Peter Singer on Our Obligations to People in Need.
Peter Singer on Our Obligations to People in Need
Peter Singer uses examples to argue that we do not have a sound moral basis for placing greater moral weight upon providing assistance to those near to us (ourselves included), than to providing assistance people far away. Pure distance of this kind cannot be a “morally relevant” difference, he argues. This would seem to imply that we should all be doing a very great deal more to aid those in distant parts of the world, or in the distant future—perhaps, even, we should assign to aiding such individuals just the same moral importance as aiding those who are nearer to us. Do you find Singer’s argument convincing? Do you think Singer’s drowning child argument works the way he thinks it does? Are there morally relevant differences he overlooks? Singer’s argument relies upon a broadly utilitarian underlying moral theory—we ought to do as much good as we can, weighing things from an impartial standpoint. Do you accept this underlying theory? Why or why not? And if you do not accept it, what principle, if any, do you believe we should be following with regard aiding distant strangers? Defend your answers.