Philosophical pessimism

One of the central points of Buddhism, which originated in ancient India, is the claim that life is full of suffering and unsatisfactoriness. This is known as dukkha from the Four Noble Truths.[17][5]^: 38[18][19]^: 130

In the Ecclesiastes from the Abrahamic religions, which originated in the Middle East, the author laments the meaninglessness of human life,[20] views life as worse than death[21] and expresses antinatalistic sentiments towards coming into existence.[22] These views are made central in Gnosticism, a religious movement stemming from Christianity, where the body is seen as a type of a "prison" for the soul, and the world as a type of hell.[23]

Hegesias of Cyrene, who lived in ancient Greece, argued that lasting happiness cannot be realized because of constant bodily ills and the impossibility of achieving all our goals.[24]^: 92

One argument for the negative view on life is the recognition that evils are unconditionally unacceptable. A good life is not possible with evils in it. This line of thinking is based on Schopenhauer's statement that "the ill and evil in the world... even if they stood in the most just relation to each other, indeed even if they were far outweighed by the good, are nevertheless things that should absolutely never exist in any way, shape or form" in The World as Will and Representation.[25]^: 181 The idea here is that no good can ever erase the experienced evils, because they are of a different quality or kind of importance.

Schopenhauer elaborates on the vital difference between the good and the bad, saying that, "it is fundamentally beside the point to argue whether there is more good or evil in the world: for the very existence of evil already decides the matter since it can never be cancelled out by any good that might exist alongside or after it, and cannot therefore be counterbalanced", and adding that, "even if thousands had lived in happiness and delight, this would never annul the anxiety and tortured death of a single person; and my present wellbeing does just as little to undo my earlier suffering."[25]^: 591

One way of interpreting the argument is by focusing on how one thing could compensate another. The goods can only compensate the evils, when they a) happen to the same subject, and b) happen at the same time. The reason why the good has to happen to the same subject is because the miserable cannot feel the happiness of the joyful, and hence it has no effect on him. The reason why the good has to happen at the same time is because the future joy does not act backwards in time, and so it has no effect on the present state of the suffering individual. But these conditions are not being met, and hence life is not worth living. Here, it doesn't matter whether there are any genuine positive pleasures, because since pleasures and pains are experientially separated, the evils are left unrepaid.[6][26]

Another interpretation of the negativity thesis — that goods are merely negative in character — uses metaphors of debt and repayment, and crime and punishment. Here, merely ceasing an evil does not count as paying it off, just like stopping committing a crime does not amount to making amends for it. The bad can only be compensated by something positively good, just like a crime has to be answered for by some punishment, or a debt has to be paid off by something valuable. If the good is merely taking away an evil, then it cannot compensate for the bad since it's not of the appropriate kind — it's not a positive thing that could "repay the debt" of the bad.[27]

Arthur Schopenhauer introduces an a priori argument for pessimism. The basis of the argument is the recognition that sentient organisms—animals—are embodied and inhabit specific niches in the environment. They struggle for their self-preservation. Striving to satisfy wants is the essence of all organic life.

Schopenhauer posits that striving is the essence of life. All striving, he argues, involves suffering. Thus, he concludes that suffering is unavoidable and inherent to existence. Given this, he says that the balance of good and bad is on the whole negative.

There are a couple of reasons why suffering is a fundamental aspect of life:

Satisfaction is elusive: organisms strive towards various things all the time. Whenever they satisfy one desire, they want something else and the striving begins anew.

Happiness is negative: while needs come to us seemingly out of themselves, we have to exert ourselves in order to experience some degree of joy. Moreover, pleasure is only ever a satisfaction—or elimination—of a particular desire. Therefore, it is only a negative experience as it temporarily takes away a striving or need.

Striving is suffering: as long as striving is not satisfied, it's being experienced as suffering.

Boredom is suffering: the lack of an object of desire is experienced as a discomforting state.[15][26]

Julio Cabrera in his book Discomfort and Moral Impediment advances an argument for the structural valuelessness of human life.

