Roe v. Wade is dead

[crispy4000]

1 hour ago, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

 

Can you clarify further?  I don't quite understand the question.

 

Let’s say that many people in your society still choose to have large families they can’t fully support, in part because of their own views on abortion.  No incentive or encouragement can convince them to stop.  To top it off, the society’s resources have become strained to where not everyone can be helped to a “just” degree.

 

At what point do you resort to more draconian measures to keep them from procreating?

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

2 minutes ago, crispy4000 said:

Let’s say that many people in your society choose to have large families they can’t support, in part because of their own views on abortion.  No incentive or encouragement can convince them to stop.  To top it off, the society’s resources have become strained to where not everyone can be helped to a “just” degree.

 

At what point do you resort to more draconian measures to keep them from procreating?

 

That's a very good question that I haven't quite thought all the way through yet, but I will say that the initial decision to forgo terminating the pregnancy would immediately result in some degree of financial penalty through the non-qualification for certain tax-related benefits.

[skillzdadirecta]

Oklahoma Legislature Passes Bill Banning Almost All Abortions - The New York Times

WWW.NYTIMES.COM

---

The legislation would be the nation’s strictest, and relies on lawsuits from private citizens to enforce it. If the governor signs the bill, it would take effect immediately.

 

[CitizenVectron]

1 hour ago, sblfilms said:

The undercurrent in this discussion that death is preferable to poverty is simply a POV I don’t share as a former impoverished person myself.

 

My opinion has nothing to do with poverty; I believe that all existence is a net negative, morally. Some people's existence is a positive, and many people's are negative. However, self-selection of those existing (by the sake of existing) will result in most people saying they are glad they are alive, even if their lives have had more suffering than joy/peace, etc. The cost/benefit morally of bringing a person into the world is my main issue, that you are rolling the die on if their life will result in major suffering. If a person is able to make that decision for themselves (to do something that will result in their own pain, be it physical or mental) then that's one thing. To make the choice for another without their consent (which is impossible for those who do not yet exist) is, imo, immoral. 

 

That is why I am generally some flavour of an antinatalist. Don't get me wrong, I am personally glad to be alive, and I devote much of my time to making others' lives as good as possible. I believe that morally the best thing you can do is make the existence of others as bearable as you can, and that society should revolve around this. I do not hate children, or people who have children, nor am I opposed to every birth, etc. I simply think that morally the act of creating sapience from nothing without consent (which cannot be granted) is immoral. 

 

Ultimately (and we are getting into the weeds here), the greatest risk is that we eventually lose agency in existence. Right now the best thing about existence is that it will end. The worst thing that could happen is some kind of eternal existence. It's why I am aghast when people say they would voluntarily upload their consciousness into a simulation if they could. Issues of originality/copy of yourself aside (which is also a question of continuity of your sense of self even when you sleep each night, etc), if someone else controls your existence (and the quality of it), then it's incredibly risky and by definition immoral. Imagine a worst-case situation where someone clicks the "torture for eternity" button in the simulation, and there is no way for you to get out. And then they make a billion copies of you and do the same thing. Real-life existence carries those same risks, but at least there is an end, so there is less moral risk. But that raises the question of if morality is even an issue if the thing involved ceases to exist (did it ever exist, once it is gone, etc).

 

/End philosophical rant.

[CitizenVectron]

14 minutes ago, crispy4000 said:

Let’s say that many people in your society choose to have large families they can’t support, in part because of their own views on abortion.  No incentive or encouragement can convince them to stop.  To top it off, the society’s resources have become strained to where not everyone can be helped to a “just” degree.

 

At what point do you resort to more draconian measures to keep them from procreating?

 

In fact, we are kind of facing that now, where the baby boomer generation is too large for younger generations to support with the resources we have. Boomers have hoarded wealth, and now there will not enough to support them in their decline, so cuts will likely be made to end-of-life care, etc. Either that or most of society will revolve around just supporting elder boomers.

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

13 minutes ago, CitizenVectron said:

 The cost/benefit morally of bringing a person into the world is my main issue, that you are rolling the die on if their life will result in major suffering. If a person is able to make that decision for themselves (to do something that will result in their own pain, be it physical or mental) then that's one thing. To make the choice for another without their consent (which is impossible for those who do not yet exist) is, imo, immoral. 

