Is society itself an ideology?
Generally speaking, a society has very discernible patterns. In the Western world, industrial production/retail consumption/billions of trade partnerships and contracts/government monetary systems and the like pretty much run the backbone of how we survive. On a daily basis this usually equates to a set work week, probably a weekend and non-work hours, maybe retirement on the horizon, educational institutions while growing up, with overlap. There's literally millions of other things to add here but I don't need to list them all. If you don't want this, you have becoming destitute and homeless, or the (probably non-starter) of hacking it in some vacant plot of wilderness. That's it.
So is society itself a sort of ideology, a sort of "brand" that we as individuals perpetuate through the gateway of birth? It has a way-of-life. By constantly birthing people, we are clearly buying into it. Sure, we might want to change parts of how the backbone runs (free health care vs. private, etc) but generally speaking, the whole pie itself of society (work, entertainment, maintenance/increase comfort levels) seems to be shared by all. Thus, birth essentially pushes this ideology unto a new generation. I think it is an ideology, forced in perpetuity on others. More work, more entertainment, more going to die hacking it in the wilderness if you don't like. There is no option for the no option (non-birth). Once born, you're living the ideology out until you don't (that is you die).
So is society itself a sort of ideology, a sort of "brand" that we as individuals perpetuate through the gateway of birth? It has a way-of-life. By constantly birthing people, we are clearly buying into it. Sure, we might want to change parts of how the backbone runs (free health care vs. private, etc) but generally speaking, the whole pie itself of society (work, entertainment, maintenance/increase comfort levels) seems to be shared by all. Thus, birth essentially pushes this ideology unto a new generation. I think it is an ideology, forced in perpetuity on others. More work, more entertainment, more going to die hacking it in the wilderness if you don't like. There is no option for the no option (non-birth). Once born, you're living the ideology out until you don't (that is you die).
Comments (125)
Well, not necessarily. Most people I meet on a daily basis here in SE Asia are just like me, digital nomads and location-independent entrepreneurs. There is also the entire gig economy for people who do not necessarily want to subsist as a corporate wage slave.
With bitcoin being my monetary instrument of reference, I do not even really rely on the mainstream concept of money. For now, most people are a bit clueless -- what's new? -- and still want paper fiat money. Therefore, I just convert a thousandth of a cent of a bitcoin to hundreds of local dollar-like paper scrip, and give them the worthless crap that they want. Why not?
I cannot remember working from nine to five. I cannot remember commuting to an office on a daily basis.
Quoting schopenhauer1
In my experience, it is exactly the other way around. Most people who wage slave from paycheck to paycheck in that societal ideology of nine-to-five jobs, are only one paycheck away from homelessness.
They are in a situation with only downsides and no upside. Losing their job or getting divorced -- usually both at the same time -- will trigger an avalanche of attacks on their person and on their assets, if they even have any. They will often even end up behind on child support payments and spend time in jail. None of that could possibly affect the typical digital nomad, location-independent entrepreneur or people who cash in on the gig economy.
Quoting schopenhauer1
People get sucked into the mainstream dead-end because they believe the manipulative lies that float around and convince them to join in.
The false beliefs of the mainstream, i.e. the lies that they believe in, are highly inconsistent. People get encouraged to find a job, which actually means, to find an employer. However, if everybody wants to be an employee, then who will be the employer? So, over time it becomes naturally harder to find such increasingly elusive jobs.
Quoting schopenhauer1
It is not really "forced" onto you. You may just get sucked in, because you believe in it.
Quoting Wikipedia on Shaitan
Al-A’war, Sut, and especially Dasim have gained control over western society. It is the shaitan named "Sut", the great liar, who has created the ideology that you have mentioned.
You can gradually escape, however, from the stronghold of Sut by asking Allah for forgiveness for your sins. Otherwise, you will sooner or later be pushed out of your wage-slave existence into one that consists of camping on skid row in Los Angeles, or into a similar situation, because in that case, that is your destiny.
All of this is interesting, but a bit off the mark as to what I mean by ideology. What you are discussing is INTRA-ideological debates (self-employed vs. employee, bit coin vs. other currency, etc.). My point is that generally speaking, LIVING itself requires a way of life (survival-through-economic-means for example), and that by birthing more people, you agree to force more people into this ideology. There is no way out of this ideology (of living generally to survive in some sort of economic system), once born, not even suicide.
Well, that would even turn breathing into an ideology. A lion has to hunt for larger animals of prey. So, he is forced into a survival-through-hunting ideology. I do not think that people use the term "ideology" in that sense.
Quoting schopenhauer1
Being tributary to biological realities does not make that person subscribe to an ideology. Better examples of ideologies are communism, fascism or democracy.
Quoting Wikipedia on the term ideology
Survival-through-economic-means is just a modern incarnation of survival-through-hunting. The reasons to do these things are purely epistemic. It would even be possible to experimentally test that a person not acquiring any calories at all on a daily basis ("starvation") would prematurely die. Hence, the survival-through-economic-means approach is not epistemically unsound.
Your question seems a conundrum if you interpret ideology as "simply ideas that people choose to believe" but ultimately has no justification really in the end. If some ideas in some ideologies, however, are simply true, and at least some truth is needed to live both individually and perpetuate a community, then it's no strange thing that society has a fairly broad consensus of things that just so happen to be true (eating poisonous mushrooms kills you for instance), and people who go outside this ideology (or rather just true things society has learned) die very quickly.
It is also not strange that entirely categories of tools that have no deducible "true or bestest form" society forms conventions about that get passes from one generation to the next. The typical example is language; we can reason that having words and grammar to express things is useful to have, but we cannot deduce the "best words" and so society picks new words or changes old ones when the want arises in no particularly coherent way. Likewise, some rules of conduct maybe deducible from reasoning or trial and error in a specific form, such as not eating the poison mushrooms or tolerating wanton murdering in the community, while other rules of conduct have no particular justification but are a useful reference point.
This broad ideology anthropologists generally call culture.
Some people really believe it's possible to subsist without eating and that various gurus have accomplished it. "Eating to live" is very much an ideology; it's more accurate to say we just happen to think it's actually true and dismiss the alternatives. If "living off sunlight" is an ideology, then so too is the alternative of "living off material food".
Likewise, the ideology of no ideology is of course itself an ideology. Trying to dismiss world views as ideological and "thus wrong" or "not justifiable really", is simply to claim one's ideology is right without introspection or defense compared to the alternatives.
The problem is the definition of the term "ideology", i.e. "beliefs held for reasons which are not purely epistemic". There is a legitimate justification for "eating to stay alive". Hence, the belief is not epistemically flawed. Concerning "living off sunlight", it would not be hard to experimentally test that a group of people exposed to sunlight would not survive longer than at most a few months. Hence, "living of sunlight (only)" is even trivially falsified. Therefore, it is a false belief.
This is the exact process I am describing, you are simply using "ideology" as short hand for "my ideology is right".
Living off of sunlight is not trivially falsefiable. If you try it and die, it can simply be claimed you didn't "try hard enough". Your friend observing this may say that's moving the goalposts, but it can be claimed the goal posts were always that far away and you just didn't reach them, due to your arrogance and narrow western scientism dogma.
Now, I agree that living off sunlight is not possible and anyone who claims to have done it is delusional or a charlatan. However, if the history of philosophy teaches us anything, it is that no idea is held for "purely epistemic reasons". My agreement with your point is that, yes I haven't myself observed being able to live off sunlight, but as important is an entire scientific ideological edifice of assumptions not only about how the universe functions but also what and how the community of people claiming to investigate the universe believe and behave. There is no epistemic given that the community of scientists is trustworthy on these key points for instance; it is an ideological choice; and it is only accepting this ideology and the world view that follows from it really does yield more truth than not about the mechanics of physical cause and affect that it seems clear to me that living off sunlight really is impossible.
However, because I see clearly the ideological foundations of the scientific worldview, I can also see clearly it's limitations. That most science is actually a community product with a prerequisite shared ethic that cannot itself be derived from scientific principles and prerequisite institutional resources; and therefore, this shared ethic and institutional structure is not immune from manipulation by people who do not share the ethic in question. The ethic required for community produced scientific knowledge is an ideology and wherever I trust the scientific community I express my ideology of assuming those particularly scientists share enough of the prerequisite ideology.
Now, yes, there are some areas where the faith in the scientific community does not seem required, that the falsification exercise really has been carried out by competing groups or then resulting in technology I can investigate myself and deduce either the theory behind it is true or some structurally symmetrical substitute.
If I ignore these ideological components to my scientific beliefs then I am vulnerably to erroneously dismissing legitimate criticism that a part of the scientific community is acting in bad faith, and, likewise, I am unable to properly account for the reasons to have faith in other parts of the scientific community to people who have come to the common sense conclusion that scientific institutions can be manipulated.
Yes, fundamental physical theories tested by different universities and countries over decades and even centuries we can have very strong faith in. Unfortunately, the disciplines of psychology and economics and large parts of medicine are simply made up for profit; this behaviour can be investigated, and trust diminished where trust is not earned, but it is a complex task. Is it all false? no, but the best propaganda is mostly true and yet yields a radically different conclusion compared to removing the small amount of lies.
Ignoring the complexities that arise from accepting scientific knowledge can be manipulated results in even the good scientific institutions losing trust over time. At each moment, every secondary teacher and most professors, even if they see such manipulation, don't call it out with the justification that it will undermine very important things elsewhere. For instance, calling out the pharmaceutical industry's manipulation of the medical scientific community seems to invite casting doubt on man-made climate change and the urgency to act with respect to it. For, if the opium crisis resulted from a corrupt manipulation of the scientific medical community, why can't we assume the climate science community is likewise manipulated? Most academics basically use this sort of reasoning for turning a blind eye to corruption in other disciplines, or even their own discipline.
However, the problem is that corrupting the scientific process has real world consequences for people. People who were told "opiods, totally safe, science says so" by "scientific medical authorities" and live the terrible consequences are entirely valid in doubting the next important thing scientific institutions tell them to believe.
These issues are ideological. If distrust is too high, then essentially nothing important can be scientifically determined in the community product sense (which is nearly all scientific knowledge we can access), it's reasonable to just doubt everything. It is only from a ideological position with sufficient trust of people in general that one can plausibly differentiate the bad science from the good.
Yes, dismissing "living off light" seems simply true and not ideological, but the ideological framework required to make such a conclusion (law of non-contradiction, consistency of physical phenomena, trust in the scientific community's accepted fundamental theories that clearly demonstrate no way to live off sunlight), if ignored as a series of choices, invites intellectual disaster when things are not as clear. In otherwords, dismissing alternatives as ideological whereas one's own position is just "clear epistemic givens" is simply to assume one's ideology is correct and the other's are incorrect without any proper examination.
What you described might be best defined as the machinery of ideology. These mechanisms and systems essentially run on autopilot regardless of the individuals keeping it running. Many of them have been in place before you or I were born and will likely persist for generations to come, with slight variation.
When we are born into it we must, as a matter of self-preservation, learn to deal with the systems and machinery around us.
