Famine, Affluence, and Morality by Peter Singer

Famine, Affluence, And Morality by Peter Singer Peter Singer's 1972 article is intended to provoke thought on the issue of the more fortunate's moral obligation toward the less fortunate. Singer uses the famine in East Bengal to claim that affluent countries and individuals have a moral obligation to give far more than they do to help relieve the suffering and death from lack of food, shelter and medical care experienced in the region at the time.

Singer argues that people who live in affluent countries must radically change their way of life and their conception of morality so that they will become committed to helping those in need.

He asserts that "…the way people in relatively affluent countries react to a situation like that in Bengal cannot be justified; indeed the whole way we look at moral issues -- our moral conceptual scheme -- needs to be altered, and with it the way of life that has come to be taken for granted in our society" (Singer, 1972). Singer begins his argument by staking two assumptions. First, that suffering and death are bad, whether from hunger, lack of shelter, or poor medical care.

Second, if one is in a position to prevent a morally bad state of affairs, without sacrificing something of roughly equal moral importance, one should do so. Singer notes that he could get by with a weaker version of this argument by replacing "something of roughly equal moral importance" with "something of moral significance." The difference being the degree of sacrifice morally required (Singer, 1972).

If one agrees with the first claim it follows that distance from the place of suffering and dying is irrelevant, one has an obligation to render aide. When joined to the second claim, it follows that one's obligation to help those who are suffering or dying does not go away if other people who are also in a position to help them are not doing anything, because the presence of other people who do nothing is, in moral terms, no different from the absence of people who do something (Singer, 1972).

Singer considers counter-arguments to his position. He first acknowledges the position that some assert overseas aide should be a government responsibility and one should not give privately. "Giving privately… allows the government and noncontributing members of society to escape their responsibilities" (Singer, 1972). Singer counters that this assumption is unsupported and not plausible. He suggests the opposite view, that if no one gives voluntarily the government will assume that no one is interested in famine relief and would be less likely to render assistance is more likely.

There is no definite probability of either circumstance coming to fruition and people who refuse to contribute to famine aid are helping to sustain a certain amount of suffering without any evidence that the consequence of their action has any benefit to diminishing the amount of suffering. Singer also makes another argument for not giving to famine relief funds because it accomplishes nothing to solve the root cause of starvation. He asserts that until there is an effective population control, reliving famine just postpones the inevitability of future starvation.

He refutes this argument by pointing out that this claim is based on a belief about what might happen in the future. He does acknowledge that the earth cannot indefinitely support a population that continues to expand at the present rate; nonetheless, this does not absolve one from the obligation to do anything to prevent famine. This raises the question of what is the appropriate level of giving. Singer suggests two possibilities: one that we ought to give until we reach the level of marginal unity.

This is the point at which giving more would cause as much suffering to one's self or dependents as would be relieved by the contributions, thus reducing oneself to the level of the afflicted group. The second, more moderate answer is that we should endeavor to prevent bad occurrences until one has to sacrifice something morally significant. This level is dependent on one's definition of 'morally significant' (Singer, 1972). According to Singer, we need to drastically revise our way of thinking.

From Singer's point-of-view charity is a moral obligation; one has a duty to assist those who are suffering from starvation, lack of shelter, and/or inadequate medical care. In other words, charity is not an arbitrary act of kindness that one may perform or not, depending upon the wind, without reflecting on one's morality. Giving to famine relief should be thought of as a duty, as wrong not to do, as a moral requirement.

Singer basis his argument on Utilitarianism which refers to moral theories which maintain that an action is morally correct if the consequences of that action are more favorable than unfavorable to a majority. Correct moral conduct is determined solely by analyzing an action's consequences. This requires that we tally both the good and bad consequences of an action before determining whether the total good consequences outweigh the total bad consequences (Diver, 2009).

This process is more subjective, for what one may deem to be a good or bad consequence is dependent on ones knowledge and experience. One person's determination of what produces the greatest utility may not be consistent with another person's, therefore this theory is not dependable and a universal law cannot be formulated from it. One problem that arises with Singer's argument is.