Duty to Distance
In “Famine, Affluence, and Morality”. Peter Singer claims that people living in relatively affluent countries are morally obligated to prevent something bad from happening in famine countries as long as it would not sacrificing anything of morally significance, which is the moral scheme that he thinks people should alter to. By saying“something bad”, he means starvation, lack of shelter and medical care, etc. This principle is also called the greater moral evil rule by John Arthur in his article “Equality, Entitlements, and Distribution of Income.”
Peter Singer starts his argument with an example. Suppose that ‘‘I am walking past a shallow pond and see a child drowning … 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.’’ By comparing the moral significance of the child’s life and the insignificance of getting clothes muddy, Singer points out what is the most urgent to do and what is the less significant to consider.
Also, by stating the fact that it makes no difference whether this child is ten yards away or thousands of miles away in Bengal and it makes no difference whether I am the only person seeing the drowning child or just I am one among millions of people to save the drowning child, Singer blocks the move from descriptive fact that a person’s being physically near to us make us more likely to help that person to the prescriptive claim that we ought to only help those physically near to us.
Then by analogy, he demonstrates that proximity and distance also should not be the excuse for inactivity of seeing major evils happening in famine countries, in fact, with the development of instant communication and modern transportation, those are the problems that everyone in developed countries involved. Thus he proposes two principle of preventing bad occurrences in famine countries. The strong version is asking people prevent bad things from happening unless doing so would reduce themselves to the level of marginal utility, i.e., the same amount of suffering as the people experiencing in famine countries, while the weak version is asking people to prevent bad things happening without sacrificing any thing of morally significance. The difference between the strong and weak version lies in whether or not people ought to sacrifice until they feel as much painful as those people needed to be helped. Though the weak version is seemingly more acceptable to people, Singer himself insists that we can never emphasize too much the importance of the strong version, since by not doing so, the consumer society that we live in, will slow down its pace of development and perhaps ultimately disappear entirely.
Garrett Hardin, an American ecologist, describe the world hunger and foreign aid problem by a lifeboat ethics metaphor. It presents a situation that a lifeboat with capacity of maximum 50 people in an ocean surrounded by 100 swimmers, the number of swimmers getting saved is limited, otherwise the life of passengers are originally on the boat will be threaten. Suppose there are already 40 people on board, then the dilemma comes to who should be the 10 to be saved among this 100 swimmer. To ensure the safety of the people on board, Hardin recommends that not allowing anyone in and guard against boarding parties. Because “ if the passengers on board are driven by Christian ideal of being "our brother's keeper," or by the Marxist ideal of "to each according to his needs" and take all the swimmers into the boat, the boat swamps, everyone drowns.” Obviously, Hardin’s solution is strongly against Singer’s principle.
In this metaphor, the passengers on the boat stands for the people in rich countries, while the swimmers represent the people in poor countries. Hardin advocates that people in rich countries should not simply provide relief fund to deal with various problems in famine countries. He points out that the main problem in famine countries are hunger and over population. Simply providing money can not solve the rapid growing population in developed countries, given the data in Hardin’s article, “the people inside the lifeboats are doubling in numbers every 87 years; those swimming around outside are doubling, on the average, every 35 years, more than twice as fast as the rich. And since the world's resources are dwindling, the difference in prosperity between the rich and the poor can only increase,” what is worse, the relief fund will increase the gap of GNP between rich and poor countries since the famine countries could possibly get dependent on the the relief fund and put less attention to solve this bad situation which already happened and will last for a long time. North Korea can be cited as a best example of famine county spoiled by the relief fund. Instead of trying to solve national wise starvation, the leader of this country prefer to rely on the support from UN and other affluent countries, consequently, the starvation problem is getting worse in North Korea nowadays and the dictatorship makes it impossible for the North Korean to improve the situation radically.
According to Singer’s principle, the best solution to the lifeboat dilemma is that people on board give their seats to others, when those who are fortunate enough on board feeling ashamed and uneasy to the swimmers in the sea, and voluntarily give up their seats to them, their compunction will be diminished by their selfless act. Besides, the swimmers get saved will not feel ashamed either, otherwise they would not take the seat from the passengers who previously possess the seats. This solution is very much similar to the strong version of the principle that Singer proposes, or even further, i.e., to sacrifice over the level of marginal utility.
