I agree with christian that the question is poorly formed. For one thing, it depends on if the altruist believes in eugenics and has good genes, or does but has bad genes, or doesn’t etc. An altruist who was healthy and smart and believed in eugenics might try to spread their genes as far and wide as possible, which could result in lots of unprotected sex and kids that don’t have a parent! Another question is, what if they’re an anti-natalist? Anti-natalism can be a fundamentally altruistic position.
it depends on if the altruist believes in eugenics
I don’t think the answer of a question about the morality of actions depends of the beliefs of the people involved (you can probably construct edge cases where it does); the answer to “Is it okay for bob to rape babies?” doesn’t depend on bob’s beliefs about baby-rape.
Note that the original question wasn’t “Is it right for a pure altruist to have children?”, it was “Would a pure altruist have children?”. And the answer to that question most definitely depends on the beliefs of the altruist being modeled. It’s also a more useful question, because it leads us to explore which beliefs matter and how they effect the decision (the alternative being that we all start arguing about our personal beliefs on all the relevant topics).
I agree with christian that the question is poorly formed. For one thing, it depends on if the altruist believes in eugenics and has good genes, or does but has bad genes, or doesn’t etc. An altruist who was healthy and smart and believed in eugenics might try to spread their genes as far and wide as possible, which could result in lots of unprotected sex and kids that don’t have a parent! Another question is, what if they’re an anti-natalist? Anti-natalism can be a fundamentally altruistic position.
I don’t think the answer of a question about the morality of actions depends of the beliefs of the people involved (you can probably construct edge cases where it does); the answer to “Is it okay for bob to rape babies?” doesn’t depend on bob’s beliefs about baby-rape.
Note that the original question wasn’t “Is it right for a pure altruist to have children?”, it was “Would a pure altruist have children?”. And the answer to that question most definitely depends on the beliefs of the altruist being modeled. It’s also a more useful question, because it leads us to explore which beliefs matter and how they effect the decision (the alternative being that we all start arguing about our personal beliefs on all the relevant topics).