Epistemic status: possibly very evil devil's advocacy, philospohicly unsophisticard ruminations
We are all familiar with Singer's drowning child thought experiment. I have often found it very compelling, or at least felt I ought to find it very compelling. My revealed preferences, as with those of nearly everyone else, tell a different story.
But it has always struck me that Singer's story can be read in two directions, and social desirability bias would likely prevent one from reading it aloud in the less-common way.
If a thought experiment is to drastically alter one's life, it seems worth a little devil's advocacy.
In this spirit, I ask if the fact that one does not donate all their energy to ameliorating the plight of the world's most impoverished provide some evidence that one does not, in fact, care as much about the near-by drowning child as they think they do?
What are some purely-selfish reasons one might have for saving the child. I can think of a few.
- You gain some prestige as a hero.
- You demonstrate your strength and competence publicly in the event someone witnesses your heroism.
- It is fun to imagine heroic acts in your head that you would not, in fact, do in real life.
- The gratefulness of the child and/or their parents isn't without value.
- Saving a child in this way is a novel, interesting experience.
If we alter Singer's story such that a hero-for-hire offers to save the near-by child, and he asks for a sum equivalent to the price of your suit (and a guarantee of that you will keep the transaction confidential) we can remove the weight of these motivations. Supposing you cannot swim and the hero-for-hire is the only person around, would you take this deal?
I think I would take the deal, but if I'm honest with myself it does seem very slightly less compelling.
If we extend this scenario and imagine that accepting this deal every week would mean sacrificing half your annual salary, the decision becomes even more complex. Would the majority still take the deal? Or would they perhaps find a path to their office where large bodies of water are not in view?
I'd be rather more inclined to pay the hero than to do it myself (with appropriate evidence that it isn't just a common scam). I'm not a good swimmer, and may well screw up saving the child. A hero-for-hire presumably has a lot more experience with saving people in situations like this. I would of course not pay cash on the spot, since that just invites people to get children to pretend to be drowning in order to extract cash from passers-by.
If we extend the scenario to hundreds of children drowning in ponds right near me per week, then I would wonder where the hell all the adults are. Once may be happenstance, twice is a suspicious coincidence, and three times is definitely enemy action - and anything I pay into that mess seems as likely to perpetuate the situation as fix it without a lot more investigation.