Instigator / Pro
0
1476
rating
336
debates
40.77%
won
Topic
#3709
No person, not anybody should desire not to have children.
Status
Finished
The debate is finished. The distribution of the voting points and the winner are presented below.
Winner & statistics
Winner
0
1
After 1 vote and with 1 point ahead, the winner is...
Novice_II
Tags
Parameters
- Publication date
- Last updated date
- Type
- Standard
- Number of rounds
- 4
- Time for argument
- Two days
- Max argument characters
- 30,000
- Voting period
- One month
- Point system
- Winner selection
- Voting system
- Open
Contender / Con
1
1890
rating
98
debates
93.37%
won
Description
Disclaimer : Regardless of the setup for voting win or lose, The aim of this interaction, Is for those that view it, Learn and or take away anything that will amount to any constructive value ultimately. So that counts as anything that'll cause one to reconsider an idea, Understand a subject better, Help build a greater wealth of knowledge getting closer to truth. When either of us has accomplished that with any individual here, That's who the victor of the debate becomes.
No person should have the mental attitude, the mindset of not wanting to produce offspring and or start a family.
Also , societal conditions have constructed this. It has perhaps installed fear or the pressure of responsibility too heavy. It's ingrained socially and not by nature.
Further elaboration coming in the debate rounds.
Questions for clarity, send a message or leave a comment.
Round 1
Pro
#1
It's the Mall and Novice II show once again.
Ha, that's cool.
No person should not desire to not produce offspring just as no person should not desire not to consume articles of nourishment.
These are biological survival tools. This is why we have a reproductive system and digestive system.
A person that has a hunger for food that will have a hunger for sex and yet will not want children.
It's like saying I want to drink the milk but I don't want to receive the nutrition.
There are those that do live for the pleasures of cake. They do live to eat making it recreational like sexual activity.
But the pleasure you can say is the reward for doing what is biologically mandated to flourish and survive.
Now how is this socially constructed and not biologically natural?
Well it's in complete contradiction to the organic anatomical makeup .
I just mentioned biological survival tools. How is refusing the way to survive the way to survive?
It's the complete opposite.
Let's start towards the dawn of mankind to build a foundation of everything to see where changes occurred roughly.
When the population of humans were a handful like a group of people you can fit into small room, perspectively that's earth's population in a room in your home .
The whole world inside a walk-in closet in your home.
You best believe none of them would have given a thought to birth control preventing births. If they would of said "no thanks", I wouldn't be here alive now. I want to live, I want to survive. So because of others adhering to their biological survival instincts, hence we obviously survive.
Now some centuries go by , the population is growing, everybody is doing good helping each one of us breathe today .
We get to today however and because of the social conditions, not biological conditions, societal circumstances, there are those that are not willing to actually practice survival or poorly doing so.
Just like with poor diet or no diet . The same with diet in that the downside of health today is socially configured. We live in an age where we are so far removed from whole foods on to more and more artificiality and added chemicals that contribute to health concerns. I won't mention any names of fast food restaurants but there's a very famous one with the arches that do the opposite of having us to live longer .
People go there because they're hungry and when they feel satiated, that count it as proper nutrition.
So because the world has a great population , therefore it's safe to not add into the world or so it seems. But that's a societal wave. People are still born with sexual reproductive equipment. So no biological wave to change anything.
In society we experience and witness many stressing , problematic cases with families and financial burdens.
Again, no biological change but the waves of societal events. We experience these things from social interactions and reactions.
This is what fosters up the fear and hesitation in some people to survive as biologically crafted and implemented.
The same way with people that have an emotional conflict brought on none other than by social factors that perhaps dampen there self image, self esteem and respond by rejecting nourishment going into an anorexic like state. Others, it's the fear, worry, emotional turbulence that causes them to overeat, eat excessively to an unhealthy state .
Now one question I can predict to contest all of this is "Why should we desire to have children?"
Let our bodies answer that. The bodies are implemented in this fashion that causes us to have the desire so we then should have it. It's cause and effect.
Like our bodies are implemented in a way that haves us crave for water.
You can say a person should desire sex but not necessarily children. But it's like saying I desire dessert but not the energy it gives.
See we are even conflicted on why the body has the drive or hunger in the first place .
In your mind you're seeking taste but the body is in need of fuel which we call carbohydrates or sugar.
It works the same way on the other side of the coin.
Round 2
Pro
#3
There's one thing I wanted to add in regards to our survival tools.
We survive at a populated level. There is survival at the individual level.
That is surviving your genetic information. You compromise it of course when skipping to pass it along.
