Comment (30)
Email
Print
del.icio.us
Technorati
diggThe ultimate miserabilist
Just when you thought philosophers couldn't get any more pessimistic, one of them surprises you.
What is there about utilitarians that makes them such miserabilists? The greatest happiness for the greatest number is the heart of their philosophy, but just try to find a happy utilitarian. The first of them, Jeremy Bentham, was such a sourpuss that he seemed pickled in vinegar. And in fact, he was, sort of. His embalmed body (pictured) still sits in a cabinet in University College London, one of its principal tourist attractions. He had no wife and no children. The greatest of them, John Stuart Mill, made utilitarianism a mainstream philosophy. But he suffered a nervous breakdown at the age of 20, stole another man's wife and had no children of his own. And while Peter Singer, the most notorious of contemporary utilitarians, may be a karaoke champ in private life, his writings suggest otherwise.
However, these are bit players in the drama of miserabilism compared with South African academic David Benatar, author of Better Never to Have Been: The Harm of Coming into Existence. Although the book has not been widely reviewed in the popular press, it was published by Oxford University Press and has been presented as a serious contribution to the increasingly influential philosophy of utilitarianism.
Professor Benatar's thesis is that life is so horrid that we all would be better off had we never existed. And not just us, but all sentient life. He introduces his thesis with a Jewish witticism: "Life is so terrible, it would have been better never to have been born. Who is so lucky? Not one in a hundred thousand!"
But Benatar is serious. "The central idea of this book is that coming into existence is always a serious harm." And, he continues, "coming into existence is always bad for those who come into existence. In other words, although we may not be able to say of the never-existent that never existing is good for them, we can say of the existent that existence is bad for them."
How does he reach this conclusion, which, even by his own reckoning, seems absurd and repellent? As a utilitarian, he calculates the benefits of existence by balancing benefits against harms. What possible benefit could a non-existent person receive that would outweigh a pinprick of pain? Since most people find this hard to accept, Benatar spends a chapter demonstrating that "human lives contain much more bad than is ordinarily recognised".
Given his distaste for life, why has he hung around so long? Hard to say. Perhaps he agrees with American writer Dorothy Parker:
-
Razors pain you, Rivers are damp,
Acids stain you, And drugs cause cramp.
Guns aren't lawful, Nooses give,
Gas smells awful. You might as well live.
As you might expect, the extinction of the human race seems like an excellent idea to Prof B, although he acknowledges that it might be difficult for society to manage in a humane fashion. However, if a couple of asteroids could be persuaded to collide with Earth, it would be a positive outcome for all concerned.
The 19th century German Arthur Schopenhauer is generally reckoned the most pessimistic of all philosophers, but in Benatar he has no mean rival. For the South African has more than a philosophy, he has a practical bioethical program. Although, as a libertarian, he acknowledges that people have a right to have children, he feels that it is generally unethical, since it brings them into a world of harm. Supporters of abortion contend that women have a moral right to have abortions, but Prof B begs to differ: they have an moral obligation to have abortions, lest they add to the total amount of suffering in the world. Needless to say, this applies to animals, too. He describes his standpoint, somewhat defiantly, not as pro-choice, but as "pro-death".
Philosophers have often inspired poets. Epicurus had Lucretius; Thomas Aquinas had Dante; Shaftesbury had Pope; Kant had Coleridge; Mme Blavatsky had Yeats. But I can't think of a poet who could bear to warble on about Prof Benatar's vision. Perhaps the novelist H.G. Wells comes closest. In his classic The Time Machine, the Time Traveller goes so far into the future that all life is extinct:
"All the sounds of man, the bleating of sheep, the cries of birds, the hum of insects, the stir that makes the background of our lives -- all that was over. As the darkness thickened, the eddying flakes grew more abundant, dancing before my eyes; and the cold of the air more intense. At last, one by one, swiftly, one after the other, the white peaks of the distant hills vanished into blackness. The breeze rose to a moaning wind. I saw the black central shadow of the eclipse sweeping towards me. In another moment the pale stars alone were visible. All else was rayless obscurity. The sky was absolutely black."
Sounds like a great place to send Prof B for his Christmas holiday.