Psychology and economics were never blindly trusted and are widely considered to be mostly conjectural. Medicine has also always been distrusted to an important extent.
Quoting Derek G. Hennecke on Nassim Taleb's take on medicine
The author, Derek G. Hennecke, is quite negative about Taleb's view on medicine, but I think that Taleb is actually right.
Quoting Iatrogenics: Why Intervention Often Leads to Worse Outcomes
As far as I am concerned, we cannot trust the interventionistas, especially, not in the subject of climate change.
Quoting boethius
The problem is not as much the idea of man-made climate change than the idea that we would trust politicians with the power to do something about it. I personally believe that there is not one problem that the government will not make worse. The idea that the French government would be allowed to increase taxes on gasoline has been resolutely rejected by the yellow-vest protestors. I completely agree with them on that point.
Quoting boethius
It probably is. There are important vested interests in peddling the idea. Therefore, it does not even matter whether the climate-change idea is true or not. Some people stand to gain power and money from making sure that people believe it is true, regardless whether it is true or not.
Quoting boethius
And they are right in that regard. If there is doubt possible, they should doubt; especially when it is obvious that some people stand to handsomely profit from the fact that we believe their lies.
Quoting boethius
This was only the case in the examples examined. It did not extend to any other subject.
I totally distrust the government, especially, when they have seemingly paternalistic motives when trying to make decisions in your stead, for your own good. The ability of politicians, and of the population at large, to see beyond first-order consequences, is abysmal. They are just not smart enough for what they think that they will be doing. Dismissing the interventionistas is almost always the right choice.
So, I don't think you're quite getting my drift. Rather, what I'm saying is that we all know that society is a certain way. By having children, we are consenting to this way of life. It doesn't matter if you are a conspiracy nut, a bit coin enthusiast, or a self-made man, the ways of life of a society are itself pretty well-known. By having a child, you are assenting/agreeing to this way of life FOR another person. One agrees with the ideals (hence ideology) of the ways of life (in whatever multi-faceted way). So you have to broaden your understanding of what an ideology's scope is to the ways of life, and NOT specific means WITHIN those ways of life, which are also rather limiting, even if some are more inventive than others (and usually not the norm).
I think your examples miss the point of the premise. Rather, I am saying that by birthing someone, one is assenting to a set of ideals (one being that at least life is worth living, that the current society is good enough to bring someone into it, that the ways of life of that society are something to instantiate a new person into, etc.).
Quoting boethius
It's about assenting to living in any culture at all.. By birthing new people into a society, one believes that the culture is something to be instantiated for yet another generation. It is an ideology, incarnated into a new person or next generation, to be lived out.. and repeat for another person, and another, and so on. It is not only believing in ideology it is creating new adherents from whole cloth (i.e. birth).
Birth by default creates conditions (major ones, like living itself) for another person, so I don't know, I'd say birthing a new person would be the hubris of believing one's ideology (living in the current society's ways of life) MUST be good enough to create conditions for others to HAVE to live in it (lest suicide).
You make it sound like an inevitability. The "machinery of ideology" is in fact people DECIDING society is good enough to (literally) procreate more people to experience it. That to me sounds like an ideology, not an unchangeable mechanism running in the background. Clearly if people are making new people, they assent to a point of view (an ideology) that they want others to live out as well (having children).
Reading the last line Quoting schopenhauer1
presses me to say, every society has a subconscious just like individuals and from time to time they need psychoanalysis when their behavior indicates the entity is having a serious problem! The US is in desperate need of psychoanalysis because it is not the democracy it defended in two world wars and it is no longer united and ideologically strong but is divided and destroying itself.
No, it is just standard epistemology.
We just look at how beliefs can be objectively justified, and if they can't, then it is ideology and not knowledge.
Society has certain ways of life that are discernible. These ways of life are its own ideology. Generally in Western society, there is work, etc. As I said in the OP as examples:
Quoting schopenhauer1
Further, birth is the gatekeeper for creating more adherents to the ideology. Birth is the ultimate YES! to the ideological underpinnings/ideals of a particular society (way of life). Having children is agreeing with the ways of life (ideology) of society. It also doesn't matter which type of society (tribal, Western, etc.).
Even more, if society is an ideology itself, any political debates are only INTRA-ideological affairs. The root question, is whether we should be promoting the initial ideology itself (society/ways of life) and the way it is promoted, is again, through birth (the ultimate recruitment into the ideology of society itself).
I think this is where you get off the track. An ideology has ideas behind it. It is doubtful animal societies (even chimps) have ideas underpinning it. But that's not what I want to argue for or against. Rather, I am arguing that even the very basics of a society- its very ways of life, the very activities that a socio-economic system allows for (work, production, consumption, entertainment, etc.) is itself an ideology. Humans assent to this ideology by having more humans be born into it. Thus, PHILOSOPHICALLY, we should be arguing whether this ORIGINARY ideology is itself worth undertaking, not just INTRA-ideological debates of things like health care, left-wing, right-wing, etc.
Well, in what way does viewing society as an ideology affect our understanding of ourselves? What impact does it have to you, me and everyone? I mean you make your claim in a tone that makes me feel as if something profound has been discovered but it seems so obvious and trivial. It's probably just me. Anyway, you aren't quite clear on how we "assent to this ideology by having more humans be born to it". I would be especially concerned, given the peculiarities of my circumstances, if an ideology demanded the birth of children just to adopt it. Can you elaborate on that please.
Sometimes the obvious is profound, but it just takes a slight perspective change on it :grin: .
Quoting TheMadFool
Would you agree that generally, a society has a "way of life", general patterns that people follow that are more-or-less the same? We generally have things like work, money, exchange, consumption, etc., right?
Well, in a way, these patterns are not really an ideology UNTIL one decides to become a parent. Then, things do change. Because now there is an evaluation of the this way-of-life as something worth continuing. Now, the ideas and ideals of society are considered as good or bad. Now, you are saying YES! the ideal of working, consuming, entertaining in various ways that we do as a society are GOOD for SOMEONE ELSE. Thus, it is not until the birth decision that society becomes an ideology of weighing of ideas and ideals and assenting to them or not assenting to them.
Thus, debating something like "Should we buy into this ideology of X (government vs. corporate run X, let's say)" is secondary to debating something like "Should we buy into the ideology of the ways of life (society) itself?".
Therefore, it seems to me, that giving birth isn't an assent to an ideology but rather a bold challenge to it.
As an aside, something seems wrong with knowingly putting people in a worse situation.
Quoting TheMadFool
So I think you are still not thinking general enough. I mean, literally the ways of life of a society- how we survive, maintain our comfort levels and environment, and entertain ourselves is an ideology. By giving birth to a new person, you are assenting to that ideology (whatever you think of the current version of that society).
Actually, to add to the above, the ways of life BECOMES an ideology once the birth decision happens. So the way we survive, maintain comfort levels, and environment become an ideology upon deciding for someone else they should live in this society too.
You have missed something very important. The US is not the democracy we inherited because of the deliberate manipulation of a few and ignorance of the masses.
The US is what it defended its democracy against and thinking we are the democracy we defended in two world wars is a huge mistake! This change happened the same way Prussia took over Germany and turned it into the strongest military-industrial complex in the world, requiring a united world action to shut it down. If the US had not gotten involved, it would still be the strongest military-industrial complex, not the US. It was the Prussians who turned Germany into a military-industrial complex, not the whole of Germany choosing to take that path. It is people understanding that military-industrial complex, running the US today, not those literate in Greek and Roman classics and who are committed to an enlightened population capable of having liberty and being self-governing.
That is the importance of the 1958 National Defense Education Act. Complete cultural change.
You still haven't said anything about ideologies enjoining birthing.
It is clearly an ideology but not a necessary one.
You can happily adopt a completely different view and function perfectly well inside that society. In fact, you will most likely do better than people who adopt the mainstream ideology. Well, that has always been my impression. I believe that adopting the standard ideology in society will automatically lead to personal failure.
It's the implication of this that is most important, not just awareness (though I doubt parents think of birthing children as assenting to an ideology). The implication is that if ideology is debatable, putting new people into these ways-of-life should be debated as well. It is no different a political debate as health care, and in fact is more fundamental and important.
But the debate isn't about which society is best, but whether it is good to bring someone into any society. See the conversation I'm having with TheMadFool for reference of where I'm going with this. Basically I'm saying that if bringing people into ways of life (any ways of life) is an ideology (you are ASSENTING to a system of life), then birthing new people into a society should be just as debatable as any other ideology.
In a way, an ideology implies something is good for someone, usually not just you but other people (sometimes everybody).
I think that it does not even matter which society is best. In my opinion, you can always personally succeed, as long as you do not adopt its standard collection of lies, i.e. its ideology. In fact, if you do not believe it, it will just not apply to you, because you will trivially bypass all its land mines.
Quoting schopenhauer1
You will have to axiomatize that belief. You cannot deduce it from other beliefs.
Life in general seems to be naturally inclined to axiomatize that it is a good thing to have offspring. Otherwise, life would probably not even exist.
If you adopt anti-natalist views, then you will not have any offspring, and then this in-existent offspring will not perpetuate your ideas. Hence, the world will be always end up being populated mostly by people who have inherited natalist opinions from their parents. It is just a question of keeping your children away from public-school indoctrination camps operated by anti-natalist cultural Marxists. Therefore, anti-natalism is an "evolutionary dead-end". Still, it is obviously your own choice.
I'm not sure how you are using the term axiomatize. However, I will say that life does not have ideas, only people do. People choose to have offspring. They are following the ideology that ways of life of a society are good. Generally speaking, most humans have to live in some sort of society. Yeah, you can give me some fringe exceptions, but besides that this isn't sustainable as a widespread thing, these fringes are only in relation to the non-fringes, so you need both.
Quoting alcontali
That is the consequence true. However, I am not saying what the consequences will be but just that indeed birth turns simple "society" into an ideology by wanting it to spread to others (new people). Ideology is not just belief, but usually belief applied to a political and social context (think of Marxism, socialism, free-market capitalism, etc.). Just take the ways-of-life of society and apply that to other people, and you have an ideology of society itself.
All life fundamentally chooses to have offspring. That is why it still exists in the first place.
Quoting schopenhauer1
Not necessarily. I can give you a simple counterexample. Jewish minorities still had children, even though they never particularly subscribed to the non-Jewish mainstream ideology of society. They clearly had their own.
Quoting schopenhauer1
A fringe can easily become the mainstream. That happens all the time. In fact, most people are sheeple. Their opinion concerning the mainstream ideology, (or concerning anything at all, for that matter) does not matter at all. Nassim Taleb has written a good article exactly on that subject: The Most Intolerant Wins: The Dictatorship of the Small Minority. The opinion of most people is immaterial and irrelevant. Only intolerant people matter. Society changes its ideology according to the principle of group renormalization in line with the opinion of its most intolerant members.
So, you can happily ignore the opinion of most people, because it is known to be worthless.
Yes, indeed. Without a consensus on how to live, a good ideology to live by, procreating simply amounts to increasing the number of confused souls.
