Peter Singer

It is 2021 and the world has experienced unimaginable suffering, death and despair. The pandemic has had a devastating effect on global extreme poverty and harrowing scenes from around the world continue to leave us shocked. As the pandemic rages on, it’s natural to ask: how can I help? Peter Singer – often considered to be the world’s most influential living philosopher– answers this question in The 10th Anniversary Edition of his seminal book, The Life You Can Save. This book will inspire and empower readers to ACT NOW and SAVE LIVES. Moreover, the ebook and the audiobook (narrated by mission–aligned celebrities including Stephen Fry, Kristen Bell, Paul Simon and Michael Schur!) is available to all readers for FREE on The Life You Can Save website. In The Life You Can Save, Peter Singer compellingly lays out the case for why and how we can take action to provide immense benefit to others, at minimal cost to ourselves. Using ethical arguments, illuminating examples, and case studies of charitable giving, he shows that our current response to world poverty is not only insufficient but morally indefensible. And he provides practical recommendations of charities proven to dramatically improve, and even save, the lives of children, women and men living in extreme poverty. The Life You Can Save teaches us to be a part of the solution, helping others as we help ourselves.

Since its original publication in 1975, this groundbreaking work has awakened millions of people to the existence of "speciesism"—our systematic disregard of nonhuman animals—inspiring a worldwide movement to transform our attitudes to animals and eliminate the cruelty we inflict on them.In Animal Liberation, author Peter Singer exposes the chilling realities of today's "factory farms" and product-testing procedures—destroying the spurious justifications behind them, and offering alternatives to what has become a profound environmental and social as well as moral issue. An important and persuasive appeal to conscience, fairness, decency, and justice, it is essential reading for the supporter and the skeptic alike.

For thirty years, Peter Singer's Practical Ethics has been the classic introduction to applied ethics. For this third edition, the author has revised and updated all the chapters, and added a new chapter addressing climate change, one of the most important ethical challenges of our generation. Some of the questions discussed in this book concern our daily lives. Is it ethical to buy luxuries when others do not have enough to eat? Should we buy meat from intensively reared animals? Am I doing something wrong if my carbon footprint is above the global average? Other questions confront us as concerned citizens: equality and discrimination on the grounds of race or sex; abortion, the use of embryos for research, and euthanasia; political violence and terrorism; and the preservation of our planet's environment. This book's lucid style and provocative arguments make it an ideal text for university courses and for anyone willing to think about how she or he ought to live.

"Peter Singer may be the most controversial philosopher alive; he is certainly among the most influential."--The New Yorker"A most important book that will change the way many of us look at animals--and, ultimately, at ourselves."--Chicago TribuneUpdated for the first time in nearly 50 years, this mainstay of the animal rights movement includes the most recent information about humanity's relationship to animals, including the explosion of factory farming worldwide, and why our cruelty towards them persists.One of the most influential books of the past half century, Peter Singer's Animal Liberation has only grown in relevance and popularity since its original publication in 1975. Named one of Time magazine's "All-Time 100 Best Nonfiction Books," this groundbreaking work has awakened millions to "speciesism"--humans' systematic disregard of nonhuman animals. Singer inspired a worldwide movement, transforming our careless attitude toward animals and helping to reduce and hopefully eliminate the cruelty we inflict on them. In Animal Liberation, Singer exposes the chilling realities of today's factory farms and product-testing procedures, destroying the spurious justifications behind them and exposing just how woefully we have been misled.Now, in this updated edition--revised from top to bottom--Singer brings us to the current moment, covering important reforms in the European Union and individual U.S. states. But he shows us how these measures are offset by the explosion of factory farming caused by unprecedented demand for animal products in China. Singer also explores how meat consumption is negatively impacting the earth, and reveals how factory farms pose a profound risk for spreading new viruses worse than Covid-19. In addition, Singer offers alternatives we can use to address this profound environmental, social, and moral issue.