Particular (bad) events cannot be predicted. But human life has some structural features that can be known in advance. These include:
a) humans start to "decay" as soon as they come into being, and their life can end at any moment.
b) the decreasing character of being is characterized by three frictions: physical pain, discouragement, and aggression from others.
c) humans have to constantly create positive values to guard themselves against both a) and b).

These structural features constitute the "terminality of being".

The structural discomfort argument states that life (having the features (a)–(c)) entails discomfort, both physical and moral. Further, the argument claims that such a life is structurally valueless. Positive values appear only within life, amidst the constant struggle against the terminal being given at birth.[28]^: 23–24

Constant unsatisfactoriness — dukkha — is a mark of all sentient existence. Any living creature wants what he doesn't have, avoids what he doesn't like, and feels loss for the things he has lost. All of these types of striving (taṇhā) are sources of suffering, and they are not external but are rather inherent vices (such as greed, lust, envy, self-indulgence) of all living creatures. Furthermore, since in Buddhism one of the central concepts is that of liberation or nirvana, this highlights the miserable character of existence, as there would be no need to make such a great effort to free oneself from a mere "less than ideal state". Since enlightenment is the goal of Buddhist practices through the Noble Eightfold Path, the value of life itself, under this perspective, appears as doubtful.[17]

David Benatar argues that there is a significant difference between lack/presence of harms and benefits when comparing a situation when a person exists with a situation when said person never exists. The starting point of the argument is the following noncontroversial observation:
1. The presence of pain is bad.
2. The presence of pleasure is good.
However, the symmetry breaks when we consider the absence of pain and pleasure:
3. The absence of pain is good, even if that good is not enjoyed by anyone.
4. The absence of pleasure is not bad unless there is somebody for whom this absence is a deprivation.

Based on the above, Benatar infers the following:

• the absence of pain is better in the case where a person never exists than the presence of pain where a person does exist,
• the absence of pleasure is not worse in the case where a person never exists than the presence of pleasure where a person does exists.

In short, the absence of pain is good, while the absence of pleasure is not bad. From this it follows that not coming into existence has advantages over coming into existence for the one who would be affected by coming into the world. This is the cornerstone of his argument for antinatalism — the view that coming into existence is bad.[14]^: 28–59[18]

Arthur Schopenhauer regarded his philosophy not only as a condemnation of existence, but also as a doctrine of salvation that allows one to counteract the suffering that comes from the will to life and attain tranquillity.[7]^: 52 According to Schopenhauer, suffering comes from willing (striving, desiring). Further, one's willing is proportional to one's focus on oneself (one's needs, fears, individuality, etc.). So, Schopenhauer reasons, to interrupt suffering, one has to interrupt willing. And to diminish willing, one has to diminish the focus on oneself. This can be accomplished in a couple of ways.[29][1]^{: 107–108}[30]^{: 375–376}[31]^{: 335–341}

Aesthetic contemplation is the focused appreciation of a piece of art, music, or even an idea. It is disinterested and impersonal. It is disinterested — one's interests give way to the devotion to the object; it's being considered as an end in itself. It is impersonal — not constrained by one's own likes and dislikes. Aesthetic appreciation evokes a universal idea of an object, rather than the perception of the object as unique. During that time, one "loses oneself" in the object of contemplation, and the sense of individuation temporarily dissolves. This is because the universality of the object of contemplation passes onto the subject. One's consciousness becomes will-less. One becomes — if only for a brief moment — a neutral spectator or a "pure subject", unencumbered by one's own self, needs, and suffering.[29][7]^: 60–61[1]^{: 108–110}

For Schopenhauer, a proper moral attitude towards others comes from the recognition that the separation between living beings occurs only in the realm of representation (originating from the principium individuationis). Underneath the representational realm, we are all one. Each person is, in fact, the same Will — only manifested through different objectifications. The suffering of another being is thus our own suffering.[32]^{: 380–381} The recognition of this metaphysical truth allows one to attain a more universal (rather than individualistic) consciousness. In such a universal consciousness, one relinquishes one's exclusive focus on one's own well-being and woe towards that of all other beings.[32]^: 405[29]

