The “anti-natalist” philosopher David Benatar believes that life is so painful that human beings should stop having children for reasons of compassion.http://nyer.cm/MFcW9Wd
All the research on human well-being shows almost everyone across cultures is well above neutral on happiness. Benatar is just empirically wrong that life is dominated by suffering.
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Don't tell Buddhists
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Buddha was empirically wrong too.
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Benatar's argument is more nuanced (although wrong IMHO). No matter how blissful life gets, the most he would concur is that one should be indifferent about bringing someone into existence. This comes out of his axiom that an absent good is not bad but an absent bad is good.
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In other words, he builds his conclusion into his axiom.
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You should see his earlier work. He argued that Love Is A Battlefield.
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Ever listen to his podcast with Harris? Just refuses to engage the idea that his own experience could’ve influenced his ideas.
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Yes and suffering is decreasing by the day. In 50 years you will get the option of living in a VR paradise while all of your survival needs are met. And, we will get better at figuring out what makes people happy.
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Yup, his argument that the will to live makes us overrate our experiences seems quite mistaken. Seems more true to say we *experience* the will to live, & it makes our experiences much better as a result by imbuing even 'objectively' mediocre moments w/ the pleasure of existence.
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And even if life was 75% suffering, who isn't to say the 25% happiness makes the 75% worth it?
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Key phrase: "dominated by" Of course life is characterized by suffering, but for most this is, within the spectrum of human experience, a means of future flourishing. Also, how can one be compassionate toward a non-existent person?
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