Philosophical Vegan Forum

brimstoneSalad wrote:

EquALLity wrote: Hmmm... I think that's different, though.

When it comes to physical illness, we have evidenced-based percentages on probability that can be used to justify euthanasia.

When it comes to mental illness, that stuff is much more flexible.

Psychology is a much softer science, sure, but at a certain point you have to trust the person who is experiencing the depression that he or she is in a state that he or she doesn't want to live in. We have to respect that interest, after we've taken the best measures we can to fix it.

What are you basing this off of?

EquALLity wrote: What are you basing this off of?

I don't know what you're asking.

That psychology is a softer science?

Or that, if we don't have information to tell us otherwise, we have to trust people when they tell us what their interests are?

brimstoneSalad wrote:

EquALLity wrote: What are you basing this off of?

I don't know what you're asking.

That psychology is a softer science?

Or that, if we don't have information to tell us otherwise, we have to trust people when they tell us what their interests are?

Why we should trust people with clouded judgements whether or not their interests are dying, when we have many cases of people who previously said they had those interests changing their minds.

EquALLity wrote: Why we should trust people with clouded judgements whether or not their interests are dying, when we have many cases of people who previously said they had those interests changing their minds.

The antinatalists claim that people who say they want to live have clouded judgment. The point is evidence.

If we know administering medication X clears said clouded judgement for people with depression, then we administer that medication -- if they still want to die, we don't really have any basis to tell them otherwise.

brimstoneSalad wrote:

EquALLity wrote: Why we should trust people with clouded judgements whether or not their interests are dying, when we have many cases of people who previously said they had those interests changing their minds.

The antinatalists claim that people who say they want to live have clouded judgment. The point is evidence.

If we know administering medication X clears said clouded judgement for people with depression, then we administer that medication -- if they still want to die, we don't really have any basis to tell them otherwise.

But that isn't the situation with depression. Sometimes medication X works, while sometimes medication Y works, and sometimes medication Z works.

Different solutions work for different people. There isn't really a clear cut solution like there is with these terminal illnesses.

EquALLity wrote: But that isn't the situation with depression. Sometimes medication X works, while sometimes medication Y works, and sometimes medication Z works.

That's why I said they should need to be cleared by multiple therapists, and have tried all of the established treatment AND changed lifestyle (which is a huge component too). Try X, Y, Z, and A, B C too and figure out what it is in their lives that's troubling them and address that, and if that still doesn't work for some of them -- they've reached the end of evidence based treatment -- there's no reason to expect them to try all of the woo or wait ten years for a miracle.

EquALLity wrote:Different solutions work for different people. There isn't really a clear cut solution like there is with these terminal illnesses.

There may be some people for whom none of the available solutions work. Maybe there aren't, but we have to be open to the possibility.

This is a response to: https://theveganatheist.com/forum/viewt ... =30#p20899:

The bottom line is that we should not be advocating antinatalism or accepting people advocating antinatalism because it is in no way clear that it is the right position and doing so harms vegan advocacy.

I created this thread for a discussion, and haven't been advocating antinatalism, only argued why I think it is more reasonable.

If you want to make a philosophical argument completely divorced from advocacy (and conceding that it's not something we should ever promote right now even if it were true), that's fine: we can have that discussion. But promoting antinatalism, or pressuring/shaming people not to have children, is unacceptable. And no, I will not tolerate that behavior any more than I'll tolerate open racism.

it is a faith based position. As such, you should not be advocating it.

I don't agree that I have been advocating anything.

believe I was responding appropriately to the vile position you were advocating.
I would probably be inclined respond in kind to a white supremacist who advocated wiping out all inferior races too. You're worse than a white supremacist in my eyes, though, since you don't just advocate wiping out some people -- you want to destroy all of us, and possibly all life, and see a completely non-sentient world. This is a revolting philosophy, and it is appropriate to be intolerant of such intolerance of life itself as you have.

The context is that the humans would always do more harm than good for an eternity. Then it's reasonable to see it as justice that the circle of life doesn't continue. Like I said, I hadn't thought about it, since it's irrelevant, so even if you think I'm completely wrong, there is no need to get up in arms about it.

The forum rules indicate answering arguments, not being nice.

Okay, but why then do you say:

You will be expected to respond in kind and address my arguments and questions.

This is a response to https://theveganatheist.com/forum/viewt ... =30#p20907:

It is perhaps a bad idea to make an argument out of frustration rather than reasoned contemplation.

