Famine, action, and the normative

Publication Type

Journal Article

Publication Date

4-2021

Abstract

It has been 46 years since the publication of “Famine, Affluence, and Morality” by Peter Singer. In the paper Singer famously challenges readers to radically change their lives to save the lives of others, often in distant lands. With this paper, Peter Singer, perhaps the most famous living philosopher today, made his name and spawned the field of global justice. Although there have been improvements and successes, easily preventable deaths from poverty still occur in large numbers today. Philosophically the paper has been very influential and continues to generate considerable debate. We return to Singer’s argument in “Famine, Affluence, and Morality” and make the case that the argument is incomplete in that while Singer’s position that we are morally obliged to help relieve famine, hunger, and so on is supported by his argument, his position that we act all things considered is not.

Keywords

Peter Singer, Famine, Affluence, and Morality, Global justice, Preventable deaths, Global poverty, Strong Principle, Consequentialism, Trumping worry, Broadness worry, Global basic structure

Discipline

Philosophy

Research Areas

Humanities

Publication

Journal of Value Inquiry

ISSN

0022-5363

Identifier

10.1007/s10790-021-09804-2

Publisher

Springer Verlag (Germany)

Additional URL

http://doi.org/10.1007/s10790-021-09804-2

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