I wanted to post something up here to think about regarding Singer's use of intuitions in his `Solution to World Poverty'. He relies on the intuition that we would usually think it would be wrong for Bob not to direct a train from a child to his car, or that we would harshly judge someone who would not risk some loss of clothing articles to save a drowning child. Moreover, these intuitions seem to be very universal.
He then argues that these intuitive obligations translate to an obligation to help children in need in far away places. What I wanted to think about was that THAT intuition does not seem widespread at all. That is, people usually don't go around judging people for buying movie tickets instead of donating the money. Does that fact in itself undermine his argument at all, or is that just irrelevant?
More to the point: In the case of the drowning child nearby the intuition that we ought to help is supposed to pick out something morally significant that can do work in a moral argument. But the intuition 'Nothing wrong going on here' in the case of people buying movie tickets is presumably supposed to not do any moral work or serve as a premise for a moral argument. But what reasons do we have to judge one intuition as "morally insightful" and the other as maybe misguided or unreflective?
Just something I thought I'd raise, I wonder what people think about it.
It would seem that to explain our difference in intuitions between the two scenarios, we need to identify what are the morally relevant distinctions that can be made of the two situations. It seems the class was in agreement that geographic proximity is morally irrelevant, that is, just because someone is far away doesn't lessen any moral obligation to save their life.
ReplyDeleteAnother possible moral distinction lies in the action required, and the sacrifice that follows. Maybe Singer over-similarizes the scenarios here, where giving up some luxuries is supposedly morally equivalent to the loss of financial security. Possibly, and I do mean possibly, we can draw a moral distinction here, where Bob is morally obligated to give up, strictly speaking, money. While on the other hand, it's not just pure and objective money/objects being asked for, but instead the poor require a siphoning of luxuries. So unlike Bob giving up what is the monetary potential for well-being and richness, to donate is giving up that realized potential richness. Although prima facie this still seems but a psychological difference with no moral relevance, it possibly requires more exploring.
Well, I think that the intuition "Nothing wrong with spending money on movie tickets" is predicated on a lack of awareness of the situation rather than moral insight. We are like Bob, and the Bugatti represents the extra money we have. Unlike Bob though, most people cannot see the child on the track, because geographical proximity makes us unaware. We think there is nothing wrong with spending money on luxuries, because most of us are unaware of two things: our power to help save children's lives and the urgency of the situation.
ReplyDeleteBasically, Singer says that if people have the power to save children's lives, they are morally obligated to do so. As first world citizens, we have the power to save starving children with excess money, and therefore, we are morally obligated to send that money according to Singer.
Basically, the moral distinctions between the Bugatti case and real life obfuscate what our moral duty is. Psychological differences, like diffusion of responsibility, may make our willingness to help less likely, but it is still morally irrelevant. The moral question here is whether we should spend extra money to help save starving children instead of on recreational hobbies that make life a little more fun. In the end, Singer is trying to make us aware of the fact that unless we can justifiably say "I should spend extra money on luxury instead of helping to save starving children", we are morally obligated to donate that money to the organizations that help starving children instead.
One more point: This leads to the "Counterproductive to insist sacrificing so much" issue that we talked about in the last class. From a consequences viewpoint, I think Singer's argument "spend all extra money to save starving children" may function better as a supererogatory standard than as a moral duty. By making us aware of the problem, the supererogatory standard would motivate us to spend some money to help save some children without alienating people who would be dissuaded by the notion of always having to give up money that could enrich their lives or be used for future financial security.
ReplyDelete(Apparently, you cannot edit comments. I didn't mean to make 2 comments in a row, my bad)