This feels like an argument that proves too much. If you were not in a war, or tortured, you are still missing some kinds of human experience. It could be argued that war is quite common experience. Yet this argument would not convince me to go to war or get tortured, just to achieve the full spectrum of human experience.
Fair point, but in practice when you actually have the debate, it very quickly becomes clear that it’s really the “commonly reported to be positive experiences” argument.
And for some, war and surviving hardship _do_ qualify—there’s plenty of examples of people seeking pain (or risk of pain) just because they crave “adventure”. IMO, this doesn’t reach anywhere as close to universal as parenthood does, but it seems like a related drive.
This feels like an argument that proves too much. If you were not in a war, or tortured, you are still missing some kinds of human experience. It could be argued that war is quite common experience. Yet this argument would not convince me to go to war or get tortured, just to achieve the full spectrum of human experience.
Fair point, but in practice when you actually have the debate, it very quickly becomes clear that it’s really the “commonly reported to be positive experiences” argument.
And for some, war and surviving hardship _do_ qualify—there’s plenty of examples of people seeking pain (or risk of pain) just because they crave “adventure”. IMO, this doesn’t reach anywhere as close to universal as parenthood does, but it seems like a related drive.