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ArgumentPreventing harm when one can
If I can prevent a great harm at the cost of a minor sacrifice, I ought to do so, wherever the victim may be: our duties do not stop at refraining from harm.
Supports
Singer · 'Famine, Affluence, and Morality' · 1972
- Suffering and death for want of food, shelter, or care are evils: no one disputes it.
- Now if we can prevent such an evil without sacrificing anything comparable, a little money, a little comfort, we ought to do so: it is what everyone feels before . To refuse this principle is to say that a dying child counts for less than our small comforts.
- This principle knows no border: neither remoteness, nor the fact that others could help, nor the number of victims lessens the obligation; what counts is that I can act, and at what cost.
Therefore So morality demands far more than 'do no harm': as long as a great evil remains preventable at a modest cost, not acting is consenting to it. Helping the most destitute, wherever they are, is a , not a favor.
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Deepenings
Why distance does not count
- Proximity was never a moral reason, only a practical limit: once, one could neither know nor act at a distance.
- Now that one can, the excuse falls: a child's death weighs no less for happening ten thousand kilometers away, and a transfer reaches him as surely as an outstretched arm.
How far does this reasoning convince you?
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Put to the test
Objection