The key word here is chooses. To say that most animals "choose" to have offspring, is a misuse of that word. Animals may have instincts for children, but choosing is something different. They may "choose" a mate, but "choose" in this regard, is a loosely used meaning, referring to rote cognitive processes. Same goes for "choosing" what time to mate, or if to mate.
Humans, on the other hand, can deliberate based on the fact that we are linguistic animals. Again, I don't even want this debate. If you want to start another thread on animal cognition, be my guest, but this is my final word on it in this thread. If you answer it, I will ignore it as it is not what the thread is about.
Quoting alcontali
No, this example does not have anything to do with what I am discussing. To clarify, I meant ANY society- not just the majority, not just a minority, not just a small one, or a large one, but choosing to birth someone in ANY society is an ideology. In fact, I'd still say that since all parties involved (majority and minority) are part of a bigger system anyways, the more general ways of life (having to survive, having to maintain comfort, having to maintain some form of entertainment/meaning) make it simply SOCIETY rather than various intra-societies. That is to say, when you pan out of it, really ALL societies are going to have similar ways of life.. even if they look different on the surface. Everyone needs to eat and so need to be a part of an economy (bit coin, real currency, markets, hunting, whatever..).. Everyone will want comfortable levels at some point (too cold, too hot, too this or that)... Everyone will want some sort of entertainment or meaning (boredom, needs and wants of all kinds). So, really we can just say any or all societies at this point in the argument.
Quoting alcontali
So again, it doesn't matter what particular society, but SOCIETY en totale. Ask yourself, is there a society at all in question? If yes, bringing someone into that way of life (majority, minority, or any at all) is an ideology in itself.
Never trusted by whom?
I think we would agree here that "they were never blindly trusted by people properly training in reasoning and the scientific method".
Of course, psychologists and economists may say otherwise, and say key points in their belief system and decision making process as likewise following from an "objective epistemology", whereas we would say it is an ideology motivated by social control: That physicists call these "soft sciences" and their own methods "hard science" to signal amongst themselves that these people down the hall are, largely, raving lunatics; if we had the money and decided to hire a team of physicists and mathematicians to study psychological phenomenon it is unlikely they would suddenly declare "well, we're doing soft science now, so anything goes, just post whatever bullshit you want on the wall and we'll take a vote on it"; rather, they would likely continue to do "hard science" but just not come to any of the radical conclusions about mental states that governments require to keep things a bit quieter; they would likely simply completely discard cherished works that turn out to be just the anecdotal musings of a pervert with a beard and whatever frameworks have since been built up on them.
Which is of course why physicists are not invited into these disciplines to "harden them up"; but of course it goes without saying that, in the case of economics, when a venture actually requires the best predictions available to make money, they hire a bunch of physicists and mathematicians to build those models, and whatever propaganda an economist believes is completely ornamental in such a situation.
And indeed, when a group of mathematicians worked up the courage and took it upon themselves, completely uninvited of course, to review the reasoning rigour in the "soft sciences" they built up a robust statistical model concluding the conclusions rarely follow from the premises.
So, maybe we agree broadly speaking on these sorts of happenings, but my point is that someone who disagrees with us will say "no, no, no, you guys have an agenda and have built an 'anti-soft-science' ideology to justify it ... and not only an agenda! but authority but Oppositional Defiant Disorder (ODD) and you need treatment fast!".
What we view as epistemic deficiency in arriving at critical conclusions in the soft sciences, well, supporters of these frameworks of classifying people as "mentally ill (...nothing wrong with society, it's just them)" will say their framework follows from an objective epistemology.
And indeed, in general, any disagreement between anyone as to what is true, each side will accuse the other of being merely an ideology whereas they're own ideas are derived from solid "standard epistemology".
Hence, in my view at least, insisting one's own ideas are epistemic whereas anyone who disagrees has a made-up ideology is simply to invite sterile debate. Your ideas about epistemology are just that, your ideas, and so form an ideology about what you consider true within epistemology; many people may agree with some key points, but if someone disagrees (for instance claims all is empty and your own self that believes these things doesn't even really exist), well they will say their's is the true epistemology and yours is just the ideology of a deluded ego.
Quoting alcontaliQuoting alcontali
Yes, we agree here, this is exactly my point. Most people's interaction with the broader scientific community is with medicine, psychology and economics. So, if they were promised trickle-down benefits that then don't arrive, or that their negative feelings arising from precarious and exhausting economic and working conditions can be "fixed", or that a certain medication is recommended and has "hard evidence it's likely more beneficial than not", it is completely reasonable that, if these promises don't turn out to be true, they then start to doubt every single scientific community.
It's of course easy for people with proper mathematical training to simply ask the doctor for the studies supporting the recommendation and then laugh it away when sample sizes are ludicrously small and, even if the conclusions are true (which is never the case, there's always "well ... we didn't study a whole range of risks .. .and are not technically recomending anything BUT! if the practioner feels this is will help their patient we don't have any evidence it will do more harm than good at this point; tada!" of course, to cover the asses of the scientists doing the study; not so "scientifically incompetent" after all) -- even if the conclusions are true on face value, only establish the thinnest of possible risk-benefits -- and in one case where I've requested the evidence, I had a few hours later the report that no such evidence exists, it's just the "policy" of the hospital to make such a recommendation; lolz.
My point is exactly that: the "bet", by most academics, that calling out bullshit they see in other areas will undermine trust in science, is completely counterproductive and has no reasoning basis but simply exemplifies their own corruption (self-censorship for money) with regards to the scientific process. Wrong science has very real world consequences for people, and living those consequences undermines faith in the scientific community far faster and surely than scientists debating "what is actually true".
Quoting alcontali
Now, my bringing up climate change was not to debate it, but just as an example of the reasoning process above academics of hard science use to justify censoring themselves about the tons of bullshit found in the "soft sciences": that if I point out economists use of mathematics is like a child driving a car on a the highway ... maybe people won't swallow the line "scientific consensus, science knows best!".
So, I agree that the arguments presented to people about climate change are terrible: basically assuming people don't have any critical thinking skills and therefore the best they can do is just follow a consensus of experts ... without realizing that whether or not to trust a consensus of experts requires critical thinking.
However, why we differ is a difference in our ideological approach to science. Whereas you see people gaining from the notion of man made climate change, I see it far more plausible much more powerful interests have to gain from denial of man made climate change. Likewise, the science of climate change is a hard science question, following from physical theories of energy conservation and thermodynamics as well as geology, built-up by scientists over decades and centuries who have earned my trust.
Of course, doubt is always possible, but the correct reasoning framework is not "a consensus of experts" but rather a risk-management framework, within the context of all the other environmental problems. Again, what is a "reasonable risk to maintain a preferred social lifestyle" and what is not, is ideological -- and not simply of one's ideological approach to science but one's value system -- there is no epistemic given on reasonable risk nor even that people care about future generations or even other people alive right now, or even their future selves!; different moral systems will yield radically different conclusions based on the same evidence, even if there wasn't a consensus.
As for the example of living off of sunlight, there are plenty of valid epistemological positions where this would be true, and not just "magic" but even with current scientific (had science) theories one could believe we really are in a simulation (many people do) and will power can "bend the rules" (that the movie "the Matrix" was just the AI gas-lighting us for fun, and "deja vu" really is hard scientific evidence proving the Matrix is real and has flaws inconsistent with thermodynamics and that you can verify yourself). Likewise, we can't rule out aliens that can live off sunlight and have come to earth to teach important spiritual lessons; that our "western rationalism" has failed and these spiritual truths "freeing" is proof the guru has the truth, maybe is an alien, and not our "science". So, not only is excluding all these epistemic possibilities the formation of an ideology (and my own, we agree on what we expect to be true about such claims of living off sunlight), coming to the conclusion that "yes, living off sunlight can't be done, anyone who says so is lying or delusional" requires trusting the scientific community "enough" (simply verifying you can't live off sunlight doesn't exclude others can't) and what "trust" level is justifiable can't be objectively verified by definition.
Yes, I misunderstood your question, it seems uncontroversial to me that parents signup to a large part of the ideology of the society they are in when deciding to conceive.
I had originally understood you were questioning whether it's possible for the resulting person that's born can escape the ideology they grow up in; wherein, my basic point is a large part of the "social common ideology" is simply necessary to live, because it happens to be true, and trying to escape it will get a person killed far before they manage to purge themselves of all socially inherited beliefs; and other parts that are arbitrary simply have little reason to forego; such as inventing one's own language and refusing to speak according to society's "rules". But of course, that "lot's of things are true" doesn't establish some things aren't false, and I would argue that everything a society believes in can be escaped from.
But we seem to be largely in agreement vis-a-vis parents choosing to conceive (and risking it is also an ideological choice):
Quoting schopenhauer1
I would agree with.
Of course, not all pregnancies are chosen, so I would not say a rape victim that conceives and gives birth does so out of any particular ideology; though I'm not sure this is relevant point for what you want to discuss the philosophical implications of this scenario.
Quoting boethius
So to take this implication further, I believe this to be the utmost important political decision. I see political ideology as ideas that one believes not just oneself, but other should follow. Thus, forcing other people into society should be the first thing debated. Everything else is secondary to this as everything else literally, comes from this.
You're probably going to work for some employer or maybe start a business. If you don't for a long enough, you will go hungry and become homeless. You can try to hack it in the wilderness yourself. Someone thought that this was a good situation to bring you in. But this wasn't examined more than- it is good to bring this person into society. The ideology is, "At least some people should be brought into society". Why is any person being brought into a society a good thing? It is simply an ideology that the way of life is good, and others should be brought into it.
But to live at all is the ideology in this case. Why should people live at all (be conceived, birthed into existence)? To work, to entertain themselves, in a certain socio-economic context etc. seems to be the ideology for the children. But why are we assuming this is good for people to enter into? The ideology of living in a society is assuming another person should live in the society. Why this assumption? Why isn't this ideology debated? That should be a political debate, not an assumption of inevitability.
I think there's a simple explanation for the situation as you describe it. I think it's related to what I said earlier about people procreating despite knowledge of the unpleasant facts of life but exactly the opposite. What I mean is that it's not that people giving birth the children are making a conscious effort in full knowledge of the situation such as their children having to work, having to find some form of entertainment, in short having to undertake the arduous task to find a niche for themselves in society and then go on to repeat what their parents did and have children of their own. Au contraire, people are completely oblivious about the ideology they're endorsing and have never in their lives given a single thought to the issue. Of course it could be as I said earlier, people are in the know but are overwhelmed by social pressure to continue the tradition of family-making, either with resignation to, or in defiance of, the facts.
Enter your question as to why the matter doesn't make an appearance in social debates. Perhaps people value life to the right degree to preclude persuasion otherwise. You haven't spoken of suffering at all but have made an effort to expose the meaninglessness of social existence - an endless repetition of activities having no intrinsic worth of their own. However think of it this way: nonexistence you've "known" before your birth and you will "know" it at death. Why not experience some life just for the heck of it? I know the odds are stacked against us but there's a chance, however slim, that our experience of life will not be all pain and tears. Life doesn't look so bad now does it? Even the most monotonous, dull life seems almost mouth-watering! Irresistible!
