Peter Albert David Singer (born 6 July 1946) is an Australian
philosopherPhilosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational...
who is the Ira W. DeCamp Professor of
BioethicsBioethics is the study of controversial ethics brought about by advances in biology and medicine. Bioethicists are concerned with the ethical questions that arise in the relationships among life sciences, biotechnology, medicine, politics, law, and philosophy....
at
Princeton UniversityPrinceton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....
and Laureate Professor at the Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics at the
University of MelbourneThe University of Melbourne is a public university located in Melbourne, Victoria. Founded in 1853, it is the second oldest university in Australia and the oldest in Victoria...
. He specialises in
applied ethicsApplied ethics is, in the words of Brenda Almond, co-founder of the Society for Applied Philosophy, "the philosophical examination, from a moral standpoint, of particular issues in private and public life that are matters of moral judgment"...
and approaches ethical issues from a
secularSecularity is the state of being separate from religion.For instance, eating and bathing may be regarded as examples of secular activities, because there may not be anything inherently religious about them...
,
preference utilitarianPreference utilitarianism is one of the most popular forms of utilitarianism in contemporary philosophy. Unlike classical utilitarianism, which defines right actions as those that maximize pleasure and minimize pain, preference utilitarianism promotes actions that fulfill the interests of those...
perspective.
He has served, on two occasions, as chair of philosophy at
Monash UniversityMonash University is a public university based in Melbourne, Victoria. It was founded in 1958 and is the second oldest university in the state. Monash is a member of Australia's Group of Eight and the ASAIHL....
, where he founded its
Centre for Human BioethicsThe Centre for Human Bioethics is a research and teaching centre at Monash University, based in the Faculty of Arts. It focusses on the branch of ethics known as bioethics, a field relating to biological science and medicine...
. In 1996, he unsuccessfully stood as a
GreensThe Australian Greens, commonly known as The Greens, is an Australian green political party.The party was formed in 1992; however, its origins can be traced to the early environmental movement in Australia and the formation of the United Tasmania Group , the first Green party in the world, which...
candidate for the
Australian SenateThe Senate is the upper house of the bicameral Parliament of Australia, the lower house being the House of Representatives. Senators are popularly elected under a system of proportional representation. Senators are elected for a term that is usually six years; after a double dissolution, however,...
. In 2004, he was recognised as the Australian
HumanistHumanism is an approach in study, philosophy, world view or practice that focuses on human values and concerns. In philosophy and social science, humanism is a perspective which affirms some notion of human nature, and is contrasted with anti-humanism....
of the Year by the
Council of Australian Humanist SocietiesThe Council of Australian Humanist Societies is the national umbrella organisation for Australian humanists. It is affiliated with the International Humanist and Ethical Union...
. He has been voted one of Australia's ten most influential public intellectuals. Singer serves on the Advisory Board of Incentives for Global Health, the NGO formed to develop the
Health Impact FundThe Health Impact Fund is a proposed mechanism that would provide a market-based solution to problems concerning the development and distribution of medicines. It would incentivize the research and development of new pharmaceutical products that make substantial reductions in the global burden of...
proposal.
Outside academic circles, Singer is best known for his book
Animal LiberationAnimal Liberation is a book by Australian philosopher Peter Singer, published in 1975.The book is widely considered within the animal liberation movement to be the founding philosophical statement of its ideas...
, widely regarded as the touchstone of the
animal liberation movementThe animal-liberation movement, sometimes called the animal-rights movement, animal personhood, or animal-advocacy movement, is a social movement which seeks an end to the rigid moral and legal distinction drawn between human and non-human animals, an end to the status of animals as property, and...
. Not all members of the animal liberation movement share this view, and Singer himself has said the media overstates his status. His views on that and other issues in bioethics have attracted attention and a degree of controversy.
Life and career
Singer's parents were
VienneseVienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
Jews who emigrated from Austria after
its annexationThe Anschluss , also known as the ', was the occupation and annexation of Austria into Nazi Germany in 1938....
by
Nazi GermanyNazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
and came to Australia in 1938. They settled in
MelbourneMelbourne is the capital and most populous city in the state of Victoria, and the second most populous city in Australia. The Melbourne City Centre is the hub of the greater metropolitan area and the Census statistical division—of which "Melbourne" is the common name. As of June 2009, the greater...
, where Singer was born. His grandparents were less fortunate: his paternal grandparents were taken by the Nazis to Łódź, and were never heard from again; his maternal grandfather died in the
TheresienstadtTheresienstadt concentration camp was a Nazi German ghetto during World War II. It was established by the Gestapo in the fortress and garrison city of Terezín , located in what is now the Czech Republic.-History:The fortress of Terezín was constructed between the years 1780 and 1790 by the orders...
concentration camp. He has a sister, Joan (now Joan Dwyer). Singer's father imported tea and coffee, while his mother practiced medicine. He attended
PreshilPreshil, or The Margaret Lyttle Memorial School, is an independent, co-educational, non-denominational, Progressive, school located in Kew, an eastern suburb of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.Founded in the early 1930s by Margaret J. R. Lyttle...
and later
Scotch CollegeScotch College, Melbourne is an independent, Presbyterian, day and boarding school for boys, located in Hawthorn, an inner-eastern suburb of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia....
. After leaving school, Singer studied
lawLaw is a system of rules and guidelines which are enforced through social institutions to govern behavior, wherever possible. It shapes politics, economics and society in numerous ways and serves as a social mediator of relations between people. Contract law regulates everything from buying a bus...