Schopenhauer explains that one may go through a transformative experience in which one recognizes that the perception of the world as being constituted of separate things (that are impermanent and constantly striving) is illusory. This can come about through knowledge of the workings of the world or through an experience of extreme suffering.[30]^{: 376–377} One sees through the veil of Maya. This means that one no longer identifies oneself as a separate individual; rather, one recognizes himself as all things. One sees the source of all misery — the Will as the thing-in-itself, which is the kernel of all reality. One can then change one’s attitude to life towards that of the renunciation of the will to life and practice self-denial (not giving in to desires).[32]^{: 405–407}

The person who attains this state of mind lives his life in complete peace and equanimity. He is not bothered by desires or lack; he accepts everything as it is.

This path of redemption, Schopenhauer argues, is more permanent, since it's grounded in a profound recognition that changes one's attitude; it's not merely a fleeting moment as in the case of an aesthetic experience.

The ascetic way of life, however, is not available for everyone. Only a few rare and heroic individuals may be able to live as ascetics and attain such a state. More importantly, Schopenhauer explains, asceticism requires virtue, and virtue can by cultivated but not taught.[29][7]^: 61–62[30]^{: 375–379}

Anthropocentric antinatalism

Some pessimists, most notably Peter Wessel Zapffe and David Benatar, prescribe abstention from procreation as the best response to the ills of life. A person can only do so much to secure oneself from suffering or help others in need. The best course of action, they argue, is to not bring others into a world where discomfort is guaranteed.[14][18]

They also suggest a scenario where humanity decides not to continue to exist, but instead chooses to go down the route of phased extinction. The resulting extinction of the human species would not be regrettable but a good thing.[14]^{: 163–200} They go as far as to prescribe non-procreation as the morally right — or even obligatory — course of action.[12]^{: 207–208}[18] Zapffe coneys this position through the words of the titular Last Messiah: "Know yourselves – be infertile and let the earth be silent after ye".[33]

Wildlife antinatalism

Antinatalism can be extended to animals. Benatar clearly notes that his "argument applies not only to humans but also to all other sentient beings" and that "coming into existence harms all sentient beings".[14]^: 2 He reinforces his view when discussing extinction by saying "it would be better, all things considered, if there were no more people (and indeed no more conscious life)."[14]^: 164

It can be argued that since we have a prima facie obligation to help humans in need, and preventing future humans from coming into existence is helping them, and there is no justification for treating animals worse, we have a similar obligation to animals living in the wild. That is, we should also help alleviate their suffering and introduce certain interventions to prevent them from coming into the world — a position which would be called "wildlife anti-natalism".[34][35]

Some pessimists, including David Benatar and Julio Cabrera, argue that in some extreme situations, such as intense pain, terror, and slavery, people are morally justified to end their own lives. Although this will not resolve the human predicament, it may at the very least stop further suffering or moral degradation of the person in question.[28]^{: 246–249}[12]^{: 163–199}[36] Furthermore, Cabrera says that dying is usually not pleasant nor dignified, so suicide is the only way to choose the way one dies; he writes, "If you want to die well, you must be the artist of your own death; nobody can replace you in that."[28]^: 249

Eduard von Hartmann was against all individualistic forms of abolition of suffering, prominent in Buddhism and in Schopenhauer's philosophy, since they leave the problem of suffering still going on for others. Instead, he opted for a collective solution: he believed that life progresses towards greater rationality—culminating in humankind—and that as humans became more educated and more intelligent, they would see through various illusions regarding the abolishion of suffering, eventually realizing that the problem lies ultimately in existence itself. Thus, humanity as a whole would recognize that the only way to end the suffering present in life is to end life itself. This would happen in the future, where people would have advanced technologically to a point where they could destroy the whole of nature. That, for von Hartmann, would be the ultimate negation of the Will by Reason.[18][7]^{: 126–161}[37][38]

Even though pessimists agree on the judgment that life is bad and some pessimistic antinatalists criticise procreation, their views on abortion differ.[14]^{: 133–162}[28]^{: 208–233}

