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Compare And Contrast Singer's Argument Against Utilitarianism

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1. Singer’s argument states that if you can prevent suffering without sacrificing “too much” then it is wrong not to do so. You can prevent suffering without sacrificing “too much”. Therefore, it is wrong to keep your luxuries while others are starving, suffering etc. An objection to this argument is that “too much” is too general. The argument does not define too much and can differ from person to person. The same goes for suffering. The way a person’s suffering differs from person to person. 2. The principle of utility states that actions are right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness and they are wrong as they tend to promote happiness and they are wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness. A utilitarian would say …show more content…

The best argument against Utilitarianism is, If Utilitarianism is true then bearing false witness is right. Bearing false witness is never right, thus Utilitarianism is not true. 4. The Pope’s argument against abortion states that it is wrong to kill innocent humans. A fetus is an innocent human. Therefore Abortion is wrong. Warrens criticism to this argument is the word “human” is an ambiguous word; making the argument an equivocation. He states that there are 2 senses to the word human. A creature can be a human genetically by DNA or morally by “personhood” (consciousness, reasoning, self-motivated, communication, self-awareness). An example of equivocation is “Doritos are chip. Chips go into computers. Therefore Doritos go in computers. 5. The first formulation of the categorical imperative is Act only on that rule you can will to be a universal law. This formulation basically says that if you make an exception to a universal law such as lying for yourself, than it has to be an exception for everybody. For example lying to get something that you want. If you make that exception for yourself, then it is okay for everyone to lie in order to get what they want under the categorical imperative. This will lead to nobody believing what anybody

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Patrick Lee and Robert George assert that abortion is objectively immoral. One of Lee and George’s main reason for coming to this conclusion is that human embryos are living human beings. This essentially validates that abortion is indeed the process of killing a human. Another main point said by the two is a rebuttal to a common argument used in favor of abortion, which states that a potential mother has full parental responsibilities only if she has voluntarily assumed them. The rebuttal to this was that the potential mother does indeed have special responsibilities to raise the child.

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While pointing out that it is much easier to ignore an appeal for money to help those you’ll never meet than to consign a child to death, Singer uses his utilitarian philosophy to deflect the argument, stating that “if the upshot of the American’s failure to donate the money is that one more kid dies… then it is, in some sense, just as bad as selling the kid to the organ peddlers.” This argument, however, can only be made while using false dilemmas. Singer also addresses a large criticism of his work, that one can’t decide moral issues by taking opinion polls. The argument to this reiterates how the audience would feel being in these situations. This argument is poor as it does not address how the entire article is based on how everyone feels about this particular subject.

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Hursthouse states, “... the status of the fetus - that issue over which so much ink has been split - is according to virtue theory, simply not relevant to the rightness or wrongness of abortion” (Hursthouse 164). Don Marquis argues that abortion is seriously wrong. Marquis does admit that his argument can include some exemptions which include such cases as

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The context of the paper is discussion of why utilitarianism is consistently appealing. As Foot

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Singer’s Solution Good or Not? Who wouldn’t want to find a solution to end or reduce poverty in the world? A utilitarian philosopher, Peter Singer stated his own solution in his essay called “The Singer Solution to World Poverty”. Singer’s solution is simple: people shouldn’t be spend their money on luxuries, instead they should donate their money to overseas aid organizations. Peter uses two characters in his essay in hope to get to the hearts and minds of the people, and encourage them to donate.

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Due to this reason, Singer states that the fair donation argument fails and would not be enough to fix the problem. Now that we have an understanding of Singer’s beliefs, I can show how Singer would respond to the question given in the prompt. Peter would say that yes he should donate, but the small amounts he would be choosing to donate would be nowhere near the amount that he should be choosing to give. Singer would say that any money that he isn’t spending on necessities should be donated to help those in dire situations, and that not doing so is

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576 Words | 3 Pages

Singer attempts to close this gap with the age old question of ‘why don’t we give the riches’ money to the poor’. The essence of Singer’s argument is obviously end world poverty. Probably the strongest point made in Singer’s argument is the involvement of the whole world. By taking this money from those across the world eliminates the opportunity for indifference. To stand with indifference is to stand with the oppressor.

