Briefly addressing Antinatalism (voluntary human extinction)

Author: Kaitlyn

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Kaitlyn
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Ever since I lost my Christian faith at a young age, I've struggled with this topic a lot. Mainstream intellectuals either don't ever address it or mangle their understanding of arguments in favor of antinatalism, so antinatalism always seemed a rather large beacon of truth to me.

Overall, I don't think human life can be argued as acceptably good. Negative affect is a prerequisite to positive affect, at least in humans (probably other sentient creatures, too). A drink of water doesn't feel good (positive affect) without first being thirsty (negative affect). In other words, you're always going to have more instances of negative affect than positive affect.

You can add to this conundrum by realizing that people generally experience more units of negative affect when bad things happen, than the inverse. We see this with loss aversion in regards to financial decisions, wherein someone will prioritize avoiding losses Prospect Theory and Loss Aversion: How Users Make Decisions (nngroup.com) You can also theorize about the best thing that could happen in life (e.g. winning a massive competition) versus the worst things (e.g. early onset Alzheimer's). 

I think a possible solution to the antinatalist argument involves humans being radically genetically engineered to not have this deprivation mechanism that has them have more instances of negative affect and experience more units of negative overall in their life. Effectively, you'd be removing the desire part of the human psychology, whatever that comprises. If tasks still needed to be done, you could replace the deprivation mechanism model with an algorithmic one, of which simply does required tasks without the need for motivation (the thing is done because it is logical to do so). I guess this new being would be far enough from a human to be considered post-human.

Another solution is to simply have humans in a dream state or virtual reality world that allows for unrealistic levels of deprivation fulfilling, of which doesn't come at the expense of other real humans (e.g. you win a gold at the Olympics in your dreams, but you don't realize than you are dreaming, so no real human actually lost and feels the negative affect). Perhaps we could even pre-program a device/human to allow the human to experience a life they think is real but is a linear progression that allows the human to feel better and better as their perceived life continues (e.g. winning the Olympics in one category, then in two in the next Olympics). The pre-programming would protect against unwanted negative affect because the perceived life is pre-determined. 
Best.Korea
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Ever since I lost my Christian faith at a young age
Oh no
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@Kaitlyn

    Are you related to Jim Jones?
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life is a struggle for almost everyone. but i would still say overall the good outweighs the bad. even the poorest among us have a lot to be thankful for. it's about perspective. there's a lot of people born with disease, or people who come into massive problems, but those are the exception, not the rule. as jesus said about those who are born diseased, they were allowed to be made that way... allowed, not created... so that one day, even if it's in the afterlife, when their poor condition is changed for the better.... God will be glorified. 

trying to make a virtual reality or otherwise escape reality is just avoiding the truth as it is. i mean i guess it's okay to have a way to escape, if it's done in a healthy way, but the truth needs accepted as the truth, otherwise a person is living a lie. i suppose the details would need to be determined on a case by case basis. 
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@FLRW
Are you related to Jim Jones?
Antinatalism is different from a mass suicide movement (i.e. what Jim Jones spearheaded) because antinatalism wants to prevent suffering, and suicide invokes suffering. Thus, an antinatalist prefers to prevent humans from being created in the first place, rather than kill off humans whom already exist.
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@n8nrgim
life is a struggle for almost everyone. but i would still say overall the good outweighs the bad.
It's always fascinated me how people say things like 'life is a struggle' or 'life is unfair', and yet somehow, magically, the good outweighs the bad.

How do you know this at all? Does it just feel like the right answer to you?

even the poorest among us have a lot to be thankful for. 
The poorest are born into the same deprivation mechanism as everyone else. The poorest still experience negative affect as being per unit worse than positive affect.

How do you deal with the above issues?

there's a lot of people born with disease, or people who come into massive problems, but those are the exception, not the rule.
Antinatalism isn't just about the outliers who have it bad. It's about everyone, on average, having more negative affect than positive affect. You're not dealing with the core tenants. 

as jesus said about those who are born diseased, they were allowed to be made that way... allowed, not created... so that one day, even if it's in the afterlife, when their poor condition is changed for the better
This is a tangent but I'll address it anyway.