Just as a person that compromises the length of life going on dialysis. A person can say I'm still surviving on dialysis treatment.
Reducing the life span survives it or does it start the ticking time bomb of a gradual slow death?
Surviving a life is the move to extension. The opposite would not be, like a bullet wound of a person dying slow. They're still breathing, living but it's compromised.
They're not going to survive .
Con
#4
x. Burdens
- The burden of proof is on pro to prove that every person that exists should not desire to not have children.
x.1 Negation
- Proposition x is "no person, not anybody should desire not to have children."
P1) If there is nothing ethically wrong with a desire to not have children, proposition x is false.
P2) There is nothing ethically wrong with a desire to not have children.
C) Therefore, proposition x is false.
P1
x.2 Ethics
- When pro says people "should not" hold x desire he is making a propositional claim on the way people ought to think or behave. This is an ethical claim or a normative claim that expresses what should be the case. Pro holds the burden of proof, thus he must make an argument that proves a desire to not have children is ethically wrong.
P2
- Here we can present many cases in which it is reasonable as well as ethical to desire not to have children.
x.3 Severe Disability/Severe Inheritable Disease
- Evaluation of humans and medical science shows us that many people have severe disabilities that impede their quality of life. That being said, many of these ailments are heritable, and there would be nothing ethically wrong with such people actively desiring not to reproduce and implicate their children into lives of suffering.
x.4 Poverty
- People in crippling poverty should actively desire not to have children in order not to introduce them into a life of unnecessary suffering. It would certainly not be ethically wrong to value the future of a child, and desire not to have such a child because of environmental circumstances.
x.5 Severe psychological condition
- People who suffer from chronic mental or psychological distress are not in a position where they can take care of themselves adequately, much less any children. This includes, for instance, people with severe schizophrenia, or severe delusional disorder. One would be hard-pressed to see it as ethically wrong for people who can hardly care for themselves, and desire not to have children.
a. Rebuttal(s)
- Pro's round one case is a ramble that does not prove the resolution to be true. Pro's argument:
No person should not desire to not produce offspring just as no person should not desire not to consume articles of nourishment.These are biological survival tools. This is why we have a reproductive system and digestive system.
- Producing offspring is not necessary for every individual to survive, whereas consuming nutrition on a fundamental level is, and our species is not in a position in which we need to increase fertility for the survival of the human race. This nullifies pro's argument.
b. Is-Ought problem.
- Pro also argues without evidence that our bodies are implemented in a fashion that creates people to desire to have children. Even if this were true David Hume has already established that "knowledge of the present world does not necessarily lead to knowledge of how the world ought to be."
Round 3
Pro
#5
"Evaluation of humans and medical science shows us that many people have severe disabilities that impede their quality of life. That being said, many of these ailments are heritable, and there would be nothing ethically wrong with such people actively desiring not to reproduce and implicate their children into lives of suffering. "
This is like saying somebody that's bleeding slowly to death would not want anybody else to do the same. Why ?
Their quality of life is poor or have a compromised livable set of circumstances.
Which a poorer chance to survive is not surviving.
The context of the debate topic is no person not desiring to have children due to survival.
Must keep the context in mind.
"People in crippling poverty should actively desire not to have children in order not to introduce them into a life of unnecessary suffering. It would certainly not be ethically wrong to value the future of a child, and desire not to have such a child because of environmental circumstances."
Again, barely surviving on the route to a diminishing of life. If you ever paid a notice to anything said in the first round, the context is regarding biological survival functions which you have no refutation for. If you do, take it up with biology, biology sets it up .
So with that foundation, we're talking about how we survive and continue to survive. So if we are going to continue to survive, let's do what biology has arranged for us to do .
Now those who are barely surviving themselves and passing along their genes would not really make a difference, they're likened to those who cannot sexually reproduce.
I haven't seen you gone there yet. It's needless to say those that don't have much of a chance, a low probability of survival of their genes or a survival themselves, that they should not have a desire.
It would be futile.
But that wasn't my position like it wasn't my position that people who have certain food allergies or medical conditions should not desire to eat certain things that are essential.
The pattern here if you noticed by now, it's survival. We eat to survive. We reproduce to survive in part, to some extent, that part of us which is our genetic information.
If we have a situation that doesn't make a difference in survival, so be it. No point of mine .
"People who suffer from chronic mental or psychological distress are not in a position where they can take care of themselves adequately, much less any children. This includes, for instance, people with severe schizophrenia, or severe delusional disorder. One would be hard-pressed to see it as ethically wrong for people who can hardly care for themselves, and desire not to have children. "
I pretty much covered this with the basis above about survival. If you have a situation not helping you to survive, it would be a contradiction to what I'm explaining.
