Questions tagged [singer]

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What responses are there to Singer's "Should this be the last generation?"?

The article can be found here. It deals with many issues, but what I would really like to see a response to is the following paragraph: [W]hy don’t we make ourselves the last generation on earth? If we would all agree to have ourselves sterilized…
Xodarap
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Argument against Singer's analogy of the pond

Peter Singer gave a famous argument in Famine, Affluence and Morality that made an analogy between saving a drowning child in a pond at the expense of getting your clothes wet, and donating the equivalent amount of money to save children from dying…
user3076
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Resolving weighting conflicts in preference utilitarianism

Assuming we're dealing with the actions of two people based on the preferences of two non overlapping sets of affected people, other than the number of people, which methods are available to resolve weighing conflicts on the same preference? I know…
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Request for philosophers opposed to Singer's Famine, Affluence and Morality

I am new here, so I apologize if this question doesn't suit this platform in any particular way. I am currently in high school. I came across this article by the name "Famine, Affluence and Morality" by Peter Singer. It has troubled me ever since.…
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About an argument in Famine, Affluence and Morality

Peter Singer argues that if it is in our power to prevent something bad from happening, without thereby sacrificing anything of comparable moral importance, we ought, morally, to do it. I am debating the parameters of this argument. Suppose that you…
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What are the limitations of Peter Singer's utilitarianism?

What are the limitations of Singer's argument in "Famine, Affluence and Morality" and the conclusion he presents ? As well as the limitations of his statement that letting the child drown when you are fully capable of saving him is the same as not…
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What is the difference between plants and animals for Singer?

Peter Singer cares a lot about animals and he is against speciesism, the discrimination on the basis of species. However, I've never heard that he had said something about plants. What makes plants or fungi different for Singer? Isn't…
wythagoras
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Objection to Famine, Affluence and Morality

If you can prevent something bad from happening at the cost of something less bad, you ought to do it. The second principle, as quoted above, is the link between the seemingly obvious claim that: starvation and death are morally bad, which forms the…
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Would Singer believe a person needs to be self-conscious or just conscious? What even is the difference?

In philosophy class, we were given a revision guide that listed philosophers for and against a list of viewpoints. Peter Singer was listed as "for" for the claim that "Consciousness is required to be considered a person", but "against" for the claim…
Matt
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Preference Utilitarianism with regards to humans and animals

I am not in depth familiar with the theory of preference utilitarianism, so this might be a complete misunderstanding of the principle. But nonetheless there are a few things that I can not gasp under this framework. My questions concerns the…
simba
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How would a preference utilitarian decide about cheating on something or lying about something?

I cannot find a reliable example of either. I want a practical everyday example of the choice of a preference utilitarian. Do preferences have weight? Is there some sort of "preference calculus"? For example, a son lying to his mother--wouldn't…
adamaero
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Does Singer mean that we are never moral, and if not so what?

Singer seems both radical and quite commonsense, to me. one cannot claim to be a morally decent person unless one is doing far more [for charity] Peter Singer, Achieving the Best Outcome: Final Rejoinder, Ethics & International Affairs,…
user25714