 

This succinctly and cogently states the identical reasoning why I've deliberately chosen to not procreate.

 

I simply refuse to take the moral risk of bringing another being into existence not only without their "consent" (which, of course, is an impossibility) but also without any absolute certainty that they would experience an overall net positive life.  It all comes back to my firmly-held notion that non-existence is INFINITELY preferable to an overall net negative one. 

 

For me, even a 0.0000000000000000000001% chance that the being might experience an overall net negative life is simply too much to morally justify brining them into existence. 

[crispy4000]

21 minutes ago, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

 

That's a very good question that I haven't quite thought all the way through yet, but I will say that the initial decision to forgo terminating the pregnancy would immediately result in some degree of financial penalty through the non-qualification for certain tax-related benefits.

Glad to hear you understood, appreciated.

 

Can’t say I agree, because of how it essentially makes them second class citizens and pushes them further into poverty.  But it is an option.

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

And just to head off the argument that if the philosophy advocated by @CitizenVectron and me ever took root then the human species would cease to exist, my response is simply: "So what?"

 

[Zaku3]

6 minutes ago, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

And just to head off the argument that if the philosophy advocated by @CitizenVectron and me ever took root then the human species would cease to exist, my response is simply: "So what?"

 

 

Existance is in fairness a pass or fail test. 

[legend]

1 hour ago, crispy4000 said:

You’re talking to one now, technically. 

 

I’d say personhood is more an attribution we place on someone.  So of course there can be a distinction, and like other general attributes of humans, one can grow into it.
 

It just doesn’t have anything to do with what makes us individual human beings materially.  Which is generally where the “potential life” view is mistaken.

 

Well, pretty much any description is an attribution we place  Not sure I'm following your last comment though. So we agree that some people (possibly yourself) reason by additively valuing hypothetical people. It is a moral question whether to addtively value hypothetical people or not. I, for example, do not. (I also don't think most people actually do and instead adopt this moral framework as a flawed tool that they following too closely, but I can't prove that to to be the case.)

[Jason]

 

 

 

[Jason]

 

[Massdriver]

2 hours ago, legend said:

 

What you value is a moral question though. If there is a possible series of events that leads to some person X existing in the future, and you additively value that hypothetical person, that is a moral matter.

 

This kind of thinking leads to all kinds of insane conclusions. Classically, philosophy would describe it as the repugnant conclusion and it might have just be a weird academic thought experiment. But this kind of crazy thinking is something we have to contend with. Effective altruists, for example, make all kinds of weird moral decisions as a consequence of this thinking. In particular, they make decisions based on a goal to create as many people as possible in the future, even as far out as a trillion years. This leads them to downplaying the importance of climate change because they think "well it probably won't kill us all, and we'll still eventually populate the galaxy, better to focus on the fantasy "problem" of a god-like AI killing us all in the future and prevent our galaxy empire from ever happening!" They similarly reach anti-abortion conclusions because they additively value the "hypothetical" people that could exist. I'm waiting for them to start advocating that women are raped to add more to the population. Since their trend is only toward the more insane, I won't be shocked to see that happen.

The effective altruist charity organizations seem to be good though. For instance GiveWell has a good list of charities in my opinion, focused on malaria, deworming, and giving cash to the poor. 

[crispy4000]

33 minutes ago, legend said:

 

Well, pretty much any description is an attribution we place  Not sure I'm following your last comment though. So we agree that some people (possibly yourself) reason by additively valuing hypothetical people. It is a moral question whether to value hypothetical people or not. I, for example, do not. (I also don't think most people actually do and instead adopt this moral framework as a flawed tool that they following too closely, but I can't prove that to to be the case.)

It’s a difference in semantics, firstly.  What you choose to call a hypothetical person I call a human being at an early stage of development.  There’s biases inherit to both, but I do consider a material definition of human life much less subjective than personhood. 

 

As to ascribing value based on development and state of life, sure.  Even the most staunch pro-life people do it, whether they admit it or not.  The politics of today reflects it, sadly.  The biggest difference between pro-life and pro-choice is still to what extent and circumstances it is considered moral to kill a human being.

