
Is it OK to have kids? - nkurz
https://aeon.co/essays/do-people-have-a-moral-duty-to-have-children-if-they-can
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dgreensp
Pain and suffering are part of the human condition. If you want to blame them
on the immoral act of some creator, blame God, not those who choose to have
children.

~~~
sheepdestroyer
But considering the really poor chances there being a god... Anyway, you are
responsible for your own choices.

Also "Pain and suffering are part of the human condition" does seam like a
poor, religiously ingrained, philosophy. I do not see why it has to be the
case.

~~~
zaccus
"You are responsible for your own choices" is just as much of a religious
philosophy as "pain and suffering are part of the human condition". Both are
non-empirical, irrational expressions of your personal observations and
beliefs.

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rrss1122
Aeon used to be interesting but it's just gone off the deep end recently.

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reasonattlm
Under the heading of "creating people seems like a necessary but not terribly
nice thing to be doing":

Less us ponder the subject of having children in the face of the existence of
aging coupled with the possibility of progressively defeating aging - perhaps
to the point where some of us alive today will escape age-related death by the
skin of our teeth. Or perhaps not if we don't get our act together here and
now. Evidently we need to have children in order to have the chance of
incrementally defeating aging by building ever better versions of a biological
repair kit to reverse ever more of the damage that causes degeneration and
death. This task is one of decades, long enough that it may be today's
researchers who start the job, but it'll be younger hands that finish it -
their children and grandchildren. Yet creating people is somewhat like
drafting them into a war and a human condition that they didn't ask for:

"There's a task we need you for, son, you and the rest of your generation. We
may or may not manage to complete it, but we certainly won't without your help
- and if we don't get this done, we're dead all too soon, a slow death, heavy
on the pain and suffering. We'll be dragged away first so you get to see the
end in all its horror, with plenty of sleepless nights to think it over before
it happens to you as well. Oh yes, and most people don't see the need for any
of this work and think the pain and suffering and death is just dandy. So
that's the deal, a raw one all round - welcome to the asylum, son. No need to
thank me."

I'm sympathetic to the hedonistic imperative view of pain and priorities in
technological development, and I also think there's a fair but short-sighted
argument to be made for nihilism along the lines of voluntary species
extinction. It runs something along the lines of a utilitarian consideration
of suffering, slavery, existence, natural rights, and similar concerns. I call
that short-sighted because, if we're going to be utilitarian, we should
consider that the point and beneficiary of all this technological development
- not to mention the bone mountain of suffering and corpses we stand upon and
continue to build - is very much not us. Our own longevity and diminished
future suffering is a tiny side-effect on the way to providing massively
greater benefits to our future descendants, be they biological or machine
intelligences. They will be so greatly endowed by the cumulative efforts in
advancing technology that ensuring their existence (and ensuring that it comes
about as soon as possible) will far and away outweigh our needs in any
utilitarian consideration. We are short-lived, small in number, small in mind,
and planet-bound evolved intelligences, while our descendants of future
centuries will not be any of those things. There will be trillions of them, a
near infinite variety of forms of mind, ageless, absent suffering, and
hopefully wiser than us for it. They will exist because we, our forebears, and
our children suffered the limitations and risks of our present existence in
order to build the road that little bit further - and because we chose to
inflict the same on others by bringing them into being.

So having children still looks to me largely like throwing new people into a
horrible situation in order that some of them will try make it better - and
with some hope that they might benefit as individuals, but also the
considerable risk that they will not, and suffer greatly as a consequence.
Beyond that, there is an abstract grail that will be enjoyed by people yet to
come - our descendants made in biology or machinery - who we will likely never
know, and whose era will be brilliant and golden beyond our imagining, but
only if we strive to lay the foundation stones here and now.

~~~
iofj
Making an argument that not having kids is an extremely bad decision for
whatever subgroup you are part of is trivial. The only exception would be if
all possible subgroups agreed this, which seems impossible. Any group of
people choosing to do this would, of course, be doomed. So let's analyze what
happens to the number of kids.

Since there is competition you're even making it easier for other groups to
have kids, and therefore more kids will come from them. So the result of
having less kids results in more kids, especially in the subsequent
generations. (assuming you're unwilling to do what China does to limit kids)

So for any individual the choice is simple, but indirect. 2 options:

Either one doesn't believe your argument about less kids is better. Obviously
those will have kids.

Or one does believe your argument about having less kids, as less kids will
minimize suffering. In this case, you should have kids.

So there is no moral argument either way. But of course we know reality : kids
are a burden. People are refusing to have kids because it would (at the
moment) affect them negatively. I have a large family, and so I can compare
the situation of older people having (lots of) kids to the situation of older
people who are alone. I don't agree that for an individual not having kids is
better, in fact it is far worse.

But a shortsighted view that for 10-20 years having kids will be a burden that
prevents them from realizing their dreams is quite common. And I can certainly
understand that argument even if I do disagree with it.

But "the good of the human race" is a horrible, misguided reason not to have
kids. It is good for the human race to have a minimum number of kids (I'd
guess about 2.1 on average).