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3128 Words | 13 Pages

Philip Manning 12504697 Q) Evaluate Peter Singer’s argument in ‘Famine, Affluence and Morality’. There can be no doubt that Peter Singer’s argument in ‘Famine, Affluence and Morality’ is unrealistic, unfair and not sustainable. Singer’s arguments are valid arguments but not sound. In order to get a clear and balanced view of my arguments which disprove the Singer article, it is first necessary to examine and lay out the main aspects of Singer’s argument in ‘Famine, Affluence and Morality’. My arguments against Singer’s claims shall then be detailed and examined in depth.

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Mary Anne Warren is a well-known American philosopher who has influenced the argument of the controversial issue, abortion. Today, I will be supporting Warren’s belief and theory on abortion solely being the woman’s choice and will do so by refuting other theories and philosophers including; John T Noonan, Judith Thompson, and Don Marquis. John T. Noonan revolves his argument of abortion around the idea of conception. According to Noonan, abortion is morally wrong because a being comes into existence at the point of conception. Also, being conceived by human parents automatically classifies the fetus as a human as well.

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In the article All Animals Are Equal, written by Peter Singer addresses the inadequacies surrounding the rights of animals in the societies of today. Singer opens the article by presenting a scholarly parallels between the fight for gender equality, banishment of racism and the establishment of rights for “nonhumans.” In order to explain this constant set of inequalities that seem to riddle our society, Singer readily uses the term “speciesism”, which he acquired from a fellow animals rights advocator, Richard Ryder. Essentially, this term is defined by Singer as a prejudice or attitude of bias in favor of the interests of members of one's own species and against those of members of other species. Singer claims that if this idea of speciesism

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M. Hare’s argument, it can be seen that there exists some issues with utilitarianism. Or, simply apply utilitarianism to this world, and use utilitarianism code to make every decision is wrong since the code of utilitarianism loss consistency in real world. According to utilitarianism, the best moral action is the one that maximizes utility, or happiness. However, happiness is complex. It is generally acknowledged that people who have their physical and emotional needs satisfied and their human rights guaranteed are happy.

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In this speech I hope to present a persuasive moral argument that abortion is akin to murder and should be avoided, even if the child is unplanned or unwanted or the women would be in danger by the consequences of abortion. (Transition: Let’s look more closely at the health risks posed by cell phones.) Body I. Abortion is a murder. It is the intentionally killing of a human being and it is also can be considered as a war on the unborn which are obviously defenseless and voiceless. A. Abortion denies the right of the eternal being to have a mortal experience and also learning experience in this world.

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The way singer explains this principle is through a utilitarian prospective, suggesting two viewpoints, Jeremy Bentham says “interest of every being affected by an action are to be taken into account and given the same weight as the like interests of any other being. ”(3) The second utilitarian, Henry Sidgwick, says “ the good of any one individual is of no more importance, from the point of view (if I may say so) of the Universe, than the good of any other. ”(3) Singer explains in these principles an aspect of achieving happiness and avoid pain.

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1564 Words | 7 Pages

John Stuart Mill, at the very beginning of chapter 2 entitled “what is utilitarianism”. starts off by explaining to the readers what utility is, Utility is defined as pleasure itself, and the absence of pain. This leads us to another name for utility which is the greatest happiness principle. Mill claims that “actions are right in proportions as they tend to promote happiness, wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness.” “By Happiness is intended pleasure and the absence of pain, by happiness, pain and the privation of pleasure”.

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948 Words | 4 Pages

In Carol Gilligan 's essay, "Concepts of Self and Morality," a college student answers the question of what morality should be by stating, "The basic idea that I cling to is the sanctity of human life" (171). When a woman decides to have an abortion, she overlooks the sanctity of human life and she forgets her morals. Therefore there should not be a question of choice in the matter of

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