,
historyHistory is the discovery, collection, organization, and presentation of information about past events. History can also mean the period of time after writing was invented. Scholars who write about history are called historians...
and
philosophyPhilosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational...
at the
University of MelbourneThe University of Melbourne is a public university located in Melbourne, Victoria. Founded in 1853, it is the second oldest university in Australia and the oldest in Victoria...
, gaining his BA degree (hons) in 1967. He received an MA for a thesis entitled
Why should I be moral? in 1969. He was awarded a scholarship to study at the
University of OxfordThe University of Oxford is a university located in Oxford, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest surviving university in the world and the oldest in the English-speaking world. Although its exact date of foundation is unclear, there is evidence of teaching as far back as 1096...
, obtaining a
B.PhilBachelor of Philosophy is the title of an academic degree. The degree usually involves considerable research, either through a thesis or supervised research projects...
in 1971 with a thesis on civil disobedience, supervised by
R. M. HareRichard Mervyn Hare was an English moral philosopher who held the post of White's Professor of Moral Philosophy at the University of Oxford from 1966 until 1983. He subsequently taught for a number of years at the University of Florida...
, and subsequently published as a book in 1973. Singer names Hare and Australian philosopher H. D. McCloskey as his two most important mentors.
After spending two years as a Radcliffe lecturer at
University College, Oxford.University College , is a constituent college of the University of Oxford in England. As of 2009 the college had an estimated financial endowment of £110m...
, he was a visiting professor at
New York UniversityNew York University is a private, nonsectarian research university based in New York City. NYU's main campus is situated in the Greenwich Village section of Manhattan...
for 16 months. He returned to Melbourne in 1977, where he spent most of his career, aside from appointments as visiting faculty abroad, until his move to Princeton in 1999. In June 2011 it was announced he would join the professoriate of
New College of the HumanitiesNew College of the Humanities is a proposed new private for-profit undergraduate college in London, England, the creation of which was announced in June 2011 by the philosopher A.C. Grayling, its founder and first master...
, a private college in London, in addition to his work at Princeton.
Animal Liberation
Published in 1975,
Animal Liberation has been cited as a formative influence on leaders of the modern animal liberation movement. The central argument of the book is an expansion of the
utilitarianUtilitarianism is an ethical theory holding that the proper course of action is the one that maximizes the overall "happiness", by whatever means necessary. It is thus a form of consequentialism, meaning that the moral worth of an action is determined only by its resulting outcome, and that one can...
idea that "the greatest good of the greatest number" is the only measure of good or ethical behaviour. Singer argues that there is no reason not to apply this to other animals. He popularized the term "
speciesismSpeciesism is the assigning of different values or rights to beings on the basis of their species membership. The term was created by British psychologist Richard D...
", which was originally coined by
Richard D. RyderRichard Hood Jack Dudley Ryder is a British psychologist. He is a former Mellon Professor at Tulane University, New Orleans. He served as chairman of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Council from 1977 to 1979, and is a past president of Britain's Liberal Democrat Animal...
, to describe the practice of privileging humans over other animals.
Applied ethics
Singer's most comprehensive work,
Practical EthicsThe book Practical Ethics is an introduction to applied ethics written by modern bioethical philosopher Peter Singer. It was originally published in 1979 and has since been translated into a number of languages. The book caused outrage in Germany, Austria and Switzerland...
(1979), analyzes in detail why and how living beings' interests should be weighed. His principle of equal consideration of interests does not dictate equal treatment of all those with interests, since different interests warrant different treatment. All have an interest in avoiding pain, for instance, but relatively few have an interest in cultivating their abilities. Not only does his principle justify different treatment for different interests, but it allows different treatment for the same interest when diminishing marginal utility is a factor. For example, this approach would privilege a starving person's interest in food over the same interest of someone who is only slightly hungry.
Among the more important human interests are those in avoiding pain, in developing one's abilities, in satisfying basic needs for food and shelter, in enjoying warm personal relationships, in being free to pursue one's projects without interference, "and many others". The fundamental interest that entitles a being to equal consideration is the capacity for "suffering and/or enjoyment or happiness". He holds that a being's interests should always be weighed according to that being's concrete properties. He favors a 'journey' model of life, which measures the wrongness of taking a life by the degree to which doing so frustrates a life journey's goals. The journey model is tolerant of some frustrated desire and explains why persons who have embarked on their journeys are not replaceable. Only a personal interest in continuing to live brings the journey model into play. This model also explains the priority that Singer attaches to
interests over trivial desires and pleasures.
Singer's ideas require the concept of an impartial standpoint from which to compare interests. He has wavered about whether the precise aim is the total amount of satisfied interests or the most satisfied interests among those beings who already exist prior to the decision one is making. The second edition of
Practical Ethics disavows the first edition's suggestion that the total and prior-existence views should be combined. The second edition asserts that preference-satisfaction utilitarianism, incorporating the 'journey' model, applies without invoking the first edition's suggestion about the total view. But the details are fuzzy and Singer admits that he is "not entirely satisfied" with his treatment.
Ethical conduct is justifiable by reasons that go beyond prudence to "something bigger than the individual," addressing a larger audience. Singer thinks this going-beyond identifies moral reasons as "somehow universal", specifically in the injunction to 'love thy neighbor as thyself', interpreted by him as demanding that one give the same weight to the interests of others as one gives to one's own interests. This universalising step, which Singer traces from
KantImmanuel Kant was a German philosopher from Königsberg , researching, lecturing and writing on philosophy and anthropology at the end of the 18th Century Enlightenment....
to Hare, is crucial and sets him apart from those moral theorists from
HobbesThomas Hobbes of Malmesbury , in some older texts Thomas Hobbs of Malmsbury, was an English philosopher, best known today for his work on political philosophy...
to
David GauthierDavid Gauthier is a Canadian-American philosopher best known for his neo-Hobbesian social contract theory of morality, as laid out in his book Morals by Agreement.-Biography:...