That "bump post/frustration post" didn't contain any arguments.

The selfishness is irrelevant to consequence, but does speak to potential biases in perception and rationalization.

The end goal of the behavior and the logical conclusions of the premise are very relevant. We have to look not just at immediate consequences, but long term as well.

We also have to consider the consequences of the mentality of pessimism inherently linked to antinatalism.

Sure, that discussion can be had as well even if it's irrelevant to the conclusions. There are biases in both camps, and we have to consider the consequences of the mentality of optimism inherently linked to pronatalism as well. Assuming that having a child is good not rational.

The very basic idea is that it comes down to whether we should gamble or not. I think not gambling with the lives of others is the responsible thing to do.

Bullshit, you gamble every single day, with your life and the lives of others. We should and must gamble when the odds are in our favor. No behavior has absolutely certain outcome.

I'm against not respecting the wills of others. If it's hard to do, that's another matter. Sometimes is may be necessary to do bad in order to live. Like being vegan, I don't want animals to die for my existence, but they do.

Every time you get behind the wheel of a car you are gambling; you're betting on the odds of its positive utility being greater than the risk to you and others.

The more ethical thing to do is to avoid doing it though even if the consequences are not that big. It's just not easy in todays society. Also, almost everyone getting behind a wheel is aware of the risks. It's basically playing with the lives of animals and passengers that are unaware of the risks.

Every time you post on the internet about how life is suffering and it would be better not to exist you're gambling too: you're betting on the odds of somebody not reading that and deciding to commit a mass murder/suicide based on the logical conclusions of that premise (or maybe you want them to do that). You're somehow betting this all does more good than harm.

The logical conclusion is not to commit mass murder/suicide by being against gambling with the lives of others. The only way I can see a person thinking that is if they get upset by everyone gambling with the lives of others, and want to stop it. But then you can say that vegans will become mass murderers when you make the arguments that animals are being killed by all the non-vegans for no good reason.

Every action you take is a gamble, if you were really against gambling, you'd be unable to act in this world.

Just don't take risks with the lives of others if you can..

Christians get offended by the suggestion that religion is silly too, and don't find the atheistic arguments compelling: this is due to their personal bias.
Likewise, you are delusional, and the victim of a powerful pessimistic bias. It is your faith that prevents you from seeing reason.

Most of the arguments from pronatalists I've heard are vague and not convincing at all.

There are two basic types of antinatalists/philosophical pessimists:

1. The type who are deontologically libertarian (which is in itself irrational), and because of that do not want to follow the philosophy to its logical conclusion of destroying the world.

2. The kind who are consequentialists, and logically consistent, and want to destroy the world -- who are obviously evil to any sensible person. We're talking cartoon villain level here.

The former is unstable, and will either decay into the latter and support the destruction of all sentient life, or abandon the pessimistic position.

I have a feeling you're trying to advocate the first type, and you think I'm straw manning you by arguing against the second. This is where you're an idiot, because you fail to understand the logical contradictions in maintaining a deontological libertarian position (like David Benatar).

I don't agree with the position that harm we do is always greater than the good. Not sure I would go into either camp here. All I cared about in this thread is whether it is ethical for vegans to have kids or not in general. There may always be contexts in which case it is, and others it isn't, but should it be encouraged/not encouraged? That's what I've been interested in. The talk about destruction of earth or whatever are only traps you set up so you can talk about how evil antinatalism is and so on. Not interested.

No one had addressed the main points in this thread either, so it's not like I am dissing anyone on this forum.

What points?
You can't just claim that. Tell me what I have not addressed. I'm ready and willing to shred any argument you have.

Your rebuttal/attack came afterwards. You've addressed them.

This, right here. You legitimately think it would be good for people to kill themselves. You think I should kill myself. You think EquALLity should kill herself. You think everybody on this forum should really just kill themselves for the greater good, right?

And if you had the opportunity to poison us all and kill us painlessly, would you take it?

Stuff like this tells me this philosophy is making you an evil person.

It depends on the context. You yourself have previously held the position that in a life boat situation, it is good to kill a fat man so that more humans can live. In this situation, wouldn't you agree that if that fat man kills himself for the greater good, that it's a good thing. If we do more harm to others, and us killing ourselves leads to good consequences, are you against that? Sidenote, I don't find it ethical to kill the man, but we've already had that discussion.

Oh, so, just because it wouldn't be "inspiring" for people to witness us killing ourselves.

How about if you can just kill everybody?
Do you lust after the giant red button of the O.O.S. crowd?

