Week 8: O'Neill & Singer (Feb. 25-March 1)
Assignment due!
What is Philosophy? Part 2 is due Friday, March 1, by 5pm.
Monday, Feb. 25
Required
O’Neill, O. (1993). “Kantian approaches to some famine problems.” In T. Regan (Ed.), Matters of life and death: New introductory essays in moral philosophy (3rd ed.). New York: McGraw Hill.
- This is the same article as was assigned before break.
- For Monday Feb. 25 read pp. 263 to end of article (p. 269)
- You can find this article on the Library Course Reserves page for this course.
Wednesday, Feb. 27
Required
1. Peter Singer, “Famine, Affluence and Morality” Links to an external site. (1972)
- For this text, try to find the premises and conclusion of his main argument in the first part of the text, then how he addresses objections to this argument.
2. Singer, “The Singer Solution to World Poverty” Links to an external site. (New York Times Magazine, 1999)
- For this article, consider: he starts with two examples of people most would think have done something morally wrong, then uses these as analogies to say that many people actually act this way in regards to poverty. Are the situations in the examples, and the situations of people with extra money who don't donate it, similar enough to justify his conclusions?
- Also look for his replies to objections in this article.
Optional
- Singer, “What Should a Billionaire Give, and What Should You?” Links to an external site. The New York Times Magazine, December 17, 2006.
- An interview with Singer on the issue of affluence and global poverty issues in the Philosophy Bites podcast, here (15 minutes): http://philosophybites.com/2010/08/peter-singer-on-the-life-you-can-save-1.html Links to an external site.
- Here’s a talk by Singer in 2016 about his article, “Famine, Affluence and Morality”: Peter Singer: "Famine, Affluence, and Morality" | Talks at Google
Links to an external site.
Links to an external site.
Discussion meetings
There will be student-led discussions in discussion meetings this week.
What to do this week, & before next week
- What is philosophy? part 2 (due Friday March 1 by 5pm)
- If you led a student discussion in a small group in discussion meetings this week, be sure to post your discussion summary by Monday, March 4 at 5pm.
- Read texts for next week (see week 9)
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If you wish, post on the discussion board
- if it's about O'Neill or Kantianism, post on the utilitarianism & Kantianisn board
- if it's about Singer, post on the Singer to Held board
Image credit: Peter Singer Links to an external site., by Chatham House, licensed CC BY 2.0 Links to an external site. on Flickr.