Peter Singer is often described as the world’s most influential philosopher. He is also one of its most controversial. The author of important books such as Animal Liberation, Practical Ethics, Rethinking Life and Death, and The Life You Can Save, he helped launch the animal rights and effective altruism movements and contributed to the development of bioethics. Now, in Ethics in the Real World, Singer shows that he is also a master at dissecting important current events in a few hundred words.In this book of brief essays, he applies his controversial ways of thinking to issues like climate change, extreme poverty, animals, abortion, euthanasia, human genetic selection, sports doping, the sale of kidneys, the ethics of high-priced art, and ways of increasing happiness. Singer asks whether chimpanzees are people, smoking should be outlawed, or consensual sex between adult siblings should be decriminalized, and he reiterates his case against the idea that all human life is sacred, applying his arguments to some recent cases in the news. In addition, he explores, in an easily accessible form, some of the deepest philosophical questions, such as whether anything really matters and what is the value of the pale blue dot that is our planet. The collection also includes some more personal reflections, like Singer’s thoughts on one of his favorite activities, surfing, and an unusual suggestion for starting a family conversation over a holiday feast.Provocative and original, these essays will challenge—and possibly change—your beliefs about a wide range of real-world ethical questions.

A thought-provoking look at how what we eat profoundly affects all living things—and how we can make more ethical food choicesFive Principles for Making Conscientious Food Choices1. We have the right to know how our food is produced.2. Producing food should not impose costs on others.3. Inflicting unnecessary suffering on animals is wrong.4. Social Workers are entitled to decent wages and working conditions.5. 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 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 "You can be ethical without being fanatical."

From the ethicist the New Yorker calls “the most influential living philosopher,” a new way of thinking about living ethically"Singer’s argument is powerful, provocative and, I think, basically right. The world would be a better place if we were as tough-minded in how we donate money as in how we make it."—Nicholas Kristof, New York Times"Bold, fresh, inspired, reasoned, optimistic."—Walter M. Bortz II, MD, Huffington Post BlogPeter Singer’s books and ideas have been disturbing our complacency ever since the appearance of Animal Liberation . Now he directs our attention to a new movement in which his own ideas have played a crucial effective altruism. Effective altruism is built upon the simple but profound idea that living a fully ethical life involves doing the "most good you can do." Such a life requires an unsentimental view of charitable to be a worthy recipient of our support, an organization must be able to demonstrate that it will do more good with our money or our time than other options open to us. Singer introduces us to an array of remarkable people who are restructuring their lives in accordance with these ideas, and shows how living altruistically often leads to greater personal fulfillment than living for oneself.The Most Good You Can Do develops the challenges Singer has made, in the New York Times and Washington Post , to those who donate to the arts, and to charities focused on helping our fellow citizens, rather than those for whom we can do the most good. Effective altruists are extending our knowledge of the possibilities of living less selfishly, and of allowing reason, rather than emotion, to determine how we live. The Most Good You Can Do offers new hope for our ability to tackle the world’s most pressing problems.

In Marx: A Very Short Introdution, Peter Singer identifies the central vision that unifies Marx's thought, enabling us to grasp Marx's views as a whole. He sees him as a philosopher primarily concerned with human freedom, rather than as an economist or a social scientist. In plain English, he explains alienation, historical materialism, the economic theory of Capital, and Marx's ideas of communism, and concludes with an assessment of Marx's legacy.About the Series: Combining authority with wit, accessibility, and style, Very Short Introductions offer an introduction to some of life's most interesting topics. Written by experts for the newcomer, they demonstrate the finest contemporary thinking about the central problems and issues in hundreds of key topics, from philosophy to Freud, quantum theory to Islam.

Hegel is regarded as one of the most influential figures on modern political and intellectual development. After painting Hegel's life and times in broad strokes, Peter Singer goes on to tackle some of the more challenging aspects of Hegel's philosophy. Offering a broad discussion of Hegel's ideas and an account of his major works, Singer explains what have often been considered abstruse and obscure ideas in a clear and inviting manner.About the Combining authority with wit, accessibility, and style, Very Short Introductions offer an introduction to some of life's most interesting topics. Written by experts for the newcomer, they demonstrate the finest contemporary thinking about the central problems and issues in hundreds of key topics, from philosophy to Freud, quantum theory to Islam

In 1972, the young philosopher Peter Singer published "Famine, Affluence and Morality," which rapidly became one of the most widely discussed essays in applied ethics. Through this article, Singer presents his view that we have the same moral obligations to those far away as we do to those close to us. He argued that choosing not to send life-saving money to starving people on the other side of the earth is the moral equivalent of neglecting to save drowning children because we prefer not to muddy our shoes. If we can help, we must--and any excuse is hypocrisy. Singer's extreme stand on our moral obligations to others became a powerful call to arms and continues to challenge people's attitudes towards extreme poverty. Today, it remains a central touchstone for those who argue we should all help others more than we do.As Bill and Melinda Gates observe in their foreword, in the age of today's global philanthropy, Singer's essay is as relevant now as it ever was. This attractively packaged, concise edition collects the original article, two of Singer's more recent popular writings on our obligations to others around the world, and a new introduction by Singer that discusses his current thinking.

