Club PA 2.0 has arrived! If you'd like to access some extra PA content and help support the forums, check it out at patreon.com/ClubPA
The image size limit has been raised to 1mb! Anything larger than that should be linked to. This is a HARD limit, please do not abuse it.
Our new Indie Games subforum is now open for business in G&T. Go and check it out, you might land a code for a free game. If you're developing an indie game and want to post about it,
follow these directions. If you don't, he'll break your legs! Hahaha! Seriously though.
Our rules have been updated and given
their own forum. Go and look at them! They are nice, and there may be new ones that you didn't know about! Hooray for rules! Hooray for The System! Hooray for Conforming!
Posts
Well the thing about John Stuart Mill's utilitarian calculus is that it's terribly circumstantial and dependent on having good information. Your ethics classes don't go out of their way to say it, but that's basically a logical conclusion.
You are not obligated to do anything for something that doesn't exist, and the idea that you might is very strange to me
Like... Are you obligated to call someone "Mr. President" because they may eventually become president? Are you obligated to treat your girlfriend as if you are married because you may someday become married? Are you obligated to buy everyone in the world a Christmas present because they may at some point become good enough friends with you to merit you giving them a present? I feel like this could quickly spiral into unreasonable places
In terms of considering the child's concerns, I think it's not unreasonable to worry about providing for what we might call the basic necessities... Food, clothing, shelter, that sort of thing
If you can't do that, you probably shouldn't have children, but even then we can debate what qualifies as "providing" and I would say that it would be presumptuous to argue that impoverished people are morally wrong for having children
Again, I don't think any kind of categorical imperative would function here... Each person must decide for him or herself the conditions that are sufficient for them to feel comfortable with raising a child, given the time commitment and expense associated
And in the end, that often becomes an emotional rather than coldly rational decision, because how much money is enough? How much time? It's all pretty subjective, no matter how much you think about it and try to create parameters and definitions
These hypotheticals are problematic.
Q: How will you feel about children when you are 70 years old?
A: I am not 70 years old.
I can imagine myself as 70, and imagine myself feeling a particular way about children when I'm 70, but that imagined hypothetical doesn't necessarily relate to how things shall actually be if I make it to 70.
That's a further level of complication on the decision. And when my lady friend says that she'll want kids in five years I want to ask how, absent a time machine, she knows that. Because she doesn't *know* it. She's imagining herself in the future desiring kids. Just as I can imagine myself in the future liking kids, or imagine myself not liking kids, or imagine myself as a pirate.
Yeah...the potential / actual component of this is quite problematic.
I'll agree that it's strange to consider the well-being of a non-existent entity...but that's part of the conversation.
At the moment I'm trying to figure out why an expectant mother's attitude towards the well-being of her zygote is different from the attitude towards....let's go with "that which shall become the zygote". Persons anthropomorphize zygotes all the time, and posit attitudes and personalities onto fetuses. I'll agree that there are material differences between a fetus, a zygote, and a non-instantiated potential...but those are all stages of potentiality. Though, the materialized fetus and zygote have particular concerns for their biology well-being that uninstantiated non-persons lack.
It seems problematic to not consider the potential / hypothetical well-being of the child in one's decision...and yet at the same time fixating upon potential hypotheticals is also problematic.
hmm
Probably what she means is that she wants to have children, but she wants to enjoy her life as it is for a few years first. Or she doesn't feel that she's in a situation where having a kid is a good idea, but she thinks that will change in five years or so.
By the way, a few people have commented that one reason to have children is so that someone will support you in your old age. You have no guarantee that your kids will be willing or able to support you; and even if you have the most loving family ever, the odds are good you'll still die alone. Whereas if you don't have kids and save your money instead, you can pay for end-of-life care yourself. Make a point of making and keeping friends as you get older, so you won't end up a lonely shut-in.
Also, as others have said, parenting lasts longer than 18 years. My parents put me through college. My sister's education was paid for by the army, but my parents helped with her rent and living expenses for a year or two after she graduated, because she was in the awkward position of not being able to get a full-time job because of being in military limbo.
It seems to me that an attempt at analysing the logic/ethics of having children is most likely to favor not procreating. So: do you want to be a parent? If so, proceed with your analysis. If not, you can stop because having a child you don't actually want is a terrible idea.
Trying to decide things purely rationally seems like a good idea, but humans aren't rational creatures. We act on emotion first and logic second. Making a major life decision if your heart isn't in it is a recipe for disaster, as any number of divorcees can tell you.
I like the Collins dictionary definiton for 'self-indulgence' as a good way to describe my attitude to childbirth. One might argue wether it's 'essential' in an individualistic sense but certainly at the global scale it's not. Just to note I have a child and he's the person I love most in the world and who brings me most joy. Is he essential to me now? Certainly. Was he essential as a hypothetical being? No.
So you are dismissive of your lady friend for an imagined hypothetical of "knowing" what she wants in five years, yet you are here in this thread using a completely hypothetical life of an unborn child to make a decision on whether or not to procreate?