, who tie morality to prudence. Universalisation leads directly to utilitarianism, Singer argues, on the strength of the thought that one's own interests cannot count for more than the interests of others. Taking these into account, one must weigh them up and adopt the course of action that is most likely to maximise the interests of those affected; utilitarianism has been arrived at. Singer's universalising step applies to interests without reference to who has them, whereas a Kantian's applies to the judgments of rational agents (in Kant's kingdom of ends, or
Rawls'sJohn Bordley Rawls was an American philosopher and a leading figure in moral and political philosophy. He held the James Bryant Conant University Professorship at Harvard University....
Original Position, etc.). Singer regards Kantian universalization as unjust to animals. As for the Hobbesians, Singer attempts a response in the final chapter of
Practical Ethics, arguing that self-interested reasons support adoption of the moral point of view, such as 'the
paradox of hedonismThe paradox of hedonism, also called the pleasure paradox, is the idea in the study of ethics which points out that pleasure and happiness are strange phenomena that do not obey normal principles....
', which counsels that happiness is best found by not looking for it, and the need most people feel to relate to something larger than their own concerns.
Practical Ethics includes a chapter arguing for the redistribution of wealth to ameliorate absolute poverty (Chapter 8, "Rich and Poor"), and another making a case for resettlement of refugees on a large scale in industrialised countries (Chapter 9, "Insiders and Outsiders").
Although the natural, non-sentient environment has no intrinsic value for a utilitarian like Singer, environmental degradation is a profound threat to sentient life, and for this reason environmentalists are right to speak of wilderness as a 'world heritage'.
Abortion, euthanasia and infanticide
Consistent with his general ethical theory, Singer holds that the right to life is intrinsically tied to a being's capacity to hold preferences, which in turn is intrinsically tied to a being's capacity to feel pain and pleasure. In his view, the central argument against abortion may be stated as the following
syllogismA syllogism is a kind of logical argument in which one proposition is inferred from two or more others of a certain form...
:
It is wrong to kill an innocent human being.
A human fetus is an innocent human being.
Therefore it is wrong to kill a human fetus.
In his book
Rethinking Life and Death, as well as in
Practical Ethics, Singer asserts that, if we take the premises at face value, the argument is deductively valid. Singer comments that defenders of abortion attack the second premise, suggesting that the fetus becomes a "human" or "alive" at some point after conception; however, Singer argues that human development is a gradual process, that it is nearly impossible to mark a particular moment in time as
the moment at which human life begins.
Singer's argument for abortion differs from many other proponents of abortion; rather than attacking the second premise of the anti-abortion argument, Singer attacks the first premise, denying that it is necessarily wrong to take innocent human life:
[The argument that a fetus is not alive] is a resort to a convenient fiction that turns an evidently living being into one that legally is not alive. Instead of accepting such fictions, we should recognise that the fact that a being is human, and alive, does not in itself tell us whether it is wrong to take that being's life.
Singer states that arguments for or against abortion should be based on utilitarian calculation which weighs the preferences of a woman against the preferences of the fetus. In his view a preference is anything sought to be obtained or avoided; all forms of benefit or harm caused to a being correspond directly with the satisfaction or frustration of one or more of its preferences. Since a capacity to experience the sensations of suffering or satisfaction is a prerequisite to having any preferences at all, and a fetus, at least up to around eighteen weeks, says Singer, has no capacity to suffer or feel satisfaction, it is not possible for such a fetus to hold any preferences at all. In a utilitarian calculation, there is nothing to weigh against a woman's preferences to have an abortion; therefore, abortion is morally permissible.
Similar to his argument for abortion, Singer argues that newborns lack the essential characteristics of personhood—"rationality, autonomy, and self-consciousness"—and therefore "killing a newborn baby is never equivalent to killing a person, that is, a being who wants to go on living."
Singer classifies
euthanasiaEuthanasia refers to the practice of intentionally ending a life in order to relieve pain and suffering....
as
voluntaryVoluntary euthanasia refers to the practice of ending a life in a painless manner...
,
involuntaryNon-voluntary euthanasia is euthanasia conducted where the explicit consent of the individual concerned is unavailable...
, or non-voluntary. Voluntary euthanasia is that with the consent of the subject.
Singer's book
Rethinking Life and Death: The Collapse of Our Traditional Ethics offers further examination of the ethical dilemmas concerning the advances of medicine. He covers the value of human life and quality of life ethics in addition to abortion and other controversial ethical questions.
Singer has experienced the complexities of some of these questions in his own life. His mother had
Alzheimer's diseaseAlzheimer's disease also known in medical literature as Alzheimer disease is the most common form of dementia. There is no cure for the disease, which worsens as it progresses, and eventually leads to death...
. He said, "I think this has made me see how the issues of someone with these kinds of problems are really very difficult". In an interview with
Ronald BaileyRonald Bailey is the science editor for Reason magazine. He was born in San Antonio, Texas and raised in Washington County, Virginia, and attended the University of Virginia, where he earned a B.A...
, published in December 2000, he explained that his sister shares the responsibility of making decisions about his mother. He did say that, if he were solely responsible, his mother might not continue to live.
World poverty
In "
Famine, Affluence, and Morality"Famine, Affluence, and Morality" is an essay written by Peter Singer in 1971 and published in Philosophy and Public Affairs in 1972. It argues that affluent persons are morally obligated to donate far more resources to humanitarian causes than is considered normal in Western cultures...
