A Look at the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement | Hacker News Reader

A Look at the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement

theawl.com

32 pointspmcpinto57 comments

The entire point about being careful of our environmental impact is because we are destroying our own habitat. Sure, the advent of human civilization might be a mass extinction event, but the Earth had these before, and nature will go on. Nature is going to be fine. It's humanity who's potentially in trouble, not the planet.

For us to die out voluntarily in order to preserve nature is completely backwards. The correct way of thinking about this is we're changing nature until it becomes hard or impossible for us to live here. So in a sense, our default path is already one of self-extinction. If we turn that around (and I'm cautiously optimistic we will), nobody needs to die out.

It's not us XOR the planet. It's us AND the planet.

Humans have a very strong cultural and genetic drive to ensure that their family survives and thrives. This drive is strong enough that sacrificing oneself for ones family is not surprising behaviour.

This drive has been exploited for good and evil by tribes, nations, religions, social movements, football teams, et cetera.

Extending this sense of "us" to include all humans seems to be the logical conclusion.

However, many people extend this sense of "us" to include all cuddly animals, all animals, all multi-cellular organisms, any life, ... I think that's silly, but perhaps 100 years from now people will think my attitude is just as morally repugnant as my view of those who think black people are sub-human.

I expect this movement to die off eventually.

All things are temporary all we have is a little bit of time. Everything you care about, everything you are, is eventually dust. All your ideas and your history is very short lived.

So yes everything dies eventually, these guys are just looking to speed up the process. As if that will "save" the planet.

We are animals, we should live like them and not worry about anything. You think a squirrel cares about all the stupid shit other squirrels are doing to the planet?

I don't control my own life. Hold on the universe... hah. I am simply here, soon I won't be here. That's all that there is to this. We are infinitesimally small and our lives are infinitesimally short. And the amount of power we have in the human systems that we inhabit are much smaller than that. We are little more than bees that are obsessed with things that should not concern us.

edit: in response to user temporal below, because it's rate limiting me.

> conscious, self-aware, sentient beings on this planet

no we are none of those things. we believe we are, but we are actually not. our systems behave much like systems of any other animal we just consume different things from other animals but we're little more than bees.

> . That is, perserving ecosystem is better than destroying it because we like it that way.

i like other bees don't care about the eco-system. i care about the nectar from the flowers so i can go on. the nectar exists for me. and without me what would be the point of the nectar?

Do you believe that or are you just summarizing their position?

Those guys are missing one crucial insight - values are features of mind, not of matter. And since as far as we know, we're the only conscious, self-aware, sentient beings on this planet, it means values are in our minds. That is, perserving ecosystem is better than destroying it because we like it that way. Yes, in a way, it's all about us. If humans were to go extinct, the Earth would be like a Disneyland with no children to enjoy it. Without purpose.

> no we are none of those things. we believe we are, but we are actually not

I don't see how you can know this. More justification is required. Saying something doesn't make it true. This sounds a lot like nihilism, so if so, why bother?

By that I am guessing he means that we are different from all the other beings on this planet. That we are "conscious, self-aware, sentient beings". I am totally not conscious of what is going on in my environment right now, and even if I were there isn't much I can do about it more than a few feet from my house. It's like my neighbor is doing this or that to destroy the planet, meh. Self-aware? Nope. I am aware I exist but lots of stuff is going on in my head that I am totally unaware of, why I feel the way I do, I don't know. I am further conditioned by the system not to respond to much of the stimulus with threats of death or imprisonment... much like in nature. Do I feel, yes I feel, but there isn't much to do about how I feel other than work more so I can buy more.

My thesis: people in terms of the amount of agency they have are little more than animals. They gather resources so they can continue to live. They have little agency to do anything about anything. They are conditioned to worry about things that they have no control over. They see this as a sign of intelligence, I don't. For me as a human being worrying about shit the system is doing is above my pay grade... much like other animals on this planet.

> We are animals, we should live like them and not worry about anything.

Why does living like animals specifically mean not worrying about anything? Why not "we are animals, we should live like them and not cook food, wear clothes, write novels, perform life-saving surgery..."