Pro-death view

David Benatar holds a "pro-death" stance on abortion. He argues that in the earlier stages of pregnancy, when the fetus has not yet developed consciousness and has no morally relevant interests, we should adopt a presumption against carrying the fetus to term. What demands justification is not the act of abortion, but the failure to abort the fetus (in the early stages of pregnancy). Benatar does not argue that such early abortions should be mandatory, but only that it would be preferable to perform the abortion.[14]^{: 133–162}

Anti-abortion view

Julio Cabrera notices that abortion requires consideration of and action upon something that is already there. He argues that we must take it into our moral deliberations, regardless of the nature of that thing.[28]^{: 209–210} He gives the following argument against abortion:
P1. From the perspective of negative ethics, it is wrong to eliminate another human being only for our benefit, hence treating him as an obstacle to be removed.
P2. It’s morally good to act in favor of those who cannot defend themselves.
P3. A fetus is something that begins to terminate from the very beginning, and it terminates as a human being.
P4. A human fetus is the most helpless being.
Conclusion: Therefore, from the perspective of negative ethics, it is morally wrong to eliminate (abort) a human being.[28]^: 210

Cabrera gives a couple of justifications for the premises:
For P1: We are all valueless, so no one has a higher value than anyone else. The potential victimizer isn't better than the victim, so he has no justification to kill.[28]^: 211
For P2: This is just a prima facie premise.[28]^{: 210–211}
For P3: It would be difficult to establish when a fetus becomes a human being, so we should err on the side of caution and not abort.[28]^: 213 The fetus has a potential to become a rational agent with consciousness, feelings, preferences, thoughts, etc.[28]^{: 213–215} We can conceptualize a human being not as a set of properties, but as a being who is always in self-construction and a fetus is such type of a being.[28]^{: 215–217} A fetus is thrown into existence with a particular character of its existence — it is decaying like a human being.[28]^: 218 We should also debate the status of those who perform abortions and the women who undergo abortions; not just the status of the fetus.[28]^{: 218–219}
For P4: The fetus is the most helpless party in the procreative situation. It has absolutely no say in the deliberations regarding the abortion.[28]^: 219

Henri Rousseau's The Hungry Lion Throws Itself on the Antelope (1905). Suffering seems to be inseparable from the life of wild animals. "The lion, being hungry, throws itself on the antelope, [and] devours it. The panther anxiously awaits the moment when it too can claim its share. Birds of prey have each torn a piece of flesh from the top of the poor animal which sheds a tear. The sun sets."

Aside from the human predicament, many philosophical pessimists also emphasize the negative quality of the life of non-human animals, criticizing the notion of nature as a "wise and benevolent" creator.[12]^: 42–44[25]^{: 364–376}[39] In his 1973 Pulitzer Prize winning book The Denial of Death, Ernest Becker describes it thus:[40]

What are we to make of a creation in which the routine activity is for organisms to be tearing others apart with teeth of all types—biting, grinding flesh, plant stalks, bones between molars, pushing the pulp greedily down the gullet with delight, incorporating its essence into one's own organization, and then excreting with foul stench and gasses the residue. Everyone reaching out to incorporate others who are edible to him. The mosquitoes bloating themselves on blood, the maggots, the killer-bees attacking with a fury and a demonism, sharks continuing to tear and swallow while their own innards are being torn out—not to mention the daily dismemberment and slaughter in "natural" accidents of all types: an earthquake buries alive 70 thousand bodies in Peru, automobiles make a pyramid heap of over 50 thousand a year in the U.S. alone, a tidal wave washes over a quarter of a million in the Indian Ocean. Creation is a nightmare spectacular taking place on a planet that has been soaked for hundreds of millions of years in the blood of all its creatures. The soberest conclusion that we could make about what has actually been taking place on the planet for about three billion years is that it is being turned into a vast pit of fertilizer. But the sun distracts our attention, always baking the blood dry, making things grow over it, and with its warmth giving the hope that comes with the organism's comfort and expansiveness.