Quoting TheMadFool
This is probably a major part of the issue as to why procreating is not considered an ideology. People don't stop and think that what they are doing is indeed a political ideology- one that is putting a stamp of approval on a way of life.
Quoting TheMadFool
TheMadFool, have you seen my other posts? Almost all of them pertain to suffering as a reason for antinatalism. However, this thread was meant to be about as you said:
Quoting TheMadFool
That's sort of true. This thread is more about the inability to recognize procreation of someone into a society as a political decision for someone. That is the issue at hand in this context.
Quoting TheMadFool
So now you are just defending the ideology I guess?
All in all, you're right on the money about how empty the ideology of procreation is.
I am essentially in agreement.
However, for me it is not a problem to categorize all beliefs as ideological and all decisions as ideologically based.
I'll make a small tangent to elucidate the negative connotation of the word ideology, which I want to avoid in this conversation, as I think you do as well, and so if there is not even a slight hint of negative connotation of ideology influencing your argument, then the following is for the benefit of others.
The idea that "ideology is bad", generally speaking, comes from propagandists defending the status quo. For instance, if a business makes some controversial decision that many don't like. We might ask "was it for ideological reasons?" which has the implicit alternative that if it wasn't "for ideological reasons" then it was just some marketing calculation intended to maximize profits by drumming up controversy and increasing loyalty in at least some people by building an us-vs-them feeling.
However, of course, maximizing profits is also an ideology. By categorizing any other decision making basis as "ideological", and thus not justifiable at best and simply irrational at worst, is simply a subtle trick to emphasize "don't go outside the lines".
So yes, deciding to have children is ideological based and implicitly accepts a large part of society's ideology.
However, I would argue that "a large part" of society's ideology is a prerequisite for having children because it happens to be true. Though I view all decisions as ideological, that does not mean all ideology is false. "You shouldn't eat poisonous mushrooms" is a part of society's ideology I've inherited, and I imagine you as well, but doesn't mean it's false.
Now, I agree that most people don't give the ideology they've inherited much thought, obviously simply going along with it in a "it's worked until now at least" sense isn't necessarily contradictory. Of course, most people who don't think much about it, just a normal thing people wanting and having children (a fact of life as it were), probably don't even argue that far. So it is an interesting debate whether such an assumption without attempting to justify it is a justifiable assumption; but of course, it can only be debated from outside by people that are reflecting on the issue and considering both proposals. So, probably best to discuss those proposals in themselves first.
So, although we agree that it an ideological choice, I would not agree completely with:
Quoting schopenhauer1
At least not in terms of a face-value interpretation, of relation to parents conceiving children, as it excludes people who cannot have children from participating in what is essential and not secondary.
A reformulation I would agree with, is that the fundamental issue is "whether it is worthwhile to continue humanity or not", and, if yes, then several principles follow as a corollary. The most important would be preserving the environmental conditions that make humanity possible, not simply because that's the foundation for humanity's project but we have responsibility to other living creatures and not just ourselves. The idea that "sometimes people should have children" also follows from deciding to continue humanity. And, for some, the best way to contribute to continuing humanity does involves having children, while others may see the best way for them as other activities.
Of course, most people who have children may not think in these terms or even intuitively share this world view; for instance may not care too much about the environment and want children anyway to satisfy their own parental desire or increase their social standing.
However, as I mention above, I believe we can't escape a large part of society's ideology because it happens to be true (and going without it leads quickly to death) but I also believe that whatever is false we inherit we can escape from. Deciding to have children is not an intrinsic commitment to perpetuate false beliefs society has. The "true ideology" may overlap a large part of society's ideology, either defined as the status quo or then just the collection of what everyone happens to believe, and the true ideology may include valuing the continuation of humanity.
Given that even a fairly small "town" can potentially have hundreds of different people, groups, and so forth, most of not all mathematical approximations of "society" or any given society are lacking in that regard, and will only end up being a very small part of a much bigger whole,
So I think we are basically in agreement except that wanting/having children is a "fact of life". I have argued several times that in the human animal, it is a deliberate choice made from deliberate actions. I don't think other animals have the same ability to deliberate on any number of choices- including whether to procreate. Thus indeed, procreating is a deliberate choice. Politically speaking, it is taking in the ways-of-life of a current society (or hoped for future society?) and wanting to put a new person into that- making the decision for them, that this is deemed as good and a new person should deal with whatever the ways-of-life are.
Quoting boethius
That is taking that a bit too literally. Anyone can debate whether procreation is good. After all, procreation certainly affects the progeny born into existence. Although I don't think anyone can force their idea of procreating or not on someone else, it is ironic that indeed the parent is forcing procreation on a new person, whether or not that parent's neighbor disapproves or not. So again, anyone can have this conversation, whether if one can actually procreate or not.
Quoting boethius
But why is the assumption that we should contribute to continuing humanity? That is the exact ideological assumption I am questioning. Perhaps we should contribute to reducing ALL suffering unto a future person by simply not having said person (who will eventually suffer)?
Quoting boethius
I don't get how you are using "true" in this post. What makes an ideology "true"? Any answer you provide will beg the question, even unto the simple answer "it helps us survive" as even that ideology can be questioned as to why we should contribute to that cause rather than reduction of suffering (which would equate to preventing any new person from being born to experience suffering).
Yes, we seem to agree on the basic framework that society runs on ideology.
By "fact of life" I mean to reference that most people with children or who see children around may not have thought through the philosophical implications.
It is an aside, however, to what extent people can be justified holding a position without thinking through the justification. My statement wasn't well written if it is not clear I was not taking a position relative this issue. Apologetics for people who haven't thought their actions through much is not a subject that interests me -- though not because the answers are clear to these questions but simply because the only person who can benefit from such arguments is someone who does have the time and desire to think about the subject and so is no longer in the category of "not having thought about it".
Quoting schopenhauer1
Though I agree that people who can't have children can still talk about it, and so indirectly affect others who can, it would certainly seem to me a position of less moral responsibility than actually deciding to have children or not, in the "face-value" framework of conceiving children in itself as the most important political act.
My main purpose in my response, however, is to make a moral equivalence between having children and all actions that maintain and perpetuate society.
Quoting schopenhauer1
In my last comments I have been outlining (in my view) how a justification for having children can be argued; although it is indeed a very weight decision in itself, it follows from the broader question of valuing humanity as a whole or not. If humanity has value, and we conclude we should continue it, then it follows children are consistent with such a value system.
I have not yet argued for these premises, that humanity does have value and should be continued.
We could of course move onto this question, but so far my goal here is to give an idea of how ideology does not exclude coherent ideology which in turn does not exclude an ideology being true. That indeed, everything is ideological, and the word only has meaning when contrasting with the status quo (which at best is simply a short hand way to say "I'm going to now describe some ideas the majority does not agree with" and at worst is the ideology of denying the status quo is an ideology -- such as maximizing profits is simply rationality beyond reproach and not an ideology in itself), and in a philosophical context is simply equivalent to "world view". We are still left with all the same questions of whether the ideology or world view in question has merit or not, is sound or not, and is true or not. It's not a useless word in the philosophical context, it makes sense to contrast "my ideological foundations to yours"; but my main point so far is that identifying something as ideological does not provide us any further information than that we are considering the ideas in question together; it remains to be seen if those ideas have justification or are really true.
Quoting schopenhauer1
Yes, this is exactly why, as with my discussion here with @alcontali, I have been arguing there are no "epistemic givens"; perhaps none at all (even within our own minds), but in the least there are no epistemic givens in philosophical debate. What I believe makes something true or false is itself part of my ideology, and if you don't share the same criteria of what's true and false in your ideology, then you will not be convinced by the same reasoning. If we find common ground, we cannot conclude that "therefore that common ground is true" but only we have shared ideology, if only partly.
However, that we are unable to convince each other of anything without sharing premises that we can always beg the question about, does not imply there is no true positions. It does not even mean that we can't be truly convinced that we really do have the truth about something. Though I accept that you see my ideology (wherever we disagree) as one ideology among many, I see my ideology (certainly the critical foundations of it) as really true, otherwise I would not believe it; and I expect you to see things the same way for the key parts of your ideology.
Good point.
Quoting boethius
Interesting. I can agree being that parents are assenting to perpetuate a certain way-of-life from being born. There is possibly a tangential aspect here too of the fact that the parent is doing it on BEHALF of the child. Therefore, procreation specifically (more than other societal perpetuation activities) is that much more under scrutiny as the participants cannot make the decision on their own behalf. Someone ELSE feels society is worth living through, and another person is the one who deals with the consequence of this decision. This makes procreation that much more of a focal point. The parent not only deems society good enough for THEMSELVES, but deem it such that ANOTHER PERSON must enter into its fray. Thus more than any other ideology, indeed there is as an aspect of forced ideology. The consequence is that it forces another person to play the game of life (society). [As an aside, let's not get bogged down if there was an actual "person" to be "forced". We can both agree that a new person would exist where there was not a person in the case of procreation, and that new person would be "forced" by having to play the game of life or die.. in that sense I mean "forced"..Others on here have tried to bog the conversation down in semantics regarding "forced" due to no person being around beforehand. Besides being off point of this particular thread, it is trying to use "forced" in a metaphysical sense and not as a shorthand for "have to go through society's ways-of-life lest the person die].
Quoting boethius
Of course, using people by "forcing" them into a way-of-life because one thinks the abstract concept of "humanity" is good, is still using the individual for an abstract concept...
Quoting boethius
I would only add that ideology is any set of ideals a particular person or group holds. My point with society being an ideology is that for all the things we do not hold in common, there are ways-of-life of any particular society (how we produce/consume/need some form of entertainment or meaning) that a parent is tacitly consenting to by having a child. That is to say, the parent agrees with the BROADER ways-of-life of a society and assents to it by having the child (which bears the consequence due to someone else's assent). This particular ideology is that of assenting to the current (or hoped-for) ways-of-life. The parent believes this is GOOD for SOMEONE ELSE (to be born at all and live out the ways-of-life).
Quoting boethius
Indeed, I think parents are convinced they have the "truth" about something- mainly that the ways-of-life of society are good and should be perpetuated. What are the costs? Who is affected? In this case it is on behalf of someone else. The parent is so convinced of their truth, they will put another person into a situation, affecting them for a lifetime because THEY think the ways-of-life are so good it MUST be good for someone else.
My children's generation came of age during the Great Recession, and corruption was in the news, the young could not be assimilated into mainstream society because of there were no jobs for them and in Oregon, two-parent families could not get public assistance, so father's abandoned their families because they had to, and young lovers did not get married. All this lead to serious social problems. We announced a national youth crisis that swept the country as the Hippie movement did.
Without question, we live in a very different society today. Traditional values have been destroyed and few women want to be "just a housewife". More women are choosing not to have children at all. Instead of a focus on liberty, we have a focus on security and we have been giving up liberty ever since 911. We can't even talk about many things because the young have no memory of the past and the meaning of our words and values are so changed, we have lost the ability to communicate across generations.