", one of Singer's best-known philosophical essays, he argues that some people living in abundance while others starve is morally indefensible. Singer proposes that anyone able to help the poor should donate part of their income to aid poverty relief and similar efforts. Singer reasons that, when one is already living comfortably, a further purchase to increase comfort will lack the same moral importance as saving another person's life. Singer himself reports that he donates 25 percent of his salary to
OxfamOxfam is an international confederation of 15 organizations working in 98 countries worldwide to find lasting solutions to poverty and related injustice around the world. In all Oxfam’s actions, the ultimate goal is to enable people to exercise their rights and manage their own lives...
and UNICEF. In "Rich and Poor", the version of the aforementioned article that appears in the second edition of
Practical Ethics, his main argument is presented as follows:
If we can prevent something bad without sacrificing anything of comparable significance, we ought to do it; absolute poverty is bad; there is some poverty we can prevent without sacrificing anything of comparable moral significance; therefore we ought to prevent some absolute poverty.
Singer's most recent book,
The Life You Can SaveThe Life You Can Save: Acting Now to End World Poverty is a 2009 non-fiction book written by Australian philosopher Peter Singer. In it, Singer argues that citizens of affluent nations are behaving immorally if they do not act to end the poverty they know to exist in developing nations.The book...
, makes the argument that it is a clear-cut moral imperative for citizens of developed countries to give more to charitable causes that help the poor. While Singer acknowledges that there are problems with ensuring that money goes where it is most needed and that it is used effectively, he does not think that these practical difficulties undermine his original conclusion (that people should make a much greater effort to reduce poverty).
Zoophilia
In a 2001 review of Midas Dekkers'
Dearest Pet: On Bestiality, Singer argues that sexual activities between humans and animals that result in harm to the animal should remain illegal, but that "sex with animals does not always involve cruelty" and that "mutually satisfying activities" of a sexual nature may sometimes occur between humans and animals, and that writer Otto Soyka would condone such activities. The position was countered by fellow philosopher
Tom ReganTom Regan is an American philosopher who specializes in animal rights theory. He is professor emeritus of philosophy at North Carolina State University, where he taught from 1967 until his retirement in 2001....
, who writes that the same argument could be used to justify having sex with children. Regan writes that Singer's position is a consequence of his adapting a
utilitarianUtilitarianism is an ethical theory holding that the proper course of action is the one that maximizes the overall "happiness", by whatever means necessary. It is thus a form of consequentialism, meaning that the moral worth of an action is determined only by its resulting outcome, and that one can...
, or
consequentialistConsequentialism is the class of normative ethical theories holding that the consequences of one's conduct are the ultimate basis for any judgment about the rightness of that conduct...
, approach to animal rights, rather than a strictly
rights-basedDeontological ethics or deontology is the normative ethical position that judges the morality of an action based on the action's adherence to a rule or rules. It is sometimes described as "duty" or "obligation" or "rule" -based ethics, because rules "bind you to your duty"...
one, and argues that the rights-based position distances itself from non-consensual sex. The
Humane Society of the United StatesThe Humane Society of the United States , based in Washington, D.C., is the largest animal advocacy organization in the world. In 2009, HSUS reported assets of over US$160 million....
takes the position that all sexual molestation of animals by humans is abusive, whether it involves physical injury or not.
Commenting on Singer's article "Heavy Petting," in which he argues that zoosexual activity need not be abusive, and that relationships could form which were mutually enjoyed,
Ingrid NewkirkIngrid Newkirk is a British-born animal rights activist and president of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals , the world's largest animal rights organization...
, president of the animal rights group
PETAPeople for the Ethical Treatment of Animals is an American animal rights organization based in Norfolk, Virginia, and led by Ingrid Newkirk, its international president. A non-profit corporation with 300 employees and two million members and supporters, it claims to be the largest animal rights...
, argued that, "If a girl gets sexual pleasure from riding a horse, does the horse suffer? If not, who cares? If you
French kissA French kiss is a kiss in which one participant's tongue touches the partner's lips or tongue and usually enters his or her mouth. A French kiss is a slow passionate kiss which is usually considered intimate, romantic, erotic or sexual...
your dog and he or she thinks it's great, is it wrong? We believe all exploitation and abuse is wrong. If it isn't exploitation and abuse, [then] it may not be wrong." A few years later, Newkirk clarified in a letter to the
Canada Free Press that she was strongly opposed to any exploitation of, and all sexual activity with, animals.
Singer believes that although sex between species is not normal or natural, it does not constitute a transgression of our status as human beings, because human beings are animals or, more specifically, "we are great apes".
Evolutionary biology and leftist politics
In
A Darwinian LeftA Darwinian Left: Politics, Evolution and Cooperation is a 2000 book by Peter Singer , which argues that the view of human nature provided by evolution is compatible with and should be incorporated into the ideological framework of the Left.Singer's argument is that the Left will be better able to...
, Singer outlines a plan for the political left to adapt to the lessons of evolutionary biology. He says that
evolutionary psychologyEvolutionary psychology is an approach in the social and natural sciences that examines psychological traits such as memory, perception, and language from a modern evolutionary perspective. It seeks to identify which human psychological traits are evolved adaptations, that is, the functional...
suggests that humans naturally tend to be self-interested. He further argues that the evidence that selfish tendencies are natural must not be taken as evidence that selfishness is right. He concludes that
game theoryGame theory is a mathematical method for analyzing calculated circumstances, such as in games, where a person’s success is based upon the choices of others...
