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Comment by dsign | Hacker News Reader

I was thinking the other day, "why do we have kids?"

The most noble, selfless reason I could think of is "so that they try again". I say, the "most noble" because people have plenty of more selfish reasons: "they'll make me feel better", "to make me a better person", "to keep up with the expectations of my friends and family", "they'll give me comfort when I'm old and frail", "they will care for me". And then no-reasons such as "it's the way things are", and "everybody does it", and "god wants it".

But I prefer mine: "so that they try again". Try what? To right the wrongs, to succeed where we failed. But that is a mirror: if my kids inherit the world of my failures, can I look back into my soul and say that I tried hard enough? When the day they lose something precious comes, and they understand this world is mostly darkness, will I be able to look them in the eyes and say that I tried hard enough to beget the light they crave?

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I think the answer is pretty simple--life is beautiful. And it's great to share that beauty.

> can I look back into my soul and say that I tried hard enough?

Imagine, if you will a large endless expanse. Clear skies above, but as you look to the floor you realize it's made of people. Compacted like tetris pieces, as far as the eye can see. You're standing there, presumably atop some people right then and there. What do you do? Do you walk forward? You'll step on the bodies; the people. Do you stand still? Won't that invalidate your life? Aren't you allowed to live?

Making that decision is trying hard enough. We all had to do it, and luckily, we did it at an age we can no longer remember; right when we were born. We decided to venture forth and try. You tried hard enough because you tried, period. That is enough.

Nah, I just want to create my own team, a bunch of people who care about each other, together exploring this beautiful world.

Give life

If you don't hate existence, raising children can also just be seen as paying back for yours. I like that view.

Unless they want humanity to end, a childless person has to hope other people don't agree with their lifestyle. If everyone had 2 kids everything would be fine. If everyone was childless humanity would end.

> And then no-reasons such as

These are the reasons, which don't start from an egocentric perspective, but try to reason about it from an absolute point. Why wouldn't they be reasons?

Two of them are not reasons, as in cause, but mere observations. The last one, involving god, needs a person to believe in a good god. A person who doesn't believe, or who would use reason to deduce that a putative god is evil, would find it as an anti-reason.

We reproduce to perpetuate human life. Life is the only good thing in the universe, and humam life is the best (pending future discoveries.)

There's definitely a cluster of personalities overrepresented in the population of parents.

Historically, there has been a lot of pressure to reproduce, but in the modern era this doesn't always make as much sense. I wish there was more research to clarify this phenomena.

We'd potentially be avoiding a lot of grief and angst during young adulthood for those who choose not to be parents if they more clearly understood why it doesn't "feel right". That grief and angst from choosing "wrong" potentially translates to cases of mental illnesses in the children at best and domestic abuse at worst. Even when couples choose not to have children, they can still be very unhappy. It's as much a matter of social justice as it is health.

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