Peter Singer quotes - page 3

How far down the evolutionary scale shall we go? Shall we eat fish? What about shrimps? Oysters? To answer these questions we must bear in mind the central principle on which our concern for other beings is based. As I said ... the only legitimate boundary to our concern for the interests of other beings is the point at which it is no longer accurate to say that the other being has interests. To have interests, in a strict, nonmetaphorical sense, a being must be capable of suffering or experiencing pleasure. If a being suffers, there can be no moral justification for disregarding that suffering, or for refusing to count it equally with the like suffering of any other being. But the converse of this is also true. If a being is not capable of suffering, or of enjoyment, there is nothing to take into account. (Peter Singer)
At the descriptive level, certainly, you would expect different cultures to develop different sorts of ethics and obviously they have; that doesn't mean that you can't think of overarching ethical principles you would want people to follow in all kinds of places. View quote
Peter Singer
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. View quote
Peter Singer
I don't think nationalism is alone holding the field; it's in contention with a lot of different things. View quote
Peter Singer
I would like us to think about it more explicitly, and not take our intuitions as the given of ethics, but rather to reflect on it, and be more open about the fact that something is an ethical issues and thin what we ought to do about it. View quote
Peter Singer
In a situation where many national leaders do the same thing and look out for national interests, and with an issue like global warming, you're likely to get no solution, so I think you have to have some kind of ethical trump on some of those issues. View quote
Peter Singer
My work is based on the assumption that clarity and consistency in our moral thinking is likely, in the long run, to lead us to hold better views on ethical issues. View quote
Peter Singer
The idea that we can actually have an impact on places more or less instantly, too, by responding in some way or not responding, I think, also makes it true. View quote
Peter Singer
What you could say, and what I do argue in the book, is that he doesn't have as much concern for the lives of Iraqis as he does for the lives of Americans, or even frozen American embryos. View quote
Peter Singer
I think ethics is always there; it's not always a very thoughtful or reflective ethics. View quote
Peter Singer
I'm a Utilitarian, so I don't see the rule against lying as absolute; it's always subject to some overriding utility which may prevent its exercise. (Peter Singer)
The Pentagon said that these prisoners were kept in accordance with the Geneva Convention, and of course I was not reassured by that, but I couldn't prove that that was wrong; so we're clearer about that. View quote
Peter Singer
An animal experiment cannot be justifiable unless the experiment is so important that the use of a brain-damaged human would be justifiable. View quote
Peter Singer
We are responsible not only for what we do but also for what we could have prevented. View quote
Peter Singer
I don't think there's much point in bemoaning the state of the world unless there's some way you can think of to improve it. Otherwise, don't bother writing a book; go and find a tropical island and lie in the sun. View quote
Peter Singer
It's also much clearer how much damage the occupation of Iraq is doing to America's reputation and prestige around the world; and that's just starting now to hit home in the United States. View quote
Peter Singer
I suppose what's happened recently has confirmed suspicions I voiced in the book, and I think made clearer some of those things that I point out. For instance I have a section of the book where I talk about the possibility of torture. View quote
Peter Singer
More often there's a compromise between ethics and expediency. View quote
Peter Singer
I don't think there's anything in the compromise that means that there's a clash of ethics. View quote
Peter Singer
Had Rumsfeld said at any time 'get me a report on what's going on', he could have had it. You're right, it depends on choices that we make, which parts of the world we want to be in immediate contact with. View quote
Peter Singer
Ancient recipients of instant news probably couldn't do very much about it, for instance. Xerxes would still need three months to get his army together, and he might not get home for years. (Peter Singer)
We see things like reciprocity which are fairly central to our view of ethics. But if you're talking about a set of worked-out rules on what we are supposed to do then, yes, it is a human product. View quote
Peter Singer
I'm not overly alarmist about it, but I do think there are some worrying signs, like the growing accumulation of wealth by a very small proportion of the population, plus elections in the US are much more dominated by money than anywhere else calling itself a democracy. View quote
Peter Singer
Bush sees the evil as out there in the wider world, residing in people who 'hate freedom'. Look at his immediate response to the pictures of prisoner abuse; this is not what Americans do, these are not our values. View quote
Peter Singer
In the sense that you're not at the centre of power, like a president or prime minister of a major power, everyone is marginalised; my position doesn't isn't unique in that respect. I think there are different sorts of relevance in different contexts. View quote
Peter Singer