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Comment by toasterlovin | Hacker News Reader

We have 3 kids and will probably have a go at a 4th next year sometime. Bringing new children into this world is probably the hardest thing you'll ever do. There's no way to be prepared. You just jump into the fire and wing it until you start figuring things out. And it's utterly exhausting for a couple of years. But I can tell you that being a parent is the most meaningful part of my life.

By a long shot.

So I would say this: if you want to live life on easy mode and enjoy all the little pleasures that modern life has to offer, then don't have kids. I say that without judgement; your life is yours to live as you see fit. But if you want meaning, if you want to struggle for something more important than yourself, and if you want to leave something enduring behind when you depart from this world, then have some kids.

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> But if you want meaning, ..., then have some kids.

Or anything else that involves devoting time other beings: homeless feeding drives, mentoring disadvantaged people about programming, working in an elderly home, etc.

The feeling of being part of something broader doesn't only come from having children sorry.

Sure, you can find meaning in other things. But play the odds. Almost nobody finds much meaning in their jobs. There is meaning to be found in being a spouse, but being a parent often outlasts being a spouse. And almost every parent you speak to will tell you that their kids are the most important undertaking of their life.

Beautifully stated.

We've had 6 children. It's hectic, loud, chaotic, frenetic, and exhausting. But I'm having the time of my life and super happy to have such a wonderful cacophony trailing around all the time.

Children are special, but not for everyone.

It's amazing how much going to work feels like play time to me now that I've had children! You can generally take a break, go to the bathroom, etc whenever you feel like it, but depending on the age of the child(ren) at home, such activities often seem like luxuries to squeeze in whenever you finally have a moment to do so. I've generally felt like the most difficult challenges at work are easier than some of the problems when caring for kids, but the joys of children far outshine the best jobs I've ever had.

"I say that without judgement [...] But if you want meaning"

Pull the other one. The judgment is very obvious. Just go ahead and own your opinion. (For the record, I do plan to raise children.)

Seriously. No judgement. It's your life, so figure out how you want to live it and go wild.

I put things in stark terms, though, because I think children are, if we're being realistic, one of the only routes to a life with meaning available to the vast majority of people. Most people do not have fulfilling careers. Most marriages fall apart at some point. Children are forever, though.

And I think people need meaning in their lives. If you're a person who is deeply into some other calling and you think that can sustain you for your entire life, then go for it. I can think of many people in my life who could probably find a lot of meaning without children. But they're not the majority of the people I know. And yet the majority of the peers on my Facebook are not on track to ever have children.

> I think children are, if we're being realistic, one of the only routes to a life with meaning available to the vast majority of people.

https://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/Typical_mind_fallacy

FWIW, all you've put forward in this thread are ad hominen attacks. If you think most people's lives have a source of deep meaning that is not their children, then I'm all ears. But that's not at all what I see when I look out into the world.

It's not an ad hominem to say that you're failing to imagine how else someone could get meaning out of their life. I agree with you that lots of people find having children to be the most important, rewarding experience they have; it does not follow that childless people's lives are lacking in meaning. Parent-child relationships are not the only meaningful ones, for one thing. And then achievements or practices outside of p2p relationships can be tremendously satisfying — meditation, religious experience, mastery of a craft. These are just examples.

Until the paragraph you had just written, you hadn't put forward any argument addressing anything I had said. First you dismissed me as judgmental. Then you dismissed me as having a myopic view of the world. Those are ad hominem arguments.

Regarding what you just wrote, here's me acknowledging that there is meaning to be found outside of children (which, logically, implies that childless people can find meaning):

> I can think of many people in my life who could probably find a lot of meaning without children.

My argument is about playing the odds. Children are the most meaningful thing in most people's lives. Most people do not find many of the other things they spend time on meaningful (their career and, proxied through their spending, consumption of goods and services). As a result, I think it's a pretty good default strategy to have children. Which is why I promote that strategy whenever somebody is on the fence (OP sounded like they were on the fence, after all).

But if you've thought seriously about it and decide that there's something else you'd rather do with your life, then by all means, follow your heart.

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