[legend]

8 minutes ago, Massdriver said:

The effective altruist charity organizations seem to be good though. For instance GiveWell has a good list of charities in my opinion, focused on malaria, deworming, and giving cash to the poor. 

 

Effective altruism is a weird group because their informally stated goals are ones I'm totally behind and some of the things like the charities you listed are decent too. But with the actual "community" involved comes a lot of dogma that drive me nuts. What particularly annoys me is on many occasions the members try to sneak in their beliefs. For example, they'll seek "open letters" to be signed by experts listing a bunch of good stuff and then sneaking in some of the bad things. When you press them on that they'll try to argue it's a benign version of it, and then when they publish the letter they'll of course try to make it out like the experts agree with the things they snuck in.

 

I'm primarily referring to experiences I've had with their AI-god nonsense, but since that's kind of the community's main "problem" to solve I tend to run into more than I'd like. Some of the researchers who do research regarding actual AI ethical and societal problems are starting to get very vocal about how toxic and counter productive the EA community is, which is a blessing  

[Zaku3]

1 hour ago, CitizenVectron said:

 

My opinion has nothing to do with poverty; I believe that all existence is a net negative, morally. Some people's existence is a positive, and many people's are negative. However, self-selection of those existing (by the sake of existing) will result in most people saying they are glad they are alive, even if their lives have had more suffering than joy/peace, etc. The cost/benefit morally of bringing a person into the world is my main issue, that you are rolling the die on if their life will result in major suffering. If a person is able to make that decision for themselves (to do something that will result in their own pain, be it physical or mental) then that's one thing. To make the choice for another without their consent (which is impossible for those who do not yet exist) is, imo, immoral. 

 

That is why I am generally some flavour of an antinatalist. Don't get me wrong, I am personally glad to be alive, and I devote much of my time to making others' lives as good as possible. I believe that morally the best thing you can do is make the existence of others as bearable as you can, and that society should revolve around this. I do not hate children, or people who have children, nor am I opposed to every birth, etc. I simply think that morally the act of creating sapience from nothing without consent (which cannot be granted) is immoral. 

 

Ultimately (and we are getting into the weeds here), the greatest risk is that we eventually lose agency in existence. Right now the best thing about existence is that it will end. The worst thing that could happen is some kind of eternal existence. It's why I am aghast when people say they would voluntarily upload their consciousness into a simulation if they could. Issues of originality/copy of yourself aside (which is also a question of continuity of your sense of self even when you sleep each night, etc), if someone else controls your existence (and the quality of it), then it's incredibly risky and by definition immoral. Imagine a worst-case situation where someone clicks the "torture for eternity" button in the simulation, and there is no way for you to get out. And then they make a billion copies of you and do the same thing. Real-life existence carries those same risks, but at least there is an end, so there is less moral risk. But that raises the question of if morality is even an issue if the thing involved ceases to exist (did it ever exist, once it is gone, etc).

 

/End philosophical rant.

 

If I could be a Magos techpriest I'd consider it but ya generally speaking I'd probably be better off not existing. The positives of it haven't made up for the negatives anf I don't anticipate another high like when I was with my ex-wife. 

 

Having said that I wouldn't do anything to end my existance and it's fine if things continue as is.

[legend]

11 minutes ago, crispy4000 said:

It’s a difference in semantics, firstly.  What you choose to call a hypothetical person I call a human being at an early stage of development.  There’s biases inherit to both, but I do consider a material definition of human life much less subjective than personhood.

 

As to ascribing value based on development and state of life, sure.  Even the most staunch pro-life people do it, whether they admit it or not.  The biggest difference between pro-life and pro-choice is still to what extent and circumstances it is considered moral to kill a human being.

