Peter Singer
Peter Singer
Peter Albert David Singer, ACis an Australian moral philosopher. He is the Ira W. DeCamp Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University, and a Laureate Professor at the Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics at the University of Melbourne. He specializes in applied ethics and approaches ethical issues from a secular, utilitarian perspective. He is known in particular for his book, Animal Liberation, a canonical text in animal liberation theory, and his essay Famine, Affluence, and Morality, a key text...
NationalityAustralian
ProfessionPhilosopher
Date of Birth6 July 1946
CountryAustralia
australian-philosopher global national people purely realise wanting
As we realise that more and more things have global impact, I think we're going to get people increasingly wanting to get away from a purely national interest.
philosophical responsibility reality
Becoming a vegetarian is not merely a symbolic gesture. Nor is it an attempt to isolate oneself from the ugly realities of the world, to keep oneself pure and so without responsibility for the cruelty and carnage all around. Becoming a vegetarian is a highly practical and effective step one can take toward ending both the killing of nonhuman animals and the infliction of suffering on them.
real cutting thinking
Well the real concept of basic needs if you cut it right down are simply the physical needs that are unavoidable for all of us. So to have enough calories to keep our bodies going. Have shelter from extreme elements. To have water that is safe to drink, So I think that's the core of it.
real commitment care
Every profession will have its rogues, of course, no matter what oaths are sworn, but many health care professionals have a real commitment to serving the best interests of their clients.
strong real believe
I believe that nationalism is a very strong force, but there are other forces operating; there are tendencies pushing towards a larger picture, especially in Europe, I think; but I still think nationalism is real.
zoos real moving
If zoos are like arks, then rare animals are like passengers on a voyage of the damned, never to find a port that will let them dock or a land in which they can live in peace. The real solution, of course, is to preserve the wild nature that created these animals and has the power to sustain them. But if it is really true that we are inevitably moving towards a world in which mountain gorillas can survive only in zoos, then we must ask whether it is really better for them to live in artificial environments of our design than not to be born at all.
war reality issues
In my world of the people who study war and defense issues, we simply did not talk about robotics. We do not talk about it because it's seen as mere science fiction. It's cold, hard, metallic reality.
decisions face hold immense individual society struggle technical together
It's not going to be the individual ... technical (public health) decisions that are going to hold our society together in the face of an immense struggle with an influenza pandemic,
lack missing numbers spending stunning wounded
The lack of numbers - missing on everything from how much we are spending to how many are being killed or wounded - is just stunning for this day and age.
allowed britain changing decide draining environment individual influence islam key poison radical success trying whether
Britain has to decide whether it's trying to influence the individual or influence the environment that has allowed this radicalism to exist. The key to success is changing the environment to make radical Islam completely unacceptable. . . . It's not just draining the swamp. You have to poison the sea.
australian-philosopher competing compromise ethics itself rather true within
So the compromise itself is within ethics rather than between competing ethics, and I think that's true in geo-political concerns.
becomes consider crisis ethical fairness glue hold intense key lesson major pandemic processes questions relation sars shared threatened time together values
A shared set of ethical values is the glue that can hold us together during an intense crisis. A key lesson from the SARS outbreak is that fairness becomes more important during a time of crisis and confusion. And the time to consider these questions and processes in relation to a threatened major pandemic is now.
access disease far life people slowly universal
More people with HIV/Aids are getting inexpensive anti-retroviral drugs, and their life expectancy has increased, but universal access is still far off, and the disease is still spreading, if more slowly than before.
difficult ethical framework glue hold shared societies struggling together
It's going to be a shared set of values, a shared ethical framework that's going to be the glue that will hold together societies struggling with enormously difficult choices.