I am horrified that after our commitment to liberty so many people look forward to a day when robots will control our lives!
Interesting post. Thanks for sharing. So this thread is about how deciding to have children is itself an ideology. The ideology would be something like "The current society is one where a someone ELSE should have to live all the ways-of-life of that society". Why do you suppose someone else should live all the ways-of-life of a society because the parent deems this to be good for the child? Why is it ever good to force the ideology of society (aka the game of life) on someone else? Unlike other "forced" ideologies, this one is permanent lest suicide. I would just like to see your justification for why it is acceptable and not questioned like any other ideology. The ideology of bringing another person into the world because you believe it is good for them to be brought into the world should be questioned.
Why should we enforce some values on everyone? Someone has to care for the children and there is an important difference between giving children a home life or institutionalizing them. Homemakers played an extremely important role in society and I am not sure we are better off without them.
So I don't think you are getting me here. You are talking about gender discrimination and the role of women in society. That is an interesting topic. However, this particular topic is about whether bringing children into the world is considered a political ideology in itself. In other words, choosing to have a child is equivalent to saying, "I like the current society and its ways-of-life and want to make another person also go through the ways-of-life of the society". To have a child is a POLITICAL decision, one made on behalf for the child, due to an ideology that the current society is good (and good enough to force another person into it on their behalf by procreating them into the society in the first place). That is more the topic, not as much role of gender in society.
As an aside, it is an interesting debate whether having someone stay at home full time is a better arrangement than two working parents. But that would be a different topic.
Good luck having children if women are not valued as mothers. Trump has not promoted having children as national patriotism as Hitler did.
That was before women's liberation and different forms of birth control. Life may choose life, but we should not take it for granted that woman choose to give birth.
I know I am not of line in this thread, but I would like to know how many women are in this thread? It troubles me that until recently extremely few women were allowed to participate in philosophy or anything else besides bearing children and caring for them. For centuries males debated truth without a woman's point of view. When the subject is having children, I certainly think a woman's point of view is an important one, so please tell me, how many women are contributing to this thread's understanding of truth?
That was before women's re-enslavement by the corporate oligarchy.
In fact, by becoming wage slaves, women have become very dependent on corporations, from whom, unlike from their husbands, they will certainly not get a divorce settlement when they inevitably part ways. Corporate wage slavery is a Faustian pact, both for men and for women, but even more so for women. It is a very fake kind of freedom.
With the 401k-style accounts melting away on the stock exchange right now, in spite of the Fed's most recent intervention, the corporation-controlled retirement savings will soon be largely gone too.
For anybody who mistakenly believes that receiving a corporate wage is a sustainable way of life, the hour of truth is nigh. The next economic downturn is just around the corner and it will be a dire moment of truth. It even looks like the Corona virus may precipitate the inevitable.
A man will always look for ways to solve the problem without any hand holding. For quite a few men, it will not matter that the existing social script no longer works. So, we will recover as we always have in the past.
In fact, men even like it when the shit hits the fan, because that allows us to creatively find solutions, rise to the occasion, and show our mettle. Hard times tend to be good for men. Still, we are certainly not going to help anybody who has always insisted that they do not need us. These people will have to help themselves.
Now that the storm finally seems to be coming to shore, let's rejoice!
What I have read of the Great Depression totally disagrees with Quoting alcontali
For me, the great recession following the OPEC embargo of oil to the US was very different from men benefitting from economic collapse.
I want to be careful to not derail this thread but economic collapses tend to destroy men's self-esteem and they abandoned their families, leaving the women alone to provide for their children and care for them too. It is nothing like your notion of the effect of economic collapse. Now let us speak of having children to pass on an ideology. :gasp: I DON'T THINK SO. Only a sheltered woman without much life experience would think that is sound thinking. Mothers rarely enjoy the freedom of men and if she does assume the freedom of a man, I think the children are in trouble. So if a woman wants freedom, she doesn't have children. At least not intentionally.
Yes, because in that particular downturn the government still managed to keep afloat. In fact, the government will keep afloat as long as the currency does not collapse. When it does, however, that will lead to Venezuela/Zimbabwe situations.
When the currency will be gone, in all practical terms, the government will be gone too.
Quoting Athena
Where are the few remaining families that could still fall apart? This time, we will mostly be looking at single men and single women fending each for themselves.
Quoting Athena
That is the current situation already.
It is the fake freedom afforded by corporate wage slavery.
That will only keep flying as long as the corporations do. The corporations will be gone in Venezuela/Zimbabwe type of situations. In fact, they may already be mostly closing, just in a corona-virus situation.
Not all men will figure out how to survive economically, and still make it, but most of the ones who do make it, will be men. These men will probably want to take care of people who depend on them today already but it will not be a good time for them to take on new burdens. Therefore, unattached people will have to fend for themselves, and make it through the storm alone.
We can also expect that the security situation will deteriorate drastically. I expect to see riots and looting. Things have been too good for too long. Some people have become way too arrogant, and it is time to pay the bills now.
I should use the user name Ms. Contrary because no matter what is said, I can take the opposite side. I think what we think of having children is dependent on several factors. Our age is one of those factors.
When I came of age, females went to college to find a good husband and then they stayed home to have children and care for the family. Homemakers did more than care for their families, as they cared for everyone in the community, or in large cities, got involved with volunteer work. It is all about being a good woman, and that can be considered a part of an ideology.
I love our brief mother goddess period following on the trail of the Hippie movement. I loved identifying with the movement and baking homemade bread, gardening and preserving food, being creative. I was a woman and women are mothers. That was most important to me at the time. I am not sure what that had to do with politics but I am sure it was not an empty ideology because it lives in me with great joy.
Later as I learned of Athens and Sparta, I came to the conclusion that family values are very important to democracy and our liberty. I can understand having a sense of patriotic duty in being a traditional woman. This is highest in my priority of importance but I would be surprised if that is what you all are talking about.
That is why I talk so much about liberty and democracy. In the beginning of all civilizations, people have nothing but a determination to work together and manifest a good life for all. I do not fear an economic collapse. I fear facing one without a shared ideology favoring democracy and liberty. Our way of life can not be sustained so I expect the worst to happen, but if our democratic ideology is strong, I believe we can maintain our civility and adjust to having a good life with less.
Quoting alcontali
:grimace: The remaining families are in the mothers fighting to give their children good lives. The problem is there are too few good men, and hopefully, we can change that. OMG that was sexist :lol: to be fair, our modern young ladies could use some improvement too. I am sorry for being so bad but hang with me okay?
Where does our idology come from and how is it transmitted?
Quoting alcontali
Agreed, but this Military-Industrial Complex is nothing like the democracy we defended in two world wars and it is not our only possible reality. This is why I had to jump into this thread. What ideology are you all talking about when you talk about having children to maintain the manifestation of the ideology. We are what we defended our democracy against. Having children does not maintain an ideology. Only educating children for an ideology maintains the ideology.
Quoting alcontali
Yes, we educated for that and we elected Trump. :lol:
It is past time for me to get in the pool and exercise. While I am gone, please tell me what ideology you all are talking about. It seems to me this thread took a turn when it became about having children. Otherwise, the ideology could be any tribe of native Americans, or any religion. If the people die, so does their culture and consciousness. Sparta became extinct because it could not reproduce fast enough to outnumber their enemies and it was their ideology that created this problem.
So it is about having children in that, by having children, a parent is assenting to the current society and its ways of life. They are agreeing with it to the point that they will create more adherents to the current society. One must have a strong conviction that society is good if one is making the decision on behalf of someone else (by procreating them) that they should also be involved in and participate in the current society and it ways of life. This assenting to bringing new people into society is an ideology in itself of perpetuating the current society. Its such a strong assent to the point of making the decision that others must go through it as well.
It's our instinct to group together and live cohesively, how we do that is the question. When the how is imposed on you it's natural to feel it's arbitrary and capricious. I don't know that I can equate instinct to ideology, but I can say it's the progenitor of ideology.
That's an interesting thought. Is the assent to perpetuate society (through procreating more people) an instinct? I say no. It is a preference and thus something that can be deliberated and reflected upon. In other words, we can choose to follow an ideology (perpetuate society) or we can choose not to. This is unlike instinct where there is no choice. There is no ideological animal instinct.
I disagree.
Eating is undoubtedly an instinct of all creatures that do it. That being said, in captivity wild animals will often starve themselves. Why do they do this? Are they deliberating on this choice? If they are is eating no longer an instinct? I would say this isn't the case. Maybe the lack of ability to fulfill one instinctual obligation will cause you to neglect another. Maybe the ability to deliberate can cause you to act against your own instinct and therefor your own self interest. It's something I personally like to call the curse of philosophy.
To go deeper, a severely disabled person could easily imagine that passing on their genetic material could curse somebody to the troubles of the same disability, thus making their life worse by default as well as poisoning the gene pool. On the opposing end one could argue that being able to think in this way means they are a value to the gene pool but a detriment to their own natural interests.
I hope this explanation illuminates my point.
How is reproducing an instinct?
Quoting MyOwnWay
What natural interests? How can you prove wanting a child is natural? Also, this example is oddly eugenic sounding. To reiterate, my argument is having a child is approving of a certain lifestyle (the current society) and thus society becomes an ideology for parents.
Eating and continued survival would be the best examples.
It was meant to. This isn't an implication of right or wrong though. What I'm trying to get across is the original question here must be answered in a clinical and biological way. If we fail to do that then I suppose every action must be viewed as part of or a contribution to ideology.
Is it though? What if you have a child outside of societies bounds and raise it disdain society?
However, men did hold a notion that having a son proved they were a man, and back in the day, having children is what a good woman did. Are these examples of having children to manifest an ideology?
I knew a young man who was diagnosed with ALS at age 28 and he chose not to have children because the disease could be inherited, but later he regretted making that choice. It was not an ideology he wanted to preserve, but dying without experiencing beginning a parent seemed to be a regret. I think also that he would have liked to have had a child to extend his short life. But as things seem to be getting worse, I think increasingly people are hesitant to bring a child into this world. For sure people are choosing to have fewer children compared to having 8 to 14 children.
I’m currently reading Aristotle’s Politics and he clearly states that the state is a community.
A community is composed of families that formed a larger social group. Typically for mutual support and survival.
I believe our ancestors hardly had the time to debate ideologies when they formed the earliest societies along lines following instincts.
Hunger certainly is. Continued survival is too broad, but generally we don't like the pain associated with dying and we may add fear of death. However, having a child is a choice. One can go their whole life without it and live. It is not like going to the bathroom or hunger.
Quoting MyOwnWay
So antinatalism believes ALL people should not procreate (due to preventing any suffering for new person born), not just some. I just don't want to get bogged down in discussing other ideas.
Quoting MyOwnWay
So in my earlier posts I explained that if we pan out of any society, the ways-of-life start looking more similar than different. There need to be social mechanisms for survival (through some sort of economy, even hunting-gathering), maintenance/comfort (keeping tools maintained, body temperature maintained, even sleep dwellings maintained and in more industrial society this gets exponentially ratcheted up as there are more "things" to maintain and worry about to keep oneself comfortable). Finally, there is entertainment/meaning that must be pursued (anything beyond mere survival or maintenance). All societies are going to perform these three aspects in SOME way. Earlier, I even mentioned the few on the fringe who want to hack it out in the wilderness. That is still in relation to the rest of society (being that's where they came from and that is what they are rebelling against). Thus, they are a consequence of a broader society, not in a vacuum.