 

I don't see how this is a matter of semantics. You can use whatever word you like  the difference is whether you're valuing something that could exist in the future or something that exists now. The distinction of values I'm making is precise enough to be an issue I could represent mathematically, but I'm not sure how many people here will enjoy that unless they also like thinking about sequential decision making mathematics  

[Massdriver]

7 minutes ago, legend said:

 

Effective altruism is a weird group because their informally stated goals are ones I'm totally behind and some of the things like the charities you listed are decent too. But with the actual "community" involved comes a lot of dogma that drive me nuts. What particularly annoys me is on many occasions the members try to sneak in their beliefs. For example, they'll seek "open letters" to be signed by experts listing a bunch of good stuff and then sneaking in some of the bad things. When you press them on that they'll try to argue it's a benign version of it, and then when they publish the letter they'll of course try to make it out like the experts agree with the things they snuck in.

 

I'm primarily referring to experiences I've had with their AI-god nonsense, but since that's kind of the community's main "problem" to solve I tend to run into more than I'd like. Some of the researchers who do research regarding actual AI ethical and societal problems are starting to get very vocal about how toxic and counter productive the EA community is, which is a blessing  

I'm not familiar with their more abstract ideas aside from every dollar donated doing the most good possible to reduce suffering, which in general seems like a decent principle in charity to couple with ethical obligations to our own community. Sounds like they're nuts.

[legend]

Just now, Massdriver said:

I'm not familiar with their more abstract ideas aside from every dollar donated doing the most good possible to reduce suffering, which in general seems like a decent principle in charity to couple with ethical obligation to our own community. Sounds like they're nuts.

 

Yeah, the "aim to have the most positive benefit" angle is a great axiom. It's all the other stuff that that they pile on top of it as a community.

[osxmatt]

28 minutes ago, Jason said:

 

Not that consistency means anything to Republicans, but they’ve spent weeks and even part of the leaked SCOTUS opinion arguing abortion disproportionately impacts blacks people, so by reeling it back in they are in reality the true party of black Americans. 

[Massdriver]

I don't care for the way abortion is debated.

 

Terms like 'rights' are thrown around, to which everyone interprets differently.

 

Terms like 'life' are thrown around, when really life isn't the issue. I believe the fetus is most definitely alive and would qualify as life and I think almost everyone would agree that is qualifies as some form of life. That's not the issue. The issue is more about the characteristics of the fetus and its moral status. Sentience, personhood, reasoning abilities are more relevant characteristics than life.

 

Potential person is sometimes thrown around, but this is actually useful because it helps people debating it determine whether potential persons should have moral status. In my humble opinion, potential persons may have some sort of moral status, but it's far lower than pro life people make it out to be, and persons further out would deserve less consideration than persons that exist now or that could exist soon.

 

Pro-choice and pro-life plays into the binary way Americans like to approach politics. Is someone that favors some abortion restrictions on later term abortions pro choice or pro life? I guess it depends on who you ask. And like I said, the word life just doesn't belong in the debate. Maybe it should be pro-potential person. That just doesn't have a nice political ring though. 

[GeneticBlueprint]

Oklahoma lawmakers pass bill banning abortion after fertilization - The Washington Post

WWW.WASHINGTONPOST.COM

---

If signed into law, Oklahoma would effectively ban all abortions in the state.

 

Next they're going to pass a law deeming that any ejaculation that doesn't result in fertilization is also banned.

[crispy4000]

28 minutes ago, legend said:

 

I don't see how this is a matter of semantics. You can use whatever word you like  the difference is whether you're valuing something that could exist in the future or something that exists now.

 

The difference is when you're choosing to infer a hypothetical.  I'll go so far to say that calling something a human being is speculative before it can be illustrated to live as such.

 

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'd assume you'd say personhood should be attributed sometime after your life began.

[Massdriver]

1 hour ago, CitizenVectron said:

 

My opinion has nothing to do with poverty; I believe that all existence is a net negative, morally. Some people's existence is a positive, and many people's are negative. However, self-selection of those existing (by the sake of existing) will result in most people saying they are glad they are alive, even if their lives have had more suffering than joy/peace, etc. The cost/benefit morally of bringing a person into the world is my main issue, that you are rolling the die on if their life will result in major suffering. If a person is able to make that decision for themselves (to do something that will result in their own pain, be it physical or mental) then that's one thing. To make the choice for another without their consent (which is impossible for those who do not yet exist) is, imo, immoral. 