(the mathematical study of strategy) and experiments in psychology offer hope that self-interested people will make short-term sacrifices for the good of others, if society provides the right conditions. Essentially Singer claims that although humans possess selfish, competitive tendencies naturally, they have a substantial capacity for
cooperationCo-operation or co-operative behaviours are terms used to describe behaviours by organisms which are beneficial to other organisms, and are selected for on that basis. Under this definition, altruism is a form of co-operation in which there is no direct benefit to the actor...
that has also been selected for during
human evolutionHuman evolution refers to the evolutionary history of the genus Homo, including the emergence of Homo sapiens as a distinct species and as a unique category of hominids and mammals...
. Singer's writing in
Greater Good magazine, published by the
Greater Good Science CenterThe Greater Good Science Center, located at the University of California, Berkeley is an interdisciplinary research center devoted to the scientific understanding of happy and compassionate individuals, strong social bonds, and altruistic behavior. By studying individuals and their relationships,...
of the
University of California, BerkeleyThe University of California, Berkeley , is a teaching and research university established in 1868 and located in Berkeley, California, USA...
, includes the interpretation of scientific research into the roots of compassion, altruism, and peaceful human relationships.
Nonetheless, he is not anti-capitalist. In an interview with New Left Project in 2010, he says the following:
Capitalism is very far from a perfect system, but so far we have yet to find anything that clearly does a better job of meeting human needs than a regulated capitalist economy coupled with a welfare and health care system that meets the basic needs of those who do not thrive in the capitalist economy.
He then adds that "If we ever do find a better system, I'll be happy to call myself an anti-capitalist."
Vegetarianism and ethics of food consumption
In an article for the online publication Chinadialogue Singer called Western-style meat production cruel, unhealthy and damaging to the ecosystem. He rejected the idea that the method was necessary to meet the population's increasing demand, explaining that animals in factory farms have to eat food grown explicitly for them, and they burn up most of the food's energy just to breathe and keep their bodies warm.
Singer calls himself a vegetarian and a "flexible vegan". In his May 2006 interview in
Mother JonesMother Jones is an American independent news organization, featuring investigative and breaking news reporting on politics, the environment, human rights, and culture. Mother Jones has been nominated for 23 National Magazine Awards and has won six times, including for General Excellence in 2001,...
, he states:
I don't eat meat. I've been a vegetarian since 1971. I've gradually become increasingly vegan. I am largely vegan but I'm a flexible vegan. I don't go to the supermarket and buy non-vegan stuff for myself. But when I'm traveling or going to other people's places I will be quite happy to eat vegetarian rather than vegan.
In addition to his addressing issues concerning the consumption of animal products, Singer's "Can You Do Good by Eating Well?" in
Greater Good examines the ethics of eating locally grown food.
Personism
Although he has expressed admiration for many of the values promoted by secular humanism, Singer believes it to be incomplete and promotes a sort of utilitarian
personismPersonism is a life stance that has been called the philosophy of Peter Singer. It amounts to a branch of secular humanism with different rights-criteria. The main distinction is that personists believe that rights are conferred to the extent that a creature is a person...
instead.
Criticism of Singer
Singer's positions have been criticised by groups concerned with what they see as his attack upon human dignity, such as advocates for disabled people and right-to-life supporters. Singer has replied that many people judge him based on secondhand summaries and short quotations taken out of context, not his books or articles.
Some claim that Singer's utilitarian ideas lead to
eugenicsEugenics is the "applied science or the bio-social movement which advocates the use of practices aimed at improving the genetic composition of a population", usually referring to human populations. The origins of the concept of eugenics began with certain interpretations of Mendelian inheritance,...
. American publisher
Steve ForbesMalcolm Stevenson "Steve" Forbes, Jr. is an American editor, publisher, and businessman. He is the editor-in-chief of business magazine Forbes as well as president and chief executive officer of its publisher, Forbes Inc. He was a Republican candidate in the U.S. Presidential primaries in 1996...
ceased his donations to
Princeton UniversityPrinceton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....
in 1999 because of Singer's appointment to a prestigious professorship. Nazi-hunter
Simon WiesenthalSimon Wiesenthal KBE was an Austrian Holocaust survivor who became famous after World War II for his work as a Nazi hunter....
wrote to organisers of a Swedish book fair to which Singer was invited that "A professor of morals ... who justifies the right to kill handicapped newborns ... is in my opinion unacceptable for representation at your level." Marc Maurer, President of the National Federation of the Blind, criticised Singer's appointment to the Princeton Faculty in a banquet speech at the organisation's national convention in July 2001, claiming that Singer's support for euthanizing disabled babies could lead to disabled older children and adults being valued less as well. Theodore Dalrymple wrote in 2010 that
SingerianPeter Albert David Singer is an Australian philosopher who is the Ira W. DeCamp Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University and Laureate Professor at the Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics at the University of Melbourne...
moral universalism is "preposterous—psychologically, theoretically, and practically".
In 1989, when Peter Singer attempted to speak during a lecture at Saarbrücken, he was interrupted by a group of protesters including advocates for the disabled. He offered the protesters the opportunity to explain why he should not be allowed to speak. The protesters indicated that they believed he was opposed to all rights for the disabled. They were unaware that, although Singer believes that some lives are so blighted from the beginning that their parents may decide their lives are not worth living, in other cases, once the decision is made to keep them alive, everything that can be done to improve the quality of their life should, to Singer's mind, be done. The ensuing discussion revealed that there were many misconceptions about his positions, but the revelation did not end the controversy. One of the protesters expressed that entering serious discussions was a tactical error.