As we can see from Singer’s argument, he considers the world as a whole. In other words, if the people in affluent countries do not give away their partial earning to famine relief, the situation in developed countries will getting worse, and finally the affluent countries will be affected. Though Singer does not admit his principle is based on utilitarianism, the act of giving relief to booth up the happiness of people in famine countries fit the principle of utility, while Hardin believes that give a man a fish and you could only feed him for a day, he is in favor of the theory that the affluent countries should not give away to famine countries and maintain the situation to live inequitably.
By plainly dividing the world into rich and poor countries, Hardin is somehow assertive without taking the mediocrity into account. Other than that, he ignore the fact that the current starvation and poverty problem in developing countries are the consequence of colonialism and exploitation driven by affluent countries staring from hundreds of years ago till the present. It is absurd to disregard the history and the relationship of famine and affluent countries. In fact, the “lifeboat” itself is the resources seize from the famine countries, which causes the unequal resource distribution. I think this is the main reason to accept Singer’s principle, that is, the wealth that the affluent country possess now were originally from the famine countries, which is the history and the fact that people in western world can not deny.
So, it is morally obligated for the people in affluent countries to help. Then the problem jumps to how to help and how much help should affluent countries provide.
Hardin’s metaphor reveals the important relationship between population growth and starvation. Actually, the connection between poverty, hunger, environment and resources are complicated. For every country suffering from hunger problem, it also suffering from over population. There is no way to deal with only one of these two problems and turn a blind eye to another. The most effective method to help the famine countries get rid of predicament is providing support on these two aspects at the same time. To solve the starvation problem, other than simply providing food, the affluent countries should provide advance agriculture technology as well as sufficient training to the farmers, educate people with the significance of sustainable society, develop a systematic plan of resource exploitation and regeneration. On the population control aspect, given that the great impact of women’s social status on population control, it is urgent to promote women’s rights on equal career opportunity. Apart from these measures, the free education and health care system should also be extended. Only by providing these, the balance between population, food, environment and economical development could be reached, the famine countries could develop steadily and harmonically, which eventually make all the countries in the world better off.
In terms of the percentage GNP that affluent countries should give away, Singer describes it as an academic matter, he mentions that if 40% of the GNP seems good for the countries in need, but as a result will slow down the economy, then 25% of the GNP will be a better choice. And he agrees that there should be a limit for the donation. Although it is generally considered by western society that 1% of GNP is the appropriate level of foreign aid, which obviously too stingy in Singer’s point of view, he agrees that it does not affect “ the question how much an individual should give in a society in which very few are giving substantial amounts.” As none of the above approaches require affluent countries sacrifice anything of moral significance, I think, it is affluent countries’ obligation to help famine countries to get rid of poverty and hunger.
Peter Singer starts his argument with an example. Suppose that ‘‘I am walking past a shallow pond and see a child drowning … 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.’’ By comparing the moral significance of the child’s life and the insignificance of getting clothes muddy, Singer points out what is the most urgent to do and what is the less significant to consider.
Also, by stating the fact that it makes no difference whether this child is ten yards away or thousands of miles away in Bengal and it makes no difference whether I am the only person seeing the drowning child or just I am one among millions of people to save the drowning child, Singer blocks the move from descriptive fact that a person’s being physically near to us make us more likely to help that person to the prescriptive claim that we ought to only help those physically near to us.
Then by analogy, he demonstrates that proximity and distance also should not be the excuse for inactivity of seeing major evils happening in famine countries, in fact, with the development of instant communication and modern transportation, those are the problems that everyone in developed countries involved. Thus he proposes two principle of preventing bad occurrences in famine countries. The strong version is asking people prevent bad things from happening unless doing so would reduce themselves to the level of marginal utility, i.e., the same amount of suffering as the people experiencing in famine countries, while the weak version is asking people to prevent bad things happening without sacrificing any thing of morally significance. The difference between the strong and weak version lies in whether or not people ought to sacrifice until they feel as much painful as those people needed to be helped. Though the weak version is seemingly more acceptable to people, Singer himself insists that we can never emphasize too much the importance of the strong version, since by not doing so, the consumer society that we live in, will slow down its pace of development and perhaps ultimately disappear entirely.
Garrett Hardin, an American ecologist, describe the world hunger and foreign aid problem by a lifeboat ethics metaphor. It presents a situation that a lifeboat with capacity of maximum 50 people in an ocean surrounded by 100 swimmers, the number of swimmers getting saved is limited, otherwise the life of passengers are originally on the boat will be threaten. Suppose there are already 40 people on board, then the dilemma comes to who should be the 10 to be saved among this 100 swimmer. To ensure the safety of the people on board, Hardin recommends that not allowing anyone in and guard against boarding parties. Because “ if the passengers on board are driven by Christian ideal of being "our brother's keeper," or by the Marxist ideal of "to each according to his needs" and take all the swimmers into the boat, the boat swamps, everyone drowns.” Obviously, Hardin’s solution is strongly against Singer’s principle.