Sex and reproduction are different. People have sex because it feels good. People find others attractive for all sorts of social and biological reasons (hormones being a part of that). However, to decide to have a child is a choice. Even "accidents" are willful ignorance. We know where babies come from. We know how to prevent it. If I have to go to the bathroom really bad, I still hold it until I get to a facility if you know what I mean.
Quoting Athena
Kind of. What I am proposing is that if a parent (man or woman) decides to have a child, generally, they are following an ideology of society. They are signalling, "I like society and think someone else should have to go through all the ways-of-life of the current society". Other ways I have said this point below:
Quoting schopenhauer1
Quoting schopenhauer1
Quoting schopenhauer1
Quoting schopenhauer1
Quoting schopenhauer1
Do these quotes give you the gist of what my argument is as how procreation relates to perpetuating society and thus becoming an ideology as the parents assent to a certain way of life?
I respectfully disagree with you. I love my fiancé and I want to sleep with her because I love her and I find her desirable. If we get pregnant, that’s the fruit of our love. Politics have nothing to do with it.
I’m thinking, if politics have anything to do with bringing a child into the world; it’s only because the parents [b]consciously[b] make it into a political decision.
So bringing a new person into the world is not a political decision? You may not think of it like that, but that's exactly why I started this thread, to make people aware that even if it's not interpreted that way, it is. You can decide NOT to have a child. It is generally known that a child would have to deal with all the things that they must do to navigate a particular society, keep themselves alive, maintained, and entertained. This decision to procreate is also something on behalf of someone else. It is in a way assenting to the society to the point of wanting to see yet another person maneuver society and its ways-of-life. That indeed is a political ideology of sorts.
As for your love for your fiance and find her desirable.. we know where babies come from. We know how to prevent it. By not preventing it, we are indeed making a political decision on someone else's behalf and assenting to an ideology, whether we actually see it that way or not, that is what is happening.
For whom is it a choice? Is abortion an equally legitimate choice and should we make sure family planning and abortion services are available to everyone?
Many of us older people find it quite impossible to excise the control of our bodily functions as you so proudly assume is everyone's choice for control. And since when did we expect a male to exercise the control we demand of men today? Back in the day, 4F males took a lot of pride in not exercising a lot of self-control.
Quoting schopenhauer1
BS, they are horny and it happens and they sure as blazes are not pondering the social and political ramifications of having sex. My bad, that was not a very philosophical statement, but here is where philosophy gets a bad rap. The average person is reacting to feelings without analyzing why and what the consequences will be to self or society? Young people having children can't even comprehend how a child will change their own lives, let alone contemplating ideologies. When it comes to sex, it is the other head in control.
We should not assume our family is universal and determines our social order for all time. Sparta did not value families. In Sparta males in barracks and in the end were defeated because they could not reproduce fast enough and their enemies overwhelmed them.
In some cultures, there is no word for "father" because they are not organized around fathers. Not being sure who the father is, it is the mother's brother who holds the father's position.
In some areas in China, a child's father may be the guest in the mother's home but it is the women who rule not the men.
Since we destroyed the value of mothers and said they were just housewives, the number of women who refuse to have children has increased. And throughout modern countries the number of children a couple has greatly decreased, some countries barely reproducing enough to have a sustainable population.
The decision is not a political one, but an identity one. In this place and time, what do I need to do to have high social status? That can mean getting as many females pregnant as possible or not becoming a mother. However, the decision does have political ramifications. The US is no longer ordered by family order, but a New World Order that is very different from the democracy we defended in two world wars.
You get the analogy though.. Always adult diapers.
Quoting Athena
Birth control is readily available. There is still choice, no matter the mitigating circumstances. We all know the consequences. If it was as you say, accidental birth would be the only reason people are born, but its not. Rather, the average person when choosing to procreate, is perpetuating a type of lifestyle- a brand. It is wanting to continue a way-of-life. It is an ideology and the adherents are the people being born.
In societies where people with a different ideology take control of resources and enforce a different way of living, it is devasting to the aboriginal people, leading to shattered lives, broken families and alcoholism. Are people who do this to other people guilty of a wrong? How important are our ideologies to the good life?
Hold on though, you are jumping off on an interesting but slight tangent. If we can make the argument that perpetuating society is like perpetuating a game, and each new person born is a new participant in the game, why should more people play this game?
Let's say the pitfalls of the game are at its most severe, death. Let's say its a continuum from there.. other pitfalls are the sufferings of all kinds throughout existence (pain, discomfort, disappointment, awkwardness, broken-heartedness, anger, boredom, etc).
Let's say the goal of this game is something like "self-actualization". The levels are things like survival-in-an-economic setting (i.e. employment), maintaining your comfort levels (cleaning, regulating surrounding temperatures, consuming preferred items, etc.). and entertaining yourself (keep your mind occupied, try to find meaning in some task or goal, etc.).
With all this in mind, why does this ideology of abiding by this well-trodden way of life (society) need to be perpetuated to yet another person in the first place? Let's not even jump into what kind of society, let's just assume any society needs ways of survival, maintaining, entertainment- its the game of life right? Why more players in this game in the first place? What is it that this game must be continued? We don't have a good answer, and its more complicated and less necessary than a stock answer like "its instinct". Its not in humans. As you admitted, its a choice, and thus a brand, and thus a sort of ideology. But why are we preferring to perpetuate this ideology? Its self-justifying and when we get to the root of the reasons, it doesn't even add up. What is going on is that people are born, they suffer but it is stated that the "brand" of the game-of-life (the ideology of society) must be played by another person.
Well in the US they are not playing the same game that started with the democratic republic. I would say the original is about dead. What are we doing about it? We are talking about our past as in such a way that we think the present is much better.
Quoting schopenhauer1
Do you think that would have always described what is important?
Quoting schopenhauer1
I don't think it does.
Quoting schopenhauer1
The purpose of mythology is to transmit social agreements and transition youth into adults who are valued by the community. The children just happen without planning. I know you think children are the result of planning, but for how many centuries has that been true?
Quoting schopenhauer1
Because we believe it is best and will mean a good life for the members of our society, but as I said we have not perpetuated the ideology of our forefathers. We stopped using education to transmit our culture and began preparing our youth for a technological society with unknown values. Today what the young think is best is not what we wanted in the past. I absolutely hate the new fade of saying "perfect" to everything! That is so superficial and frivolous. I find business practices today, intolerable. I see a serious lack of individual liberty and power and this is not "perfect". This is surely off-topic, but maybe you can understand why I find it hard to go along with your train of thought?
Quoting schopenhauer1
Quoting schopenhauer1
I think you must be young because you are unaware of a dramatic cultural change. The US has become what it defended its democracy against. That means all those people who defended our way of life, died for nothing. That bothers me a lot.
You skipped my question of how is an ideology transmitted.
Yes, I think you are misunderstanding my argument to mean only this society should be questioned. My point is questioning if any society should be perpetuated, whether new/old, this way or that way. All societies are going to have the same basic ways-of-life (that is to say a way to survive, maintain environs, and entertain). It is not whether this specific society should be perpetuated vs. another type of society. That is where there is a mismatch of dialogue here.
Quoting Athena
It might not be planned at a specific incidence, but the consequences were known and the cultural milieu was set up to accommodate what was a well-known fact regarding procreation (thus marry early, have a ceremony, make it sacred, make it tied to money and property, etc. etc.). Anyways, I don't want to veer off into feminist politics or gender roles, this is about society en totale, NOT specific cultural practices per se.
As far as youth and education, and enculturation, the question is why are we making new people? What is important to carrying out society to a new generation at all? The answer is harder than you might initially think. It's a basic question, but it's not a straightforward answer.
Quoting Athena
While I agree on many points, indeed this would be another conversation, as interesting as it is.
Quoting Athena
Again the question is about why society should be perpetuated. Why we bring more people into the world, and spread THE (not a specific) brand of "society" (any way of life, not a specific one).
Quoting Athena
Well, this thread is about specifically how society is perpetuated by procreation. I think we can move to that question after we discuss this a bit more.
This is somewhat false dichotomic, and unrelatable to theory and practice, given that different degrees and variety of "sociality" will exists in individual communities and people (e.x. dichotomies about extroversion vs introversion); and in some ways, dichotomies about "groups" vs "individuals" are false as well.
Nor does it substantiate what not being a "social animal" is or would even mean (in the sense that every animal has some desire to reproduce, sans maybe those which reproduce asexually, all would be "social" animals in this sense)
Likewise, in human (and possibly other) societies, groups, "tribes", and so on and so forth, it's not reducible solely to the desire to physically reproduce (e.x. a non-violent community of monks or nuns practicing celebacy, or a community of artists, musicians, or athletes which serves more of a creative purpose than a "surivial" purpose would be examples.
It's hard for me to discern what you are talking about here. However, as far as society being an ideology, my point is that by having more children, people are trying to force a way-of-life onto a new person (the person being born). It is such an assent (YES!) to society (life) that they want OTHER PEOPLE to live it and will make the decision that they should do so on their behalf.
That does not ring true to me. Perhaps you could describe it more precisely? Exactly what would a common ideology look like?
Quoting schopenhauer1
I don't think those are universals. They are common but not universal and there is nothing sacred about our secular marriages.
Quoting schopenhauer1
We reproduce for the same reason all other animals reproduce. It is nature, not an ideology that leads to reproduction. All animals do it. Marriage is about who is responsible for whom, and it is only common, not universal.
Quoting schopenhauer1 It is not about carrying out a society's ideology to a new generation unless there is a war and then reproduction becomes very important. Then it is important to have as many people as possible or the whole society will become extinct. Your own survival is in danger if your defense is weak. Isreal and Palestine are a good example of the importance of outnumbering "them". Israel's claim to democracy is especially difficult because if the Palestinians outnumber the Jews, the Jews would loose control of decision making. This forces Israel to increase its population faster than the Palestinians. It can not assimilate Palestinians into its culture, unlike the US that gladly assimilated most but not all immigrants. You don't become a Jew like you can become a citizen of the US. And this is about "us" and "then" not exactly ideology. A better subject might be why do divide between "us" and "them"?
Christians were super excellent at assimilating everyone they came into contact with. Jews are the reverse of this. One does not just decide to be a Jew. This is why there are more Christians than Jews.
Quoting schopenhauer1
That is not just another subject. It is stating you don't have an argument because the US is an example of a society that has not preserved its ideology.
