Better Never to Have Been? : A Critique of David Benatar’s Axiological Asymmetry Argument for Antinatalism

Abstract: David Benatar’s axiological asymmetry argument for antinatalism states that it is always bad for a sentient being to come into existence. There has been a lot of discussion about this argument since its publication in 2006, but this discussion has often been lacking by not accepting some ground rules, or assumptions, that Benatar establishes. In this paper I accept these ground rules, which is the person-affecting view, and the idea that the axiological asymmetry argument provides a lot of explanatory power, by single handedly being able to explain four other, primafacie plausible asymmetries. In this paper I investigate these other asymmetries to see (i) if they are true and (ii) if some other, more plausible theory, can explain them. My investigation shows that two of these asymmetries are false when understood in a theoretical way. When these two asymmetries are understood in a practical way, they are true, but then they don’t lend support to the axiological asymmetry argument. The third asymmetry, while true, is better explained by the so-called existence requirement. The fourth asymmetry, while true, doesn’t lend support to the axiological asymmetry argument since it doesn’t provide anything new to this argument. The conclusion drawn from this is that the explanatory power of the axiological asymmetry argument, with regards to these other asymmetries, is not that strong, which in effect weakens the plausibility of the axiological asymmetry argument for antinatalism.