Christal Anderson
PHI208: Ethics and Moral Reasoning
Julie Pedersen
Peter Singer
September 30, 2013
Singer’s overall goal was to inform us about things that we can help contribute to. He was trying to explain the morality of the world. For example he stated, “The decisions and actions of human beings can prevent this kind of suffering. Unfortunately, human beings have not made the necessary decisions. At the individual level, people have, with very few exceptions, not responded to the situation in any significant way.” This is saying that we as humans need to make better situations when it comes to affluence and morality. If something tragic was to happen to us we would want others to come to our aid. Three the counter arguments are, having lacked food, shelter, and medical attention, 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, and It is the government’s responsibility to provide for famine relief, and giving to privately organized famine-relief agencies will only encourage the government to shirk its responsibility. Having being lacked in essential things we need to survive is very bad. Lacking in these things can cause suffering and death. Now, if we can prevent something bad from happening we should. As long as we are not causing harm, danger, or any wrong doing to the situation. Singer’s example was, “if I am walking past a shallow pond and see a child drowning in it, I ought to wade in and pull the child out. This will mean getting my clothes muddy, but this is insignificant, while the death of the child would presumably be a very bad thing.” I agree with this comment. What is more important, saving a drowning child or worrying about your clothes getting muddy? I believe your reaction time to something like this to be superior. You should not have to think twice about saving someone’s life. It is the moral thing to do. Last but not least the government’s responsibility to provide famine relief. “It is sometimes said that overseas aid should be a government responsibility, and that therefore one ought not to give to privately run charities. Giving privately, it is said, allows the government and the noncontributing members of society to escape their responsibilities.” Once again I agree. Giving privately does let members of society to escape from their responsibilities. Maybe we should be taxed this out of our paychecks. An emergency relief tax. It should also be based on income. The government should also continue help with famine relief, that way everyone is doing their part to contribute. Singer define marginal utility as us giving too much and leaving us without. This means giving too much and then we would be in the same situation as those we are trying to help. “The strong version, which required us to prevent bad things from happening unless in doing so we would be sacrificing something of comparable moral significance, does seem to require reducing ourselves to the level of marginal utility.” Sometimes we as people can give too much to help others, a lot of us have really big hearts. I can relate to this. My mother does this with family and friends. She often goes out of her way to help them. One instance was when she helped my cousin get a cell phone. My mother decided to add her on her account and my cousin would have to pay her part of the phone bill. She ended breaking her phone and refused to tell my mother about it. Since the phone was broke she refused to pay the phone bill. So my mother ended up having another phone bill to pay. We have those people who contribute nothing at all and have something to give, those who have nothing at all but would give if they had something to give, and those who give what they can. It is our duty as a human race to do things right by our society. Certain things are prohibited and certain things are tolerable, each society is
