Description

Most people believe that they were either benefited or at least not harmed by being brought into existence Thus if they ever do reflect on whether they should bring others into existencerather than having children without even thinking about whether they shouldthey presume that they do them no harm Better Never to Have Been challenges these assumptions David Benatar argues that coming into existence is always a serious harm Those who never exist cannot be deprived However by coming into existence one does suffer quite serious harms that could not have befallen one had one not come into existence Drawing on the relevant psychological literature the author shows that there are a number of welldocumented features of human psychology that explain why people systematically overestimate the quality of their lives and why they are thus resistant to the suggestion that they were seriously harmed by being brought into existence The author then argues for the antinatal viewthat it is always wrong to have childrenand he shows that combining the antinatal view with common prochoice views about fetal moral status yield a prodeath view about abortion Although counterintuitive for many that implication is defended not least by showing that it solves many conundrums of moral theory about population