The theory of evolution by natural selection can be said to justify a form of philosophical pessimism based on a negative evaluation of the lives of animals in the wild. In 1887, Charles Darwin expressed a feeling of revolt at the notion that God's benevolence is limited, stating: "for what advantage can there be in the sufferings of millions of the lower animals throughout almost endless time?"[41] The animal activist and moral philosopher Oscar Horta argues that because of evolutionary processes, not only is suffering in nature inevitable, but that it actually prevails over happiness.[42] For evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins, nature is in no way benevolent. He argues that what is at stake in biological processes is nothing more than the survival of DNA sequences of genes.[43]^: 131 Dawkins also asserts that as long as the DNA is transmitted, it does not matter how much suffering such transmission entails and that genes do not care about the amount of suffering they cause because nothing affects them emotionally. In other words, nature is indifferent to unhappiness, unless it has an impact on the survival of the DNA.[43]^: 131 Although Dawkins does not explicitly establish the prevalence of suffering over well-being, he considers unhappiness to be the "natural state" of wild animals:[43]^{: 131–132}

The total amount of suffering per year in the natural world is beyond all decent contemplation. During the minute it takes me to compose this sentence, thousands of animals are being eaten alive; others are running for their lives, whimpering with fear; others are being slowly devoured from within by rasping parasites; thousands of all kinds are dying of starvation, thirst and disease. It must be so. If there is ever a time of plenty, this very fact will automatically lead to an increase in population until the natural state of starvation and misery is restored. ... In a universe of blind physical forces and genetic replication, some people are going to get hurt, other people are going to get lucky, and you won't find any rhyme or reason in it, nor any justice. The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.

Concern for those who will be coming into this world has been present throughout the history of pessimism. Notably, Arthur Schopenhauer asked:[44]^{: 318–319}

One should try to imagine that the act of procreation were neither a need, nor accompanied by sexual pleasure, but instead a matter of pure, rational reflection; could the human race even continue to exist? Would not everyone, on the contrary, have so much compassion for the coming generation that he would rather spare it the burden of existence, or at least refuse to take it upon himself to cold-bloodedly impose it on them?

Schopenhauer also compares life to a debt that's being collected through urgent needs and torturing wants. We live by paying off the interests on this debt by constantly satisfying the desires of life, and the entirety of such debt is contracted in procreation: when we come into the world.[25]^: 595

For Arthur Schopenhauer, every action (eating, sleeping, breathing, etc.) was a struggle against death, although one which always ends with death's triumph over the individual.[32]^: 338 Since other animals also fear death, the fear of death is not rational, but more akin to an instinct or a drive, which he called the will to life. In the end, however, death dissolves the individual and, with it, all fears, pains, and desires. Schopenhauer views death as a "great opportunity not to be I any longer".[25]^: 524 Our inner essence is not destroyed though — since we are a manifestation of the universal Will.[45]

David Benatar has not only a negative view on coming into existence, but also on ceasing to exist. Even though it is a harm for us to come into existence, once we do exist we have an interest in continuing to exist. We have plans for the future; we want to achieve our goals; there may be some future goods we could benefit from, if we continue to exist. But death annihilates us, in this way way robbing us from our future and the possibility of us realizing our plans.[14][12][36]

Arthur Schopenhauer rejects various objections to suicide stemming from religion, as well as those based on accusations of cowardice or insanity regarding the person who decides to end their own life. In this perspective, we should be compassionate towards the suicide — we should understand that someone may not be able to bear the sufferings present in their own life, and that one's own life is something that one has an indisputable right to.[46] Schopenhauer, however, does not see suicide as a kind of solution to the sufferings of existence, and his opposition to suicide is rooted in his metaphysical system. Schopenhauer focuses on human nature — which is governed by the Will. This means that we are in a never ending cycle of striving to achieve our ends, feeling dissatisfied, feeling bored, and once again desiring something else. Yet because the Will is the inner essence of existence, the source of our suffering is not exactly in us, but in the world itself. Taking one's life is a mistake, for one still would like to live, but simply in better conditions. The suicidal person still desires goods in life — a "person who commits suicide stops living precisely because he cannot stop willing".[32]^: 472 However, it is not one's own individual life that is the source of one's suffering, but the Will (the ceaselessly striving nature of existence). The mistake is thus in annihilating an individual life, and not the Will itself; the Will cannot be negated by ending one's life, so it's not a solution to the sufferings embedded in existence itself.[32][25][36][18]

