Interesting! Yeah, a committed anti-natalist who regrets all of existenceāeven in an āapproximate utopiaāāon the grounds that even a small proportion of very unhappy lives automatically trumps the positive value of a world mostly containing overwhelmingly wonderful, flourishing lives is, IMO, in the grips ofā¦ um (trying to word this delicately)ā¦ values I strongly disagree with. We will just have very persistent disagreements, in that case!
FWIW, I think those extreme anti-natalist values are unusual, and certainly donāt reflect the kinds of concerns expressed by Setiya that I was responding to in the OP (or other common views in the vicinity, e.g. Melinda Robertsā ādeeper intuition that the existing Ann must in some way come before need-not-ever-exist-at-all Benā).
certainly donāt reflect the kinds of concerns expressed by Setiya that I was responding to in the OP
I agree. I happen to agree with you that the attempts to accommodate the procreation asymmetry without lexically disvaluing suffering donāt hold up to scrutiny. Setiyaās critique missed the mark pretty hard, e.g. this part just completely ignores that this view violates transitivity:
But the argument is flawed. Neutrality says that having a child with a good enough life is on a par with staying childless, not that the outcome in which you have a child is equally good regardless of their well-being. Consider a frivolous analogy: being a philosopher is on a par with being a poetāneither is strictly better or worseābut it doesnāt follow that being a philosopher is equally good, regardless of the pay.
...Having said that, I do think the ādeeper intuition that the existing Ann must in some way come before need-not-ever-exist-at-all Benā plausibly boils down to some kind of antifrustrationist or tranquilist intuition. Ann comes first because she has actual preferences (/āexperiences of desire) that get violated when sheās deprived of happiness. Not creating Ben doesnāt violate any preferences of Benās.
I donāt think so. Iām sure that Roberts would, for example, think we had more reason to give Ann a lollipop than to bring Ben into existence and give him one, even if Ann would not in any way be frustrated by the lack of a lollipop.
The far more natural explanation is just that we have person-directed reasons to want what is good for Ann, in addition to the impersonal reasons we have to want a better world (realizable by either benefiting Ann or creating & benefiting Ben).
In fairness to Setiya, the whole point of parity relations (as developed, with some sophistication, by Ruth Chang) is that theyāunlike traditional value relationsāare not meant to be transitive. If youāre not familiar with the idea, I sketch a rough intro here.
Interesting! Yeah, a committed anti-natalist who regrets all of existenceāeven in an āapproximate utopiaāāon the grounds that even a small proportion of very unhappy lives automatically trumps the positive value of a world mostly containing overwhelmingly wonderful, flourishing lives is, IMO, in the grips ofā¦ um (trying to word this delicately)ā¦ values I strongly disagree with. We will just have very persistent disagreements, in that case!
FWIW, I think those extreme anti-natalist values are unusual, and certainly donāt reflect the kinds of concerns expressed by Setiya that I was responding to in the OP (or other common views in the vicinity, e.g. Melinda Robertsā ādeeper intuition that the existing Ann must in some way come before need-not-ever-exist-at-all Benā).
I agree. I happen to agree with you that the attempts to accommodate the procreation asymmetry without lexically disvaluing suffering donāt hold up to scrutiny. Setiyaās critique missed the mark pretty hard, e.g. this part just completely ignores that this view violates transitivity:
...Having said that, I do think the ādeeper intuition that the existing Ann must in some way come before need-not-ever-exist-at-all Benā plausibly boils down to some kind of antifrustrationist or tranquilist intuition. Ann comes first because she has actual preferences (/āexperiences of desire) that get violated when sheās deprived of happiness. Not creating Ben doesnāt violate any preferences of Benās.
I donāt think so. Iām sure that Roberts would, for example, think we had more reason to give Ann a lollipop than to bring Ben into existence and give him one, even if Ann would not in any way be frustrated by the lack of a lollipop.
The far more natural explanation is just that we have person-directed reasons to want what is good for Ann, in addition to the impersonal reasons we have to want a better world (realizable by either benefiting Ann or creating & benefiting Ben).
In fairness to Setiya, the whole point of parity relations (as developed, with some sophistication, by Ruth Chang) is that theyāunlike traditional value relationsāare not meant to be transitive. If youāre not familiar with the idea, I sketch a rough intro here.