Those who do not exist are not harmed by still not existing.

That would be the efilist position I believe. Still, this is not something I ever argued, nor is it the logical conclusion from my arguments.

The example of Eselstyn family seems to be to be a unique case, because there is fame, fortune and respect involved, which people are naturally attracted to.

The only reliable case studies we have are of famous families; other cases are hard to confirm. Given a lack of statistics, it's reasonable to look to case studies. We can't draw strong conclusions from them, but there's no reason recidivism should be high.

I don't understand. If we can't draw conclusions from them, wouldn't that mean that we can't draw conclusions from them? I think it's safe to start at at least 75%, and given that children usually follow their parents footstep, it needs to go down lower than that. That far I can agree with. How much is unknown to me.

If you can't do math, stop putting so much faith in your "calculations".
You're like a numerologist. You think this stuff is rational, but it's just you pushing numbers around. It's very easy to build a chaotic function, and that makes this all just a big ad hoc hypothesis that you can easily tweak in either direction with slight changes in the variables: all your equations do is make it look fancy and convincing to people who are ignorant of mathematics and statistics.

I can do math. And the goal was not to provide a definite answer, but a way to show that you can actually find examples where the harm > good. At the very least, it would be a starting point.
Also I didn't put all my faith in only this example formula. In this thread, I have stated that I am fully aware that there are many factors involved, and I wanted help in figuring out which factors are relevant.

Wouldn't it be better if we can go from a formula like this:

Good vs bad of having children (more is good) = (vague plus) + (vague minus) + (vague plus alot) + (vague minus less) +...+ (vague plus or minus)

to maybe this:

Good vs bad of having children (more is good) = (vague plus) - 102.55 + (vague plus a lot) + 188.355342 + ... (vague plus or minus)

Don't pay attention to the numbers above (this post), they are just random to make a point.

You made much more embarrassing errors in your assumptions:

1. Those who go back to eating meat after being veg frequently eat less meat, both for ethical considerations and because they are accustomed to and familiar with more options. This is not an either-or issue, but a spectrum.
2. Likewise, vegans will usually only convince a few people to go vegan, but may influence dozens or hundreds of people to reduce meat consumption. Are you aware that the vast majority of consumers buying vegan products in stores actually are not vegan themselves?
3. Non-vegans also have a positive effect on others, given that they are flexitarian-reducitarian. This is to be expected of a lot of failed vegans, who frequently still support animal rights or welfare, and often encourage people to eat less meat, and still see veganism as "a good thing to do".
4. The principle of critical mass: Feedback is non-linear. The more socially normal and accessible veganism is, the easier it becomes to convince people to reduce or eliminate animal products. I would take an extra billion people in the world today if only a quarter of them were vegan.

I only made a mistake if the goal was to actually include those variables. Not saying they are not relevant, they are, it just wasn't my point. Here are my thoughts though on these few points:

1. I think it's reasonable to expect that the longer the time period, the more they would lean towards veganism.
2. Good point.
3. Yes, but about 58% quit very early, so they wouldn't probably don't cut down their consumption of animal products much, nor influence others to do so.
4. If the vegan population go from about 2% to 4.8%, this would mean more influence as you say, (especially in parts of the world where the percentage is the highest). Hence recidivism rate is important. We can't just pop out kids expecting them to hold our political views or agree with our ethics. Global warming is urgent, so that's a problem as well. Long term goals are good enough, but not with limited time.

Ellen Degeneres who's not a vegan, have done more to advance the cause of animal rights than most vegans I know.

http://www.foodandwine.com/blogs/moby-v ... evangelism

Okay, so your point is that non-vegans do influence others to reduce their animal product consumption. Does this mean it's therefore okay to have a child that becomes a meat eater in your view? Does the child have a reduced animal product consumption compared to every other carnist and influence others with political ideas as well? They don't all become famous and influential like Ellen.

Skimming your "math", you need to explain more clearly what you think you're doing if you want people to follow your "logic" here.

(I think I removed an explanation when I edited the post.)
What's not math about it? It was to see how despite high recidivism rate among the population, how many vegans each child would produce. With 75% recidivism rate within the population, the recidivism rate for the vegan child must be less than 50.5% to do good. This would be good news for you, because that's not all factors included.

You completely ignore the actual number of carnists today, and their contributions.