Not cook food (raw vegans), wear clothes (nudists), write novels (a few people write), perform life saving surgery (a few people perform surgeries).

All these things are things and realities people consume because they can consume them -- they have the ability to buy these things by performing work.

Dogs like watching television, if wolves could buy tvs they would all buy tvs and eat microwave dinners because it's easy to do that and it's possible... because they could do it, they have technology to do it. They, like your dog, would still be the same animals.

Reality is what we can consume because we can build those things using technology and other animals also use technology to build things but they can't do it to the same extent that we can, we however are still animals.

Which basically means nothing at all.

Yes, we're animals, but we're smarter than the rest of our animal brethren, so why should we not use that smarts to live in whatever way we like? Animals that can fly, fly. Animals that can sing, sing. So let animals that can send machines to other planets send machines to other planets.

Evidently from the article, humans are different from other animals in that we are concerned with concepts like "purpose".

A purpose is a story you tell your self in order to continue to do what all the other animals on the planet do, gather resources so you can go on to tomorrow. If you have many many resources, and most don't, that you no longer need any more resources then you think about other things. And then you might try to do something about those other things, though you still have to put up with other people and their need to gather resources. The economic problem is specifically a problem with other people's need to gather resources. To function in the economic system. You can't do anything about that. You can try to change the game a little bit, but the same game must be played and by more and more people.

This is why leadership can't do much about environmental problems. At the end of the day they must protect and create jobs. The environment is a very small peripheral issue and you can pay little attention to and still get away with it.

> i like other bees don't care about the eco-system. i care about the nectar from the flowers so i can go on.

No ecosystem -> no flowers -> no nectar -> no honey bee.

You don't have to give a fig about the ecosystem in itself, as an object, to care about the effects of damaging or destroying it on yourself and the rest of us and our descendants.

I agree with you that we are animals, but even other animals care about the welfare of each other and their descendants. Even squirrels will risk their lives to protect their offspring, and bees will sacrifice their lives in defence of the colony. Fortunately for us, we are able to anticipate and take action to prevent longer term threats to our welfare and that of those we care about. We should do so.

> You don't have to give a fig about the ecosystem in itself, as an object, to care about the effects of damaging or destroying it on yourself and the rest of us and our descendants.

But if the destruction is slow, you do have to care about the other bees.

Please tell me you meant that comment as an epic pun... :)

Humanity is not the first life form to transform the Earth's climate, causing tremendous damage to the biosphere[1], and we may or may not be the last. Just like any other species we will last as long as we can last, and go extinct when we can no longer maintain a hold on the universe.

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Oxygenation_Event

Fortunately extinction isn't the only possible outcome for a species. There's also evolution. Otherwise there would be no living things left on the planet.

Or just surviving, without evolving.

Unfortunately, as humans we care primarily about individuals who are alive, not about species in the abstract. Which means any outcome involving humans suffering and dying is an outcome we don't want.

Sadly, the only possible outcomes without humans suffering and dying are outcomes without humans.

"humans are responsible for every environmental catastrophe"

My God; what incredible conceit.

Compared with the billions of years of eruptions, earthquakes, extinctions, meteorite impacts, ice ages, droughts, floods, and just the relentless and deadly drive of all organisms on the planet to survive at the expense of their competitors, the effect of human beings on this planet is insignificant.

I guess what you're saying can be discussed:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_impact_on_the_environmen...

Humans have had an effect on the environment. On some scales, a big effect. But it's certainly wildly incorrect (and absurd) to say that all environmental damage is caused by humans. And I think it's also pretty unarguable that the vast majority of the damage (a concept that is I suppose anyway subjective) over the lifetime of the planet is not human-caused.

False dichotomy. It's not "either it's all our fault or nothing is our fault". There's also the obvious middle-ground: we have an impact but other things have an impact too.

We turn vast stretches of land upside down in search of coal. We drill deep holes into the ground and pollute the water in search of oil. We excavate mountains. We then burn that oil and coal producing vast amounts of noxious fumes. We selectively breed cattle, introduce foreign species to new ecosystems. We change the course of rivers, create new islands and water the deserts.

