Buddhist takes on antinatalism and fails

[00:00:00]A Buddhist YouTube channel called Doug's Dharma recently released a video about a seemingly anti-natalistic quote from a Buddhist author, and he then goes on to discuss anti-natalism, the work of David Benatar, and what I wanted to do is provide some clarification cuz I think there's a lot of confusion around anti-natalism, which is very normal, but this is kind of more interesting cuz it intersects with Buddhism. So, without further ado, let's watch the clip.

[00:00:24]>> In a live stream a while back on Patreon, I discussed a chapter from a book of the great Thai meditation master Ajaan Chah's talks.

[00:00:34]In it, he makes a pretty jarring claim.

[00:00:38]He says, "To state it directly, the Buddha said that we should not be born because that is suffering."

[00:00:46]Now, this sounds shocking, I think, to many of us.

[00:00:50]As one of my supporters noted during that live stream, this claim of Chah's, Ajaan Chah's, sounds very similar to a controversial modern philosophy called anti-natalism.

[00:01:03]>> So, here I want to talk about the quote that Doug is highlighting because I'm no Buddhist, but I went back to the original source, and I couldn't help but think that Doug had maybe misinterpreted the passage. Although, I haven't seen the stream that he mentions where he first spoke about this, so maybe in that stream his understanding is is more apparent, but at least in this video, I kind of got a different understanding on what the quote was saying than what he's putting across in this video. So, I'm not going to read out the full passage because it's quite a long one, and I've provided the longer version for more context than what Doug put on screen.

[00:01:41]And from reading through that original quote, yes, it seems as though what is being discussed is physical birth, but it also seems like a more sort of metaphorical use of the term birth is being used as well. And this metaphorical sense of birth is essentially just the arising of any sensation of of dukkha or any other feeling. This is described as the birth of a new sensation or however you want to word it. And so it's not clear to me here that the way that the author is using the term birth is strictly just physical birth as a new person being born into the world. It seems clear to me that at least two senses of the word birth are being used and in each sentence it may not be clear which way birth is being used, if that makes sense. So you've got the physical birth but you've also got this more metaphorical sense of birth where you're being born into experiencing a new sensation. There is this new thing arising in your experience and that is being termed birth and then when the sensation fades that is kind of a death as well. And I think the passage is kind of muddling these two things and perhaps Doug has taken an isolated part of the passage where it seems to be more focusing on physical birth but actually the point being made in general is kind of about these two types of birth. From my basic understanding and research into Buddhism and Buddhist texts it does seem like the Buddha spoke about physical birth and procreation to some extent but honestly I'm not kind of learned enough on this subject to be able to like competently put it across in a video but I am planning to do a lot more research on Buddhism and make a proper video about antinatalism and Buddhism in the future so that is coming at some point.

[00:03:19]For now though the two places where I know that there has been some at least comprehensive exploration of the association between antinatalism, pessimism, Buddhism are in David E.

[00:03:29]Cooper's paper Buddhism as pessimism and also Ken Coates' book rejectionist philosophy from Buddhism to Benatar. So I've linked those two in the description, feel free to have a look at those if you're interested in this topic. My intention with the rest of this video is kind of to clear up more of the misconceptions around antinatalism and then like I said I'm really going to get deeply into antinatalism and Buddhism in a future video.

[00:03:53]>> The question therefore is whether the Buddha was an anti-natalist in a similar way to Benatar.

[00:04:02]Is the goal of Buddhism simply to wipe out life or wipe ourselves out because life is not worth it?

[00:04:10]Or is there a missing link to the chain or missing piece to the puzzle?

[00:04:14]>> So, I want to clarify cuz Doug makes a mistake here that he kind of implies that anti-natalism is about wiping out all life, but it's not. It's simply a critique of a procreative act. It's essentially the act of you are considering whether to create a new sentient being into the world. Is that morally okay? It's about that individual act of procreation. Sure, if every sentient being in the world was a moral agent and then all of them came to anti-natalism and ceased reproducing, then yes, you would get the end of all life. I wouldn't term that wiping out life cuz that implies some more sort of totalizing killing off form of ending life, whereas this would be a voluntary phasing out of life. But at the end of the day, that's not the situation we're in anyway, far from it. If anti-natalism were somehow to lead to the end of life, it would be more of a consequence of the end of reproduction rather than an intentional attempt to cease life. I think what Doug is actually getting at here is something different called efilism, which I've made a video about before, which I will link in the description, and people can check out.