If there are a billion carnists in the world, and I'm the only vegan, if I have a hundred children and only two of them end up vegan, once I'm gone I will have still almost doubled the ratio of vegans to carnists in the world.
This is closer to the situation we have today. Having 98 carnist kids does almost nothing to influence the number of carnists, but having two vegan kids doubles the vegan influence on the world.

Sound extremely vague to me. Why does 2 vegan kids double the vegan influence on the world (relative to the 2 parents I assume)? So, those 98 carnists will do neutral harm, but those two vegans will do the same times the good that the parents do? Why? This is going in the extreme direction of optimism, and it is faith based.

The ratio is very important to social change, because it's what contributes the most in terms of ideological influence.
This is why I say I would gladly add a billion people to the world today if only 25% of them were vegan.
It would probably be a good choice if only 10% of them were vegan too.

Do you have any idea what kind of market pressure that would create? How much influence on peers in favor of social normalcy that would result in? How much political pressure that would mean?

At some point as the percentage lowered, this might become a bad choice, but it's not clear where (perhaps if it were under 1%).

Ten percent would also increase the percentage of vegans on earth, which would be good. I haven't argued against that. The recidivism rate of vegan children is an important factor. Generally, the more people that are vegan, the safer it is to have kids (if you care about not doing more harm than good). The percentage matters less on a global scale, and more on a local scale I'm assuming, since people affect each other locally with their food choices, not globally.

You are apparently laboring under the delusion that the only positive influence we can have on the world is by creating vegans in one-on-one direct evangelism with on the spot conversions. That's not how influence works.

That's not what I've been saying. I just don't know how much weight we should put on these influences from vegan/non-vegans alike.

All of your attempts at mathematical reasoning are useless, because all you have done is represent the worst case scenario in ignorance of how real change and social movements manifest.

I didn't create this thread to debate anything. You are turning a question into a debate and are trying to "win". I am not playing your game.

Usually children follow their parents footstep, so it is reasonable to lower the 75% recidivism rate (which could be higher) and maybe have at least 50%?

Much higher than that, if you consider the fact that even the "failures" will positively regard animal rights and welfare, and use fewer animal products than the typical consumer.

You mean lower? By recidivism for the public I mean trying vegan, then going back to being non-vegan. By recidivism for vegan children, I mean an abandonment of a vegan diet. You say much higher, what is the rate? 33% 25%? 10%?

The goal is less meat eaters.

Is it really? I thought it was less animal suffering.
If you just want fewer meat eaters, you could become a mass murder and achieve that goal pretty easily.

Less animal suffering is more accurate and is what I meant. Good for you, more "win".

So, now you do trust probability theory, and accept "gambling" if the odds are in your favor.

I can accept probability theory and see that long term goals will lead to good results in the end. That doesn't mean it's necessarily okay to gamble with someones elses life since there is an issue with consent - that's subjective though.

What is your "solution" that you think has so little risk?
How arrogant are you, exactly, that you think you have the one and only answer to everything?

For vegans not to have kids and use the extra time and energy on activism instead would be optimal, but maybe it's not realistic to expect that.

Do you want to wipe out all life on Earth? What?
You think vegans not breeding is going to inspire everybody to realize voluntary human extinction?

No.

You think vegans not breeding is going to cause the population to level off so it never reaches a critical level?

I have no idea what your point is.

None of this is relevant to the topic at hand, because dysgenic antinatalism is not a solution to population growth. All you'll do is make the population stupider and less responsible by advocating these policies, and place a selective pressure for stronger breeding instincts.

I don't know anything about that.

Oh, so for a person who is only willing to eat factory farmed meat or free ranged meat, that person would be ethical if he or she chose the better option?

It's relatively more ethical.

You're gambling on the good that you can do in a single lifetime without being distracted being greater than the good your lineage will do over generations. That's pretty arrogant.
If you're on the verge of developing a clean fusion technology and you just need a little more time to perfect it, this may be valid, but for most people it will not be.

Only one lifetime matters, your lifetime. What good the children will do can be compared to what good the "converts "you convinced will do when you did activism instead of spending time raising the children. Well, not exactly, because the converts are older and so on, but you get the idea I hope.

On adoption:
I don't have any strong opinions on this topic. It's one alternative at least if you want to have kids like many do.

This is a response to https://theveganatheist.com/forum/viewt ... =30#p20930:

1. Done.
2. Done.
3. Done.

4. You have to clarify.
5. How is that remotely shaming anyone?
6. No one was responding. The last bump was a last attempt to try and get a different perspective. After that, I responded to posts.


Other points you responded to will come later.