It's absurd to think that we are the only thing affecting Earth's ecosystem and biosphere, but it's not any less naive to think we don't leave our mark.

>It's not "either it's all our fault or nothing is our fault"

I don't believe I ever said any such thing.

If you care about animal suffering, human extinction is exactly the wrong way to solve the problem. Without humans, there will still be pain. Wasps will lay eggs in caterpillars until the Sun goes out. Intelligence is our only hope for abolishing suffering, not just for us but for all living creatures.

I was pondering the same idea, but to stop animal from suffering in nature you need to stop all food chains above plants. Right?

Maybe just genetically engineer them to feel no fear or pain at the moment of being eaten?

Imagine a nature reserve where predators were air-dropped cultured meat, and drones tracked predators and administered a non-lethal deterrent like a targeted acoustic weapon at a lion chasing a baby elephant.

The herbivore population would be kept in equilibrium with future-contraceptives.

It's a tricky thing, an abortion-level tricky thing actually. At the top of life's process you have humans, and human death is obviously Bad. At the bottom of life you have simple chemical reactions, which are obviously Quite Cool. The line will have to be drawn somewhere in between, but we need to figure out where.

Personally, I expect it to be somewhere above plants and bugs and below kittens. But then, I'm a bit biased about bugs - I tend to think about them as either "those ugly annoying things" or "cool high-tech drones we'll hopefully program one day". And I'm definitely biased about kittens.

So what are you going to do, commit genocide against all the wasps? Not that I am necessarily against genocide in all cases. If every single HIV virus or anthrax bacterium was wiped off the face of the planet I would shed no tears, but you need to think through a position like yours. Are you in favour of whale eradication due to their predation of Krill?

I don't advocate killing anyone just yet. My preferred approach is more like "transhumanism, merging utility functions, worldwide cooperation, singleton entity, reshaping the world with infinite care". The eventual solution could be as mild as ecosystem redesign, or as extreme as moving all life into simulations. Whatever maximizes humanity's utility function, which I don't claim to understand yet.

A fellow abolitionist!

For the people wondering how, here is an essay by David Pierce on some possibilities for how humanity could reduce suffering in the animal kingdom.

http://www.hedweb.com/transhumanism/humanity-plus.html

Reminds me of "Transhumanism as Simplified Humanism"[0].

[0] - http://www.yudkowsky.net/singularity/simplified/

The response to the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement was written before the movement appeared. By no other than the great George Carlin: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ovbF0D2wySI

tldr; The Earth is fine; We are in trouble

Interesting to see an article about this on HN. I consider myself an antinatalist. Antinatalism is a philosophical position that assigns a negative value to birth, and by extension, that it's immoral to have children. However, I think it's silly to try to promote it as a world view others should adopt. It's contrary to our most basic biological instincts. There is absolutely no chance for it to succeed as a movement. I also don't find the environment argument compelling. Our world has no inherent value other than the utility it provides for the creatures who live here. For me, antinatalism is just an issue of individual morality and not something to push as a political or social cause.

Out of interest, what is the individual moral argument--unrelated to environment or functional externalities like that--against procreation?

Essentially that you're rolling the dice in a lot of ways when you have a child. They could be born with serious medical problems. Something terrible could happen to them through no fault of their own, like being in an accident or being the victim of a crime. Every human being will experience pain, sadness, and suffering in some way at some point in their lives. At the very least, they will have to face the foreknowledge of their own death, and the loss of family and friends that die before them. Creating a child forces a being to experience all these things that would otherwise never have had to. In an antinatalist world view, the possibility or even guarantee of good things happening to the child does not "balance out" or justify forcing them to experience negative things.

I also don't want to have any part in contributing to humanity's self destruction and inflicting of suffering on other living things. We are not rational creatures. We largely do whatever we want, including hurting and killing each other, and make up all sorts of justifications for why it's okay. I'm no different in this regard, I just don't want to perpetuate that further.