So, the author of reality (God) chose to make these people suffer substantial more than other people, because why? He's omnipotent and omniscient, but still chooses to make these people suffer more? God could choose to have a perfectly level playing field, but doesn't choose that. What an asshole lol.

trying to make a virtual reality or otherwise escape reality is just avoiding the truth as it is. i mean i guess it's okay to have a way to escape, if it's done in a healthy way, but the truth needs accepted as the truth, otherwise a person is living a lie. i suppose the details would need to be determined on a case by case basis. 
If the 'truth' is just pointless suffering, then it's better to have never been.

At least VR is attempting to work with reality in a way that attempts to fix it.
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@Kaitlyn
there's instability for the average person on the globe, i'll give you that. but, the average person has evolved to have decent health until they die or get close to death, and the ones who don't have decent health are the exception. they might not live lavishly, but they have enough to survive. life is about more than lavish living. it's about gratitude, and making the best of not having everything one wants. 

our dispute the way i see it, is whether the average person on the globe has a decent life or not. it's at least gotta be good enough to think existing is better than not existing. the way you describe it, most people would be better off not being born, but the irony is that almost none of them agrees with that. life can be a struggle and still worth living, and still worth being grateful for, for the average person. 
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So, the author of reality (God) chose to make these people suffer substantial more than other people, because why? He's omnipotent and omniscient, but still chooses to make these people suffer more? God could choose to have a perfectly level playing field, but doesn't choose that. What an asshole lol.
there can be purpose in struggle. there is a wise video circulating about a priest saying how God answers prayers. he asked for strength and God gave him difficult people to deal with... that develops strength. the priest asked for courage, and God gave him scary siutations that required him to develop courage. 

life is about creating our reality as a species. we're co creators. the higher purposes require us to find meaning in doubt, to live in faith... to create based on faith.  we use our free will, without having all the answers, to embrace a higher possible purpose. 

ultimately, i admit that you have formidable philosphical arguements. but it really comes down to optimism v pessimism. your arguments dont necessarily describe existence the best. it's just a way of looking at it. pessimistic, instead of optimistic. you see the glass half empty. it might not be the right way to look at it. you are being like an ingrateful teenager who doesnt get things their way, so they assume the world is unfair, instead of just figuring out that there's something to gain in not always getting things the way you would like. our desires of our flesh, v our desires of our spirit. 

bottom line, you are simply just choosing to be a pessimist, when it's possible to be an optimist, and there's good reason to think the optimists have it right. 
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@Kaitlyn
I don't think human life can be argued as acceptably good
Do you think it's in an individual's best interest to commit suicide? Most people don't (not even anti-natalists), so it seems to me that people tend to prefer existing to not existing.

A drink of water doesn't feel good (positive affect) without first being thirsty (negative affect).
I don't think that's how dopamine works. A lot of food tastes better than not being hungry in the first place.
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@n8nrgim
there's instability for the average person on the globe, i'll give you that. but, the average person has evolved to have decent health until they die or get close to death, and the ones who don't have decent health are the exception. they might not live lavishly, but they have enough to survive. life is about more than lavish living. it's about gratitude, and making the best of not having everything one wants. 
There's a fair bit to unpack from the language you use here.

Firstly, we need to look at humanity as a collective average, rather than just what most people experience. Yes, most people have decent health until they die or get close to death, but the exceptions to this should be built into the equation. Life can get truly awful for some people (especially if you agree that negative affect is experienced with far more vivacity than positive affect), and when you give birth to someone, you risk imposing that truly awful life upon someone. These exceptions drag the average quality of human life far further down than if you were to exclude them from the equation.

Secondly, having "enough to survive" doesn't justify human existence, because survival doesn't objectively make life worthwhile due to life not being inherently valuable. However, avoidance of negative affect and attraction to positive affect is objectively valuable (at least to sentient life). If all human life involves greater negative affect than positive affect, even if all human life "survived", that would be a net negative.

