Every Cradle Is a Grave: Rethinking the Ethics of Birth and Suicide Paperback – November 21, 2014

If strictly based on important original contributions to moral philosophy, Sarah Perry would be every bit as well known and respected as Peter Singer. While some of Singer's opinions are extreme, they are mainstream extreme -- not challenging sacred beliefs. His arguments rest on assumptions that he never questions -- assumptions that are so sacred that they go unnoticed. Perry, on the other hand, not only questions the ethics of policies that rely on these assumptions, but does not let us get away with dismissing her questions reflexively (as most people do when someone challenges sacred beliefs).Every Cradle Is a Grave carefully and logically addresses, as the subtitle suggests, the ethics of birth and suicide. This is a topic that will be difficult for many people to be open-minded about. We live in a all-life-is-good-all-the-time-let's-have-more-babies-and-prevent-extinction culture. If we consider the possibility that creating new lives is unethical, we have to consider the possibility that our parents were unethical, or that we were unethical (if we have kids). If we consider the possibility that suicide should be a safe, legal option for most people, we then will likely worry that people we care about will exit the world sooner than we'd like. However, in my opinion, whether or not you agree with Perry's conclusions are not that important. What is important is the questions she is raising.For example, I've read several articles about de-extinction (the possibility of bringing to life species that previously existed, but have gone extinct). The ethical questions tend to be things like 'should humans play God in this way?' or 'what effect will it have on the ecosystem?' What I have never heard is anyone ask a question like 'would it be good for the animals themselves to be brought to life?' Almost everyone just assumes that it would be good for the animals to exist. Relatedly, consider the lengths that conservationists go through to prevent species from going extinct (even doing some seemingly awful things to them -- see, for example, the Raising Crane episode of Radiolab).I especially enjoyed the chapters in the book on free disposal, experience machines, and the burden of life. I would love to include some of my favorite quotes and arguments from the book, but doing so would lessen the joy of reading it in context.

From my humble, superlative spewing albeit totally sincere perspective, this is one of the most important texts written and published since the dawn of man. Beloved nonpareil giants like Shakespeare, Montaigne, Freud, Nietzsche, would have to concede to her superior clarity and concision on at least a few points regarding the human condition. This "housewife" was reading Origin of Consciousness in The Breakdown of The Bicameral Mind as a teenager -- this book is an especial oasis in this desert of the Idiocracy. As the tendrils of the contemporary nightmare spectacular become virtually impossible to elude, her shining black diamond is a beacon for the alienated, atheistic, antinatalist, free falling aesthetes dancing on the edge of the abyss. Thank you, Sarah Perry!

I am on chapter 5, it did not get too interesting until chapter 5 but this is only my opinion. Book was in excellent shape when I got it. I would recommend reading this book but be weary because it will change your perception.

Wow, not an easy read, because it truly moves you and makes you think, analyse and re-think about your traditional values, ethics and principles. Guaranteed to shake your belief systems!The title is scary, and true! If you think about it, by giving birth we are creating a mortal being...... while giving a new individual the "gift of live" (!?), we are also condemning this individual to a certain and unavoidable eventual death!Well researched and poignant. The phylosophy of Antinatalism exposed and re-explored!Recommended for intellectual readers with well founded criteria!

The late Jean Amery, in his masterful work On Suicide, claimed that the majority of the population progresses through their decision making with the "logic of life" in mind. That is, they begin from a conditioned supposition that having a life is good and so maintaining one and keeping one at all costs is sacred. This is not simply in a religious context, but down to the core of the very values that keep our species, its hierarchies and systems, its family units and social circles, churning along. Anti-suicide crusaders are not uniformly right wing loons. In fact, it is likely that one would not encounter any more conservatives than liberals within the ranks of such organizations. And yet, from these widely respected tanks of thought one is treated to the same sort of data skewing and guilt pushing found at pro-life rallies. With regard to suicide, this community works together through enormous political divides to take away a person's ability to quickly and safely end their own life. They have decided for you that your life is worth keeping whether you think so or not, no matter how sick you are, no matter how lonely or grief-stricken you are, no matter, no matter. The executive decision works to take away your greatest liberty, which is an individual's choice to discontinue being.Perry accurately points out that this prohibition is not directly carried out by jail sentences and fines. Rather, we have subtly given the reigns to the medical complex who, working in conjunction with officials, confines and medicates a potential suicide against his will ( or, later, confines and medicates him post-attempt). Operating from the assumption that taking one's life is inherently irrational, the suicide is automatically given the status of an insane person. For me, this is the crux of the entire debate. The majority of people, drilled with lay speak about the sanctity of life from the time of birth, cannot extract themselves from that cocoon of thought. In this country and beyond, how are we to have an intelligent discussion about suicide when it is so broadly looked at as an act of insanity? Collectively, we are so wounded by the prospect of death that we cannot fathom another's desire for it. We cannot accept that many people choose non-existence while sound of mind. This places us, intellectually, in about the sixth grade.And your antiquated statistics? Depression is the leading cause of suicide? Suicide contagion prevails? Debunked piece by piece. Perry makes especially resonant points about predictors for taking one's life, and they are not the nice and neat ones we've tied with a bow. For instance, social death, or the shunning of one by others, is far more likely to lead to a suicide than is generalized depression. I recall reading something to this effect in the nineties in a psych periodical, but it was poorly elucidated and passed over for more shocking (and less accurate) data. Social withdraw, which is not necessarily chemical depression, can potentially lead to a rational state of hopelessness. If the human experience is that we are most content in the company and acceptance of others, then it is possible that in the absence of those things we become rationally desperate. Can we accept that a suicide is often done logically, thoughtfully, as an antidote to being cast out?Your ability to relate to this book is dependent on your ability to shed some very common misconceptions. For most, it will entail disregarding the stock quotes and armchair optimism that swirled around your childhood and adolescent environments. Even for those who attended college and felt themselves in the presence of free thought, these are perspectives likely never addressed. Under it all, though, is compassion for the very real misery of many.

Well-written, well-argued, and meticulously laid out - this is a scholarly and professional treatment of the topics of suicide and anti-natalism. A great complement to reading Benatar and Ligotti. I only wish the book had a bibliography as well an an index. Btw, I'm surprised that chapter 6 - what really causes suicide - made no mention of Emile Durkheim's 19th century classic treatment of the subject (the first of its kind) wherein he identifies 4 causes or types of suicide: altruistic, egoistic, anomic, and fatalistic. Perry would have done well to have integrated this into her explanation, for a more robust treatment of the subject. Otherwise, well done!

This books is extremely well planned, well written and easy to read but also densely packed with intelligent observations and reflections. Packs plenty of punches and lances the hypocritical madness that frames hive-mind beliefs about suicide and procreation.

I really enjoyed this book even though these are two very different topics discussed. The author should have made two books, one about Antinatalism, the other about suicide. Nevertheless a very eloquent and structured style of writing with brilliant arguments.

She gives a different view which some may feel uncomfortable with. Some reviews say she shouldn't: "Most people seriously interested in whether life has meaning suspect it actually doesn't. So the goal should be to bolster their intuition and give them ways of having a meaningful life without causing harm to others (unborn or otherwise)."So there should be self-help books only. Don't question, seek the thousands eager to put you "right" through their indoctrination. Or maybe read and see life and the universe in a different way. Your choice. Something liberating about that.

This book is in big parts a joke: one study made me laugh though (arguing that suicid(attempt) is an evolutionary adaptiv behaviour: the study is no less than absurd...but it really is a so called scientific study...not much worth I guess these days).An author who uses such studies disqualifies himself to be taken serious.