Also in context, you see I'm only referring to people that have socially be deterred. Not niche compromised situations.
I'm talking about those that are not compromised that do compromise themselves.
Those that are already compromised, it's already over for them. Why discuss them ?
Well the context I'm dealing with is irrefutable, that's why.
"Producing offspring is not necessary for every individual to survive"
Are you saying it's necessary for some or for none?
If it's necessary for some , why not everyone?
Isn't everyone aiming to live aiming to survive?
That's why we consume food. It's to survive. That goes along with your next statement here.
"whereas consuming nutrition on a fundamental level is"
You're going to have to present proof that sexual reproduction is not a survival function such as breathing air, blood being pumped and consuming food.
When any one of these things are hindered to any extent, it compromises the quality of life and survival probability.
Someone with asthma has a compromised survival rate. That's a fact you call a ramble and I hold a greater regard than that for people with that condition.
"and our species is not in a position in which we need to increase fertility for the survival of the human race. "
This is pretty much indicating that the world is heavily populated, so no harm. Am I right?
You're looking at it on an individual level. One person alone creates no harm to the world population. Just because one cigarette wouldn't mean presumably I dropped dead right now that the one doesn't affect my health in contrast if I would of skipped one puff .
It's not just about dropping dead now or the population going extinct overnight. Remember what I said about a slow death . A gradual compromised living.
Just skipping out on passing genetic material and continuing that is the first line of extinction. Then everything accumulates from there.
If it's anything I try to get folks to understand is the principle in the big picture.
"Pro also argues without evidence that our bodies are implemented in a fashion that creates people to desire to have children. "
You can accept this or not. I know of no wall that can accept anything. Not able to reject anything for that matter.
Our bodies are the evidence. People desire , crave for food. As our bodies rely on energy from food. Our bodies crave sex to transit seminal fluid point blank.
Now if you know none of this, you're ignorant or suppressing the truth or evidence, whatever.
So when we hinder any of these survival mechanisms from our bodies , we compromise survival. We make a compromise making a deal of not dying instantly, not living long term. It's a mixture of the two reducing the life span, cutting down the life expectancy and probability.
We do this with a lack of active healthy lifestyles, diet and sexual reproduction as well as not doing things that are healthy for our sexual reproductive organs.
Before you jump off with people that are physically disabled that are not able to have an active healthy lifestyle, these context clues gives you no clue I'm talking about them.
We do and don't do or make do or don't. You can read that anyway you want.
I have no point in discussing what somebody obviously can't do like not being able to prolong life.
Con
#6
x.1 Negation
- Pro has made no objection to my constructive syllogism. This entails that pro needs to establish an ethical wrong in desiring not to have children, a position he has currently failed to argue. His implications that childbearing is necessary for survival hold no relevance in our current age in which we have a population of over 7 billion, and the survival of the human race is not remotely in question. If anything, having more children will push the population past the Earth's carrying capacity, at a certain threshold.
- Note that my argument does not just apply to the cases I listed for P2. It applies to every single human that exists. Pro needs to argue why it is ethically wrong to desire not to have children for any person. However, my P2 affirmations further solidify the case against the resolution. All that is necessary is to show that one person in the world can ethically desire not to have children.
P2
x.3 Severe Disability/Severe Inheritable Disease
This is like saying somebody that's bleeding slowly to death would not want anybody else to do the same.
- Yes absolutely.
x.4 Poverty
Again, barely surviving on the route to a diminishing of life. If you ever paid a notice to anything said in the first round, the context is regarding biological survival functions which you have no refutation for. If you do, take it up with biology, biology sets it up .
- This is a ramble that is not relevant to this contention and exhibits no refutation to my argument. Having children is not imperative to the survival of the human race presently (see x.1).
x.5 Severe psychological condition
I pretty much covered this with the basis above about survival. If you have a situation not helping you to survive, it would be a contradiction to what I'm explaining.
- See x.1.
- Cumulatively, pro has not refuted any of my arguments.
a. Rebuttal(s)
You're looking at it on an individual level. One person alone creates no harm to the world population. Just because one cigarette wouldn't mean presumably I dropped dead right now that the one doesn't affect my health in contrast if I would of skipped one puff .
- Pro admits here that he is not arguing on an individual basis, meaning he concedes that he is not attacking the ethicacy of the resolution to all people.
Our bodies are the evidence. People desire , crave for food. As our bodies rely on energy from food. Our bodies crave sex to transit seminal fluid point blank.