I think there are dangers to looking at the morality of existence in a rigid net suffering vs net positive framework. I would be willing to wager that there are quite a few people that you or others would think would prefer not to have existed due to their life being filled with suffering, but upon speaking with many of them would find that they are content in some way that is more nuanced than a rigid suffering calculus. Maybe you need to add a big net positive number that's intrinsic to existence that people strongly prefer and weigh.

 

There's nothing immoral about bringing people into this world if one is responsible and cares for their well being. If someone does not care for existence, they have the agency and ability to leave at any time once they're adults. We consent everyday to exist. Granted, children do not, and perhaps that's the argument you would make, but they eventually do, and children that are well cared for are mostly happy with existing from what I can tell.  Older children have quite a bit of agency of their own too.

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

3 minutes ago, Massdriver said:

I think there are dangers to looking at the morality of existence in a rigid net suffering vs net positive framework. I would be willing to wager that there are quite a few people that you or others would think would prefer not to have existed due to their life being filled with suffering, but upon speaking with many of them would find that they are content in some way that is more nuanced than a rigid suffering calculus. Maybe you need to add a big net positive number that's intrinsic to existence that people strongly prefer and weigh.

 

There's nothing immoral about bringing people into this world if one is responsible and cares for their well being. If someone does not care for existence, they have the agency and ability to leave at any time once they're adults. We consent everyday to exist. Granted, children do not, and perhaps that's the argument you would make, but they eventually do, and children that are well cared for are mostly are happy with existing from what I can tell.  Older children have quite a bit of agency of their own too.

 

That's all very well and good, but it's reflective of externalities rather than a person's own internal moral calculus.

[Massdriver]

3 minutes ago, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

 

That's all very well and good, but it's reflective of externalities rather than a person's own internal moral calculus.

I'm not sure what these means. Can you elaborate a bit?

[Air_Delivery]

Republicans Just Voted Against Feeding the Baby They’re Forcing You to Have

WWW.VICE.COM

---

192 House Republicans voted against a $28 million emergency funding bill to address the baby formula shortage.

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

5 minutes ago, Massdriver said:

I'm not sure what these means. Can you elaborate a bit?

 

Yeah - I didn't exactly phrase that very well as I wasn't even sure what I was getting at   It's more along the lines of that those notions are largely based on the inherent, highly subjective perception of the individual making them rather than those of an observer outside of that subjective perception.  For instance, your example of the person who is "content" despite a life filled with suffering may not be in the best position to effectively judge whether they should even have existed in the first place. Their "contentment" could probably be the result of a fear of what non-existence entails rather than actual contentment.

 

Also:

 

21 minutes ago, Massdriver said:

If someone does not care for existence, they have the agency and ability to leave at any time once they're adults. We consent everyday to exist. Granted, children do not, and perhaps that's the argument you would make, but they eventually do, and children that are well cared for are mostly happy with existing from what I can tell.  Older children have quite a bit of agency of their own too.

 

I'm going to argue that it's morally questionable/dubious to even put an individual in the position of having to make such a decision through bringing them into existence in the first place. 

 

[ThreePi]

45 minutes ago, GeneticBlueprint said:

Oklahoma lawmakers pass bill banning abortion after fertilization - The Washington Post

WWW.WASHINGTONPOST.COM

---

If signed into law, Oklahoma would effectively ban all abortions in the state.

 

Next they're going to pass a law deeming that any ejaculation that doesn't result in fertilization is also banned.

 

I already posted thr Monty Python so g here once. I'll do it again if I have to.

[Massdriver]

29 minutes ago, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

 

Yeah - I didn't exactly phrase that very well as I wasn't even sure what I was getting at   It's more along the lines of that those notions are largely based on the inherent, highly subjective perception of the individual making them rather than those of an observer outside of that subjective perception.  For instance, your example of the person who is "content" despite a life filled with suffering may not be in the best position to effectively judge whether they should even have existed in the first place. Their "contentment" could probably be the result of a fear of what non-existence entails rather than actual contentment.

As opposed to the highly subjective perception of the individual observing the individual? I'm willing to take people at their word rather than assuming I know better than they do on existential matters. Whether their contentment is mostly the result of fear is conjecture and probably would vary a lot per individual. 

