Celebrate Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month with These Great Reads

Andy McKenzie's Reviews > Better Never to Have Been: The Harm of Coming into Existence

Better Never to Have Been by David Benatar
Rate this book
Clear rating
1 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars

by
1072037
's review

it was ok

A bit egocentric in its presentation--all about "his views"--although maybe that is typical for philosophy. I want to stress that the 1.5/5 rating is not for the topic itself, which I think is fascinating and worth considering, in appropriate settings, but rather for the actual logic. The outright refusal to make harm/benefit trade-offs, even in theory, is just a non-starter for almost anybody who thinks about this issue. Also it got a bit technical and terminology-heavy at times, which at least from my perspective was not necessary.
5 likes ·  ∙ flag

Sign into Goodreads to see if any of your friends have read Better Never to Have Been.
Sign In »

Reading Progress

Finished Reading
June 13, 2012 – Shelved

Post a comment »
Comments Showing 1-3 of 3 (3 new)

dateDown arrow    newest »

message 1: by J (new) - rated it 3 stars
Sep 23, 2015 08:28AM

J harm/benefit tradeoffs. How about a more objective tradeoff question: what good in this world makes up for genocide?


message 2: by Andy (new) - rated it 2 stars
Sep 23, 2015 08:36AM

Andy McKenzie The possibility of humanity expanding across our future light cone with near-utopian experiences?

(not saying this is likely, but IMO it's plausible and worthy of harm/benefit consideration)


message 3: by Andy (new) - rated it 2 stars
Sep 23, 2015 08:37AM

Andy McKenzie (By the way, I think your question is reasonable and it is *not* what Benatar does, from what I recall.)


back to top