Anon0045 wrote: I created this thread for a discussion, and haven't been advocating antinatalism, only argued why I think it is more reasonable.

This is advocating, dumbass.

http://www.dictionary.com/browse/advocating

verb (used with object), advocated, advocating.
1.
to speak or write in favor of; support or urge by argument; recommend publicly:
He advocated higher salaries for teachers.
noun
2.
a person who speaks or writes in support or defense of a person, cause, etc. (usually followed by of):
an advocate of peace.

If you don't actually agree with the position, you could be playing devil's advocate, but in such a case you should be clear about that.
Generally speaking, decent human beings won't present such assertive claims for such harmful positions that they don't agree with.

Out of moral responsibility, there are many positions I will not publicly play devil's advocate for.

Anon0045 wrote: I don't agree that I have been advocating anything.

Then you are delusional or stupid. This thread is transparently your advocacy and defense of the concept of antinatalism.

If you don't believe it, and you understand that it's a harmful thing to advocate, then you should just shut up rather than making bad arguments for it.
Let somebody who actually believes it and is familiar with the arguments (which you are not) come here and do that.


If you wish to find an actual argument, and honestly ask us how to debunk that argument, that's fine. You are clearly advocating for the position, and as you said yourself, you find the (weak) arguments you're presenting convincing.

Anon0045 wrote: The context is that the humans would always do more harm than good for an eternity. Then it's reasonable to see it as justice that the circle of life doesn't continue.

There's no reason to believe that's true today, much less for eternity. This is a faith-based assumption on your part if you make that assumption.

Anon0045 wrote: Like I said, I hadn't thought about it, since it's irrelevant, so even if you think I'm completely wrong, there is no need to get up in arms about it.

There's every reason to criticize somebody who says something harmful to the vegan movement on the grounds of personal pessimistic faith.
You choose to believe this, and you choose to advocate these things.

Anon0045 wrote:

The forum rules indicate answering arguments, not being nice.

Okay, but why then do you say:

You will be expected to respond in kind and address my arguments and questions.

You don't know what "in kind" means. This is your problem.

Anon0045 wrote:That "bump post/frustration post" didn't contain any arguments.

It contained a number of claims.

Anon0045 wrote: Sure, that discussion can be had as well even if it's irrelevant to the conclusions.

It's relevant to your unethical behavior in advocating and defending this faith based "philosophical" pessimism.

Anon0045 wrote: There are biases in both camps, and we have to consider the consequences of the mentality of optimism inherently linked to pronatalism as well.

Like social normalcy and better acceptance of veganism. Like depressed people being told they are ill and encouraged to seek help and get medicated instead of told they are right and the world is terrible and they would be rational and even good to kill themselves.

Like vegans having more children, and the consequences of that: these are consequences I want.

Anon0045 wrote: Assuming that having a child is good not rational.

We assume it's morally neutral as the default, not bad or good. With evidence, we can conclude that in certain situations it may be bad or good: like being in poverty and having drug problems it likely being very bad, or being well off and being vegan it likely being very good.

Anon0045 wrote: I think not gambling with the lives of others is the responsible thing to do.

Then stop doing it. You gamble every day. You clearly believe it's appropriate to do for the greater good, although you deny this.

Anon0045 wrote: I'm against not respecting the wills of others. If it's hard to do, that's another matter. Sometimes is may be necessary to do bad in order to live. Like being vegan, I don't want animals to die for my existence, but they do.

How is this an excuse? Why do you have to live? You have the option to die, then you stop gambling.

I'm against not respecting the wills of others. If it's hard to do, that's another matter. Sometimes is may be necessary to do bad in order to eat meat. Like eating meat, I don't want animals to die for my meat, but they do.

Is this an excuse? Then how is yours an excuse?

Anon0045 wrote: The logical conclusion is not to commit mass murder/suicide by being against gambling with the lives of others.

Yes it is, and you'd realize that if you could logic. You're just biased and making excuses for yourself. You can kill yourself any time now and stop gambling: why don't you?
If it's because you don't want to, and you consider that an excuse, then that's an excuse for anybody to do anything.
If it's because you know you can do more good than harm in life, then that is an excuse: and it's also a reason to have kids if you think there's a better chance than not that they can do the same.

Anon0045 wrote: The only way I can see a person thinking that is if they get upset by everyone gambling with the lives of others, and want to stop it. But then you can say that vegans will become mass murderers when you make the arguments that animals are being killed by all the non-vegans for no good reason.

