I don't understand why you're seeing this paradox is relating to partiality I mean it's just as true if we completely impartial about universal good right? We'll take the Bernard Williams question which I think you've written about. Let's say that aliens are coming to the Earth and they may do away with us and we may have reason to believe they could be happier here on Earth than what we can do with Earth. So you would sign up to fight with the aliens. But does the question show not only that it's some unusual paradox in a corner of the moral universe but that in all our choices that assessments of utility are within some framework that is pre-assuming a certain amount of
Peter Singer is one of the world’s most influential living philosophers, whose ideas have motivated millions of people to change how they eat, how they give, and how they interact with each other and the natural world.
Peter joined Tyler to discuss whether utilitarianism is only tractable at the margin, how Peter thinks about the meat-eater problem, why he might side with aliens over humans, at what margins he would police nature, the utilitarian approach to secularism and abortion, what he’s learned producing the Journal of Controversial Ideas, what he’d change about the current Effective Altruism movement, where Derek Parfit went wrong, to what extent we should respect the wishes of the dead, why professional philosophy is so boring, his advice on how to enjoy our lives, what he’ll be doing after retiring from teaching, and more.
Read a full transcript enhanced with helpful links, or watch the full video.
Recorded May 25th, 2023
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Photo credit: Katarzyna de Lazari-Radek