Virtual Wits Philosophy Research Seminar: 16 September 2021 - Asheel Singh (UJ)

[Mary Carman]

 

Virtual Wits Philosophy Research Seminar

 

Asheel Singh

(University of Johannesburg)

 

“The Metaphysics of Anti-Natalism”

 

Thursday, 16 September 2021

14:00 – 16:00

 

You need to register in advance for the Zoom webinar here: https://wits-za.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJUqceysqjIvG9VSJ63hRteF1DN9JDvziE0x

 

Abstract:

My aim in this talk is to draw attention to what is assumed, but never explicitly stated, in contemporary arguments for anti-natalism. What is assumed is a thoroughgoing materialist metaphysics, according to which consciousness arises from inert matter. I concede here that if this metaphysical framework is true, then anti-natalism is true—that is to say, if procreation involves the creation of consciousness (in which the experience of suffering is unavoidable), then it is morally wrong to procreate. But, as I will discuss, there is an ancient challenge to materialism, one that has recently garnered attention as a solution to the ‘hard problem’ of consciousness (Chalmers 1995). Advaita Vedānta is the ancient Indian philosophical system that takes as its first principle the notion that all conscious beings are but manifestations of an ‘absolute’ consciousness; cosmopsychism can be viewed as the modern restatement of this view. Procreation, then, may not in fact involve the creation of consciousness, for, within an Advaitin or cosmopsychist framework, consciousness is neither created nor lost; rather, consciousness is all that there is. This discussion serves less as a refutation of contemporary anti-natalism, and more as suggestion of new directions worth pursuing by anti-natalists.

 

Upcoming talks:

• 30 September: Barbara Vetter (Freie Universität Berlin), ‘Knowledge of Ability’
• 14 October: Ashley Coates (Wits)

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