One of the world’s most influential philosophers here considers the ethical issues surrounding globalization. Peter Singer discusses climate change, the role of the World Trade Organization, human rights and humanitarian intervention, and foreign aid, showing how a global ethic rather than a nationalistic approach can provide illuminating answers to important problems.The book encompasses four main global climate change, the role of the World Trade Organization, human rights and humanitarian intervention, and foreign aid. Singer addresses each vital issue from an ethical perspective and offers alternatives to the state-centric approach that characterizes international theory and relations today. Posing a bold challenge to narrow or nationalistic views, Singer presents a realistic, new way of looking at contemporary global issues—through a prism of ethics.

'So the only question do animals other than man suffer?'One of the great moral philosophers of the modern age, Peter Singer asks unflinching questions about how we should live our lives. The ideas collected in these writings, arguing that human tyranny over animals is a wrong comparable to racism and sexism, triggered the animal rights movement and gave impetus to the rise in vegan eating.One of twenty new books in the bestselling Penguin Great Ideas series. This new selection showcases a diverse list of thinkers who have helped shape our world today, from anarchists to stoics, feminists to prophets, satirists to Zen Buddhists.

Love him or hate him, you certainly can't ignore him. For the past twenty years, Australian philosopher and professor of bioethics Peter Singer has pushed the hot buttons of our collective conscience. In addition to writing the book that sparked the modern animal rights movement, Singer has challenged our most closely held beliefs on the sanctity of human life, the moral obligation's of citizens of affluent nations toward those living in the poorest countries of the world, and much more, with arguments that intrigue as often and as powerfully as they incite. Writings On An Ethical Life offers a comprehensive collection of Singer's best and most provocative writing, as chosen by Singer himself. Among the controversial subjects addressed are the moral status of animals, environmental account-ablility, abortion, infanticide, euthanasia, and the ultimate choice of living an ethical life. This book provides an unsurpassed one-volume view of both the underpinnings and the applications of Singer's governing philosophy.

Integrates valid insights of both science and philosophy to examine the mysterious origin of ethics in human nature, arguing that biology alone cannot account for our behavior patterns or altruistic social ties

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.

In this ground-breaking book, a renowned bioethicist argues that the political left must radically revise its outdated view of human nature. He shows how the insights of modern evolutionary theory, particularly on the evolution of cooperation, can help the left attain its social and political goals.Singer explains why the left originally rejected Darwinian thought and why these reasons are no longer viable. He discusses how twentieth-century thinking has transformed our understanding of Darwinian evolution, showing that it is compatible with cooperation as well as competition, and that the left can draw on this modern understanding to foster cooperation for socially desirable ends. A Darwinian left, says Singer, would still be on the side of the weak, poor, and oppressed, but it would have a better understanding of what social and economic changes would really work to benefit them. It would also work toward a higher moral status for nonhuman animals and a less anthropocentric view of our dominance over nature.

The new commandments according to Rethinking Life and Death .--If you must take human life, take responsibility for the consequences of your decisions.--All human life is not of equal worth; treat beings in accordance to the ethical situation at hand.--Respect a person's desire to live or die.A profound and provocative work, Rethinking Life and Death , in the tradition of Aldous Huxley's Brave New World , examines the ethical dilemmas that confront us as we near the twenty-first century.

Henry Spira's extraordinary life as an activist shows that an individual can make a difference. Inspired by the thinking of Peter Singer in the early 1970's, Henry turned Singer's ethical lessons into action, launching campaigns against organizations whose practices caused unnecessary suffering to animals. By thinking about how giant corporations, including Revlon, Avon, Perdue, and McDonald's, might be vulnerable, he found ways to change their practices and save the lives and health of animals all over the United States. This book tells the inspiring story of a lifelong activist whose creativity and careful thought set the standard for the animal rights movement in the twentieth century.

The ethicist and author of Animal Liberation offers a provocative look at moral failure of President George W. Bush, revealing a pattern of ethical confusion and self-contradiction when speaking out on such controversial issues as stem-cell research, tax cuts, the war in Iraq, and America as a global power.

