I don't really understand the bit about markets. I can understand a general worry about epistemology and knowledge of who needs what most. But it just doesn't seem to me that that has anything to do with markets. How exactly do you think markets (which were a minor feature of any economy until a few hundred years ago) are supposed to help us find out how to best allocate charitable resources?
The point is that markets are about the best thing we have going for us when it comes to the impersonal allocation of resources--something economists have done lots of work on. But we lack a mechanism like that in the case of finding effective charities. So, there are differences in terms of what can know about the impact of our actions with regard to saving a child *in person* versus saving them at a distance through a contribution. The market point is meant to illustrate just how different the two cases are epistemically. And that matters for applying moral principles and such.
Also, see *Why It's OK to Want to be Rich* by the philosopher Jason Brennan if you doing the role markets can play in addressing poverty, even if only indirectly.
Yup. The business about knowledge is on point. But it's always seemed to me that there's more to think about with this argument. It's sort of related to Kant's stuff on perfect vs imperfect duties, but not just the same. If I see the child in the fountain and could save it with no cost greater than getting my shoes wet, then it's hard to imagine that I do nothing wrong if I don't. But suppose I know (whether because markets or something else) that I could save an unspecified child's life for a puny donation to Save the Toddlers. Does than mean I'm obliged to?
I'm not convinced. There may be many things I could do that would have a big impact at a small cost. Am I obliged to do each of them? Surely not. It might be that the cost of doing them all would no longer be trivial. Of course Singer is well aware of this and if I have it right, his view is roughly that you're obliged to do as many as you can until it gets to the point where the cost to you would exceed a certain threshold determined by the utilitarian calculus. But this doesn't feel so obvious. And it would be silly to say that if I accept the initial case, consistency compels me to accept this consequence. Consistency with what? With utilitarianism? Thinking that you ought to save the drowning child doesn't make you a utilitarian, and doesn't mean you're obliged to base your decisions on long chains of reasoning from contestable theoretical principles that take you far beyond the initial example.
Of course there's lots more to talk about. My instinct is that, as Kant would say, we have an "imperfect duty" to do some good. But I'm pretty skeptical of the idea that there's a recipe for settling how much good and of just what sort.
I, too, feel the argument goes a bit too quickly. And I've long had doubts about moving from the moral good to the moral right too directly. Seems too quick.
I don't really understand the bit about markets. I can understand a general worry about epistemology and knowledge of who needs what most. But it just doesn't seem to me that that has anything to do with markets. How exactly do you think markets (which were a minor feature of any economy until a few hundred years ago) are supposed to help us find out how to best allocate charitable resources?
The point is that markets are about the best thing we have going for us when it comes to the impersonal allocation of resources--something economists have done lots of work on. But we lack a mechanism like that in the case of finding effective charities. So, there are differences in terms of what can know about the impact of our actions with regard to saving a child *in person* versus saving them at a distance through a contribution. The market point is meant to illustrate just how different the two cases are epistemically. And that matters for applying moral principles and such.
Also, see *Why It's OK to Want to be Rich* by the philosopher Jason Brennan if you doing the role markets can play in addressing poverty, even if only indirectly.
Yup. The business about knowledge is on point. But it's always seemed to me that there's more to think about with this argument. It's sort of related to Kant's stuff on perfect vs imperfect duties, but not just the same. If I see the child in the fountain and could save it with no cost greater than getting my shoes wet, then it's hard to imagine that I do nothing wrong if I don't. But suppose I know (whether because markets or something else) that I could save an unspecified child's life for a puny donation to Save the Toddlers. Does than mean I'm obliged to?
I'm not convinced. There may be many things I could do that would have a big impact at a small cost. Am I obliged to do each of them? Surely not. It might be that the cost of doing them all would no longer be trivial. Of course Singer is well aware of this and if I have it right, his view is roughly that you're obliged to do as many as you can until it gets to the point where the cost to you would exceed a certain threshold determined by the utilitarian calculus. But this doesn't feel so obvious. And it would be silly to say that if I accept the initial case, consistency compels me to accept this consequence. Consistency with what? With utilitarianism? Thinking that you ought to save the drowning child doesn't make you a utilitarian, and doesn't mean you're obliged to base your decisions on long chains of reasoning from contestable theoretical principles that take you far beyond the initial example.
Of course there's lots more to talk about. My instinct is that, as Kant would say, we have an "imperfect duty" to do some good. But I'm pretty skeptical of the idea that there's a recipe for settling how much good and of just what sort.
I, too, feel the argument goes a bit too quickly. And I've long had doubts about moving from the moral good to the moral right too directly. Seems too quick.