Then you're just not very good at thinking.
There is clear evidence that the efilists and antinatalists (the most rational ones, who understand logic) want to destroy the world and/or humanity.
There is no evidence of non-misanthropic vegans wanting to do this; to the contrary, we tend to be anti-war and anti-violence, because the logical conclusion (if you don't see humanity as inherently bad) is not to destroy it, but to improve it -- and even if we get frustrated and give up on improving it, it's still not to destroy it.

Anon0045 wrote: Just don't take risks with the lives of others if you can..

You can. Kill yourself if you believe that. It's easy. People do it every day for fun and profit.
I'd rather you didn't, but maybe it is better if you do if you really believe and continue to advocate this philosophical pessimism: the harm you are doing to veganism may be greater than any of the good you'll do in life.
If all of the mysanthropic vegans who want to destroy the world rather than fix it killed themselves today, the movement would be much better off and in a stronger position to actually make the world a better place without that anchor.

Anon0045 wrote: Most of the arguments from pronatalists I've heard are vague and not convincing at all.

Most of the arguments are just against antinatalists. Just arguing against antinatalism doesn't make somebody a pronatalist.

You're the one making the claim, and you're the one with the burden of proof here to show that in terms of probability humanity is on balance evil, and how the ultimate consequence of having children is overwhelmingly bad in the long run.
Once you've done that, you have to have a plan of action that's superior to argue for.

Anon0045 wrote: I don't agree with the position that harm we do is always greater than the good.

That's sensible, but your "don't gamble" reasoning is not. It's not based on anything in rational ethics; it's a dogmatic deontological claim.

Anon0045 wrote: Not sure I would go into either camp here.

This is because you're mixed up, inconsistent, and don't really understand what you believe in terms of ethics. You're courting irrational deontological beliefs AND trying to have a sense of consequence at the same time. It doesn't work.

You need to read this thread (maybe again) and choose a side already:

https://theveganatheist.com/forum/viewt ... ?f=7&t=785

You're either a deontologist or a consequentialist. Either irrational or rational. Taking half measures from each, of course you're going to be confused.

Anon0045 wrote: All I cared about in this thread is whether it is ethical for vegans to have kids or not in general.

You said you didn't think it was vegan to do so. That was a strong claim.

If you had only asked without making any claims, you might have gotten a better response, since you wouldn't be shaming vegans with kids for doing something non-vegan.

Anon0045 wrote: There may always be contexts in which case it is, and others it isn't,

See, this makes it sound like you are a sane person who cares about consequences, and is not brainwashed by some deontological ideology about "not gambling".

Anon0045 wrote: but should it be encouraged/not encouraged? That's what I've been interested in. The talk about destruction of earth or whatever are only traps you set up so you can talk about how evil antinatalism is and so on. Not interested.

If you are not interested in answering relevant questions, then you will be banned.
Nobody is setting any "traps" here, you sound like Sarah Palin complaining about "gotcha questions". If you're too dumb to answer these challenges, then you are not prepared to engage in this discussion.

Whether it should be encouraged or discouraged depends on the consequences, and the ultimate consequences people are after (and the consequences of the philosophy of encouraging/discouraging people on certain bases) are relevant.

So, contrary to your claims, it seems like we need to explore this a lot more, because your failure to understand the importance of this point is probably key to your misunderstanding of the topic as a whole.

Let's examine a few methods by which we might discourage people from having children by argument:

1. You shouldn't have children because the world is fucked and they will have a terrible life and die.
Consequence: No need to try to save the world, it's fucked anyway, do whatever you want as long as you don't have kids.

2. You shouldn't have children because humanity is evil and will do harm even as vegans.
Consequence: (for any rational consequentialist following form this premise -- this IS the logical conclusion) We should destroy humanity.
Consequence: Maybe humanity gets destroyed, but probably not: more likely people will just be put off veganism.

3. You shouldn't have children because that's hard and you should just enjoy your life.
Consequence: Clearly you also shouldn't bother going vegan because that's hard and you should just enjoy your life.

What, exactly, is the argument you want to appeal to people with?

Anon0045 wrote:If we do more harm to others, and us killing ourselves leads to good consequences, are you against that? Sidenote, I don't find it ethical to kill the man, but we've already had that discussion.

That is the logical conclusion. It's the conclusion sensible people will draw (who aren't deluded by deontological dogma).
The reason why we should not do that is that there's no evidence that it does more harm, and overwhelming evidence that we can do more good.

See point #2 above, to understand why it's harmful to argue that.