Never mind that you seem to be stubbornly insistent on dismissing emotions, yet your entire metric for the desirability of the hypothetical child's existence is a net-sum evaluation of the said child's emotive state.
I could hypothetically get in a car accident on the way to work, but I still get in my car every morning and go, because that risk is outweighed by my desire to pay for my house and food and occasional fun times
You could hypothetically have a kid who is unhappy for some reason at random points in time, but is it worth the risk for the hypothetical happiness he and you might also have
You are literally the only person who can make that decision for you, and there is nothing rational about it
The rational part, as I think someone else mentioned, is determining what timing you find appropriate, and even that is only slightly more rational because it's still highly subjective
Plus have you seen the kind of other people out there who are pooping out babies? It's like my duty to the human race to put a few decently raised moral human beings in to the future population mix.
It seemed like a good idea at the time.
Because this is a subset of the greater question,
For most people that's a question of the physical practicalities. For you that seems to be a philosophical problem where you are unsure any life can be classed as happy.
And to preempt you, yes, thinking has to be good enough because nobody can know the future for sure. Without some gambles in life none of us go anywhere, either individually or as a whole species.
This is my favourite post all year. It is so exactly you.
We were unable to receive the proper diagnosis until my dad's autopsy (he made it to 55). His brain matter was flown to the Cleveland Clinic and studied for months before we received solid confirmation. Until that point, we just knew that various members of our family would stop sleeping, "go crazy", and die.
Our family was informed that a blood test is available to determine if one has the genetic marker for this particular prion disease. A child has a 50/50 chance of inheriting the marker from a carrier parent. If one carries the marker, it will become active at some point; a true genetic time bomb. Should one carry the marker, he/she will die from the disease at a rate of 100%.
I elected to get tested because I have a 13 year old daughter. I had to know if I needed to inform her of this issue so that she could make an informed choice regarding getting tested herself and procreation in the future. I wouldn't have mentioned it until she was 18, the hospitals will not test minors for this disease. Luckily, my test was negative. I have zero chance of ever contracting FFI and zero chance of passing it along to my children.
During the course of my dad's disease and ultimate diagnosis my wife and I were discussing having a child (my daughter is from a previous relationship and was a "surprise"). Had I been positive for the genetic marker we absolutely would not have had a child together. I couldn't imagine putting my kid in a situation where they would have to watch my slow death with the knowledge that they may share the same fate. Did that logic make me selfish? Selfless? I didn't regret being born prior to testing, nor did I regret having my daughter. Would it have been the right thing to do to deny a life solely based the on the promise of a 50/50 shot of at ugly death? I'm immeasurably fortunate I didn't have to ultimately face these decisions.
My wife and I had a boy on 11/23/12. Please recognize that I hate being this earnest, but the ability to have children is a gift that biology, circumstance, and luck (yes, luck...my daughter was a complete surprise after all) that is not granted everyone. If you have even the smallest predilection toward having children, fucking go for it. Have a loving wife/husband/partner? Make that shit happen. It's worth every sleepless night, silly teenage argument, and time strain.
"Death is so terribly final, while life is full of possibilities." -Tyrion
I guess there is still some question of should you have a kid if you know they are going to have to watch you die in what sounds like a horrific manner at some unknowable point in time. But from a purely genetic procreation point of view... is there any reason for things like this to still be a major hindrance?
That was something we discussed at the time, but we weren't comfortable with coin flip odds of having to determine if we should terminate a pregnancy.
Let's say that was our plan...how many time do we try? Once, twice..and on and on hoping the test came back negative? For us, that wasn't a feasible option.
I think this is a corollary to the more general "if you are unsure whether you want one, don't have one"
It is also okay not to want one NOW, or to say you are not sure that you will ever want one but be open to changing your mind at some point
This is not something that needs to be decided for ever and ever right now, in this particular case
At the same time, it's good to ask yourself the question because if you legitimately decide that you do NOT want kids, and your significant other does, then you may want to think about breaking up before it becomes a more serious issue
It's one of those fundamental things that, if you are not on the same page, or at least in the same book, you are doing your relationship a disservice by continuing, I think
@Calica: If the logic / ethics indicate that having children is not justifiable, or problematic, then why would an emotional inclination to have children trump that analysis?
It's the first premise from the OP: Our reactions to serial killers are not usually, "Oh, you wanted to kill people? Well, go ahead, then." There are other factors to be considered than the agent's disposition towards the activity. With serial killers we get the handy legal appeal of "X is illegal, so it's impermissible." but there are times when laws are considered to be immoral / unethical, and so one engages in illegal acts or refrains from legal acts due to some other ideal.
It seems strange that procreation would not be subject to that same level of critique and analysis. It's legal to procreate. Some persons want to procreate, while others do not.
Great.
Is it a good thing to do? Is it justifiable / permissible?
Or, what makes procreation so fundamentally different from every other human activity that it is somehow only subject to emotional inclination?
@Bogart
And we're only 11 days into the year!
