Peter Singer

This is the right time to ask yourself: "What should I be doing to help?"For the first time in history, it is now within our reach to eradicate world poverty and the suffering it brings. Yet around the world, a billion people struggle to live each day on less than many of us pay for bottled water. And though the number of deaths attributable to poverty worldwide has fallen dramatically in the past half-century, nearly ten million children still die unnecessarily each year. The people of the developed world face a profound choice: If we are not to turn our backs on a fifth of the world's population, we must become part of the solution. In The Life You Can Save, philosopher Peter Singer, named one of "The 100 Most Influential People in the World" by Time magazine, uses ethical arguments, provocative thought experiments, illuminating examples, and case studies of charitable giving to show that our current response to world poverty is not only insufficient but ethically indefensible.Singer contends that we need to change our views of what is involved in living an ethical life. To help us play our part in bringing about that change, he offers a seven-point plan that mixes personal philanthropy (figuring how much to give and how best to give it), local activism (spreading the word in your community), and political awareness (contacting your representatives to ensure that your nation's foreign aid is really directed to the world's poorest people). In The Life You Can Save, Singer makes the irrefutable argument that giving will make a huge difference in the lives of others, without diminishing the quality of our own. This book is an urgent call to action and a hopeful primer on the power of compassion, when mixed with rigorous investigation and careful reasoning, to lift others out of despair.From the Hardcover edition.

A thought-provoking look at how what we eat profoundly affects all living things--and how we can make more ethical food choices Five Principles for Making Conscientious Food Choices 1. Transparency: We have the right to know how our food is produced. 2. Fairness: Producing food should not impose costs on others. 3. Humanity: Inflicting unnecessary suffering on animals is wrong. 4. Social Responsibility: Workers are entitled to decent wages and working conditions. 5. Needs: Preserving life and health justifies more than other desires. Peter Singer, the groundbreaking ethicist who "may be the most controversial philosopher alive" (The New Yorker), now sets his critical sights on the food we buy and eat: where it comes from, how it's produced, and whether it was raised humanely. Teaming up once again with attorney Jim Mason, his coauthor on the acclaimed Animal Factories, Singer explores the impact our food choices have on humans, animals, and the environment. In The Way We Eat, Singer and Mason examine the eating habits of three American families with very different diets. They track down the sources of each family's food to probe the ethical issues involved in its production and marketing. What kinds of meat are most humane to eat? Is "organic" always better? Wild fish or farmed? Recognizing that not all of us will become vegetarians, Singer and Mason offer ways to make the best food choices. As they point out: "You can be ethical without being fanatical."

This is an attempt by renowned philosopher Peter Singer and researcher Tom Gregg to assess how well Australia is doing as a global citizen. They take a look at Australia's record in five major areas: foreign aid, cooperation with other nations through the UN, trade, global environmental policy, and the treatment of refugees.

"Rethinking Life and Death is a book that only the distinguished philosopher Peter Singer could write - a book that creates nothing less than a new set of ethics for the next century. Singer shows just why our traditional ethic of life and death is collapsing all around us - but instead of lamenting the fact, as traditional moralists do, he sees it as an opportunity to move forward to a more soundly based approach." "In discussing themes like euthanasia, brain death, abortion, and the treatment of patients in a persistent vegetative state, Singer boldly discards the old rhetoric and meaningless cliches about the sanctity of human life. Instead he produces a fresh account of when life should be regarded as precious and worth preserving, and when it should not be." "Using provocative case studies, Singer vividly describes the break-up of our current ethic of life and death. He asks penetrating questions like: What are the results of the classic Dutch experiment with voluntary euthanasia? What are its implications for the future and will a similar system work in the United States? Is the definition of death in terms of "brain death" a medical judgment? Or is it an ethical choice based on our need for organs and the emotional and financial futility of keeping human beings in this state alive? Why do we consider it wrong to take organs from a baby born without a brain, but acceptable to take them from an ape? Is it really possible to defend abortion on the grounds of "choice" or do we have to make up our minds first about the status of the fetus and whether it has rights in the first place?" "With Rethinking Life and Death, Peter Singer describes a world that has already begun to be revolutionized by twenty-first-century technology, and in doing so, provides us all with a profound reexamination of the ethics that govern how we live and how we die."--BOOK JACKET.

Singer suggests that people who take an ethical approach to life often avoid the trap of meaninglessness, finding a deeper satisfaction in what they are doing than those people whose goals are narrower and more self-centered. He spells out what he means by an ethical approach to life and shows that it can bring about significant and far-reaching changes to one's life. How Are We to Live? explores the way in which standard contemporary assumptions about human nature and self-interest have led to a world that is fraught with social and environmental problems. Singer asks whether selfishness is in our genes and concludes that we do not have to accept the bleak view of human nature sometimes believed to be inevitable, given our evolutionary origins.

One of the world's most influential philosophers here confronts both the perils and potentials inherent in globalization. Every issue is considered from an ethical perspective, including climate change, foreign aid, human rights, immigration, and the responsibility to protect people from genocide and crimes against humanity. Singer argues powerfully that solving global problems requires transcending national differences.