As one Amazon reviewer of Better Never to Have Been pointed out, "you need a PhD to be this stupid". Benatar's pessimism is the blind elaboration of the central utilitarian thesis: that good is a balance of pleasure and pain. But everyday life gives the lie to this. Utility is a soulless way to assess happiness and to know what is good. You don't have to be a martyr to realise that the pain of raising children is amply compensated by their love. Or that the pain of work is outweighed by the joy of achievement. Or that a sunrise over Everest obliterates the pain of climbing there.
Are these watertight refutations? No, and, to be fair, Benatar deserves a few rounds of philosophical fisticuffs with a fellow academic. But common sense is enough. The great Samuel Johnson was once challenged to counter Berkeley's theory that matter was a figment of our imagination: "I never shall forget," says his biographer Boswell, "the alacrity with which Johnson answered, striking his foot with mighty force against a large stone, till he rebounded from it, 'I refute it THUS.'"
Nonetheless, Better Never to Have Been has its own utility. It unveils "the greatest good of the greatest number" as the secret password of nihilism. And it is a lesson in intellectual history: after two centuries, the bitter streams gushing from Bentham and Mill have finally trickled into the Dead Sea of the University of Cape Town philosophy department. Anyone toying with the seductive arguments of Peter Singer and his ilk should read it. There they will see what happens when the precepts of utilitarianism are taken to their logical conclusions.
Michael Cook is editor of MercatorNet. He has borrowed the useful term "miserabilist" from Spiked.
Although I haven’t read Dr Benatar’s book I think I see where he is arguing from. There are good and bad in the world. Pain and pleasure. If we exist we experience both pain and pleasure. If we never [did not] exist[ed] then we would feel neither pleasure nor pain. Since we would not miss / regret the lack of of pleasure as non-existent beings then it would be better to be nothing than alive.
If Benatar believes his argument then he should kill himself. Perhaps he would, as a utilitarian, reply that the act of suicide involves pain. I am sure he is clever enough to come up with a painless method, since his is as wise as he is.
Benatar’s argument does not threaten me. Neither does it anger or disgust me. Nor do I think anihilationism will ever become a widespread social program (for Darwinian reasons: the organisms (including man) that exist in the world strive to continue to exist; else they would have died / lemming jumped years ago.)
I read this page and some of the comments laughing. It is hysterical. As Hamlet would say: “What a piece of work is man...”
The Christians are just as absurd as Benatar. They in fact have more in common with his philosophy than with my own. Both the religious commenter and Benatar have the common idea that they can justify, explain, find meaning to their existence through verbal reasoning, rational discourse, logical disputation. This is actually an absurd idea.
Benatar and Christian theology are both examples of man thinking too much. We need to live in the moment. If you are unhappy do something to become happy. If you think your life has no meaning and that it needs one then maybe you think it follows you should kill yourself or give up. But why should you.
It is not the goal that matters. It is the journey. It is not the pleasure or the pain: it is BEING. Become aware of the world. Enjoy it if you can. Understand the illusion of yourself, of your subjectivity. Pierce the veil of Maya and glimpse the game of the gods!
“jim"(??) said:
“One wonders if Mariusz Wesolowski would pen these words after a few days spent pulled on the rack, or enjoying those ‘illusory’ pains of stomach cancer.”
Well, there is only one way to find out, isn’t there? All I can say right now is that there have been people who suffered exactly that and still considered it non-real, or at least unimportant (numerous Christian saints, Sri Ramana Maharshi, etc., etc.) On the whole, though, this is a typical cheap shot.
“And of course, following the same logic, there really should be no sense of urgency in dealing with famine, child exploitation, spousal abuse, aids prevention and treatment, and all the myriad ‘illusory’ sufferings that arise under the face of the sun.”
Another emotional and confused cheap shot, not worth answering, although it can be answered in several interesting ways, all of which would be wasted on the likes of “jim” whose “arguments” are always based on maudlin sentimentality.
(and they are also subconsciously anti-natalist)
Prof B i think is right, his contribution at least balances the harm Peter Singer’s ramblings about disabled people counting as non-persons. One wonders if knowing whether B’s father spanks him too hard would really help here.
I haven’t finished book but the inconsistencies are blatant. He wants good but without the evil, extinction of the human race ASAP but without the hasty death (because it counts as harm) of any humans. He seems to embrace the ‘live long and die out’ slogan of VHEMT while rejecting the pro-human extinction eco-movements. that’s the reason it does not make sense to the reader.