Lastly, when a person doesn't get what they want, that is a small negative affect that comes with it. Every unfulfilled wish produces a negative affect until it is fulfilled, and those add up to be larger overall. Gratitude may help cope, but it's only ever mitigation, not complete removal. The only complete removal is to not exist.

our dispute the way i see it, is whether the average person on the globe has a decent life or not. it's at least gotta be good enough to think existing is better than not existing. the way you describe it, most people would be better off not being born, but the irony is that almost none of them agrees with that. life can be a struggle and still worth living, and still worth being grateful for, for the average person. 
Most people don't ever think about whether life is worth living. They're so caught up in the distraction of existing that they don't ever stop to consider whether existing is worth it in the first place. Just because they continue to exist doesn't mean they have an extensive, thorough reasoning as to why they exist. What actually happens is that they exist and tack on ad hoc reasoning as to why they do it. 

In any case, if life is such a pointless struggle with more negative affect than positive affect, why live it in the first place?
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@n8nrgim
So, the author of reality (God) chose to make these people suffer substantial more than other people, because why? He's omnipotent and omniscient, but still chooses to make these people suffer more? God could choose to have a perfectly level playing field, but doesn't choose that. What an asshole lol.
there can be purpose in struggle. there is a wise video circulating about a priest saying how God answers prayers. he asked for strength and God gave him difficult people to deal with... that develops strength. the priest asked for courage, and God gave him scary siutations that required him to develop courage. 
Why couldn't God design existence so that purpose could be found without struggle? Why can't God simply grant people strength? Why impose negativity when you get to choose if it exists at all?

life is about creating our reality as a species. we're co creators. the higher purposes require us to find meaning in doubt, to live in faith... to create based on faith.  we use our free will, without having all the answers, to embrace a higher possible purpose. 
Why would God set-up humans to find purpose in such a convoluted way? Why not give humans all the answers? What about people who never see any of the answers or even hear about God? 

ultimately, i admit that you have formidable philosphical arguements. but it really comes down to optimism v pessimism. your arguments dont necessarily describe existence the best. it's just a way of looking at it. pessimistic, instead of optimistic. you see the glass half empty. it might not be the right way to look at it. you are being like an ingrateful teenager who doesnt get things their way, so they assume the world is unfair, instead of just figuring out that there's something to gain in not always getting things the way you would like. our desires of our flesh, v our desires of our spirit. 

bottom line, you are simply just choosing to be a pessimist, when it's possible to be an optimist, and there's good reason to think the optimists have it right. 
Lol I'm actually not an antinatalist. I'm defending it against what I see to be ineffective criticism.

Not always getting what you want is a negative experience. If we could engineer a world wherein we always got what we wanted, or never have wants in the first place (so that they could never go unfulfilled), that would be a better world.

You haven't addressed the core tenants of antinatalism I outlined in the OP. Calling my argument 'pessimistic' doesn't disprove (1) negative affect being a prerequisite for positive affect, and (2) on average, negative affect per unit is impactful than positive affect per unit. You really need to show neither of those things are true.
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@Savant
I don't think human life can be argued as acceptably good
Do you think it's in an individual's best interest to commit suicide?
No. It causes a dreadful amount of negative affect, and it doesn't solve the problem of procreation.

Most people don't (not even anti-natalists), so it seems to me that people tend to prefer existing to not existing.
Most people don't even think about whether it's worth living. They don't have thorough, reasoned arguments that extend from philosophical axioms as to why they should live. Living isn't really a conscious choice at all for these people. They just live.

A drink of water doesn't feel good (positive affect) without first being thirsty (negative affect).
I don't think that's how dopamine works. A lot of food tastes better than not being hungry in the first place.
Yes, not being hungry doesn't feel that good because it's the satisfaction of relieving oneself of hunger that creates the positive affect. We don't naturally rejoice constantly when we are not hungry, similar to how we aren't constantly jumping for joy when we don't have the plague.