I'm a vegan, and there is no possible way to live a normal life as a person without having at least some negative effect on animal suffering by proxy. More than likely, the child would be much worse than the best possible case, and would eat meat, eggs, cheese, and use other non-food products made from animals.

And beyond all of these reasons, there is just the fact that a person cannot consent to being born. If I had a child, they would be quite likely not to have such a pessimistic view of their own life, but there's no way to know that in advance. I would be making the choice for them because of what I wanted. I see having children as an extremely selfish and destructive act.

Thanks for the explanation. It's something worth pondering.

Luckily for us, they'll all be dead before they can do any serious damage to humanity.

Elaborate, please. What damage would that be? Less people on Earth? How is that damage to humanity?

I'd pretty much count extinction as damage to humanity.

Everything is harmful in high doses. That said, a little bit wouldn't hurt ... :fff

By then, nobody will be left to care.

After having read the book Sapiens, I finally understood how a thriving human population happened basically at the cost of millions of other species that went exctinct. So the philosophical question I see here is whether an extinct humanity which would let other species live and thrive, would be a good or bad thing. Not that I have an answer. But I find it worthwile to question the paradigm of human reproduction for the sake of human reproduction.

Looks like we need to the millennium group: "As the 3rd millennium approached, the Group's internal differences began to manifest into two factions—the "Roosters", who believed in a religiously eschatological view of the end of the world, and the "Owls", who believed the world would end with a secular natural disaster. Attempting to instigate the end of the world artificially, the Rooster faction began to develop a lethal virus; in 1998 they released this virus in the Pacific Northwest, killing upwards of seventy people before the outbreak was contained. A year later, a vastly depleted Millennium Group staged one last attempt to trigger the apocalypse, resurrecting deceased members in order to create the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse; when this plot was foiled by the FBI, it was believed to have caused the dissolution of the Group." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennium_Group

Interestingly, some Western societies and Japan are already below the balanced reproduction rate. Not set to die out as fast as possible, but certainly on a long-time trajectory to radically less people (migration not factored in).

Maybe, given enough gadgets and holiday opportunities, and the hedonistic treadmill required to finance all this, H. Sapiens chooses to not reproduce but live well instead.

Then someone eventually will see this and say we need more people for economy, but they aren't bumping uglies. So let's cut out the middle people.

And then you'll have government mandated population quotas.

Like all other animals, we don't generally pause to critically examine the merits of the instincts that drive our behavior. Unlike all other animals, we're actually capable of doing so! I applaud VHEMT for openly and critically considering one of our basic built-in drives.

That said, I disagree with their conclusion. VHEMT is right that we are too intelligent and successful for a mere animal. I don't think this means we must die. I think it means we must become something more.

It is kind of stupid in my opinion. like x5n1 said we are too small but we think we are making the difference who know the grass and dog might think the same... We still dont know most of the things like. What is inside earth , how water came, where are we now in universe, etc..etc... With out knowing all atleast most of the parameters it is foolish to think we are causing the damage. Who knows if there are invisible aliens doing or some unknown virus in deep sea doing it... we dont know. we have long way to go and i happy for humans to continue even if it is destroy entire earth livings things then who knows we might mutate and learn to live the way we should like (no corporation no jobs and abundent food and health care and entertainment)

Without humans there would be no one (as far as we currently know) to appreciate and contemplate the beauty of the universe and planet earth. So it would all be pointless.

Oh? And what does contemplating and appreciating the beauty of universe and planet earth accomplish?

It's us who define the concept of 'accomplishing something'. The universe without humans is pointless, because it's us (that we know so far) who say what has a point at what hasn't.

Sounds tautological. Universe without humans is meaningless (in human terms) because we define what meaning is (in human terms).

It does, but then again we don't know of any other source of meaning than ourselves.

Seems like a really silly joke. Like one of those things that will get a reaction from normal people so it makes it fun to participate in and not fooled.

You could just drop the "stop breeding" part and we're still headed towards extinction.

I guess this is a no-lose movement, how convenient :-)

Reply on news.ycombinator.com