The same year, Peter Singer was invited to speak in
MarburgMarburg is a city in the state of Hesse, Germany, on the River Lahn. It is the main town of the Marburg-Biedenkopf district and its population, as of March 2010, was 79,911.- Founding and early history :...
at a European symposium on "Bioengineering, Ethics and Mental Disability." The invitation was brutally attacked by leading intellectuals and organizations in German media, with an article in
Der SpiegelDer Spiegel is a German weekly news magazine published in Hamburg. It is one of Europe's largest publications of its kind, with a weekly circulation of more than one million.-Overview:...
comparing Singer's positions to
NazismNazism, the common short form name of National Socialism was the ideology and practice of the Nazi Party and of Nazi Germany...
. The symposium was eventually cancelled and Singer's invitation consequently withdrawn.
A lecture at the Zoological Institute of the University of Zurich was also interrupted by two groups of protesters. The first group was a group of disabled people who staged a brief protest at the beginning of the lecture. They objected to inviting an advocate of euthanasia to speak. At the end of this protest, when Singer attempted to address their concerns, a second group of protesters rose and began chanting "Singer raus! Singer raus!" ("Singer out!") When Singer attempted to respond, a protester jumped on stage and grabbed his glasses, and the host ended the lecture. The first group of protesters was distressed by this second, more aggressive group. It had not intended to halt the lecture and even had questions to ask Singer. Singer explains "my views are not threatening to anyone, even minimally" and says that some groups play on the anxieties of those who hear only keywords that are understandably worrying (given the constant fears of ever repeating the holocaust) if taken with any less than the full context of his belief system.
Meta-ethics and foundational issues
Though Singer focuses more than many philosophers on applied ethical questions, he has also written in depth on foundational issues in
meta-ethicsIn philosophy, meta-ethics is the branch of ethics that seeks to understand the nature of ethical properties, statements, attitudes, and judgments. Meta-ethics is one of the three branches of ethics generally recognized by philosophers, the others being normative ethics and applied ethics. Ethical...
, including why one ethical system should be chosen over others. In
The Expanding Circle, he argues that the evolution of human society provides support for the utilitarian point of view. On his account, ethical reasoning has existed from the time primitive foraging bands had to cooperate, compromise, and make group decisions to survive. He elaborates: "In a dispute between members of a cohesive group of reasoning beings, the demand for a reason is a demand for a justification that can be accepted by the group as a whole." Thus, consideration of others' interests has long been a necessary part of the human experience. Singer believes that contemplative analysis may now guide one to accept a broader utilitarianism:
"If I have seen that from an ethical point of view I am just one person among the many in my society, and my interests are no more important, from the point of view of the whole, than the similar interests of others within my society, I am ready to see that, from a still larger point of view, my society is just one among other societies, and the interests of members of my society are no more important, from that larger perspective, than the similar interests of members of other societies... Taking the impartial element in ethical reasoning to its logical conclusion means, first, accepting that we ought to have equal concern for all human beings.
Singer elaborates that viewing oneself as equal to others in one's society and at the same time viewing one's society as fundamentally superior to other societies may cause an uncomfortable
cognitive dissonanceCognitive dissonance is a discomfort caused by holding conflicting ideas simultaneously. The theory of cognitive dissonance proposes that people have a motivational drive to reduce dissonance. They do this by changing their attitudes, beliefs, and actions. Dissonance is also reduced by justifying,...
. This is the sense in which he means that reason may push people to accept a broader utilitarian stance. Critics like Ken Binmore say that this cognitive dissonance is apparently not very strong, since people often knowingly ignore the interests of faraway societies quite similar to their own, and that the "ought" above only applies if one already accepts Singer's basic premises about the equality of various interests.
An alternative line taken by Singer about the need for ethics is that living the ethical life may be, on the whole, more satisfying than seeking only material gain. He invokes the
hedonistic paradoxThe paradox of hedonism, also called the pleasure paradox, is the idea in the study of ethics which points out that pleasure and happiness are strange phenomena that do not obey normal principles....
, noting that those who pursue material gain seldom find the happiness they seek. Having a broader purpose in life may lead to more long-term happiness. On this account, impartial (self-sacrificing) behavior in particular matters may be motivated by self-interested considerations from a broader perspective.
Singer has also implicitly argued that an airtight defense of utilitarianism is not crucial to his work. In "Famine, Affluence, and Morality", he begins by saying that he would like to see how far a seemingly innocuous and widely endorsed principle can take us; the principle is that one is morally required to forgo a small pleasure to relieve someone else's immense pain. He then argues that this principle entails radical conclusions—for example, that affluent people are very immoral if they do not give up some luxury goods to donate the money for famine relief. If his reasoning is valid, he goes on to argue, either it is not very immoral to value small luxuries over saving many lives, or such affluent people are very immoral. As Singer argues in the same essay, regardless of the soundness of his fundamental defense of utilitarianism, his argument has value in that it exposes conflicts between many people's stated beliefs and their actions.
Publications
Singer is one of the most prolific writers in philosophy, sometimes publishing several books a year as well as public engagement.
His books include:
- Animal Liberation
Animal Liberation is a book by Australian philosopher Peter Singer, published in 1975.The book is widely considered within the animal liberation movement to be the founding philosophical statement of its ideas...
: A New Ethics for our Treatment of Animals, New York Review/Random House, New York, 1975; Cape, London, 1976; Avon, New York, 1977; Paladin, London, 1977; Thorsons, London, 1983. Harper Perennial Modern Classics, New York, 2009.
