Two Arguments against Anti Natalism

Argument from Inner Contradiction

 

Antinatalists say: Suffering is bad. If you do not exist, you do not suffer. They therefore formulate the moral rule: No one should have children, thus no humans would have to suffer in the future.
State S1: No humans exists anymore.
Proposition P1: S1 is the highest goal.
Rule R1: You should act to bring about S1 with minimal suffering along the way.

 

Currently we are in State S2: There exist some human beings that follow R1.

 

P2: Some propositions that are implicit in the concept of “morality”:
An objective moral rule holds for all people in all places at all times.
It is good /desirable, that all people act in acordance with moral rules.
It is good / desirable, that people do things, which are definded as “good”.
The more human beings do these good things, the better.

 

I ask: Is R1 an objective moral rule? – Yes.
(P3: R1 is an objective moral rule.)
Then it would follow:
P4: The more people follow R1, the better. – Yes.
But if S1 were achieved, then no one would follow R1 anymore. – Yes.
Then according to P4, S1 would be worse than S2. – Yes.
This contradicts P1. So P1, P2, and P3 cannot all be true at the same time.

 

Any moral rule which elliminates human life, cannot be correct. A moral rule defines desirable behavior, but if there are no more humas, then no one performs the desirable action anymore.

 

Argument from Teleology

 

Aristotle: The end of a thing cannot be freely chosen. The goal / end / purpose of a thing is definded by the thing itself / is inherent in its nature.
The goal of a knife is to be a good knife. The goal of a human being is to be a good human being.

 

Variant 1

 

One aspect of a human being is that it is an animal / a living being. As such, procreating is part of what it naturally does / is part of it’s nature. Being a good human being therefore involves procreating well (=having children and raising them well).
Human beings have free will, thus they can choose to do things which will make them into good human beings or bad human beings. Being moral means making the choices, which will turn you into a good human being. Morality only pertains to human beings because only human beings have free will. A tree / rock / cat cannot choose, whether they will become a good or bad tree / rock / cat. It simply happens. Therefore they dont have morality. Only human beeings have free will, therefore morality only applies to human beings. Since this is so, and since part of human nature is to have children, any moral rule which says that one should not have children must be false.

 

Variant 2

 

If humans don't have children anymore, there will not be any good human beings in the future. But the goal of morality is the existence of good human beings. Thus any moral rule that leads to the extinction of human beings must be false.

 

No thing can have the goal / purpose of ending its own existence. Else it would not exist in the first place.