5 ms·

Kids? Just Say No

18 points by uoaei 9y ago

relics443 9y ago
Sometimes I feel like those advocating for not having children are doing the world a favor by following their own advice.
c_r_w 9y ago
This is basically the exact opposite of the Repugnant Conclusion, which states that many poor lives is better than fewer happy lives. This ran on HN within the last year. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/repugnant-conclusion/ https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/repugnant-conclusion/
candiodari 9y ago
This ignores a basic truth of evolution. You think you can "choose" against children, for the environment. But that is not allowed. If you take that choice, long term, it'll simply result in others, presumably less ecologically conscious, doing it for you. Furthermore, one can easily argue that fluctuating numbers of animals is far worse than just large numbers of them. Animals will adapt to having larger numbers (by, for instance, shrinking their bodies). Fluctuating numbers, well, read the history of environmental protection at Yellowstone park for instance to hear what can happen.
LyndsySimon 9y ago
I read the article once, and didn't find it interesting. The TL;DR that was apparent to me was "existence is pain". I read the article again, this time in Mr. Meeseeks' voice. It was substantially improved.
stephenr 9y ago
> People should never, under any circumstance, procreate The human race would have a serious problem in about 70 years if we all adopted this approach. > Certainly, sentencing someone to such a world is the worst of all crimes, and a serious moral violation. If the "feedback" is in fact genuine I feel for him/her but to associate the unfortunate aspects of their life as a "sentence" by the parents is particularly selfish IMO. No parent wants their child to suffer, and to imply they should have foreseen the situation and just not had the child is quite selfish and doesn't consider the anguish the parents must feel as they see the child they raised in misery.
- BrandoElFollito 9y ago
  > No parent wants their child to suffer Some do, the ones who know that their child will have a range of illnesses, disabilities, etc. but decide to keep it in the name of their selfishness (or faith, or whatever reason they have), instead of aborting. They make the decision to have a suffering child out of moral comfort, so some, yes, deliberately want their child to suffer.
Overtonwindow 9y ago
This article troubled me. There are many good reasons to have children, and likely many bad reasons. I think everyone's situation is different, and there's no definitive answer for either side.
hackeraccount 9y ago
I can't put my finger exactly as to why but his argument reminds me of that part in the book Catch-22 where one person argues that they don't believe in God because the world is so terrible and the other counters that they don't believe in God either - but they don't believe in a good and just God not in an evil and cruel God. Maybe it's because the logic seems to be that existence is terrible so we're doing the unborn a favor by saving them from it. Given the shortness of our time (something the author mentions) it seems like no great harm is done. And in any case wouldn't it be more fair to give the unborn the opportunity to make the choice of existence or not themselves?
vgrocha 9y ago
This is being alive and has always been: a struggle for survival. With all the capital we accumulated as a civilization this might no longer be evident: we are all competing and collaborating in order to obtain scarce resources (like food, shelter, etc.) People who don't embrace this and won't have kids will just exit the gene pool. Life will go on.
taylodl 9y ago
"thoughtful people should pause and reflect rather than hastily dismiss it as mad or wicked" Here's the problem: I want thoughtful people to have kids. Otherwise only the less intelligent, thoughtless folks would be having kids and the human race will be marching on to madness.

18 points by uoaei 9y ago

Sometimes I feel like those advocating for not having children are doing the world a favor by following their own advice.

c_r_w 9y ago

This is basically the exact opposite of the Repugnant Conclusion, which states that many poor lives is better than fewer happy lives. This ran on HN within the last year. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/repugnant-conclusion/ https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/repugnant-conclusion/

candiodari 9y ago

This ignores a basic truth of evolution. You think you can "choose" against children, for the environment. But that is not allowed. If you take that choice, long term, it'll simply result in others, presumably less ecologically conscious, doing it for you. Furthermore, one can easily argue that fluctuating numbers of animals is far worse than just large numbers of them. Animals will adapt to having larger numbers (by, for instance, shrinking their bodies). Fluctuating numbers, well, read the history of environmental protection at Yellowstone park for instance to hear what can happen.

LyndsySimon 9y ago

I read the article once, and didn't find it interesting. The TL;DR that was apparent to me was "existence is pain". I read the article again, this time in Mr. Meeseeks' voice. It was substantially improved.

stephenr 9y ago

> People should never, under any circumstance, procreate The human race would have a serious problem in about 70 years if we all adopted this approach. > Certainly, sentencing someone to such a world is the worst of all crimes, and a serious moral violation. If the "feedback" is in fact genuine I feel for him/her but to associate the unfortunate aspects of their life as a "sentence" by the parents is particularly selfish IMO. No parent wants their child to suffer, and to imply they should have foreseen the situation and just not had the child is quite selfish and doesn't consider the anguish the parents must feel as they see the child they raised in misery.

BrandoElFollito 9y ago
> No parent wants their child to suffer Some do, the ones who know that their child will have a range of illnesses, disabilities, etc. but decide to keep it in the name of their selfishness (or faith, or whatever reason they have), instead of aborting. They make the decision to have a suffering child out of moral comfort, so some, yes, deliberately want their child to suffer.

Overtonwindow 9y ago

This article troubled me. There are many good reasons to have children, and likely many bad reasons. I think everyone's situation is different, and there's no definitive answer for either side.

hackeraccount 9y ago

I can't put my finger exactly as to why but his argument reminds me of that part in the book Catch-22 where one person argues that they don't believe in God because the world is so terrible and the other counters that they don't believe in God either - but they don't believe in a good and just God not in an evil and cruel God. Maybe it's because the logic seems to be that existence is terrible so we're doing the unborn a favor by saving them from it. Given the shortness of our time (something the author mentions) it seems like no great harm is done. And in any case wouldn't it be more fair to give the unborn the opportunity to make the choice of existence or not themselves?

vgrocha 9y ago

This is being alive and has always been: a struggle for survival. With all the capital we accumulated as a civilization this might no longer be evident: we are all competing and collaborating in order to obtain scarce resources (like food, shelter, etc.) People who don't embrace this and won't have kids will just exit the gene pool. Life will go on.

taylodl 9y ago

"thoughtful people should pause and reflect rather than hastily dismiss it as mad or wicked" Here's the problem: I want thoughtful people to have kids. Otherwise only the less intelligent, thoughtless folks would be having kids and the human race will be marching on to madness.