- Democracy and Disobedience, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1973; Oxford University Press, New York, 1974; Gregg Revivals, Aldershot, Hampshire, 1994
- Animal Rights and Human Obligations: An Anthology (co-editor with Thomas Regan), Prentice-Hall, New Jersey, 1976. 2nd revised edition, Prentice-Hall, New Jersey, 1989
- Practical Ethics
The book Practical Ethics is an introduction to applied ethics written by modern bioethical philosopher Peter Singer. It was originally published in 1979 and has since been translated into a number of languages. The book caused outrage in Germany, Austria and Switzerland...
, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1979; second edition, 1993; third edition, 2011. ISBN 0521229200, ISBN 0521297206, ISBN 9780521707688
- Marx, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1980; Hill & Wang, New York, 1980; reissued as Marx: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford University Press, 2000; also included in full in K. Thomas (ed.), Great Political Thinkers: Machiavelli, Hobbes, Mill and Marx, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1992
- Animal Factories (co-author with James Mason), Crown, New York, 1980
- The Expanding Circle: Ethics and Sociobiology, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, New York, 1981; Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1981; New American Library, New York, 1982. ISBN 0192830384
- Hegel, Oxford University Press, Oxford and New York, 1982; reissued as Hegel: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford University Press, 2001; also included in full in German Philosophers: Kant, Hegel, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1997
- Test-Tube Babies: a guide to moral questions, present techniques, and future possibilities (co-edited with William Walters), Oxford University Press, Melbourne, 1982
- The Reproduction Revolution: New Ways of Making Babies (co-author with Deane Wells), Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1984. revised American edition, Making Babies, Scribner's New York, 1985
- Should the Baby Live? The Problem of Handicapped Infants (co-author with Helga Kuhse), Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1985; Oxford University Press, New York, 1986; Gregg Revivals, Aldershot, Hampshire, 1994. ISBN 0192177451
- In Defence of Animals (ed.), Blackwells, Oxford, 1985; Harper & Row, New York, 1986. ISBN 0631138978
- Ethical and Legal Issues in Guardianship Options for Intellectually Disadvantaged People (co-author with Terry Carney), Human Rights Commission Monograph Series, no. 2, Australian Government Publishing Service, Canberra, 1986
- Applied Ethics (ed.), Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1986
- Animal Liberation: A Graphic Guide (co-author with Lori Gruen), Camden Press, London, 1987
- Embryo Experimentation (co-editor with Helga Kuhse, Stephen Buckle, Karen Dawson and Pascal Kasimba), Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1990; paperback edition, updated, 1993
- A Companion to Ethics (ed.), Basil Blackwell, Oxford, 1991; paperback edition, 1993
- Save the Animals! (Australian edition, co-author with Barbara Dover and Ingrid Newkirk), Collins Angus & Robertson, North Ryde, NSW, 1991
- The Great Ape Project: Equality Beyond Humanity (co-editor with Paola Cavalieri), Fourth Estate, London, 1993; hardback, St Martin's Press, New York, 1994; paperback, St Martin's Press, New York, 1995
- How Are We to Live?
How Are We to Live? : Ethics in an Age of Self-Interest is a book on applied ethics by modern bioethical philosopher Peter Singer. It was first published in 1993.-Chapter content:...
Ethics in an Age of Self-interest, Text Publishing, Melbourne, 1993; Mandarin, London, 1995; Prometheus, Buffalo, NY, 1995; Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1997
- Ethics (ed.), Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1994
- Individuals, Humans and Persons: Questions of Life and Death (co-author with Helga Kuhse), Academia Verlag, Sankt Augustin, Germany, 1994
- Rethinking Life and Death: The Collapse of Our Traditional Ethics, Text Publishing, Melbourne, 1994; St Martin's Press, New York, 1995; reprint 2008. ISBN 0312118805 Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1995
- The Greens (co-author with Bob Brown), Text Publishing, Melbourne, 1996
- The Allocation of Health Care Resources: An Ethical Evaluation of the "QALY" Approach (co-author with John McKie, Jeff Richardson and Helga Kuhse), Ashgate/Dartmouth, Aldershot, 1998
- A Companion to Bioethics (co-editor with Helga Kuhse), Blackwell, Oxford, 1998
- Ethics into Action: Henry Spira and the Animal Rights Movement, Rowman and Littlefield, Lanham, Maryland, 1998; Melbourne University Press, Melbourne, 1999
- Bioethics. An Anthology (co-editor with Helga Kuhse), Blackwell, 1999/ Oxford, 2006
- A Darwinian Left
A Darwinian Left: Politics, Evolution and Cooperation is a 2000 book by Peter Singer , which argues that the view of human nature provided by evolution is compatible with and should be incorporated into the ideological framework of the Left.Singer's argument is that the Left will be better able to...
, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, London, 1999; Yale University Press, New Haven, 2000. ISBN 0-300-08323-8
- Writings on an Ethical Life, Ecco, New York, 2000; Fourth Estate, London, 2001. ISBN 0060198389
- Unsanctifying Human Life: Essays on Ethics (edited by Helga Kuhse), Blackwell, Oxford, 2001
- One World: The Ethics of Globalisation, Yale University Press, New Haven, 2002; Text Publishing, Melbourne, 2002; 2nd edition, pb, Yale University Press, 2004; Oxford Longman, Hyderabad, 2004. ISBN 0300096860
- Pushing Time Away: My Grandfather and the Tragedy of Jewish Vienna, Ecco Press, New York, 2003; HarperCollins Australia, Melbourne, 2003; Granta, London, 2004
- The President of Good and Evil: The Ethics of George W. Bush, Dutton, New York, 2004; Granta, London, 2004; Text, Melbourne, 2004. ISBN 0525948139
- How Ethical is Australia? An Examination of Australia's Record as a Global Citizen (with Tom Gregg), Black Inc, Melbourne, 2004
- The Moral of the Story: An Anthology of Ethics Through Literature (co-edited with Renata Singer), Blackwell, Oxford, 2005
- In Defense of Animals. The Second Wave (ed.), Blackwell, Oxford, 2005
- The Ethics of What We Eat: Why Our Food Choices Matter, Rodale, New York, 2006 (co-author with Jim Mason); Text, Melbourne; Random House, London. Audio version: Playaway. ISBN 157954889X
- Eating (co-authored with Jim Mason), Arrow, London, 2006
- Stem Cell Research: the ethical issues. (co-edited by Lori Gruen, Laura Grabel, and Peter Singer). New York: Blackwells. 2007.
- The Bioethics Reader: Editors' Choice. (co-editor with Ruth Chadwick, Helga Kuhse, Willem Landman and Udo Schüklenk). New York: Blackwells. 2007.
- The Future of Animal Farming: Renewing the Ancient Contract (with Marian Stamp Dawkins, and Roland Bonney) 2008. New York: Wiley-Blackwell.
- The Life You Can Save: Acting Now to End World Poverty. New York: Random House 2009. (see also thelifeyoucansave.com)
- Schaler, Jeffrey A. (Editor.). 2009. Peter Singer Under Fire: The Moral Iconoclast Faces His Critics. Chicago: Open Court Publishers.
- Leist A. and P.Singer. (eds.) 2010. J. M. Coetzee and Ethics: Philosophical Perspectives on Literature. New York: Columbia University Press.
See also
- Intrinsic value (animal ethics)
The intrinsic value of an animal refers to the value it possesses in its own right, as an end-in-itself, as opposed to its Instrumental value, its value to other animals . The phrase has been adopted by animal rights advocates...
- Argument from marginal cases
The Argument from Marginal Cases is a philosophical argument regarding the moral status of animals. Its proponents hold that if members of society such as infants, the senile, the comatose, and the cognitively disabled do have direct moral status, animals do have a direct moral status, too, since...
- Utilitarian bioethics
Utilitarian bioethics is a branch of utilitarian ethics and bioethics that recommends directing medical resources where they will have most long-term effect for good....
- Utilitarianism
Utilitarianism is an ethical theory holding that the proper course of action is the one that maximizes the overall "happiness", by whatever means necessary. It is thus a form of consequentialism, meaning that the moral worth of an action is determined only by its resulting outcome, and that one can...
- Demandingness objection
External links
- Peter Singer at Princeton University
Princeton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....
- Column arcchive at Project Syndicate
Project Syndicate is an international not-for-profit newspaper syndicate and association of newspapers. It distributes commentaries and analysis by experts, activists, Nobel laureates, statesmen, economists, political thinkers, business leaders and academics to its member publications, and...
Interviews
- Richard Dawkins interviews Peter Singer for UK's Channel 4 series 'The Genius of Charles Darwin'
- 'Each of Us Is Just One Among Others' in A. Voorhoeve, Conversations on Ethics. Oxford University Press, 2009 ISBN 978-0-19-921537-9
- Singer appears and freely articulates thoughts on vegetarianism and applied ethics in Time Square, NYC in a 10 Minute segment of Astra Taylor
Astra Taylor is a Canadian-American documentary filmmaker and writer, best known for her 2005 film, Zizek!, about the Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Žižek, and for her 2008 film, Examined Life....
's 2008 film Examined LifeExamined Life is a 2008 documentary film directed by Astra Taylor. The film features eight influential contemporary philosophers walking around New York and other metropolises and discussing the practical application of their ideas in modern culture....
.
- Big Think's Interview with Peter Singer: http://bigthink.com/petersinger
- Bloggingheads.tv
Bloggingheads.tv is a political, world events, philosophy, and science video blog discussion site in which the participants take part in an active back and forth conversation via webcam which is then broadcast online to viewers...
interview by economist Tyler CowenTyler Cowen is an American economist, academic, and writer. He occupies the Holbert C. Harris Chair of economics as a professor at George Mason University and is co-author, with Alex Tabarrok, of the popular economics blog Marginal Revolution...
on the book; The Life You Can Save about Acting Now To End World Poverty
- Video (with audio-only available) of conversation with Singer and Tyler Cowen
Tyler Cowen is an American economist, academic, and writer. He occupies the Holbert C. Harris Chair of economics as a professor at George Mason University and is co-author, with Alex Tabarrok, of the popular economics blog Marginal Revolution...
on Bloggingheads.tvBloggingheads.tv is a political, world events, philosophy, and science video blog discussion site in which the participants take part in an active back and forth conversation via webcam which is then broadcast online to viewers...
- RSA Vision webcast - "RSA/WWF Series on Global Challenges and the Values we Live By" - Peter Singer on ethics, engagement and civil society
- Video: Peter Singer: Climate change, eating meat and ending poverty (2009 Milthorpe Lecture)
- Audio: Peter Singer in conversation on the BBC World Service discussion show The Forum
The Forum is the BBC World Service's flagship discussion programme. It brings together prominent thinkers from different disciplines and different parts of the world to try and create stimulating discussion, informed by highly distinct academic, artistic and cultural backgrounds.-Format:Each...
- Singer, Peter (1946-) National Library of Australia, Trove, People and Organisation record for Peter Singer
- Peter Singer and Eugenics
- Reading The Singer on "Bestiality"