[00:05:16]>> Now, if we look only at the first noble truth, that is the truth of dukkha or of suffering, the Buddha and Benatar seem to be more or less on the same page.

[00:05:29]That is, the Buddha specifically defined birth as suffering.

[00:05:36]He pointed to old age, illness, and death as unavoidable features of having a body.

[00:05:43]Indeed, he said that all five aggregates subject to clinging, that is the parts that make us up, are themselves suffering.

[00:05:54]Similarly, David Benatar argues that even the happiest of lives has some pain.

[00:06:01]Since nonexistence has zero pain, nonexistence is therefore technically better than existence for Benatar.

[00:06:11]Basically, he says that pleasures do not compensate us for pains.

[00:06:18]If that's what Buddhism is also saying, then it looks like a kind of cosmic pessimism, even maybe nihilism.

[00:06:25]>> So, I don't have an insane amount to say here. One thing I just want to do is interject and say that if you're really interested in this overlap between Buddhism and pessimism, which is actually more what he's talking about here, not anti-natalism, then I'd encourage you to read Ken Coates's book on the part on Buddhism, and also David E. Cooper's paper. And also, if you're interested in the difference between anti-natalism and pessimism, then my most recent video before this one was about that topic. Again, I've linked that in the description below. But here, what he's talking about is more pessimism and Buddhism, rather than anti-natalism.

[00:06:55]>> But here's the crucial difference.

[00:06:58]Benatar's argument has similarities with the first noble truth, but the Buddha went on to discuss three more noble truths.

[00:07:08]And these are the truths that lead to liberation.

[00:07:12]Essentially, in Buddhist terms, Benatar is assuming in his argument that any pain is equal to suffering, or dukkha.

[00:07:22]But as we discussed in a recent video on chronic or unavoidable pain, the Buddha distinguished between the physical sensation of pain and true suffering.

[00:07:35]The latter of which involves a kind of mental resistance.

[00:07:41]The third noble truth claims that it's possible to be alive to experience that first arrow of physical pain and yet not to suffer.

[00:07:52]An enlightened being is said to experience back pains and perhaps toothaches, but they don't experience mental anguish over them.

[00:08:02]Now, this, at least potentially, breaks Benatar's calculus.

[00:08:07]If existence can be free of suffering through the destruction of craving and ignorance, then existence isn't inherently a net negative.

[00:08:19]It's simply a kind of problem that has a solution.

[00:08:23]>> So, I don't think Benatar's argument has been dissolved here, and I think on a very basic level, we can actually use Doug's words, his own words, to show that. If life is a problem, as Doug says, because of the pain and suffering in life, then why create a problem to be solved in the first place? A problem avoided seems better than a problem created and then resolved. But also, more specifically, if you remove the craving and the ignorance and the mental anguish from life, that still doesn't make it worth coming into existence.

[00:08:50]There is no positive case. There is no reason to come into existence. And given that if you bring someone into existence, there is suffering and there is pain, which, like you said, they can work to overcome, but you're putting them into a situation where they've got to work to overcome that, and there's going to be many years that it's going to take to do that, probably imperfectly anyway. And so, all those years they're going to be suffering and feeling pain and mental anguish and ignorance and craving. And I don't understand why you would put someone through that just so they can finally get to the point where they might be able to imperfectly resolve those issues when they just didn't need to be put on this treadmill in the first place. And also, not everyone has the capacity to even be able to get to that place anyway. You're running the risk of creating a child who won't have the adequate skills to be able to nurture that kind of devotion so that they can suppress or avoid craving and ignorance.

[00:09:43]But also, someone might be competent enough to develop the skills, but they're just not predisposed to actually want to pursue that. They want to do other things with their life, and can't really blame them. So, why create someone into a world where all you have for them is an imperfect solution, which they may not even be able to attain anyway?

[00:10:00]>> It's because we have the capacity to understand the Dharma, to practice well, and to overcome craving, that the Buddha considered human birth so important.

[00:10:12]It was also precious because because the Buddha considered it so vanishingly unlikely.

