If you had the choice to be born would you have been born?

To be able to make such choice implies that I already exist in some form.

And I'd probably be too afraid of non-existence to choose not being born.

Life sucks, but I also don't want to "not-exist". Its terrifying.

Can I just be a ghost floating around and just "chill" and observe? Perhaps in the company of other ghosts to talk to...

Certainly not.

no.

Absolutely.

A. Even with how shit the world is there's enough good that exists for it to be worth it.

B. If I didn't exist, I would never have a chance to help improve the world in my small way.

No. And thats the reason i don't have kids.

Humanity is rotten, and personally i don't think we'll ever change. The best thing that can happen to earth is for humanity to collapse and become extinct.

Fuuuuuck no.

No. Not even remotely. Not even if I was assured it was a simulation. No.

Certainly yes.

I'm echoing a lot of the replies here by saying “No.” Even if I'm given a choice as to what kind of life I'd live, still no.

Even if people say there's a lot of good things in life, or that there are people living their dreams in this world, still no. I don't play the lottery, even if I might end up with more money than I could ever hope to spend. The same logic applies here.

There would be no me to regret not existing if I don't exist.

Fuck no.

Even if my life currently is not bad, there are and have been bad times. Not existing is never bad. So no.

Others have already answered this well, but I'll repeat it anyway: No.

Funny you should ask because fetus me actually tried to hang myself with my own umbilical cord and they had to cut me out of my mom to stop me. So apparently i really wasnt looking forward to my time on earth.

Oh fuck no. For my entire life I've resented having to be alive. You try being a suicidally inclined 7 year old and see how you like it. The fact that it's impossible to ask someone if they want to be born is enough for me to never want to have kids, always had been. Forcing existence and cognizance on a human being is unspeakably fucking cruel.

No

Hell no

I reckon so, yeah. Better than nothing, right? Been plenty of good with the bad. That's about all a disembodied energy form could really hope for, after all.

No

I mean, the universe is just an experiment in experience. Even with the bullshit, it's better to have been than to never have been

Warning: ITT, lots of nonresponse bias.

Life dissatisfaction guides people to type no;
neutrally satisfied folks will skip;
the relatively contented might type a "yes" or be offline.
With today's historical context, there's a bit of a skew, especially for those hanging out online o( ; ´ ﹏ `;)o

As for me, I'm excepted. I have decent dissatisfaction rather often, but arrogantly -- I'd be born a million times, every time (unless you ask me at a bad moment).

Even at my worst, why do I not roll over and die? "I want to see how my story ends."

Question, can I change my sex at birth?

Yes. If I'm actually some kind of cosmic being that can choose to be born yes, I am taking that pill. I'm taking all the experience pills.

Yeah, it's worth it. Plus maybe I can help.

Just like how we don't know what it would feel like to be dead, and we dread dying, I suppose choosing to be born would feel like death of that self that is given this choice, so I guess the question can be rephrased as "if you could die in this moment, would you choose that?"

I guess not.

Damn right I would.

Yes!

Yes. Everything is pointless and nothing is forever. Might as well enjoy the life we've got. Non-existence is better for some people, but I think on the whole life is worth living for most people.

_naw

I think I would have preferred to just manifest as a being of energy that could take corporal form at will.

Would have been a lot easier on my mum.

I've been through some terrible things in life.

But yes, I'd still choose to be born. The universe is an amazing place, and despite everything that has happened and is going on, there truly isn't anything as wonderful as getting to experience a small, brief slice of the universe.

God no. And I won't have kids either. Spare them having to think about it.

Fuck no!

Yes! I'd rather there be something than nothing. It's a wonder that anything exists at all

Absolutely. I'm not terribly privileged, but while the difficulties of life are non-trivial, overall I've experienced enough joy to justify the expense.

Seeing as how shit everything is, no.

just go ahead and turn me to dust again, split apart my atoms, make something useful out of it.

So far, yes. I think being able to be physically embodied is so remarkable. And on top of that, to be able to hear and see (sort of) and think and feel? It's not gonna last forever, so I want to feel it while I can. Absolutely yes.

I lean no, but it's close. On the one hand, life is meaningless and hurts. On the other I've gotten to see some cool things.

Absolutely.

If I had the choice ahead of time? No, I wouldn't choose to be born.

If it's a retroactive thing though, I wouldn't undo my birth

Like, now? No way. I would choose to continue my unborn existence. However, if I could choose a time period, that would be a different story.

I don't know what I would choose, I was just a little baby at the time

Yes, but with better teeth.

Yes. We have to persist through the horrors, thats just how it is on this bitch of an earth

Yes. Alternative doesn’t actually exist, to some degree.

Even being able to process this question means some amount of knowledge to understand it.

Even then, yes. Every time. Existing is the best we know we’ve got.

Maybe if I had the choice of where and when to be born. Much too risky to leave it up to chance though

If I'm just being asked to be born in a randomized way in a randomized location to a randomized family in randomized situations .... then no

If I had a choice of where, when and what circumstances I would like to be born in? ... then yes I would like those odds better and would like to be born.

Do I get a vision of my entire life, or do I just have to choose on a whim?

Depends. What's the alternative?

only under certain conditions; mostly pertaining to wealth & vanity. lol

No. My existence has been nothing but trauma and failure. My brain is disordered, and I am too mentally fragile to be forced to endure the hell that is life. Me being born was a mistake. I am the 8th child of parents who believed that it was their Christian duty to reproduce. I have made no significant contribution to life other than being a burden on those around me.

I'm here now. But if I had a choice to begin with, no.

Now? No.
If I had the choice I'd wait a century or two

absolutely, I'm a fucking delight. Eudaemonia, baby!

Hard to say.

If it was before I’d had my kids, probably. Now with my kids existing in the world, I’d essentially be deleting their existences too, so no.

Some religions -old and new - believe we choose the lessons we come to learn. If we learn quickly, we can advance to more advanced lessons, if we refuse or aren't capable of understanding our lessons, we repeat them, in one life or another. Just as settings, teachers and teaching styles vary, so do the subjective experiences and understanding of the lessons. Repeating them is karma. Demonstrating grasp and practical application is dharma. Choosing to incarnate to help others learn because one feels a deep empathy and compassion for everyone on the wheel of Samsara is bodhisattva.

Some of these religions believe we reincarnate until we have lived every experience from every possible perspective.

That said, back to my own cultural religious teachings, would I eat again from the tree of knowledge of good and evil? If I'm honest, on my worst days, no. On ok and best days? Yes. It's good to experience things from various perspectives. Our imaginations have been constrained and lack ability. Physical and intellectual exercise is the remedy.

We all had a choice (well, maybe not ivf babies), we were just so dumb (single cell sperm) that the "choice" was not informed.