- This does not prove that having children is necessary for survival. If it is in respect to the human race, I will simply extend x.1.
b. Is-Ought problem.
- Dropped. Extend.
Conclusion
- Pro has not made an argument, talk less of a valid one, that proves it is unethical to desire to not have children (in order to disprove premise two: x.1).
- Pro has not refuted any of the cases I presented by showing that desire not to have children would be unethical in them.
- Pro argues that having children is necessary for the survival of the human race, which in our current society, is far from true.
Round 4
Pro
#7
"This entails that pro needs to establish an ethical wrong in desiring not to have children, a position he has currently failed to argue."
Just amazes me. I guess nobody has to argue if we're damn near extinct or very small number of folks on the planet. Scary worldview of yours.
"His implications that childbearing is necessary for survival hold no relevance in our current age in which we have a population of over 7 billion, and the survival of the human race is not remotely in question."
If childbearing is not necessary for survival, then you should have no problem with nobody childbearing anymore. See your antihuman worldview .
Along with the support of abortion . The same monster.
"If anything, having more children will push the population past the Earth's carrying capacity, at a certain threshold."
Oh so the very thing that helps us survive will destroy us. It's that same monster. Now if that wasn't your point, so what?
So what?
"Pro needs to argue why it is ethically wrong to desire not to have children for any person. However, my P2 affirmations further solidify the case against the resolution. All that is necessary is to show that one person in the world can ethically desire not to have children. "
It is wrong for any person to desire not have to have children due to the hindrance of survival.
But wait, this is where you say it doesn't count for a person with this biological survival function because ironically it won't help them survive. Right ,they don't count as any person that should desire sexually reproducing due to surviving themselves which would mean prolonging themselves in any extent, form or fashion.
Just like it doesn't count for a renal disease patient to eat certain vegetables but we still say it's unhealthy not to eat vegetables. Any unhealthy person that way due to the lack of vegetables is incorrect.
I believe you want to make this "context-less " or lesser than, but I'll continue to tie it down in proper context.
Just as the next response, it looks like you get the idea about that context of somebody, someone not surviving.
"This is like saying somebody that's bleeding slowly to death would not want anybody else to do the same. "
"Yes absolutely. "
Yes that is absolute.
Is my position about survival or non survival?
Which one is it?
One side of the position I'm pushing for survival by following our natural bodily instinct. The other side, the same instinct would destroy us.
This position would negate itself.
It has to one or the other for the sake of consistency.
To argue survival by those transmitting sexual diseases cutting the life span is a non sequitur.
We can take a lot of things that can be done properly to perform incorrectly to make them incongruous.
We can do that with exercise, vegetables, drinking water.
We can flip any of this around to demonstrate them as wrong to do based on the given circumstances laid out .
"This is a ramble that is not relevant to this contention and exhibits no refutation to my argument."
In short , you have no refutation to my point, understandable.
"Having children is not imperative to the survival of the human race presently"
Then you have no problem with no one sexually reproducing .
Somehow we won't go extinct. You have to prove that.
Our biological function says different.
"Cumulatively, pro has not refuted any of my arguments. "
Do you admit you're painting a different picture?
My portrait is the survival of life. You're looking at niche situations to contradict but it doesn't refute our natural survival functionality.
Like I say, I can argue that any healthy person consuming vegetables for health is valid.
You substitute any person for one poor in health or subpar that has a malignant onion allergy.
"Pro admits here that he is not arguing on an individual basis, meaning he concedes that he is not attacking the ethicacy of the resolution to all people."
The contrary, I'm dealing with both levels.
"You're looking at it on an individual level. One person alone creates no harm to the world population. Just because one cigarette wouldn't mean presumably I dropped dead right now that the one doesn't affect my health in contrast if I would of skipped one puff ."
No where in here did I say I'm not arguing at the individual level.
My point is your view at the individual level is off concerning harm.
Just because I don't drop dead right now, the one cigarette wouldn't mean my health is not affected.
It's all in accumulation. The damage has to start somewhere. You can look at one iota and add from there to get the problem we'll have on a larger scale.
"This does not prove that having children is necessary for survival."
Then you have to prove that we will survive ourselves including our genes without sexually reproducing.
Every time you say this, you make a claim but prove it.
To say we won't go extinct without this reproduction, are you claiming we're immortal?
Don't go that far to be intellectually dishonest.
So in this precise statement and point, sum up your understanding, you readers from the following.
Any person that is or to survive should not want to not produce offspring.
I'll rephrase it. Choose which one you like, is more comfortable, whatever.
Any person or no person should not want to not produce offspring due to the hindrance of survival.
