Why do human beings ignore that the world is like a hell which is full of suffering?
People are born everyday and they will one day die and cause grief to those they left behind. Life is full of suffering that they did not consent to. Leaders are full of greed and aggression and need more people for tax dollars and soldiers. There are diseases, parasites, germs, blood-sucking insects, and animals that bite and kill and eat each other. Even humans are usually selfish and indifferent to the suffering of others except in extreme cases such as an emergency or a natural disaster. Every second is a second closer to death and eventually everyone is killed by life (no immortals yet, as far as we know).
Is it even ethical to have children and bring them to the suffering of life in the world without them being able to consent to it? Why do human beings ignore that the world is full of pain and suffering and try to walk around happy, indifferent to the suffering and even creating more suffering sometimes?
Is it even ethical to have children and bring them to the suffering of life in the world without them being able to consent to it? Why do human beings ignore that the world is full of pain and suffering and try to walk around happy, indifferent to the suffering and even creating more suffering sometimes?
Comments (18)
I don’t know if what you say is necessarily true. I don’t think they’re indifferent and I think a lot of people will take on the suffering of others to help them through it. Walking around being happy, or trying, as you say, may mean they are relatively happy for that moment in a world that is hard going and that they’re experiencing a moment of relief from it all. What’s amazing about it all is that people find moments of happiness in the simplest of situations and pass it on to others. A smile really is an infectious thing.
This too is not altogether true. There are people who pass through the lives of others and leave a lot more in the long term than just grief.
Yeah, they leave a lot and it hurts even more when they leave and are reminded of how their love is not present with them physically.
Yes.
This is a difficult conundrum. If the babies later when they can communicate complex thoughts properly, decide they ought not to have been born, it's not possible to retroactively fulfill their wishes and demands to not be born. At the time of birth, or during the first trimester, the baby has no concept of life, and is not able to communicate anything, yet that's when the abortion of the life ought to occur.
Indeed you asked a valid and invalid question.
True, this is. My aunt left me a trust fund which was beyond and over and above the grief I ought to have experienced with her passing, but did not.
And my uncle, my aunt's husband, who died 20 years prior, left me five pairs of nylon socks (male) size 8. That was all he could muster for me, in order to leave something, since grief was not one of them.
Well, actually,it's not true. Their love (the love THEY feel, not what we feel for them) stays with them. They can't take it with them, and they can't leave them behind. Love stays in a limbo, somewhere around the coffin in which the dearly beloved lie six feet under, and also at or about midnight on Friday, the thirteenth, at fool moon, when Love and other parts of the remains of the dearly beloved do their rounds of visitation.
The argument you are making is the justification for anti-natalism - the belief that people should not have children. It has been discussed on this forum many times. One of the main proponents of this way of thinking is @schopenhauer1. I suggest you take a look at some of his posts. Actually, you may find his current thread interesting.
Many of us do not agree with his, or, apparently, your, view of life.
For a counter-argument to that, you should take a look at Schopenhuer1's thread I linked.
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/6202/work-should-be-based-on-quantity-of-boredom-involved/p1
It's one thing to acknowledge that there is suffering in the world (that is hard to deny) but it is a sweeping generalization to conclude that life is a hell which is full of suffering. Billions of people are born, live, and die without enduring a lifetime of hellish agony. They might break an arm, or have a heart attack but neither of those things amount to a living nightmare. Even a death from cancer lasts a limited period of time.
they will one day die
cause grief to those they left behind
Life is full of suffering
Leaders are full of greed and aggression an
There are diseases, parasites, germs, blood-sucking insects
animals that bite and kill and eat each other.
Even humans are usually selfish and indifferent to the suffering of others
Every second is a second closer to death
Are you having a bad day, or what?
Some of your statements are true (we will all die) and some of them are just glittering generalities like "Leaders are full of greed and aggression". There are many people who are leaders at various levels of society and even you can probably think of some minor leader who wasn't full of greed and aggression.
Choosing to be "against life" is certainly an option, but it seems like one should come up with something a bit more profound and compelling than tape worms and blood-sucking insects. At the very least one could howl at the meaningless universe, for example.
You are here. Get used to it.
Looks like I made the link wrong, but it seems you are already involved in the discussion.
It's a choice to not enjoy the beauty with which one is surrounded every day.