Objectively, without reference to human perspective? No reason whatsoever, unless you count the fact that humans would generally prefer to exist than to not exist as an objective reason.
Subjectively? Because we, generally, prefer to exist, and more than that, prefer that other human beings continue to exist. Should we count the preferences of people who don’t exist yet? Doesn’t really matter. The preferences of people today are, cumulatively, that people exist tomorrow. We can of course ignore the general preference of people tomorrow to exist (as they’re functionally counterfactual in consideration of antinatalism) but then we don’t get to then selectively -fail to ignore- their potential suffering. Otherwise you’re just selecting what counterfactuals you include based on what conclusion you want to reach.
If their suffering doesn’t matter (ignoring counterfactuals) then their potential preference not to exist doesn’t matter. OR if their suffering DOES matter (accepting counterfactuals), then we have to also include the general preference of people to exist.
Or we could say preferences don’t matter whatsoever (full objectivity) inwhichcase there’s no argument -against- reproducing, even if there’s likely no argument for it.
Objectively, without reference to human perspective? No reason whatsoever, unless you count the fact that humans would generally prefer to exist than to not exist as an objective reason.
Subjectively? Because we, generally, prefer to exist, and more than that, prefer that other human beings continue to exist. Should we count the preferences of people who don’t exist yet? Doesn’t really matter. The preferences of people today are, cumulatively, that people exist tomorrow. We can of course ignore the general preference of people tomorrow to exist (as they’re functionally counterfactual in consideration of antinatalism) but then we don’t get to then selectively -fail to ignore- their potential suffering. Otherwise you’re just selecting what counterfactuals you include based on what conclusion you want to reach.
If their suffering doesn’t matter (ignoring counterfactuals) then their potential preference not to exist doesn’t matter. OR if their suffering DOES matter (accepting counterfactuals), then we have to also include the general preference of people to exist.
Or we could say preferences don’t matter whatsoever (full objectivity) inwhichcase there’s no argument -against- reproducing, even if there’s likely no argument for it.
[Edited some grammatical mistakes.]