It's life, it's shit but it's also full of joyful moments and if we weren't born we'd miss out on those moments. Man the fuck up and accept the bad with the good. Does that qualify?Personally I've not heard a compelling argument against Antinatalism, what's the strongest you've come across?
Personally I've not heard a compelling argument against Antinatalism, what's the strongest you've come across?
Benatar’s antinatalist view can be criticised on the basis of research carried out by Robert Biswas-Diener. Biswas-Diener has travelled the world interviewing people about their lives and how satisfied they are with them. Wherever he goes, he has found that most people (with the exception of the homeless) are more satisfied than dissatisfied with their lives. He even found this was the case with prostitutes in Calcutta, forced by poverty to sell their bodies and sacrifice their futures to disease. Overall, Biswas-Diener‘s research suggests that the lives of those we might pity are much better from the inside than they may look to an antinatalist like Benatar.
There's also evidence that intensive meditation can have a transformative effect, making us more selfless and content with our lives. Buddhists would claim that this is because this practice orients us more towards reality as it truly is. Others might argue that this effect is akin to a form of neuroplasticity that causes us to don perceptual rose-tinted spectacles.
Research on the brain of Matthieu Ricard is relevant in this respect:
https://www.entertales.com/matthieu-ricard-worlds-happiest-person/
The sceptical Bristol-based academic Kathy Sykes's documentary on meditation also demonstrates the value of meditation.
I'm not sure sex is really about pro creation...it's a bag of fun and experience (um...mostly).
I'm open minded...I've benefitted enormously through a lot of exercise but haven't spent any real time meditating to comment yet.
As a slight aside and not really to do with religion, if you've ever read any books on quantum theories and the sub atomic world...well they're pretty mind blowing.
A discussion about 'objects' the Planck scale and how truly small they are (blow an atom up to the size of the universe and the object at the Planck scale would be the size of the tree). We know nothing John Snow. We're all quantised basically. A higher form...a creator would have have to be aware of all of this. Same applies if we're a computer program on a 'space hard drive'. Imagine the scale of the hard drive holding the details of very single atom in the universe (and then everything included within that atom)...and then the possibility of infinite multiverses.
There are arguments to cease the human race, but christ there's so much we'd be missing out...so much to learn.
What is it that made it inconceivable for you that there is no God? Has it presented itself to you? Has it spoken to you? What irrefutable evidence have you seen that there being a God is unquestionable?
Also, if it’s absolute to you that there is a God, who or what created this God? Where did it come from? How old is it? How long will it last for? Where does it go?
Have you ever thought that what religious folk call God is actually the Sun?
Simply because I find it impossible that the complexities involved in the creation happened by chance. Randomness creates chaos not order.
All major religions have answered this.
[Q 112:2] He is Eternal
[Q 112:3] He neither begets nor is born
[Q 57: 3] He is the First (nothing is before Him) and the Last (nothing is after Him)
Sun is one of the signs of the Creator.
[Q 41:37] And of His signs are the night and day and the sun and moon. Do not prostrate to the sun or to the moon, but prostate to Allah who created them, if it is Him that you worship.
[Q 10:5] It is He who made the sun a shining light and the moon a derived light and determined for it phases - that you may know the number of years and account [of time]. Allah has not created this except in truth. He details the signs for a people who know
Apart from what has been written (often many years after what was supposed to have happened) what evidence do you have for this?
What has been written is more likely to be a fable rather than a subjective record of events.
And bear in mind said fable will have been passed down and translated a number of times before formally being committed to text, and likely bear little or no resemblance to the original message.
My comment was in relation to judging the prophets based on the "divine laws". Even if you don't consider them as divine, you could still consider them as laws applicable of the time they lived in.not being funny mate but you are, certainly in the above passage intimating that these "divine revelations" are somehow fact
when infact you have no actual evidence that this is the case
Because the standards of the 21st Century are the ones we are currently living in, not the 1st or 5th. As time has progressed, society and it's morals and integrity has changed. For example, the Holy books proclaim that slavery is a "fact of life" and even has a warrant and conducts in the trafficking of other humans. According to those who value these books, these words are the words of God. So God is big on slavery; have at it, he says. Well we don't think that way now, and there are many things we, society and humanity, disagrees with on what constitutes a life lived well and good in the eyes of God.
As Ricky Gervais said to Stephen Colbert;"You know there are around 3,000 Gods throughout history, right? And you don't believe in them either do you? But you believe in one. So you don't believe in 2,999 Gods, well I happen to not believe in one more than you do".