Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Backtracking

This post is mostly meant as a bookmark for myself as I seek to fine-tune my understanding and expression of the fundamental Benatar asymmetry. Good reading, though.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

What is an antinatalist's opinion on the philosophies and pursuits of this man?

Anonymous said...

Anonymous:

Sorry, but I'm getting a dead link there.

Anonymous said...

Link

Sister Y said...

David Pearce

Sounds good to me.

Sister Y said...

Though, of course, extinction is a much more certain route to the abolition of involuntary suffering than magical transhuman technologies that might appear sometimes in the future.

Anonymous said...

I wrote a little about the subject here. To add a couple points: Beyond the unjustifiably (IMO) optimistic belief in human behavior modification at both individual and societal levels, there's the stability question to consider. That is, once we arrive, how do we manage to 'stay put'? A monumental task on par with the original transformation, I think.

And of course, there are the natural obstacles that I can't believe will ever be wholly under our control. Accidents, cataclysms, disease, etc. Is it realistic to believe we can eliminate all future risk? I don't think so.

Chip said...

Jim,

I think you're probably right. Even if the problem of suffering were to be resolved through technological intervention, basic physics would seem to make sensory equilibrium unsustainable. You encounter similar problems when you think about heaven.

NU is increasingly attractive to me. It's interesting how the same philosophical imperative that leads one mind to envision utopia, leads another to beckon for extinction. Or, at least in theory, extermination.