Anon0045 wrote:That would be the efilist position I believe. Still, this is not something I ever argued, nor is it the logical conclusion from my arguments.

You may only want to destroy all human beings, and think the "wild" is good. This isn't really a much more endearing perspective.

You're saying "1+1", and how dare somebody draw the only logical conclusion of "2" from your claims!
Your only defense here is that you reject logic and rational consequentialism. That's a weak defense, particularly since you should well know other people do not reject reason. Your defense is ultimately ignorance: in misunderstanding logic and ethics so thoroughly, you can't fathom how people would draw that conclusion.

Read their site:
onlyonesolutionsite.org/homepage.html

At least be familiar with their arguments before you defend their core premises in ignorance.

Anon0045 wrote:I don't understand. If we can't draw conclusions from them, wouldn't that mean that we can't draw conclusions from them?

I said we can't draw strong conclusions. We can use anecdotes, for lack of other evidence, to inform probability; it's just of limited reliability.

Anon0045 wrote: Wouldn't it be better if we can go from a formula like this:
[...]Don't pay attention to the numbers above (this post), they are just random to make a point.

That requires information we do not have.
I argued from the information we have.

Anon0045 wrote:1. I think it's reasonable to expect that the longer the time period, the more they would lean towards veganism.

No, it isn't. Even people who have been vegan for a short period were introduced to the foods.
Look at Chelsea Lifts, and her single day vegan food challenge. There are many cases of this. The vast majority of influence seems to occur very quickly. There may or may not be significant increases after that; this would require study.
This is one of the reasons why meatless Monday is so amazing.

Anon0045 wrote:3. Yes, but about 58% quit very early, so they wouldn't probably don't cut down their consumption of animal products much, nor influence others to do so.

Again, no reason to assume this.

Anon0045 wrote:4. If the vegan population go from about 2% to 4.8%, this would mean more influence as you say, (especially in parts of the world where the percentage is the highest). Hence recidivism rate is important. We can't just pop out kids expecting them to hold our political views or agree with our ethics.

They don't have to all ultimately agree with us; just some of them do.

Assume there are 7.5 million vegans in the U.S. out of 318.9 million. That's 2.35%
If all of those 7.5 million magically had 16 children raised with vegan values
By the time they're teens and make the choice for themselves ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Projectio ... ns_by_2030 )
There will be 361.7 million people in the U.S. plus 120 million from the vegan population boom = 410.7 million.
If only 25% of them stay vegan, that will still be another 30 million vegans.
Assuming even that all of their parents have died and nobody else has gone vegan, 30 million vegans in a 410.7 million population is 7.3% of the population.

The more children vegans have, even with a 75% recidivism rate, the better.

Anon0045 wrote:Global warming is urgent, so that's a problem as well. Long term goals are good enough, but not with limited time.

In the short term, the chances of them being vegan are 100%.
Not until they are teenagers is there any significant chance of quitting.
They'll also be able to influence others throughout childhood.

Anon0045 wrote:Okay, so your point is that non-vegans do influence others to reduce their animal product consumption. Does this mean it's therefore okay to have a child that becomes a meat eater in your view?

Yes, for the parent. The parent only has to do his or her best. The child is doing wrong by falling short of the values he or she was raised with, but just doing something wrong does not mean the net effect on the world is negative.

Anon0045 wrote:Does the child have a reduced animal product consumption compared to every other carnist and influence others with political ideas as well? They don't all become famous and influential like Ellen.

They likely do, and they don't have to become famous to influence friends and others to reduce meat consumption.
Effortless things like voting and contributing occasionally to animals charities are expected, because these are typical behaviors.

Anon0045 wrote:(I think I removed an explanation when I edited the post.)
What's not math about it?

Don't do that. It's only comprehensible and meaningful if you can explain what you were doing.

Anon0045 wrote:Sound extremely vague to me. Why does 2 vegan kids double the vegan influence on the world (relative to the 2 parents I assume)?

Relative to one vegan parent. I explained with another example above. It doubles the influence by changing from one vegan to two. The percentage of vegans roughly doubles. This is very easy to do with small movements, which is why small religions (like scientology) can have immense growth rates.

Anon0045 wrote:So, those 98 carnists will do neutral harm, but those two vegans will do the same times the good that the parents do? Why? This is going in the extreme direction of optimism, and it is faith based.

You missed my point; I was talking about social influence, and giving you a simple example because I thought you'd understand it more clearly.
See the example above using actual numbers and a model of having 16 children.