The issue with food that generates a lot of dopamine is that it's unhealthy. Sure, if you could just wire someone up to have hamburger after hamburger shoved into them, and there weren't any health issues in doing so, you might reach a point wherein the negative affect is overwhelmed by the positive affect (it was one of the solutions for antinatalism I suggested in the OP). 

After all, you don't need real world interaction in order to feel a sense of achievement.
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Are you trying to prove that we need Christianity to prevent people from having this idiotic belief?

Another win for Christianity, I guess. 😁
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@Kaitlyn
Overall, I don't think human life can be argued as acceptably good. Negative affect is a prerequisite to positive affect, at least in humans (probably other sentient creatures, too). A drink of water doesn't feel good (positive affect) without first being thirsty (negative affect). In other words, you're always going to have more instances of negative affect than positive affect.
If I am not expecting a birthday party, and someone surprises me with one, did a negative affect precede that positive affect?

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@Math_Enthusiast
Overall, I don't think human life can be argued as acceptably good. Negative affect is a prerequisite to positive affect, at least in humans (probably other sentient creatures, too). A drink of water doesn't feel good (positive affect) without first being thirsty (negative affect). In other words, you're always going to have more instances of negative affect than positive affect.
If I am not expecting a birthday party, and someone surprises me with one, did a negative affect precede that positive affect?
It does for humans, overall. Whilst the individual receiving the surprise did not have the preceding negative affect, the person organizing the surprise did. 

Although, you appear to be onto something.

For example, if a non-human constantly organized random surprises for humans, this could be argued as a net positive because there isn't a sentient creature to experience the negative affect involved in organizing the surprises. VR simulating surprises to humans would also fulfill this requirement, too. Albeit, if enough surprise events are given, humans may become accustomed to them and expect them, so there are diminishing returns involved. 

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@Kaitlyn
If it’s too late to have your own children, you can still adopt, assuming you’re able.
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@Kaitlyn
It does for humans, overall. Whilst the individual receiving the surprise did not have the preceding negative affect, the person organizing the surprise did. 
Why is this a necessity?

Although, you appear to be onto something.

For example, if a non-human constantly organized random surprises for humans, this could be argued as a net positive because there isn't a sentient creature to experience the negative affect involved in organizing the surprises. VR simulating surprises to humans would also fulfill this requirement, too. Albeit, if enough surprise events are given, humans may become accustomed to them and expect them, so there are diminishing returns involved. 
It doesn't just have to be "surprises." There are plenty of things that bring joy to us without a negative affect preceding it. For that matter, there are cases where the negative affect is minimal to the point non-existence. For example, when I eat dinner, I usually have yet to reach the point of noticeable hunger. I anticipate that you will argue that the net affect is still negative, but the world has gone from a zero sum game to a positive sum game in this recent era of human existence: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rvskMHn0sqQ. It is no longer the case that what benefits me is necessarily harmful to someone else.
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@Reece101
If it’s too late to have your own children, you can still adopt, assuming you’re able.
This thread is about the validity of antinatalism. It's not about my personal circumstance.
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@Math_Enthusiast
It does for humans, overall. Whilst the individual receiving the surprise did not have the preceding negative affect, the person organizing the surprise did. 
Why is this a necessity?
Organizing surprises takes planning and work, both of which generate negative affect in humans. Therefore, it's necessary that there is negative affect in organizing surprises.

Although, you appear to be onto something.

For example, if a non-human constantly organized random surprises for humans, this could be argued as a net positive because there isn't a sentient creature to experience the negative affect involved in organizing the surprises. VR simulating surprises to humans would also fulfill this requirement, too. Albeit, if enough surprise events are given, humans may become accustomed to them and expect them, so there are diminishing returns involved. 
It doesn't just have to be "surprises." There are plenty of things that bring joy to us without a negative affect preceding it. For that matter, there are cases where the negative affect is minimal to the point non-existence. For example, when I eat dinner, I usually have yet to reach the point of noticeable hunger. I anticipate that you will argue that the net affect is still negative, but the world has gone from a zero sum game to a positive sum game in this recent era of human existence: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rvskMHn0sqQ. It is no longer the case that what benefits me is necessarily harmful to someone else.
If the negative affect is minimal, then the positive affect is also minimal. That's why eating dinner after you've starved for a week feels far better than eating dinner when you're not hungry. The more we've felt negative affect in our starvation, the greater the positive affect that is felt as a reward for eating.