Eastern spirituality and utilitarian philosophy meet in these unique dialogues between a Buddhist monastic and a moral philosopher on such issues as animal welfare, gender equality, the death penalty, and moreAn unlikely duo—Professor Peter Singer, a preeminent philosopher and professor of bioethics, and Venerable Shih Chao-Hwei, a Taiwanese Buddhist monastic and social activist—join forces to talk ethics in lively conversations that cross oceans, overcome language barriers, and bridge philosophies. The eye-opening dialogues collected here share unique perspectives on contemporary issues like animal welfare, gender equality, the death penalty, and more. Together, these two deep thinkers explore the foundation of ethics and key Buddhist concepts, and ultimately reveal how we can all move toward making the world a better place.

Why this holiday season is a great time to rethink the traditional turkey feastA turkey is the centerpiece of countless Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners. Yet most of us know almost nothing about today’s specially bred, commercially produced birds. In this brief book, bestselling author Peter Singer tells their story—and, unfortunately, it’s not a happy one. Along the way, he also offers a brief history of the turkey and its consumption, ridicules the annual U.S. presidential “pardon” of a Thanksgiving turkey, and introduces us to “a tremendously handsome, outgoing, and intelligent turkey” named Cornelius. Above all, Singer explains how we can improve our holiday tables—for turkeys, people, and the planet—by liberating ourselves from the traditional turkey feast. In its place, he encourages us to consider trying a vegetarian alternative—or just serving the side dishes that many people already enjoy far more than turkey. Complete with some delicious recipes for turkey-free holiday feasting, Consider the Turkey will make you reconsider what you serve for your next holiday meal—or even tomorrow’s dinner.

"What binds us pushes time away," wrote David Oppenheim to his future wife, Amalie Pollak, on March 24, 1905. Oppenheim, classical scholar, collaborator and then critic of Sigmund Freud, and friend and supporter of Alfred Adler, lived through the heights and depths of Vienna's twentieth-century intellectual and cultural history. He perished in obscurity at a Nazi concentration camp in 1943. More than fifty years later, philosopher Peter Singer set out to explore the life of the grandfather he never knew. Combining touching family biography with thoughtful reflection on both personal and public questions we face today, Pushing Time Away captures critical moments in Europe's transition from Belle Epoque to the Great War, to the rise of Fascism, and the coming of World War II.

In recent years a number of oppressed groups have campaigned vigorously for equality. The classic instance is the Black Liberation movement, which demands an end to the prejudice and discrimination that has made blacks second-class citizens. The immediate appeal of the black liberation movement and its initial, if limited, success made it a model for other oppressed groups to follow. We became familiar with liberation movements for Spanish-Americans, gay people, and a variety of other minorities. When a majority group—women—began their campaign, some thought we had come to the end of the road. Discrimination on the basis of sex, it has been said, is the last universally accepted form of discrimination, practiced without secrecy or pretense even in those liberal circles that have long prided themselves on their freedom from prejudice against racial minorities

The health-sciences equivalent of Thomas Friedman's bestseller The World is Flat , this inspiring and revelatory book by two of today's finest scientists shows how advances in global health will transform lives -- particularly in the developing world -- over the next decade.The Grandest Challenge begins with a simple that every person's life is of equal value, regardless of where in the world he or she lives. It also begins with a simple, alarming in this age of spectacular scientific advances, it is still those who live in the developed world -- in the West -- who benefit most from our enormous power to combat disease, and those in the developing world who are most likely to die for lack of basic, inexpensive care and nutrition.In this revelatory book, distinguished scientists Abdallah Daar and Peter Singer argue that the revolution in biotechnology can save millions of lives -- but only if we find a way to bring knowledge and treatments out of state-of-the-art labs and into the world's most remote villages. The doctors lead us on an eye-opening, globe-spanning tour, showing us in vivid detail how developing countries can and are breaking the cycle of dependence, exchanging knowledge, and creating solutions that work for their own people as well as the rest of us.

Asking, "Why, or in what circumstances, ought we to obey the law?", this work focuses on the common view that disobedience to the law, while justifiable in a dictatorship, is much more difficult to justify in a democracy. It then develops a theory of political obligation in an ideal democracy. After discussing various forms of disobedience, the author wonders to what extent systems of government approximate to this ideal and why Western democracies fall short of it. The book concludes with a brief case the development of disobedience in Northern Ireland.