, with it's intendant harms.
With all of this comes the more basic notion that there seems to be something that is not using people by not creating them and paternalistically making them play a game. In the grand scheme, there is no "good for someone" or "not good for someone", when considering the procreation decision, simply creating someone who will be affected (and harmed) and not creating that. The "not creating someone who will be affected (and harmed) is not using people in any fashion. It is more deontologically sound.
Quoting Down The Rabbit Hole
I could take the easy route and say, that this is correct that using any person for a majority is wrong.. Especially when it comes to harming that person. While this is true, the more difficult case though that I am laying out is enacting any agenda that makes someone play a game is using them.. Especially if that game has known and contingent harms that cannot be avoided, are unnecessary for them to play in the first place, and practically inescapable (suicide is really not the same as not playing in the first place).
Not sure about this. People make the decision. Things aren't brought into existence by simply "external forced" doing it on their own.
I think you might be taking that metaphor too literally. To the extent that we are using "group think" I think you are correct. We often nag each other and pressure each other into decisions based on cultural norms. Raising a baby becomes a signal and signifier. It becomes a totem. It becomes simply a way to pass the time for 20 years or so for many people. Its an accident that people rationalize (or have no way of getting rid of in some areas). However, what is the case is it is up to the human agent and they can make a choice not to create a new person, and the prevent intendent consequence of doing so for that person. In other words, it's not inevitable.
So I'm trying to develop the idea of more than just the "collateral damage" of the minority who view it as such. Rather I am trying to show how reality is limited in enough ways that it really is a "limited" game.
Forced Situations of Real:
-Technology/ science follows only certain principles. We cannot just create things from fiat. Rather, it is a truism that science must follow these principles that we are bound to.
-Survival requires cooperative effort. Economic activity requires interactions we may not want to do if we had the option not to do it.
-Forced power relations. With that economic activity, you need people who tell others what to do and when to do it and make sure the "ship is running". This creates power hierarchies and dynamics. Ones we would not want to deal with if there was another choice. This happens anywhere from anarcho-communes to business orgs.. It's just how things work (not to say that it is good though).
-Throwness of already existing systems from historical contingency. Our political/economic/social structures may not be what we would want it to be otherwise, but we deal with them because one cannot easily start anew.
Again, if these Forced Situations of the Real are inescapable (mostly), how would putting more people knowingly in these structures NOT a political agenda?
Structures of Control:
- Personal habits of shame, guilt, anxiety are instilled to internally control behavior.
-External cajoling, shaming from peers (social psychology) to get people to do what they wouldn't want otherwise.
-Firings, threats of excommunication and becoming an outcast from the system
-jobs not easy to get, lag time for employment (labor markets aren't perfect representations of what we want, just what is available).
-Not all jobs are known or advertised (again non-perfect labor markets)
Post-Modernism Has Wrong Assumptions, Rather:
-One cannot escape these situations of "the real" and "throwness"
-There are NOT infinite amounts of options
-One must accept the real and embrace it or "leave the game"
I suppose people being ok with the arrangement, the deal they have with life (long periods of discomfort interrupted by fleeting moments of mediocre contentment), isn't because there's anything great about it but is actually for the reason that, just as a slave ultimately begins to get accustomed to his condition, we've gotten used to it (the misery). There's a big difference between getting what you want and being happy with what you have. There's even a whole host of quotes that contain the phrase, "be happy with what you have", a clear signal indeed that you've hit the nail on the head in a manner of speaking.
Some might object to your thesis but those who do need to take the red pill.
There's this story about how young elephants are tied to a stake (to prevent them from escaping) with strong iron shackles. This then goes on for a good part of the young elephant's life, in the process the elephant realizes there's no point in trying to break the iron chain and stops trying to escape.
At this point, the iron shackles are replaced with a simple rope. The elephant stays put. Getting used to one's circumstances: SNAFU!
[quote=Wikipedia ]It (SNAFU) means that the situation is bad, but that this is a normal state of affairs.[/quote]
Quoting schopenhauer1
Quoting schopenhauer1
Quoting schopenhauer1
Quoting schopenhauer1
Putting a gun to their head.
Quoting schopenhauer1
No one telling you what to do.
Very good. Now how about no one asking you what to do, but doing it to you anyways, to you?
That too; nobody grabbing my arm forcing me to go anywhere, or do anything.
And that is very much accepted. In fact, post-modernism is a concept that is often misunderstood. And here, the politics involved is very much a factor. But upon who might befall the authority to classify this as “unjust”?
We believe it is unjust because it doesn’t fit into our worldview. But who is to say that it might very well be considered unjust by all? In fact, it might not seem bad to the victims in the obstacle course primarily because we are led to want to accept the existence of a higher being who controls the phenomena in the world and guides us and throws obstacles our way. This is primarily why they might believe that it is in fact not “unjust” and they might not be incorrect to think so.
I am preaching to the choir here, but procreation is taken to be a sacred activity. Having children is taken to be one of the most critical and sublime moments of a person's entire life. Bringing more people into the game is part of playing the game, because there isn't any point in playing it if you're the last one to do so.
Build a better tomorrow...think of the children!...don't ever stop or slow down...you might start thinking...wondering...hmm why are we doing this?...oh shit back to work...