The zero-sum game you've referenced does refer to a part of antinatalism, but not all parts. The part you've referenced through your video does argue well that there are a greater amount of resources to share with people (i.e. more food to make sure we don't have to fight for it).

However, the issue with the human condition is that we're designed to be motivated, not satisfied, so once our basic needs are met, we quickly begin to ask again 'what next?' So, even if our food and water needs are met, our psychology immediately starts to want more. That's where the zero-sum game truly shows it colors -- we're experience negative affect before we've satisfied our desires *AND* after we've satisfied our desires (because we get bored). In other words, humans have a psychology that is designed to produce negative affect at all times. 

It's the internal zero-sum game found within human psychology that is the major problem.
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@Kaitlyn
Aka deep ecologists

..."....But, deep ecologists say, if people are to protect the environment for all species , now and in the future, they must challenge and change long-held basic beliefs and attitudes about our species place in nature. For example, people must recognize that animals, plants, and the ecosystems that sustain them have intrinsic value—that is, are valuable in and of themselves—quite apart from any use or instrumental value they might have for human beings.

......The genetic diversity found in insects and plants in tropical rain forests is to be protected not (only or merely) because it might one day yield a drug for curing cancer , but also and more importantly because such biodiversity is valuable in its own right. Likewise, rivers and lakes should contain clean water not just because humans need uncontaminated water for swimming and drinking, but also because fish do.

.....Like Gandhi, to whom they often refer, deep ecologists teach respect for all forms of life and the conditions that sustain them"..
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@Kaitlyn
Organizing surprises takes planning and work, both of which generate negative affect in humans.
That's an assumption that isn't always true. For example, they may feel excited about surprising their friend as they work and plan. There are many situation in which work can be enjoyed, most notably, when you are passionate about something. I am passionate about math. When I do math, I feel experience a positive affect from working on it, and a positive affect from finding a solution. No need for any sort of negative affect.

If the negative affect is minimal, then the positive affect is also minimal. 
That's simply false. In my example, by the time a eat dinner, my hunger is minimal to the point of being unnoticeable, but I still enjoy my dinner to a very noticeable extent.

However, the issue with the human condition is that we're designed to be motivated, not satisfied, so once our basic needs are met, we quickly begin to ask again 'what next?'
...and being able to live a happy life despite that is a sign of good mental health, not delusion. Working hard may ironically be one of the best ways in which one can constantly experience a positive affect with relatively low negative affect. This is because not only does the result of one's labors generate a positive affect, but so does the work itself. In this way, the fact that we are never satisfied is a blessing, as it is what allows us to generate more positive affects for ourselves.

In other words, humans have a psychology that is designed to produce negative affect at all times. 
Being someone who experiences the human psychology every day, I cannot say this is entirely true. For example, I am not experiences a negative affect right now. I enjoy discussing this stuff, and I am content as I type this.
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@Kaitlyn
By some strange coincidence, immediately after posting, I read the following in the novel The Awakening by Kate Chopin: 

And being devoid of ambition, and striving not toward accomplishment, she drew satisfaction from the work in itself.

I felt like that was worth commenting on. It would appear that Kate Chopin also understands that work itself can generate positive affect.
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@ebuc
people must recognize that animals, plants, and the ecosystems that sustain them have intrinsic value
I don't see why I should agree with this axiom.

