I've actually listened to Singer a few times, and was always left with the impression that I was being fed thought-games. Invited to reflect on the coherence of my position, and the implications that my premises demanded. Which is not only fine, but, I'd've thought, the very job of a public philosopher.
The technocratic utilitarianism below, is no great distance from the world in which Singer's fierce detractors live, of course, as you must well know. Our society is not as coherently organised as a true technocrat might like, but the essence is well in place. If Singer serves no other purpose but to make us see where our worldview is logically taking us (as opposed merely to the scope of social behaviours with which our worldview is compatible), then his status might be for the good.
I guess I'm saying we should be very careful about shutting people up - there are plenty abroad who'd like to shut up the likes of you and me, after all.
All the best, Rob.
>http://www.theage.com.au/daily/990428/news/news22.html
>
>Good riddance to a warped philosopher
>
>By DAVID S. ODERBERG
>
> Tonti-Filippini bemoaned the loss to Melbourne
>caused by the appointment
>of Professor Peter Singer (pictured) to a position
>at Princeton University,
>one of America's leading colleges.
>Tonti-Filippini praises Singer for his
>``fierce independence of thought'' and
>the ``healthy polemic that
>he inspired''. Which leads me to think that the
>former St Vincent's hospital
>bioethicist does not really understand what Singer
>represents, nor has any
>inkling of what is going on at Princeton.
> On 30June last year, I had published
>an opinion piece in the
>Washington Times critical of the Singer
>appointment. This was followed by
>numerous articles across America
>agreeing in their condemnation
>of Princeton's decision. Among a number of
>prominent papers, The Wall Street
>Journal has published several opinion
>pieces critical of the
>appointment, and The New York Times recently
>quoted some of Singer's
>harshest academic critics.
> Last week, hundreds of students and academics
>denounced Princeton in a
>major public protest against Singer's appointment.
>This follows the pattern
> established in Germany, Austria,
>Switzerland and elsewhere, where
>lectures and conferences have been cancelled
>because of demonstrations by
>disabled and other groups against
>Singer's presence.
> Disapproval of Singer's views and his public
>expression of them has come
>from no less a figure than Simon Wiesenthal, the
>world's leading Nazi hunter.
>When Singer was invited to address a Swedish book
>fair in 1997, Wiesenthal
>wrote to the organisers saying, ``a professor of
>morals who justifies the
>right to kill handicapped newborns ... is in my
>opinion unacceptable for
>representation at your level''.
> All of this seems to have been missed by the
>Australian media, which
>continues its love affair with academia's Dr
>Death, as though nothing were
>wrong. The fact is, something is very wrong when
>someone with Singer's ideas
>is appointed to an institute known as
>the University Centre for
>Human Values, in one of the world's premier places
>of learning.
> Singer is an outspoken advocate for the
>killing of any ``non-person'' who
>does not have a life ``worth living''. This
>includes ``defective'' babies
>(his word), the senile, the terminally ill, the
>comatose and the severely
>disabled. Time and again Singer has said that
>disabled babies and children
>have no right to life, and if their lives turn
>out, according to some
>criterion best known to himself, to be ``not
>worth living'', they can
>be killed with impunity.
> For all that Singer is falsely portrayed in
>the media as being a
>prominent campaigner for animal rights, the truth
>is he does not believe
>anyone has rights, human or animal, because rights
>are ``a convenient
>political shorthand'' for ``the era of 30-second
>TV news clips''. The only
>individuals worthy of serious protection, then,
>are those with ``lives worth
>living'', but even they can legitimately be
>killed, says Singer, if ``the
>balance of advantage'' tips against them.
> One of Singer's most notorious examples, found
>in his textbooks, involves
>the haemophiliac infant. For Singer, even a baby
>with such a mild condition
>can be killed if this ``has no adverse
>effects on others''. In
>other words, if the parents, and society at large,
>want the haemophiliac baby
>dead because she is a burden on them, killing her
>does no wrong. Indeed, if
>the parents go ahead and produce
>another ``normal'' baby, then
>far from their dead baby having been murdered, the
>sum total of human
>happiness has been increased by the killing and
>subsequent replacement.
>
> In another, perhaps more infamous example,
>Singer compares the life of a
>newborn baby and that of a snail, and concludes
>that, as far as killing
>either one is concerned, they fall morally into
>the same basic category of
>``non-person''. Non-persons, for Singer, are
>``replaceable'', much like
>farmyard animals (his analogy). Indeed, any adult
>who happens to become a
>``non-person'', say by becoming a
>``senile elderly patient'', can
>be killed with morality's blessing if the sum
>total of human happiness
>requires it. Killing a severely disabled
>`non-person'', for instance, might
>be a moral duty, not just an ``option'', because,
>like all good
>consequentialists, Singer's only criterion of
>right and wrong is the weighing
>of costs and benefits.
> Autonomy and consent - these are useful, but
>can be overridden if the
>benefits outweigh the costs. Rights - well,
>they're good for soundbites.
>Good and evil - well, for Singer they are in the
>eye of the beholder.
>
> And Tonti-Filippini would have us believe that
>Melbourne has lost an
>important contributor to public philosophical
>debate, that it has been
>``diminished''? He mourns the sterility of
>bioethical discussion in
>Australia, taken over as it has been by the
>technocrats and biotechnologists
>themselves.
> The fact, as he only obscurely appreciates, is
>that we have Singer to
>thank for that. Too many biotechnologists hold
>Singer's views. They attended
>his first-year courses, they learned from his
>followers, they read his books
>and articles, they heard his speeches.
>Now they advocate what he
>advocates, and Singer can leave Melbourne's shores
>proud of a job well done.
>
> Meanwhile, the protests get louder, the
>denunciations increase, and the
>outrage continues to pour forth from the disabled,
>the elderly, the young,
>the vulnerable, and all those who see the darkness
>at the heart of Singer's
>warped philosophy. The truth is that Melbourne has
>not lost by Singer's move.
>America most certainly has.
>
>Dr David S. Oderberg, a graduate of the
>Universities of Melbourne and Oxford,
>is a lecturer in philosophy at the University of
>Reading, England. E-mail:
>opinion at theage.fairfax.com.au