If you ask me, he sought originality (perhaps) while still being unsure of what he is saying or he is cautious so as not to jeopardize his status in Singer’s miserabilist karaoke club.
One wonders if Mariusz Wesolowski would pen these words after a few days spent pulled on the rack, or enjoying those ‘illusory’ pains of stomach cancer. And of course, following the same logic, there really should be no sense of urgency in dealing with famine, child exploitation, spousal abuse, aids prevention and treatment, and all the myriad ‘illusory’ sufferings that arise under the face of the sun.
Nice way to anaesthetize awareness, I think.
Excuse me, but Michael Cook’s review of Benatar’s book is utterly unreasonable and childish. Does Cook know that argumentum ad hominem is considered to be a fallacy? Does Cook think that he can ‘refute’ Benatar’s arguments just by calling him names (e.g. “stupid")? Cook obviously does not know how to construct an argument, so he expects his ridiculous claim that “common sense is enough” to be an adequate ‘refutation’ of a serious work of philosophy. ‘Common sense’? Please! If Cook knew anything about social psychology (or, if Cook would just notice all the absurd and self-contradictory claims made in the name of ‘common sense’), then he would know about the massive amount of empirical evidence to the effect that the ‘common sense’ of most people is plagued by diverse biases and many different kinds of faulty reasoning. But Cook is obviously convinced that the truth can never be unpleasant; his review reminds me of the old adage that you cannot refute atheism just by reciting the Lord’s Prayer.
By the way: Why does Cook blabber on about Utilitarianism? Benatar’s conclusions certainly do NOT depend on the truth of Utilitarianism, and Benatar explicitly DENIES that we can assess the value of a life just by subtracting the negative values (the bad) from the positive values (the good) experienced in that life. Cook would know this if he had read Benatar’s book the way it should be read: critically, but rationally, fairly, and with an open mind.
I am not a utilitarian. People say Benatar’s view is over pessimistic. People claim that there are joys and pleasures in life that make life worth living. These joys and pleasures are only slightly lesser pains than the pain of existence we are accustom to. Utilitarianism can only grasp this superficiality of existence.
You can be a Catholic without being a Christian. You can be a Baptist without being a Christian. Understand that Religion and Christianity are not the same. Understand that Spirituality and Christianity are not the same. You can be spiritual about a tree or a rock.
The question of Christianity is simply do you believe that Jesus Christ is the Messiah? You either do or you don’t. Would the Earth be better off without us? This blue planet full of life was made for us to walk on and be alive and experience life. Life is a gift. I’d much rather have life experience then to not exist. Joy and suffering are bedfellows...you can’t know one without the other. What would be the point? We would be robots then if we didn’t know the difference between happy and sad.
To me Dr. David Benatar’s thesis is nothing more than an academic cicle jerk of sorts. We are entering a very bizarre time where this sort of thinking is going to become more and more mainstream. It’s very odd. These same people who believe we are capable of controlling and causing global warming and destroying the Earth are the same people who believe the Earth has somehow managed to survive for billions and billions of years (including the infamous big bang) until the likes of us. Is there really anything more pompous than that?
Existence is not meaningless and without purpose.
David Benatar’s argument doesn’t rest upon utilitarianism. He considers three theories of the good: hedonistic theories, desire-fulfilment theories and objective list theories. He also considers, briefly but adequately given the scope of the book, religious objections to his position.
Also, Benatar does not advocate murder and does not maintain that those already alive are better off dead.
While I don’t think I agree with Dr. Benatar completely, (though I haven’t finished the book yet) he has done us a service by raising this question in a careful and thoughtful way. He deserves respect, not abuse.
In The Great Divorce there is a chilling description of just such a sadistic domestic ‘saint’ that David Page describes. The problem with a phrase like ‘Fear of the Lord’ in our post-Freudian age, is that all ‘fears’ are seen to be wrong, oppressive, the result of childhood traumas etc.
But some fear is healthy. It is good for a man to fear the consequences if he is thinking of cheating on his wife. It is good for heavy drinker to fear what might happen if he gets into his car when drunk.
‘Fear of the Lord’ is healthy when it reminds us of our own shortcomings; it is not the craven, abject, terrified ‘fear’ of a slave for his master.