I see a reason to disagree with this axiom if life is, overall, more negative affect than positive affect.
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@Math_Enthusiast
Organizing surprises takes planning and work, both of which generate negative affect in humans.
That's an assumption that isn't always true. For example, they may feel excited about surprising their friend as they work and plan. There are many situation in which work can be enjoyed, most notably, when you are passionate about something. I am passionate about math. When I do math, I feel experience a positive affect from working on it, and a positive affect from finding a solution. No need for any sort of negative affect.
Work is never the end-goal in itself, or else the result of work would be totally irrelevant. Who would work 10 hours on something and be totally unconcerned as to whether the work was complete?

We work to achieve a goal. 

We know work is a negative because people want to reach the end goal of work, not be stuck in a state of work.

You may find the completion of mathematics problems to be positive (which they are), but they are always proceeded by the negative feelings of not having them complete -- it's zero sum.

If the negative affect is minimal, then the positive affect is also minimal. 
That's simply false. In my example, by the time a eat dinner, my hunger is minimal to the point of being unnoticeable, but I still enjoy my dinner to a very noticeable extent.
Do you enjoy it more when you are hungry? Do you enjoy it more when you are full?

Clearly, starving people feel far better when eating than someone who is full who is eating.

Therefore, the positive affect is built out of the negative affect that proceeded it.


Also, your dinner still comes at the price of work to get/make it, so there is that negative affect involved, too.

However, the issue with the human condition is that we're designed to be motivated, not satisfied, so once our basic needs are met, we quickly begin to ask again 'what next?'
...and being able to live a happy life despite that is a sign of good mental health, not delusion. Working hard may ironically be one of the best ways in which one can constantly experience a positive affect with relatively low negative affect. This is because not only does the result of one's labors generate a positive affect, but so does the work itself. In this way, the fact that we are never satisfied is a blessing, as it is what allows us to generate more positive affects for ourselves.
If dissatisfaction were the ideal state, then no one would be trying to escape it.

And being devoid of ambition, and striving not toward accomplishment, she drew satisfaction from the work in itself.
I felt like that was worth commenting on. It would appear that Kate Chopin also understands that work itself can generate positive affect.
Yes, work can produce positive affect, but it's built out of negative affect. You need the negative affect to escape in order for work to become satisfying.

This is quite silly when we could simply blast people with dopamine hits that don't require the negative affect from dissatisfaction beforehand.
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@Kaitlyn
We know work is a negative because people want to reach the end goal of work, not be stuck in a state of work.
This is a non-sequitur. Your premise that people only do work to reach an end goal is true, but your conclusion is false. The anticipation of and active progress towards an end goal creates a positive affect, not a negative one.

You may find the completion of mathematics problems to be positive (which they are), but they are always proceeded by the negative feelings of not having them complete -- it's zero sum.
Using this example, yes, I want to solve the problem, but I enjoy the process of solving, just as I am happy once it is done. In fact, I am happier when I have a difficult problem to work on then when I don't.

Do you enjoy it more when you are hungry? Do you enjoy it more when you are full?

Clearly, starving people feel far better when eating than someone who is full who is eating.

Therefore, the positive affect is built out of the negative affect that proceeded it.
Everything here is true, but it does not follow that the positive affect cannot be any greater than the negative affect.

Also, your dinner still comes at the price of work to get/make it, so there is that negative affect involved, too.
While I acknowledge that many people are not satisfied with their job, many enjoy their work.

If dissatisfaction were the ideal state, then no one would be trying to escape it.
I never said that it was an ideal state, but trying to escape it is likely one of the fastest routes to a miserable life, whereas if you are able to find joy in striving towards the next goal, it is possible to live a happy life.

Yes, work can produce positive affect, but it's built out of negative affect. You need the negative affect to escape in order for work to become satisfying.
I'm not sure what you mean by the negative affect "escaping."

This is quite silly when we could simply blast people with dopamine hits that don't require the negative affect from dissatisfaction beforehand.
How practical would that be? Speaking from experience: When you regularly receive an excessive amount of dopamine, you will begin to feel demotivated when it comes to actual work. Soon enough, all of that work begins to make you miserable. You wind up with three options: Continue to be miserable, stop doing the work and let your life collapse around you, or give up the dopamine hits. I chose the third option, and today I am a very a happy person.

