John Stuart Mill's Utilitarianism is one of the most important, controversial, and suggestive works of moral philosophy ever written. Mill defends the view that all human action should produce the greatest happiness overall, and that happiness itself is to be understood as consisting in "higher" and "lower" pleasures. This volume uses the 1871 edition of the text, the last to be published in Mill's lifetime. The text is preceded by a comprehensive introduction assessing Mill's philosophy and the alternatives to utilitarianism, (...) and discussing some of the specific issues Mill raises in Utilitarianism. (shrink)

This essay counteracts that trend [regarding the debate about whether partiality can be justified, those supporting impartiality have generally been on the offensive arguing that morality calls for impartiality] by taking a closer look at the moral complexity of our social practices of partiality. My adoption of this approach does not represent an endorsement of current notions of impartiality. The ideal of impartiality, in my view, should be substantially reformulated. However, that the concept of partiality is transparently defensible. In this (...) discussion, I focus on the aspects of partiality that complicate the philosophical defense of it. In the first part of the discussion, I argue that the moral value of partiality depends partly on the moral value of the relationships it helps to sustain. It matters to the philosophical issues at stake that personal relationships can be abusive and oppressive. In Section II, I refer to the vastly unequal social distribution of the means for favoring loved ones. Because many people have inadequate resources for caring for their loved ones, our conventional relationship practices of partiality-practices by which we care only for our ``own''-can be disasterous for many people. This seriously complicates the defense of partiality. The paper ends with a discussion, in Section III, of ``global moral concern'' and the resistance which most partialists show to it. (shrink)

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. (shrink)