Antinatalism, theism, and meaning in life

Influentially, David Benatar argues that life’s lack of meaning sub specie aeternitatis (SSA) undermines the value of bringing new children into the world. While non-theists like Benatar often believe that rational inquiry, moral striving, and creating beauty can make life deeply meaningful, they generally lack a compelling conception of meaning-SSA that can hold against Benatar’s pessimistic view. On the other hand, Supernaturalist accounts of meaning can establish a more encompassing and optimistic vision of life’s meaning that can resist Benatar’s logic. Supernaturalist accounts can make procreation permissible even when the prospective child’s life is likely to be suboptimal. We favorably examine a theologically Christian approach to SSA-meaning to illustrate one such account capable of resisting Benatar’s antinatalist conclusions. Although the doctrine of hell presents a major problem for many Christian accounts of meaning, we argue Christian universalism, the view that all humans will eventually enjoy an eternal life in heaven, successfully overcomes this problem. Overall, Benatar’s antinatalist argument relies on a narrow vision of meaning’s evaluative role, which a variety of Supernaturalist perspectives can analogously resist by appealing to alternative, cosmic evaluative frameworks.