Either way you splice it, we're specifying of any persons.
Con
#8
x.1 Negation
- At this stage, all that is needed is to extend and draw from the previous round's x2. Pro has no objected to any aspect of my syllogism, and while accepting all premises he has not established an ethical wrong with any person desiring not to have children.
- Firstly, the pro continues to misunderstand my response to his contention, however, I am not too concerned with this; my job is to refute his arguments not to educate him.
- Cumulatively, remember that pro's assertions on the survival of the human race are irrelevant as humanity is not in a stage where everyone needs to have children for our survival. In fact, we are approaching overpopulation so pro's odd assertions don't even apply to the current state of reality.
x.2 Ethics
- Observing my constitutive syllogism, pro is making a claim where he must show it is unethical for anyone to desire to have children. Pro has not even attempted to make this argument despite making no objection to either of my aforementioned premises. Theorizing situations that are in-congruent with reality does not give evidence of this.
P2
- Recall from the previous round that "that my argument does not just apply to the cases I listed for P2. It applies to every single human that exists...however, my P2 affirmations further solidify the case against the resolution. All that is necessary is to show that one person in the world can ethically desire not to have children."
x.3 Severe Disability/Severe Inheritable Disease
- Dropped. Extend.
x.4 Poverty
Then you have no problem with no one sexually reproducing.
- This is both a non-sequitur as well as not relevant to the claim that no one, "not a single person," should desire not to have children.
x.5 Severe psychological condition
- On this note, I do not detect a single response from pro where he establishes an ethical wrong with desiring not to have children if one is in a critical psychological condition.
x.Verdict
- Not only has pro failed to establish an ethical wrong with anyone desiring to have children, but he also has not established an ethical wrong with the individuals I have shown in these cases, which supplements my case against the resolution.
b. Is-Ought problem.
- Pro completely drops this point of the debate, and so it is extended.
Conclusion
- With the instigators only vaguely constructive argument being irrelevant to the resolution, an entire syllogism dropped, as well as several arguments, it is self-evident as to who has won this debate.
Criterion
Pro
Tie
Con
Points
Winner
1 point(s)
Reason:
I did not feel pro was able to rebut the Severe Disability/Severe Inheritable Disease adequately enough to warrant a win.
Since pro seemed to stop arguing against that point, it appears he conceded that point. Mind you, the way the debate was set up made it pretty easy for con to find the one exception to the rule as laid out by pro at the start of the debate. I believe Con proved that exception in the case of Severe Disability/Severe Inheritable Disease people, especially in the case of having such a severe disability that it nullifies the natural urge to procreate.
Dumb and liberally brainwashed.
Put the topic to the test. No person in the world desiring to have children, each of you championing human extinction.
Anyways, congratz Novice.
Well I wasn't done reading and pondering all the points of the debate, so I couldn't even decide who I thought won. If I had done that in time, I would've made a placeholder vote and explained my voting decision later in the comments. Oh well. It seems like somebody was able to vote in time, so it doesn't bother me.
Thanks a lot, I was worried.
I really need a vote for this. There are 40 minutes left. Can anyone please vote on this debate?
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>Reported Vote: Undefeatable // Mod action: Removed
>Voting Policy: info.debateart.com/terms-of-service/voting-policy
>Points Awarded: 1 point to Con
>Reason for Decision:
I am terribly sorry pro but I cannot understand a word of what his argument is saying. Conis straightforward with issues of poverty and disability. Mall might have been arguing for anti abortion but it’s horribly unclear.
>Reason for Mod Action:
The voter must assess specific points made by both debaters and determine how well they support their positions. Even if one side's argument is borderline indecipherable, there still must be some assessment of individual points made or, at minimum, examples of what made the debater's argument so difficult to parse. Even with Con, the voter just says that Con had two issues that were straightforward, which doesn't assess how well they functioned under this resolution. Stating that they were straightforward alone is insufficient.
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The vote from undefeatable is an unacceptable RFD
Can either of you cast a vote for this debate, if you have time? I have around two days left.
I have two days left for this, and it is a very straight forward decision.
I have two days left for this, and it is a very straight forward decision.
Votes needed.
Votes needed, 4 days left.
I was raised by capitalist muslims. I blame them.
How un-north-korean of you to say.
Downgrading personal choice to logical evaluation based on someone elses standards and not the standards of the person making the choice negates the point of personal choice.
Sure, there may be benefits to having children. There may be downsides. Its really up to the person to estimate what he or she prefer.
You could say that not having offspring is equal to murdering your offspring due to results being the same. But thats just the problem with consistency in societys morality and not the problem of the person itself.