But now the phrase ‘perfect love casts out fear’ comes into my mind - and I am thinking of the Prodigal Son, stumbling back home and afraid of his father’s wrath - and his Father has been waiting for him anxiously all the time, and planning a feast in his honour.
Francis, I haven’t read ‘The Great Divorce’. From what little I know about C. S. Lewis, I would think that ‘Mere Christianity’ would be more to the point of this discussion.
His concept of universal morality is intriguing to me because it’s something I have always believed. My morality is, at it’s base, the same now as when I was a street kid in Boston. It’s something I just know.
Lewis says that, given the words of Christ, he was either the son of God or a madman. This argument only works if you believe the New Testament to be completely accurate. If you’re familiar with The Jesus Project, then you know that many scholars don’t believe this to be true. Having said that, given the time in history when it happened, The Parable of The Prostitute is truly an extraordinary moment.
My problem with ‘fear of the Lord’ is that it reminds me way too much of Battered Child Syndrome. The battered child , given a choice, usually runs to the batterer. Battered children, later in life, often talk about the abusive parent as if he,or she, was a saint.
Like David Page I was raised by nuns 50 years ago (perhaps they were the same nuns?). In primary school in 1953 I raised my hand and asked if Stalin would go to hell (he had just died). The nun and the rest of class much approved my question, though they could not give an exact answer.
Has DP read The Great Divorce? It does not pretend to theological accuracy (Lewis allows people in hell the choice to remain there or join their loved ones in heaven) but it has great psychological acuity. Hell isn’t about mass murderers like Stalin; it is about ordinary people who are absorbed by themselves. (Lewis is good on self-pity).
Seeking personal salvation is not selfish; we will never get there if we don’t love others - especially our enemies.
‘Fear of the Lord’ is one of the gifts of the Holy Spirit. It does not cancel out love; it enhances it, purging it of sentimentality and helping us to recognise that God is just as well as merciful. This is different from the fear I would feel if I were a Cambodian being attacked by the Khmer Rouge.
Francis, I see hell as it was described to me by nuns fifty years ago. I don’t believe they were contemporaries of Hieronymus Bosch. The hell of the fundamentalists also seems an unpleasant place. By the way, how do you know Lewis
was right about hell? Has anyone ever returned? I, myself, could find very little on the subject in the Bible. I doubt there is such a place.
On the subject of selfishness, isn’t there selfishness in the quest for personal salvation? The old expression, ‘God fearing’, keeps popping into my head during these discussions.
Do you fear God, or do you love Him? I think the one always diminishes the other.
Why does David Page think we can’thave it both ways? we do - all the time. We experience life as both fruitful, beautiful and necessary and as a “vale of tears” - sometimes on the same day. The problem with quotes is that they are often taken out of context; I bet I could find a ‘happy’ quote from St Teresa if I searched for it.
About hell: I was also going to mention The Great Divorce. I think DP is an unconscious ‘medievalist’ i.e. he sees hell as Hieronymus Bosch does: flames of fire stoked up by demons with pitchforks and forked tails. CS Lewis is more accurate in his description of the banality of hell, a place of pure selfishness.
Do I want to see my children go there? No more than I want to go there myself. As a mother I pray constantly for my children - and I believe,as St Ambrose reassured St Monica, that God anwers our prayers.
B.N. Although I got your post in my E-mail, but it hasn’t yet appeared on the Mercator site. I’ll answer you more fully when it does. For now I’ll just reply to the last two questions.
B.N. writes: “Out of curiosity, you say your disagreements with the Catholic Church are mainly philosophical, besides what you have already mentioned may I inquire as to what they are? Another question; what religion (if any) do you practice?”
I belong to a Unitarian church. That doesn’t mean that I practice a religion. In Unitarianism my beliefs (or lack of them) are completely up to me.
My problem with Catholicism, as with all dogmatic religions, is that they haven’t got any evidence to support their beliefs. Having said that, I don’t understand how the words of Jesus can be compatible with the old testament, or for that matter, much of the new testament. More later.
John Thomas,
Could you be clearer about exactly what the “sensible choice”
is? Do you have children? How could you abandon them to hell? I know there is magic in the world. I have seen it. That doesn’t convince me that the Bible is the unedited word of God. That doesn’t mean that I don’t approach life with reverence. You presume much when you say that the life I value is inferior to the life that you value.
Page 1 of 2 : 1 2 >