To summarize:

If you do not expect complete satisfaction in life, and you know what your passion is, you can find joy in striving to achieve your goals.  A happy life follows this simple pattern:

  • Set a goal that you are passionate about.
  • Find joy in working towards it.
  • Complete it, and experience a feeling of accomplishment.
  • Experience a brief period of satisfaction.
  • Repeat.
At no point in this process do negative affects outweigh positive affects.
Kaitlyn
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@Math_Enthusiast
We know work is a negative because people want to reach the end goal of work, not be stuck in a state of work.
This is a non-sequitur. Your premise that people only do work to reach an end goal is true, but your conclusion is false. The anticipation of and active progress towards an end goal creates a positive affect, not a negative one.
You may find the completion of mathematics problems to be positive (which they are), but they are always proceeded by the negative feelings of not having them complete -- it's zero sum.
Using this example, yes, I want to solve the problem, but I enjoy the process of solving, just as I am happy once it is done. In fact, I am happier when I have a difficult problem to work on then when I don't.
You're not seeing how it follows because you're starting at the conclusion.

Before you even begin work, you experience negative affect which then inspires you to work. Something, in your eyes, needs to be worked on, meaning that you're in a negative affect state to being with (before you've made any "progress"), and thus you work to get out of it. You wouldn't feel the need to work if you were okay with things not requiring work -- you're in a state of negative affect before you even begin the work.

Also, progress is not assumed with work *and* it's not a constant throughout the work, so anticipation of progress/good results isn't always fulfilled with the irl reality. Sometimes, your hard work and efforts go completely unrewarded, thus this would be instances of pure negative affect. Sometimes, you will be between "progress" and feel like you're not making progress, despite working, and thus you're in a state of negative affect.

Do you enjoy it more when you are hungry? Do you enjoy it more when you are full?

Clearly, starving people feel far better when eating than someone who is full who is eating.

Therefore, the positive affect is built out of the negative affect that proceeded it.
Everything here is true, but it does not follow that the positive affect cannot be any greater than the negative affect.
I agree that positive affect can outweigh the negative affect, but current human biological life, overall, has the negatives outweighing the positives. 

With human biology and life as it is, for all circumstances, there is negative affect that proceeds positive affect. Even at an equal value of 1 negative affect unit to 1 positive affect, this would be zero sum. However, people give more negative value to negative affect than they do positive value to positive affect (e.g. loss aversion), so it doesn't even end up being 1 to 1 zero sum because negative affect has more impact.

Also, your dinner still comes at the price of work to get/make it, so there is that negative affect involved, too.
While I acknowledge that many people are not satisfied with their job, many enjoy their work.
People don't ever "enjoy" their work. People may enjoy the progress they make during work and the completion of work itself.

Nobody works for the sake of work. People would be miserable if they worked for a long time and screwed everything up.

If dissatisfaction were the ideal state, then no one would be trying to escape it.
I never said that it was an ideal state, but trying to escape it is likely one of the fastest routes to a miserable life, whereas if you are able to find joy in striving towards the next goal, it is possible to live a happy life.
All humans try to escape dissatisfaction, so when you say that that's one of the fastest routes to a miserable life, you're actually making the case for antinatalism by inadvertently arguing that normal human behavior is one of the fastest routes to a miserable life.

There is no "joy" in striving to the next goal, either. There is joy in progress towards and completion of goals, but not in having a goal unfulfilled (i.e. "striving"). Existing in a state of being that has goals unfulfilled (i.e. "striving") produces negative affect.

Yes, work can produce positive affect, but it's built out of negative affect. You need the negative affect to escape in order for work to become satisfying.
I'm not sure what you mean by the negative affect "escaping."
Humans want to escape from negative affect. Being in a state of having unfulfilled goals produces negative affect. Therefore, humans attempt to escape this negative affect by completing those goals.

Furthermore, work isn't satisfying if you never had goals, and the negative affect that comes with that, to begin with.