 

Antinatalism has a lot to overcome. It doesn't match with most of our moral intuitions which is probably its biggest issue. The dice rolling reasoning doesn't work either. If we used the possibility of something bad happening as a result of an action that most of the time doesn't as justification for inaction, we would be paralyzed to act at all. 

 

 

29 minutes ago, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

Also:

 

 

I'm going to argue that it's morally questionable/dubious to even put an individual in the position of having to make such a decision through bringing them into existence in the first place. 

 

Why would it be immoral putting someone in a position where they have to make a choice about their existence? I don't see why it would be.

 

Intent should matter some here too. If the intent is to bring a child into this world and care for the child, and one is responsible and has the resources to do so, then I don't see the problem. The intent isn't to bring someone into existence so that they are miserable. 

 

If you drive at all, your intent is to use the car to get from point A to point B (presumably), but it's a dice roll every time, that is something really bad may happen as a result of one driving. You may put another driver in a terrible moral dilemma. It doesn't follow that driving with the 'A to B intent' is unethical. 

 

I'm in a hurry so this driving example may not do my thoughts justice. I would need more time to refine the analogy, but I hope that gets my point somewhat across. 

[legend]

1 hour ago, crispy4000 said:

 

The difference is when you're choosing to infer a hypothetical.  I'll go so far to say that calling something a human being is speculative before it can be illustrated to live as such.

 

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'd assume you'd say personhood should be attributed sometime after your life began.

 

 

I'm not choosing anything  These are descriptive facts. At time T a fertilized egg is one kind of system that is almost entirely (if not entirely) lacking of the cognitive capabilities that matter for any kind of moral reasoning. At time T+N, conditioned on the correct biological conditions up until then, that fertilized egg may now have turned into a system with a different set of capabilities. If you don't actually care about what the system is at time T, but you do care about what it is at time T+N under the correct conditions, then you're valuing a hypothetical entity.

 

 

[Guest]

14 minutes ago, Massdriver said:

The dice rolling reasoning doesn't work either. If we used the possibility of something bad happening as a result of an action that most of the time doesn't as justification for inaction, we would be paralyzed to act at all. 

If these two actually believed the things they are saying, they would off themselves as it is the only rational choice because it guarantees no future suffering. 

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

4 minutes ago, sblfilms said:

If these two actually believed the things they are saying, they would off themselves as it is the only rational choice because it guarantees no future suffering. 

 

Make no mistake that I genuinely do believe in everything that I'm saying here.

 

I draw a distinction between bringing a life into this world and potentially subjecting that life to suffering and already being alive in this world and making the very best of it that I can where I had no "choice" in whether or not I came into being.

 

@CitizenVectron also made that distinction pretty clear in his post.

[CitizenVectron]

8 minutes ago, sblfilms said:

If these two actually believed the things they are saying, they would off themselves as it is the only rational choice because it guarantees no future suffering. 

 

4 minutes ago, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

 

Make no mistake that I genuinely do believe in everything that I'm saying here.

 

I draw a distinction between bringing a life into this world and potentially subjecting that life to suffering and already being alive in this world and making the very best of it that I can where I had no "choice" in whether or not I came into being.

 

@CitizenVectron also made that distinction pretty clear in his post.

 

Yeah I am very clear and consistent in my view:

• The less new sentience and sapience created, the better (on a universal, moral level)
• Existing life should be made as comfortable as possible (and society should be structured around this)

[crispy4000]

42 minutes ago, legend said:

I'm not choosing anything  These are descriptive facts. At time T a fertilized egg is one kind of system that is almost entirely (if not entirely) lacking of the cognitive capabilities that are matter for any kind of moral reasoning. At time T+N, conditioned on the correct biological conditions up until then, that fertilized egg may now have turned into a system with a different set of capabilities. If you don't actually care about what the system is at time T, but you do care about what it is at time T+N under the correct conditions, then you're valuing a hypothetical entity.

You don’t care about a fertilized egg because it has no cognition, so it’s a hypothetical entity?

 

I think you mean that’s when you consider it a person, and you don’t care what it was before then.