Eating meat will be illegal in 50 years

Daily Debate #552: "Eating meat will be illegal in 50 years". You are arguing FOR the motion. Your opponent: Peter Singer.

Is having children selfish?

You're asking the wrong question. Selfishness requires a choice to deprive others of something scarce. Children aren't a zero-sum resource. What's actually selfish, adopting your logic, is *not* having them when you're capable. What stops you?

You're using an overly narrow definition of selfishness. Plenty of selfish acts don't involve depriving someone else of a scarce resource. Having a child is a choice made because the prospective parent wants something. The fact that the child doesn't exist beforehand doesn't make the motivation any less self-interested.

You've just collapsed your own argument. By that logic, *every* intentional act is selfish because humans always want something from their choices. Feeding the hungry, saving a drowning child, teaching someone to read, all self-interested because you wanted to do them. If selfishness means "having any motivation at all," the word means nothing. So what actually distinguishes a selfish act from a good one in your framework?