This is quite silly when we could simply blast people with dopamine hits that don't require the negative affect from dissatisfaction beforehand.
How practical would that be? Speaking from experience: When you regularly receive an excessive amount of dopamine, you will begin to feel demotivated when it comes to actual work. Soon enough, all of that work begins to make you miserable. You wind up with three options: Continue to be miserable, stop doing the work and let your life collapse around you, or give up the dopamine hits. I chose the third option, and today I am a very a happy person.
Not practical at all, but it's a possible solution to a problem that most people realize doesn't exist.

If work is so bad that people would prefer to be put on dopamine blast after dopamine blast, then what does that say about work? I already know that people don't want to do work, but you're just confirming it more here.

Your whole argument is currently a massive cope that glorifies work whilst ignoring all its major pitfalls. If humans didn't exist in the first place, we wouldn't have to cope with the hardships of reality with dumb things like "work" just so we can make life not as bad.

9 days later

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Here are some miscellaneous thoughts about antinatalism that I don't think currently deserve a thread on their own:

  • Benatarian asymmetry can be rejected because the absence of pleasure is bad, not 'not bad'. It's bad that a potential person doesn't exist to experience pleasure. It's true that we don't look at empty space and say, 'gee, I wish there was a human experiencing pleasure there'. However, it also true that potential parents can think of a potential child and realize that not having that child come into existence to experience pleasure is bad. It's bad when a person doesn't get to experience pleasure when someone could.
  • The pain of childbirth experienced by the mother should also be factored into the morality of childbirth (barely anyone seems to factor this in -- thought it was worth a mention)
  • The 'optimism bias' argument antinatalists like to run is actually a benefit for pronatalism. If people are delusional about how good their life is (i.e. optimistically biased), and that delusional doesn't have any real world impacts (when would you be punished for liking your life too much?), then it's actually good that people are delusional about how good their lives are because they feel better than they would otherwise.
  • Life could be unimaginably good in the future through transhumanism/virtual reality/posthumanism/augmented reality etc. It's possible that technology like wireheads or Robert Nozick's experience machine make life so enjoyable, whilst reducing negative affect by circumventing natural human biology, that life indisputably becomes worth living for everyone. The moral issue is that in the meantime, if antinatalism is correct, we're sacrificing the lives of current humans in order to reach this unimaginable good -- that's morally problematic
  • People rarely think about their children as old adults getting ravaged by cancer and watching all their friends die. Old age is pretty brutal and that needs to be factored in

48 days later

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@Kaitlyn
I was thinking about the last time I consented to your position on antinatalism. I think it's important to recognize everything we learn from the world is not uncovering something new but telling us something that was already there. Understanding is an articulation of an abstract concept that was already present and surrounding us. We have a current moral structure and we do not know much about where morals come from. Many people believe it's from religion and other people believe in moral relativism. The last thing I agreed to was given a moral structure where it is considered morally wrong to torture an innocent individual for the procreation or defense of oneself or many than antinatalism would be theoretically correct. Perhaps I'm reading the situation the wrong way, there are two sides to understanding the discovery that the world will inevitably be more negative than positive for individuals of the future. The obvious one is where we recognize current morals as judging our actions in the future and stating antinatalism is theoretically correct as a result of the inevitable net negative for individuals in the future. The alternative is recognizing that our actions and the structure of society is how we judge our morals. Perhaps uncovering and recognizing that the inevitable net negative for individuals in the future is a necessary cost for humanity to continue that we should not judge humanity by morals but morality by humanity. In this case, morality would change to conform with society and recognize that the net negative lives of individuals from the future is considered morally acceptable in order to maintain a society. I do not claim one way or another, but I wanted to present this new thought I had and here your perspective. Why should morality judge actions such as humanities continuation if morality is based upon what is conventionally accepted and not acceptable. In this perspective, being morality is the judge of what is naturally considered right and wrong if many individuals consider that civilizations continuation is good than morality would not be able to judge the population as it is the metric used as the majority populations indicator.