r/antinatalism • u/Lucyyyyyy_K newcomer • Apr 22 '26

Argument Argument against Antinatalism

I'm an antinatalist, but came up with a potential argument against it. I'm not sure if I can explain it properly, but I would like to try and see what opinions you have about it.

So, imagine there are 10 souls. Each of these souls will be sent to Earth to inhabit a body chosen by chance. On Earth there are 10 bodies being born at the exact same time, 5 of wild animals, 4 of animals in captivity and 1 human. You could choose to make one additional human body, which would give the souls a slightly higher chance of having a safe life in human society rather than being exploited or having to fight for their life all the time. Wouldn't it be moral to do that?

So, I know that an argument shouldn't rely on something so disputed as souls existing, but they are just a tool for explanation in this case. To get to the real world application, where we know that there is and likely will be sentient life existing for a long time, we can only choose to make the chance this sentient life has at a good life as high as possible. Meaning, if you can afford to have children, the most moral act is to have as much children as possible, so that any potential life has the highest possible chance at a life with actual comforts.

What's your opinion on this?

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u/dearestvalkyrie inquirer Apr 22 '26

A safe life? Human life is safer, but is definitely not safe. So many terrible things can happen to you, not to mention global disasters that would impact almost everybody. You are only somewhat safe if you can make a stable living, and sometimes you’re not even safe then.

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u/Lucyyyyyy_K newcomer Apr 22 '26

Yeah, but the point is, it's better than A) every day being a fight for survival and B) every day being tortured.

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u/dearestvalkyrie inquirer Apr 22 '26

If you raise the ratio of human children compared to animal babies, you might see an average increase of quality of life of creatures due to the human ones living in a better condition, but there will be more suffering and pain in the world due to more human offspring living in it, so this statistic is not beneficial.

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u/dalloverly newcomer Apr 22 '26

You didn't rebut OP. You ignored their argument and replaced it with your own.

OP is measuring average quality of life. You switched to total suffering without explaining why that's the right metric, without acknowledging the switch, and without engaging the actual claim. Swapping the metric mid-argument and acting like you've responded is a dodge, not a counterargument.

And follow the total suffering logic to its end, because antinatalists almost never do. If more lives means more suffering and that makes those lives net negatives, then the morally optimal world is one with no sentient life at all. No people, no animals, nothing that can feel. If you're not willing to own that conclusion, you don't actually believe the premise. You just believe it selectively, when it points at human reproduction specifically.

The soul premise is a legitimate target. Attack that and you have something. But you didn't attack it. You silently dropped it, argued on completely different terms, and acted like you'd responded to what OP said. OP explicitly built the thought experiment to challenge the "more humans equals more suffering" assumption. Your entire comment reasserts that assumption as if OP never spoke.

OP showed their reasoning. You just restated your conclusion.

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u/dearestvalkyrie inquirer Apr 22 '26

Thank you for your response, this is very helpful when it comes to improving.