Because analysing the future life worth of an as yet unborn being is filled with so many unknowns as to defy any attempt at analysis other than the emotional.
The motivations you articulated were related to the well-being of your offspring, rather than yourself. You wanted to protect your potential child from that pain. This would seem to be a selfless act.
To the "deny a life" notion: This is something I'm trying to figure out. If I refrain from having children am I denying a life? That would seem to require that there be a specific potential life that would occur were I to procreate, and my abstaining from procreation is actively denying that particular specific potential life. That notion seems, initially, kinda silly. There probably isn't a line of potential human beings / souls waiting to be implanted into a zygote. But maybe I'm wrong, and there is a line, and there is a specific particular potential life that is just waiting for me to not use a condom so it can be born and cure AIDS. It would be quite problematic for me to deny that AIDS-cure-potential-human access to this realm of existence.
I can imagine a reality in which procreation allows those waiting non-beings into existence. I can imagine a reality in which abstaining from procreation denies a potential AIDS-cure-potential-human from accessing this reality.
I'm just not sure which of those is the actual reality in which we live.
It seems that there are times when persons are urged to do things they do not want to do for the sake of some larger ideal. For example, persons are sometimes convinced to join the military or run for political office or take a particular job for the sake of their country, their family, their particular group. One of the other replies on this page mentioned the notion of "duty" towards humanity.
Those sorts of concerns seem relevant, too. Does a human being have some duty to the human species such that procreation is something to be done? Or is procreation significantly different from other instances of duty to humanity?
This, of course, does not invalidates the discussion so long as everyone are on the same page. The problem is that you can't really reach an understanding with people who do not share enough of your values to create a common language. What can you say to change the mind of someone who, from their own perspective, plays optimally because their victory condition is different?
I may be wrong here, but I think that what you hold as valuable is often rather different from what most of the other posters here find valuable. Thus the most common answer will come down to 'I value this more than you do, so under the same conditions this reasoning is enough for me'.
Alright, then.
That's an odd notion of duty / obligation.
Hi, Hume.
I'll agree that different people place value in different things. However, given that we are all human beings, there would seem to be some commonality inherent in our being human that isn't merely biological. Presumably there are some universal considerations that are applicable to all persons. We may each give a different answer, but we each ask the same question.
What's odd is that I just had this conversation with lady friend. I was talking about trying to find those general rules and she was talking about how every person's considerations are different. So, if you have some genetic problems those need to be considered, but if you don't have genetic problems they aren't a factor. To which I replied that she'd articulated a general rule for all humans: Consider what genetic conditions, if any, can be passed on to your offspring.
So far in the thread we seem to have 3 general things to assess with respect to procreation:
1) Genetic issues
2) Economic issues
3) One's emotive disposition
There are, presumably, other considerations that a reasonable person would make. It seems that most people only do #3 and, as Thanatos mentioned, that's fucked up.
But for your purposes, does it really matter? You're trying to decide whether YOU should do it
Why would there be a duty to procreate? For what reasons would it be compulsory
EDIT: That is not to say that these people do not value the prevention of suffering, but that they value 3 more. People can hold similar values but prioritize differently.
Continuation of the species, or one's particular genetic heritage. If I never have a kid then my particular genetic composition is never passed on, and ends with me. That may be good or bad, I'm not sure. But there is a consequence of my procreating or not procreation with respect to humanity as a whole. One may have a duty to recognize that consequence, and then act in a particular way depending upon what the consequence is.
They may care more about 3 than 1 or 2. Once again, though, their emotive disposition isn't necessarily the best justification, or indicative of the right / proper / best action.
1) Player A is emotionally inclined to procreate.
2) Player A is emotionally inclined to privilege its emotional attitude towards procreation over other reasons.
Ok, great. We know how Player A feels. Fantastic. Now let's put those emotions aside, and discern all of the other factors.
Because, again, a serial killer's desire to kill isn't adequate justification for killing. A child's aversion to vegetables and preference for ice cream isn't a sufficient reason to permit the child to only eat ice cream.
Rational human beings consider factors other than their emotional dispositions.
You accept or do not accept a duty. Lots of people try to apply a duty to others, but it's ultimately a choice whether or not you accept it. A lot of people none of us have ever met are very certain that we have a duty to X, Y, or Z, but it doesn't matter unless we accept it and internalize it.
1: All human beings have duties X, Y, and Z.
2: As a human being, Player A duties X, Y, and Z.
If Player A does not accept those duties, then Player A is not dutiful. In not accepting the duty Player A is not somehow immune from having it. Rather, Player A is denying a duty it has.
Duty is about obligation. If one can choose to not be obligated to X, then there's no actual obligation involved. It's just choice. Similarly, if one chooses to have duty-X, then they don't really have a duty to X. Rather, they just chose to do X.
Duty and obligation go together.
Choice and non-obligation go together.
Screwy things happen when those are mixed.
If they're saying that to different people it's fine.
If they're both saying that to Player C? Then, obviously, one of them is mistaken.