dominicq

What are all these children doing in my ponds?

(this is not criticism of effective altruism, only one analogy that's used as an argument) Peter Singer writes in the The Drowning Child and the Expanding Circle: > To challenge my students to think about the ethics of what we owe to people in need, I ask them to imagine that their route to the university takes them past a shallow pond. One morning, I say to them, you notice a child has fallen in and appears to be drowning. To wade in and pull the child out would be easy but it will mean that you get your clothes wet and muddy, and by the time you go home and change you will have missed your first class. > I then ask the students: do you have any obligation to rescue the child? Unanimously, the students say they do. The importance of saving a child so far outweighs the cost of getting one’s clothes muddy and missing a class, that they refuse to consider it any kind of excuse for not saving the child. Does it make a difference, I ask, that there are other people walking past the pond who would equally be able to rescue the child but are not doing so? No, the students reply, the fact that others are not doing what they ought to do is no reason why I should not do what I ought to do. > Once we are all clear about our obligations to rescue the drowning child in front of us, I ask: would it make any difference if the child were far away, in another country perhaps, but similarly in danger of death, and equally within your means to save, at no great cost – and absolutely no danger – to yourself? Virtually all agree that distance and nationality make no moral difference to the situation. I then point out that we are all in that situation of the person passing the shallow pond: we can all save lives of people, both children and adults, who would otherwise die, and we can do so at a very small cost to us: the cost of a new CD, a shirt or a night out at a restaurant or concert, can mean the difference between life and death to more than one person somewhere in the world –

91Apr 3, 2021

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642

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Climate and environmental activists frequently complain how the technocentric approach to solving the climate crisis isn't enough or isn't good in some other way than "enough". I agree that it is not enough. Policy probably plays an equally, if not more important role. Policy interventions are things you can do...

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dominicq

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dominicq

What are all these children doing in my ponds?

Taking money seriously

Bureaucracy is a world of magic

Why I am no longer driven

dominicq

Notes on the "Heart of Darkness"

I finally fixed my footwear

Comparing yourself to other people

On rationality skills

My notes from "Energy: A Beginner's Guide"

Being good at the basics

Technological solutions to the climate crisis

What are all these children doing in my ponds?

Taking money seriously

Bureaucracy is a world of magic

Why I am no longer driven

Notes on the "Heart of Darkness"

I finally fixed my footwear

Comparing yourself to other people

On rationality skills

My notes from "Energy: A Beginner's Guide"

Being good at the basics

Technological solutions to the climate crisis