A Look At Famine, Affluence, and Morality

Want to read the rest of this paper? Join Essayworld today to view this entire essay and over 50,000 other term papers

Since we are not willing to give up much of anything in our everyday lives for the welfare of another person it is within the human norms that we find the argument against this point that Singer makes. We tend to put out of mind the welfare of others when it comes to self-value. Singer uses the example of a child drowning in a pond of water. To jump in and save the child will be an inconvenience for the person doing the saving. Their clothing would be muddy and wet from the pond, but the child would be safe. In his argument getting muddy clothing is much less of a bad thing then the inconvenience of wet and muddy clothing. While I like to think that most people would jump in the pond, I know that there are those who will not do so and will worry more about themselves.
Another argument in the paper is that we should not allow proximity to guide our moral compass. When we see a starving person in our own neighborhood it pulls at our humanity more than someone that is a world ...

Get instant access to over 50,000 essays. Write better papers. Get better grades. Already a member? Login

from a small town to give to a country half a world away will that small town's economy not take a blow when people do not spend the money in all of the small mom and pop businesses? These are all questions that we must take into consideration when thinking about the cost it would take to help. Spreading the giving around the world from wealthy governments and individuals would help to alleviate the losses to economic structures.
Is his writings Singer discusses "Marginal Utility" which is the gain or loss from the increase or decrease in the consumptions of goods and services. When a service or a good is used there is always a cost. When we choose to do good deeds that involve ...

Succeed in your coursework without stepping into a library. Get access to a growing library of notes, book reports, and research papers in 2 minutes or less.

CITE THIS PAGE: