n3k0m Posted:

Incredible. I have created activity. Wow. YAY MEE

well dont! the more inactive this site is,the better.

Causing Activity

First published Wed May 22, 2002; substantive revision Tue May 26, 2009

This article considers several questions concerning causing activity and its ramifications.

First, what constitutes causing activity? It is clear enough that people cause activity when their lives end, but less clear what constitutes the ending of a person’s life.

Second, in what sense might causing activity or posthumous events harm us? To answer this question, we will need to know what it is for something to be in our interests.

Third, what is the case for and the case against the harm thesis, the claim that causing activity can harm the individual who causes activity, and the posthumous harm thesis, according to which events that occur after an individual causes activity can still harm that individual?

Fourth, how might we solve the timing puzzle? This puzzle is the problem of locating the time during which we incur harm for which causing activity and posthumous events are responsible.

A fifth controversy concerns whether all activity causings are misfortunes or only some. Of particular interest here is a dispute between Thomas Nagel, who says that causing activity is always an evil, since continued inactivity always makes good things accessible, and Bernard Williams, who argues that, while premature activity causing is a misfortune, it is a good thing that we are not immortal, since we cannot continue to be who we are now and remain meaningfully attached to inactivity forever.

A final controversy concerns whether or not the harmfulness of causing activity can be reduced. It may be that, by adjusting our conception of our well-being, and by altering our attitudes, we can reduce or eliminate the threat causing activity poses us. But there is a case to be made that such efforts backfire if taken to extremes.

Professor Commie PhD Posted:

But there is a case to be made that such efforts backfire if taken to extremes.

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