Quoting schopenhauer1
Why is it important for Christians to make everyone one of "them"? Why does one society assimilate others and another society keep itself pure of those others? Can we be sure those Jews forced to be Christians are really Christians or are they faking it and do they threaten "us"? I think you have locked onto the wrong premiums. Reproduction is not the only way to increase our numbers. Quoting schopenhauer1
No, we procreate because of nature not because of ideology unless we are in a conflict with others and have to outnumber them. The drive to procreate drastically decreases when people start living in cities and most of the young survive. Now if you are a male Hindu, you must procreate to be sure you have a son to help you pass into the good life. For most men, it is important to have a male child because of ego reasons, and women, in general, want a girl child for ego reasons. It just isn't right to dress up a boy like a girl and teach him to cook and sew like a girl. Only recently did it stop mattering that boys be as boys and girls be as girls. This is about ego, not ideology. Give us the ideology that you are talking about. I don't think there is a universal ideology. There is "who I am" and "who I am not", and there is "us" and "them". What gets passed on is not an ideology! The US is not passing on its original ideology.
People living in the US think of themselves as belonging, even if they are children of illegal immigrants or criminals sitting in a prison. We think we are us and not them. But we do not share an ideology.
I am on your side of the argument. I think we need to question what does it mean to be one of us and why does it matter. A society needs a shared ideology but do we have that?
Is someone with a different skin color one of us? Are Japanese children one of us? Is a Mexican one of us? Can a Jew really be one of us? Do all these people share the same ideology?
Who can list 10 characteristics of democracy? How can a person who can not list 10 characteristics of democracy, pass the ideology of democracy on to his/her offspring? What does it mean to pass on an ideology?
It's hard for me to discern what you are talking about here. However, as far as society being an ideology, my point is that by having more children, people are trying to force a way-of-life onto a new person (the person being born)
[/quote]
So what do you propose? Voluntary Human Extinction Movement?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voluntary_Human_Extinction_Movement
I think you're conflating various things, such as cultures and ideologies with biology.
Obviously on some sub-rational level, the impulse or desire to physically reproduce exists independent of any specific culture or ideology.
Much as animals, such as ants, presumably have nothing akin to human rationality or rational notions such as law, society, culture, and so forth, but still reproduce on a purely instinctive level. (If people were 100% rational all of the time, then unplanned pregnancies or "sex" just for pleasure would presumably not exist).
Basically, your views sound "anarchist" to me. Yes, obviously on some basic level, in civilized nations and societies, a bare minimum of morality or "conformity" is imposed on people by force, assuming they can't or won't on their own accord (e.x. laws against rape, murder and things of those nature), but your anarchist view would somehow argue that "forcing" a rapist not to rape, or a murderer not to murder is "wrong", despite such behavior being based on force and disregards for others' life, rights, autonomy, and so forth.
Any society needs at least three things: A way to survive (hunting and industrial trade would be the two sides of the spectrum I guess), maintenance/comfort regulation (humans generally regulate environment- everything from temperature adjustments to cleaning their ass), entertainment (big brain animals like ourselves generally need to occupy mind if not generally occupied with survival/maintenance activities.. Mind you all three things can be done simultaneously.. its not all cut-and-dry.. You clean the carcass of a deer, while laughing at your neighbor, and cleaning up the mess from the deer (survival, entertainment, and maintenance all at once). You turn down the heat, write up some document for work, while you laugh at a text, and sweep up your kitchen (survival, entertainment, maintenance all at once).
All societies have some way of life (they can be radically different even). It doesn't matter. whatever way -of-life there is (and I don't care if it is back-to-the-landers in the middle of the forest in some remote commune or the most straight-laced 2.5 kids in a suburb of regular heartland Western world).. the fact that some new person will live a way of life and have to maneuver that way of life will occur. The fact that any new life has to maneuver and "deal with" to survive, maintain, and entertain lest they die is an ideology in itself.. It doesn't matter what way of life (as repeated again).
Quoting Athena
See SURVIVAL, MAINTENANCE, ENTERTAINMENT above (aka what is needed in big-brained, linguistically-based, conceptually-based life forms such as ourselves... see Homo sapiens).
Quoting Athena
Not about one type of society versus another.. Only about having to navigate society (survival, maintenance, entertainment) in general.
You are conflating procreation with actual instincts. An actual instinct is the feeling that you must go to the bathroom. An actual instinct is hunger. An actual instinct is the surprise you get when someone pops out of nowhere, or you fall from a ledge. Wanting a child is a preference. I really really want a particular brand of car.. Does that mean a preference is an instinct? Only if you mean that any "want" or preference is an instinct can you make that argument.. But that would be like saying "natural" and "synthetic" have no distinction since everything is technically "from nature" and the big bang. Clearly, there is a distinction between a preference that someone wants and instinct.
Also, let's make the distinction between the physical pleasure of sex and the preference or possible outcome of the procreation of new people. There is a major difference.
No, the "need" to procreate in humans is (actually) driven by want.
I don't get your question. Prove to me, procreation is anything but a preference.. I've already gave some reasons for why it is preference, not instinctual. You haven't provided any evidence to the contrary. All you've stated is the obvious- other animals procreate from instinct, not humans. Even though humans are animals, we are also different kinds of animals.
What would be your criteria that this is an instinct? Also, please use the quote tool; otherwise I have no idea if you answered me. You can use the "Reply" button or highlight the text in a post and click the "Quote" button that pops up.
You're trolling if you meant to not quote anything.. And Freudian theory certainly doesn't fall under the empirical evidence you seem to want.
Besides the fact that Freudian theory is almost universally derided as the most unscientific modern theories due to its limited subjects (middle class Victorian women mainly), and for the very fact that it didn't include anything scientific in its studies (no controls, no experiments, etc.)...Its usually considered interesting literary thought. As a Schopenhauerian, I can go the low road and say he pretty much ripped off Schopenhauer.. but I'll even give him the benefit of the doubt on that (which is a lot of benefit).
1) You haven't proven how Freudian theory applies to nature versus nurture in what drives human procreation.
2) You haven't provided any other criteria besides eluding to Freudian theory for how procreation is instinctual.
drove procreation in the first place, even for us humans.
Preferences are not "derived" from empirical science- they are just a fact of human deliberation. People have choices and they choose certain things based on personal factors including surroundings, culture, personality, etc.
Quoting LuckilyDefinitive
Well, I asked you a legitimate question based on you objection- what is your criteria for testing for instinct vs. preference? That makes sense being you stated an objection.
Quoting LuckilyDefinitive
I'll allow this, though odd choice of phrasing..
Quoting LuckilyDefinitive
Ok...
Quoting LuckilyDefinitive
I don't understand this statement in its current form. It seems like you're saying is "sex drove procreation". Well, yes sex is the mechanism for procreation. But we can choose to have sex. And nowadays, we can choose to have or not have children even if sex takes place.
Even if you were to say "sex is instinctual" you must say how that is.. Is it the pleasure of sex that makes it "instinctual"? But the bigger question is, if sex is instinctual, that does not answer the question whether procreation is instinctual. There is a big difference there.
Also, to actually "quote" something you click and drag over a text in a post and then let go. Once you let go, you will see a "Quote" button display. Click the Quote button to quote the text.
Preferences are majorly studied in psychology and neuroscience. What are you talking about? Also, what do you mean "derived from" empirical science? Nothing is derived from empirical science.
I brought up "empirical science" because you seemed to object based on there being no control study on procreation being a preference vs. an instinct. That's how we got on this topic and why I immediately questioned your Freud mention as a criteria based on your objection which was to use empirical science. That is how we got there- nothing with what I was saying originally.
If you asked a million people why they had sex, I doubt they would say "the instinct to survive". You'd have to majorly qualify that.
Perhaps you are using an anthropological definition of ideology?
That seems to cover a group of people more advanced than primitive tribes. I would not except primitive people to put so much thought into their lives and without the thought, there isn't an ideology.
I understand the political ideologies but question the value of the anthropological and sociological use of the word. I am not sure it is helpful to make a word mean anything you want it to mean? Of course, tribes have their method of survival and at some stage, they will come up with stories, but an idealogy? I am not sure that is a good use of the word? I don't think believing we came out of the center of the earth is equal to the more formal political ideologies.
I would say religions and ideologies are a step away from a primitive survival system with unquestionable truths. The story about the three sisters that tells people where to find water is just a story. For me, it does not become a religion or an ideology until people forget the reality-based meaning of the story and mistake the abstract story for the reality. Political and religious ideologies are not equal to the story of the three sisters that tells a person where to find water. Political and religious ideologies exist with no concrete reality. I think we walk down a troublesome path if we forget that.
The sociology definition or ideology is "the lens through which a person views the world". Knowing the three sisters is where to find water, is not a lens, it is reality. Thinking the abstract story is real, is seeing the world through a lens.
Quoting schopenhauer1
What? It doesn't matter if it is apple or oranges? Try making an orange pie. :lol: Aren't we arguing the difference between dealing with reality or being lost in abstract ideas? Perhaps that is what is wrong today. People willing to kill for their religion/ideology and blind to reality.
Yes, "preference is most definitely not a thing derived from empirical science". If we rejoice about global warming and the pandemic sweep across the world or think it is terrible and must be stopped, it is a preference. Some see it as a sign of the last days and are thrilled they are proven right and Jesus is about to return. It depends on the lens we are looking through. Basing all decisions on money is another lense. :lol: some people may have bifocals and some people can't find their glasses.
That's the POINT. That even the idea of bringing more people into a society IS an ideology- the ideology of thinking people SHOULD BE playing the game of LIFE ITSELF. So, that is the POINT of my thesis- that even something this BASIC IS AN IDEOLOGY.
Quoting Athena
No, the goal here is to argue whether thinking it is okay to bring more people into the world IS itself an ideology.
I thought we had an agreement that some people think about having children and some people do not?
For sure my decision to have children was intentional. For sure I thought I would not have the full experience of being a woman without having children. I was a virgin until marriage because I didn't want to risk having a child without a man to support us. I wanted to own a home and have money in the bank before having children. I thought a woman should be a full-time homemaker. Those are very traditional values that were strongly promoted by public education. I associate these values with democracy. But having the ideology of democracy was not the reason for having children. The reason for intentionally having children was to fully experience being a woman.
Unfortunately, I began my family with a man who didn't want to be a participating father. He just wanted to prove he was a man by having a son. From there he took no pleasure in being a father. He begrudgingly supported the family for several years, became alcoholic, went through rehab. and AA helped him put himself first. He abandoned the family to protect his sobriety. What was his idealogy?
They do not settle in one place and consume everything, instead they move around and allow that which has been consumed to re grow. In crop growing this is known as crop rotation, a resting of the soil at the appropriate time.
We could also liken this to cancer in the body. Cancer is simply cells that wont stop growing (cell transgression). The body is dealing with this all the time and has very good methods for eliminating these cells. The problem arises when the cells stop moving and therefore cannot be removed by normal elimination from the body. At which point the cells set in and a tumour develops. If the settlement site happens to be in an organ that normal distributes around the body (generally in the glands) then the cells are sent everywhere that gland has access to.
I would dare to suggest that our rise in physical cancer in the body is in perfect relation to the cancer our now "global city" dwelling, where countries are liken to districts. A reverse of the pattern would be needed to fix it. Our cities should be dismantled and everyone should become multi skilled in living and not single skilled in dependance. How we get there is an unanswered question.