Anon0045 wrote:The percentage matters less on a global scale, and more on a local scale I'm assuming, since people affect each other locally with their food choices, not globally.

Yes, which is why I would suggest raising vegan children in a city where you can connect with other vegan parents, so they can have vegan friends while growing up and not be alone.

Anon0045 wrote: That's not what I've been saying. I just don't know how much weight we should put on these influences from vegan/non-vegans alike.

It's fine not to know the exact weight, but then don't make negative claims about having children, or argue against "gambling" when in fact we do know the general state of the influence and can see the odds are in favor for good outcomes.

Anon0045 wrote: I didn't create this thread to debate anything. You are turning a question into a debate and are trying to "win". I am not playing your game.

You made several claims, and provoked debate. If you had not made claims, then this would be a different matter.
You're the one who started this.
If you don't respond to argument as required in the rules, you'll be banned. You don't have to "play", you can leave if you don't like having your claims challenged.

Anon0045 wrote: You mean lower? By recidivism for the public I mean trying vegan, then going back to being non-vegan. By recidivism for vegan children, I mean an abandonment of a vegan diet. You say much higher, what is the rate? 33% 25%? 10%?

It might be better to speak of retention for children, since it's not really recidivistic, and that might be less confusing.
We should expect retention to be at least 25%, yes, and probably higher than that.
We need better data, but even if it is only 25%, that's not an absolute value because it ignores partial retention. And even if it were absolute, it would still probably be a net good because of increasing the very low numbers of vegans to have more social influence, and the influence vegans have in their lives.

Anon0045 wrote: I can accept probability theory and see that long term goals will lead to good results in the end. That doesn't mean it's necessarily okay to gamble with someones elses life since there is an issue with consent - that's subjective though.

It's not subjective, it's deontology, and it's irrational.

Anon0045 wrote: For vegans not to have kids and use the extra time and energy on activism instead would be optimal, but maybe it's not realistic to expect that.

No, it's not a realistic expectation, and even if you said that, you should say, "having vegan kids is good, but devoting all of your time to activism instead is even better".
This would be a claim that would be more credible, accurate, and not shame people who have children as being non vegan.

Anon0045 wrote: I have no idea what your point is.

The consequences you hope to achieve by stopping vegans from having kids.

Anon0045 wrote:

None of this is relevant to the topic at hand, because dysgenic antinatalism is not a solution to population growth. All you'll do is make the population stupider and less responsible by advocating these policies, and place a selective pressure for stronger breeding instincts.

I don't know anything about that.

You should inform yourself on the topic. It's very important to the question of consequence.

Anon0045 wrote:

Oh, so for a person who is only willing to eat factory farmed meat or free ranged meat, that person would be ethical if he or she chose the better option?

It's relatively more ethical.

You said it mattered what they were willing to do. So if somebody is not willing to go vegan, in your opinion, it is NOT more ethical for them to go vegan? Because it's not an option if they aren't willing?

It's entirely sensible to recognize a spectrum of good and bad. But you also have to recognize that somebody deciding to have children and not devoting a life to activism is not BAD, it's still good, it's just less good (perhaps) than a life devoted to activism.
These are still good people who have a positive effect on the world, and on balance their children do too.

Anon0045 wrote: What good the children will do can be compared to what good the "converts "you convinced will do when you did activism instead of spending time raising the children. Well, not exactly, because the converts are older and so on, but you get the idea I hope.

Yes, you can compare that. And if your claim was that it's more good to do nothing but activism, that would have been more credible, accurate, and would not be shaming vegans who have kids.

Again "having kids is good, but doing full time activism instead is probably better" that's fine to say.
What is not fine to say: "Is it vegan to have children? ...because I don't think it is."

Of course it's vegan, just like it's vegan to eat a $1 veggie dog, instead of spending $0.25 on beans and donating $0.75 to an animal charity.
You don't have to constantly do the best thing possible to be vegan. That's an impossible standard that does nothing but shame people into giving up on veganism entirely.
The point is just to be a better person, to try to avoid causing so much harm, and hopefully to become a better person over time.

Don't make the perfect the enemy of the good.

Anon0045 wrote: On adoption:
I don't have any strong opinions on this topic. It's one alternative at least if you want to have kids like many do.

Or have kids, which is cheaper, and donate the would be adoption fees to mercy for animals, which will do a lot more good with that money than the adoption would do. Another parent would adopt that child if not you. Babies in particular are in high demand. I addressed the issue of adoption.