In this metaphor, the passengers on the boat stands for the people in rich countries, while the swimmers represent the people in poor countries. Hardin advocates that people in rich countries should not simply provide relief fund to deal with various problems in famine countries. He points out that the main problem in famine countries are hunger and over population. Simply providing money can not solve the rapid growing population in developed countries, given the data in Hardin’s article, “the people inside the lifeboats are doubling in numbers every 87 years; those swimming around outside are doubling, on the average, every 35 years, more than twice as fast as the rich. And since the world's resources are dwindling, the difference in prosperity between the rich and the poor can only increase,” what is worse, the relief fund will increase the gap of GNP between rich and poor countries since the famine countries could possibly get dependent on the the relief fund and put less attention to solve this bad situation which already happened and will last for a long time. North Korea can be cited as a best example of famine county spoiled by the relief fund. Instead of trying to solve national wise starvation, the leader of this country prefer to rely on the support from UN and other affluent countries, consequently, the starvation problem is getting worse in North Korea nowadays and the dictatorship makes it impossible for the North Korean to improve the situation radically.
According to Singer’s principle, the best solution to the lifeboat dilemma is that people on board give their seats to others, when those who are fortunate enough on board feeling ashamed and uneasy to the swimmers in the sea, and voluntarily give up their seats to them, their compunction will be diminished by their selfless act. Besides, the swimmers get saved will not feel ashamed either, otherwise they would not take the seat from the passengers who previously possess the seats. This solution is very much similar to the strong version of the principle that Singer proposes, or even further, i.e., to sacrifice over the level of marginal utility.
As we can see from Singer’s argument, he considers the world as a whole. In other words, if the people in affluent countries do not give away their partial earning to famine relief, the situation in developed countries will getting worse, and finally the affluent countries will be affected. Though Singer does not admit his principle is based on utilitarianism, the act of giving relief to booth up the happiness of people in famine countries fit the principle of utility, while Hardin believes that give a man a fish and you could only feed him for a day, he is in favor of the theory that the affluent countries should not give away to famine countries and maintain the situation to live inequitably.
By plainly dividing the world into rich and poor countries, Hardin is somehow assertive without taking the mediocrity into account. Other than that, he ignore the fact that the current starvation and poverty problem in developing countries are the consequence of colonialism and exploitation driven by affluent countries staring from hundreds of years ago till the present. It is absurd to disregard the history and the relationship of famine and affluent countries. In fact, the “lifeboat” itself is the resources seize from the famine countries, which causes the unequal resource distribution. I think this is the main reason to accept Singer’s principle, that is, the wealth that the affluent country possess now were originally from the famine countries, which is the history and the fact that people in western world can not deny.
So, it is morally obligated for the people in affluent countries to help. Then the problem jumps to how to help and how much help should affluent countries provide.
Hardin’s metaphor reveals the important relationship between population growth and starvation. Actually, the connection between poverty, hunger, environment and resources are complicated. For every country suffering from hunger problem, it also suffering from over population. There is no way to deal with only one of these two problems and turn a blind eye to another. The most effective method to help the famine countries get rid of predicament is providing support on these two aspects at the same time. To solve the starvation problem, other than simply providing food, the affluent countries should provide advance agriculture technology as well as sufficient training to the farmers, educate people with the significance of sustainable society, develop a systematic plan of resource exploitation and regeneration. On the population control aspect, given that the great impact of women’s social status on population control, it is urgent to promote women’s rights on equal career opportunity. Apart from these measures, the free education and health care system should also be extended. Only by providing these, the balance between population, food, environment and economical development could be reached, the famine countries could develop steadily and harmonically, which eventually make all the countries in the world better off.
In terms of the percentage GNP that affluent countries should give away, Singer describes it as an academic matter, he mentions that if 40% of the GNP seems good for the countries in need, but as a result will slow down the economy, then 25% of the GNP will be a better choice. And he agrees that there should be a limit for the donation. Although it is generally considered by western society that 1% of GNP is the appropriate level of foreign aid, which obviously too stingy in Singer’s point of view, he agrees that it does not affect “ the question how much an individual should give in a society in which very few are giving substantial amounts.” As none of the above approaches require affluent countries sacrifice anything of moral significance, I think, it is affluent countries’ obligation to help famine countries to get rid of poverty and hunger.
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