I dont know what the right answer is, perhaps at his time of writing it made perfect sense, but I see that it is not the answer for us today.
Society is a fabrication fathered by Socrates and Plato. All variations thereof have stemmed from this.
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I'm inclined to not believe that. in same ways, the notions of society are innate, or have their roots In genetics.
For example, ants are known create vast "cities" complete with phenomena such as roadways or irrigation systems:
https://www.vnews.com/Allegheny-mound-ants-discovered-in-Temple-29066253
(Obviously not all societies are "the same", or equal, nor is the society of ant colony anything akin to a model of an integrated human society, good, bad or otherwise, or a way or means of distinguishing between archaic, uncivilized, savage society or remnants or elements thereof (e.x. horrible and archaic, anti-intellectual parenting practices) and higher-quality and/or higher level forms of which better societies and their elements thereof take or perpetuate to begin with, such as. a totalitarian state whether ancient or modern, or other morally or intellectually degenerate or worst elements of societ(ies) which function in similar outdated, antisocial, and/or archaic ways, albeit informally and unofficially).
(Much given that any society or attempted mathematical, economic, or financial approximation(s) thereof to begin with, or any deeper or complex knowledge of its laws, institutions, and so and so forth both in, for instance, legal theory and/or as wells as in similar legal or human nature practices. negative, begin or otherwise, is merely as mall window or looking glass into a complex whole or interplay of different individuals, families, businesses, schools, colleges, universities, cultures and so-called "sub-cultures" social groups, medias, villages, towns, cities, nations, international organizations, legal systems, languages, jargons, dialects, and institutions, offline and online social groups or networks, and so on and so forth to begin with, there naturally being no exact science or 'perfect' way to approximate or quantify one to begin with, nor is it reducible necessarily to any one of the above components either).
For that matter, the idea that society or humanity whether in East or West "began" solely with the ancient Greeks is rather fallacious as well, though it does mark a historical milestone.
As an example, there are still pre-literate tribes of hunter gatherers, such as the Sentinelese, who live or exist in some co-operative capacity, as presumably have or did many other ancient cultures or tribes, regardless of whether or not there is anything akin to a "formal" or written law.
Your argument, to me sounds like popular anarchist mythos.
Again i would argue, and certainly not for the advocation of anarchy which paramounts to chaos. Yes that is an option but one resulting in absolute destruction so not one I would vote for. My point here is, that a society that is effective for all concerned would need to be one based on order, but not of the few, but order by agreement of all. To hide behind the complexities of an existing system as a reason to say it cannot be known is to mix up content with structure. As you rightly highlighted, an ant hill is highly complex in its appearance but is structurally created by very basic rules, and hierarchies or order.
If you can show a model before Ancient Greek that represents closely to what we now see in our own cities, that fundamentally issues justice by those who are unjust, then I would welcome the opportunity to see it. Prior to Greek, we had the latter dynasties of Egypt but by that point they had also already become corrupta had lost there head. However, the earlier version of Ancient Egypt which were run as a well organised Theocracy showed what humans could achieve with co operation was greater than anything else. Of course we were told, probably by the Greeks, that Egypt was founded on slaves, although archeology has shown the people were actually well respected and looked after and actually loved their Pharoahs. Needless to day the pyramids and the like were built in a time when most others were generally still smash flint together to make fire and living in caves.
If my arguement sounds like anarchy then my message was not understood, that may be my fault for not explaining it well enough, if so I apologise. The point is, what we have now can only end is disaster because a fundamental flaw was built into the foundation from the start, being the objective to favour the few at the cost of the many, or simply exploitation. A beautiful house built on sand will still sink no matter how nice it might be for those living in it.
Upon contemplating my original comment further, I would rather say that dismantling the city may not be necessary if indeed it can be re-engineered. Whether there is enough time to do such a thing, I very much doubt, but it certainly would be possible.
If you fancy seeing how this has played out over the last 40 years, I recommend you watch Hypernormalisation.
So, people think they live in a vacuum. You live in a SOCIETY. You probably birthed in a hospital, with doctors and nurses and care units. You probably knew that your children were going to enter some sort of school system, some kind of job. You probably knew that, just like you wanted money in the bank, it would be feasible in Western/"modern" societies to do so, and to work for it. You probably also realize comfort regulation and entertainment is a thing, and whatever current society you are in (Western/modern in this case) that is also handled a certain way. No matter what individualized "microdecision" you make within that broader context, it's still about the same in a SOCIETY. Thus, by procreating the child you DID know that you were perpetuating the ways of a society.. I'm talking on a macro-level.. not small ones like living on a commune vs. a single family home or any bullshit like that, because at the end it is still a SOCIETY with the same needs. Having more people FORCES a way-of-life onto another person.
A guy buys all the parts for a gun, but it's not a gun yet. He intends to use it to kill when he's finished. He puts the gun together and kills someone. The gun didn't exist until he made it. Should someone not try to prevent him before he makes the parts into a gun?
If you know he intends to kill with it, yes.
Cool. My point. A person (gun) doesn't have to exist. It isn't completely analogous, the only point was to prove that the actual person in question doesn't have to exist, just the potential.
Sure, but no ethical behavior or principle can be held towards potential people by the simple fact that they do not exist, just like a man cannot kill with a potential gun.
But the man would kill, if the gun was made and he has a very realistic chance of doing that because he has all the parts and know how. So, the potential victim doesn't matter because the gun isn't made yet?
I’m having difficulty with the analogy here.
My position is that there are many reasons why one wouldn’t want to have children, but I do not think it needs to be spun into a moral principle towards “potential beings”, which are not beings at all. I think ethics should pertain towards beings.
With this repetition of your initial objection, you do seem to have difficulty with the analogy. The analogy applies here because the gun being created will directly affect another person, even though in that particular moment, the gun is not created yet (to affect another person).
At the same token, if someone has a potential to exist (all the parts to do this and know how is there), then certainly, when those parts come together, a person will be affected.
I have difficulty with it for a few reasons. One, it’s not analogous. Two, creating a child is in no way similar to assembling a gun. Three, creating life is the opposite of taking a life.
But as for your argument, I do agree that if and when those parts come together a person will be affected. At that point we are able to apply ethics and morals to them.
If those are your objections then, yes you would not get the point of the analogy, but then you sort of do in your next sentence, so I won't even address this since you sort of address it there.
Quoting NOS4A2
So if we know the outcome of the gun getting put together, and we know the outcome of the parts of the person coming together, you should understand why you can talk about preventing people from being born.
In a very real sense, society is itself an ideology--the ideology of settled, state-centered society.
I haven't actually read the book, the principle was summarized for me. Against The Grain, by James C. Scott posits that 10 or 12 thousand years ago sedentary agriculture was not an attractive option for successful hunter/gatherers. Rather, hunter/gatherers were coaxed, seduced, or coerced into agriculture by proto-state actors who wanted to harness the energy of people--their capacity to work and to reproduce--for purposes of accumulating power.
I don't know whether this theory is valid, or not. I wouldn't rule it invalid out of hand. But hunter/gathers avoided sedentarian life for maybe a hundred thousand years. Had they wanted to settle down, surely they could have figured out how. The first states were city-states in the Middle East, generally ruled by a strong-man. The city state was pretty much dependent on its surrounding agricultural hinterland. No grain, no city-state; no city state, no strong-man.
Agriculture wasn't the beginning of society, of course. The hunter-gatherers were/are as much society as the Upper East Siders of Manhattan. But the kind of society which came to dominate much of the world was settled, urban-rural, agriculture-based states.
Quoting Bitter Crank
Interesting thesis. I see society using birth itself as harnessing the energy of people- their capacity to work and to reproduce. In a way procreating is being complicit in the accumulation of power, if that is what it is. The parents want their children to be enculturated into society. They want their children to (generally) work, consume, do the ways-of-living that they themselves are used to. Kind of like when navies used to "press" hapless victims into working ships.. that is what having a child does. It presses yet another life, creates a new victim, to DEAL WITH an maneuver society, and generally experience suffering of every and all kinds.
Perhaps what I don’t understand is the language being used. I cannot see how deciding not to have children is to prevent them from being born, just like I cannot see how deciding not to assemble a gun is preventing yourself from committing murder.
A person who decides not to have children is not performing an action called “preventing”, and he certainly isn’t performing such an action on any objects called “people”. He is not stopping people from being born as if he was standing in their way or performing abortions. He isn’t preventing their suffering as if feeding them or mending their wounds. The action called “preventing” is performed, and the objects called “people” exist, only in his imagination.
Just like it is impossible to obtain consent from a potential human, it is also impossible to perform any other act towards him and for the same reasons—no such being exists. For this reason it is impossible to act morally towards beings that do not nor will never exist. Instead the antinatalist is imagining beings, imagining their suffering, and directing his moral faculties and moral behavior inwards, ultimately towards himself. So I have trouble seeing the argument as anything more than a sort of affectation.
To be fair to you, you are far more well-read on the arguments than I and you’ve probably heard this all before, but I think the absence of any beings is a problem for many moral arguments for antinatalism. The antinatalist should limit the moral case to protecting the environment or to affecting beings that already exist.
In potentialities, it is proper to think in terms of a few things:
1) what you intend to do as a deliberative agent 2) The means to do it . I used the gun example as, it is not an actual gun yet (just like a human isn't an actual one until certain things happen), because
1) The man intended to use the gun to do something with it 2) He had the means to do it.
This being the case, anywhere in the sequence of the man making the gun to intend to kill the victim can be fair game to "prevent" the outcome from happening. If the man had no intent nor the means, then it would be correct that "prevent" would not really be a necessary part of the language being used, as there is "nothing" to prevent.
Like this case, many people have the intent and means to do create new people who will suffer (in the antinatalist view at least). Educating people that they can prevent future people by not having them is thus perfectly in the realm of sense in terms of how language is used. Even accidental deaths by guns is analogous.
Quoting NOS4A2
I have addressed this above, as I see this being not a real argument for how we live our lives everyday. We train people for outcomes that don't exist yet everyday. The actual entity doesn't have to exist, just the means by which that entity is produced. Is it a very real possibility of happening? If yes, then indeed we can prevent that possibility. I shouldn't even have to spill this many words to explain this to you.
Quoting NOS4A2
Again, the intent and means, a possibility has a high potential of happening. If that possibility is a new human, then indeed you can talk about performing an act to prevent something that does not exist. For example, if you knew that at the exact time of birth, the baby would be severely harm, would you consider the future child then? You knew this was a very high probability too. I'm sorry but this argument is not great, it's not revealing, it isn't even how we ordinarily think of future outcomes. You want to try to make the antinatalist seem out of touch, like they are fighting windmills or something.
Quoting NOS4A2
It really isn't a problem at all for moral arguments. To say that something "will exist" if such and such actions take place is not some crazy philosophical notion. Antinatalists are considering that humans can exist if you make the conditions to happen so. Don't make those conditions happen for x, y, z reasons. It's that simple. You can try to stretch the sophistry to make it not that, or to make it crazy, but it's not and we talk in future possibilities and likelihoods all the time.