[00:10:19]As he said, "Mendicants, suppose the Earth was entirely covered with water, and a person threw a yoke with a single hole in into it, and there was a one-eyed turtle who popped up once every 100 years.

[00:10:36]What do you think, mendicants? Would that one-eyed turtle popping up once every 100 years still poke its neck through the hole in the yoke?

[00:10:45]It's unlikely, sir.

[00:10:47]That's how unlikely it is to get reborn as a human being.

[00:10:53]Now, ideally, we would not be reborn again somewhere afterwards, since that would mean we hadn't really reached the goal of our practice.

[00:11:03]But now that we are born, this life is not a mistake. Indeed, instead, it's a unique opportunity that we should make use of.

[00:11:11]>> So, Doug's view here actually isn't that far away from anti-natalism, to be honest. He's basically saying that it is not good to be reborn, but since you have been reborn, you can see this as an opportunity. And that's not far away from pessimism and anti-natalism, which essentially says, like, coming into existence isn't good, but since you're here, try and do the best you can. I'm not saying it's exactly the same thing and his framing of Buddhism in general does seem more life-affirming than something like pessimism or anti-natalism. But I also want to point out that again, no expert in Buddhism, but the passage that he just went over, again, his interpretation of it doesn't seem like the only one that you can take. So again, I'm putting the full passage up on screen here, but one possible interpretation is that it's just extremely rare to become an enlightened human being, a realized one as they're called in this passage. And so even you're born as a human, it's extremely rare to be able to actually overcome suffering if you accept the Buddhist framing that you can at all become free from suffering. And again, surely that just further goes to support the idea of anti-natalism because it's better not to create the problem of suffering in the first place, especially since there's an admission that it's very rare to be able to overcome it.

[00:12:22]Now, someone could say that given the Buddhist worldview and if you adopt this this view of a literal rebirth, then surely it's better to have this cycle of rebirth with the even though rare potential escape and becoming free from suffering than having the the cycle of rebirth and and just not having that capacity at all because what's essentially being said is that all all of the sentient species in the world are going through this this cycle of rebirth. And if you are reborn as a human, at least then you have the chance of escaping the cycle. Whereas if if anti-natalism had its way, everyone adopted anti-natalism and and eventually there were no humans, then the cycle of rebirth would just continue in animals but with no possibility of escape because there would be no human form to be reborn into. And if you accept this literalist framing of physical rebirth, then that could be correct. Potentially, there's other ways around that. I'm not sure. I'm not, you know, expert in nothing Buddhism. But I I just don't think we should accept that view. I think Buddhism has a lot of wisdom to give. I actually think it's It's wiser than basically any other religion, mainstream religion that I've come across. But we shouldn't just swallow everything that Buddhism has to say, especially these more literalist metaphysical sort of viewpoints that that it contains. I just don't see any good reason to think that there is a physical rebirth process, and so I've I've no reason to adopt it. So I think we can take the wisdom from Buddhism and leave behind any sort of weird metaphysical beliefs. But if someone has that metaphysical belief, then maybe that is a an argument against antinatalism. I'd need to know more, but I just don't think we should accept that view. I think that view is is kind of ludicrous.

[00:14:00]>> So, in conclusion, to return to the quote we began with, Ajahn Chah was right. Birth is suffering in the sense that we're born with the minds of craving and ignorance that recoil from our ordinary conditions of change and decay.

[00:14:20]But Benatar is wrong to think that therefore human life is a net loss.

[00:14:26]We aren't so much victims of a cruel universe as beings with the capacity to truly understand and thereby transform our relationship to that universe.

[00:14:38]>> So, this is the last bit that I'm going to go over, but again, in brief, if you never come into existence, you you never have a need to understand or transform your relationship with the universe.

[00:14:49]These are only things that could be a benefit to you if you already exist.

[00:14:54]Because then you have a need for those things. An understanding of the universe will help you to pursue the things you want to pursue in life and and realize your interests. And changing your relationship with the universe, I'm actually not entirely sure what that means, but if we just assume it's in your interest to do that, then the only reason you have that interest is because you exist already. But the fundamental question is, why create the problem of life in the first place when you don't need to? Let me know what you think in the comments below, and I'll see you in the next one.