David Benatar discards various objections to suicide (violation of the sanctity of human life, violation of the person's right to life, being unnatural, being a cowardly act) as unconvincing. The only relevant considerations are those of people to whom we hold some special obligations, such as, for example, our family members. In general, for Benatar the question of suicide is more a question of dealing with the particular miseries of one's life, rather than a moral problem per se. Consequently, he argues that, in certain situations, suicide is not only morally justified but is also a rational course of action.[12][36] Furthermore, Benatar lists various kinds of empirical harms we are subjected to in our lives: boredom, hunger, illness, lack of existential meaning, inability to achieve our goals, aging, etc. On top of that, he points to the phenomenological asymmetry between the experiences of pain and pleasure — in regard to duration, pains can last for days, months, and even years, while pleasures are usually more ephemeral (there is such a thing as chronic pain, but not "chronic pleasure"); and, in regard to intensity, the worst pains are also worse in magnitude than the best pleasures are good (to illustrate this point, he raises the question of whether one would accept "an hour of the most delightful pleasures in exchange for an hour of the worst tortures"). Benatar also argues that, due to various cognitive biases, we overestimate how good our lives actually are. The empirical argument for the bad quality of human life does not, however, lead Benatar to say that death is generally preferable to the continuation of life. But it makes for a context for cases where one's continued existence would be worse than death, as it makes it clear that suicide is justified in a greater variety of situations than we would normally grant. Every person's situation is different, and the question of the rationality of suicide must be considered from the perspective of each particular individual, based on their own hardships and prospects regarding the future.[14][47][36]

Jiwoon Hwang argued that the hedonistic interpretation of David Benatar's axiological asymmetry of harms and benefits entails promortalism — the view that it is always preferable to cease to exist than to continue to live. Hwang argues that the absence of pleasure is not bad in the following cases: for the one who never exists, for the one who exists, and for the one who ceased to exist. By "bad" we mean that it's not worse than the presence of pleasure for the one who exists. This is consistent with Benatar's statement that the presence of pleasure for the existing person is not an advantage over the absence of pleasure for the never existing and vice versa.[48]

The character of Rust Cohle in the first season of the television series True Detective is noted for expressing a philosophically pessimistic worldview;[49][50] the creator of the series was inspired by the works of Thomas Ligotti, Emil Cioran, Eugene Thacker and David Benatar when creating the character.[51]

• Dostoevsky, Fyodor (1864). Notes from Underground
• Le Guin, Ursula K. (1973). The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas
• Leopardi, Giacomo (1835). Canti
• Ligotti, Thomas (2018). The Conspiracy Against the Human Race: A Contrivance of Horror. Penguin Books ISBN 978-0143133148
• McCarthy, Cormac (1992/1985). Blood Meridian; or, The Evening Redness in the West. Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group ISBN 978-0679728757
• McCarthy, Cormac (2006). The Road. Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group ISBN 978-0307387899
• Pessoa, Fernando (1982). The Book of Disquiet
• Thacker, Eugene (2018). Infinite Resignation. Repeater ISBN 978-1912248193
• Thomson, James "B.V." (1874). The City of Dreadful Night
• Yalom, Irvin D. (2005). The Schopenhauer Cure. HarperCollins ISBN 978-0-06-093810-9 (The novel switches between the current events happening around a therapy group and the psychobiography of Arthur Schopenhauer).
• Voltaire (1759). Candide
• Novels and short stories by Guy de Maupassant.[52]
• Labadie, Laurance (2014). Anarcho-Pessimism: the collected writings of Laurance Labadie. Ardent Press.

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