The Life You Can Save is the brand new book (just seven days old) from Melbourne’s very own philosophy bad boy; Professor Peter Singer.
Last night Peter spoke to a packed auditorium made up of children, students, professionals, weirdos and a sea of pens and notebooks at his alma mater, Melbourne University. Peter’s message is simple: millions of people are dying every year from preventable and treatable causes, as persons of privilege we are morally obliged to stop these lives being lost.
In Victoria we are currently experiencing the worst bush fires in our state’s history, many lives have been lost, many towns completely destroyed. The donations are flooding in from the Australian general public in the form of money, help, goods and shelter. Professor Peter Singer argues that the same sort of aid should be given to people in need who are not in our own backyards and that we all should be doing this by donating a small percentage of our annual income to an NGO such as Oxfam (there is a scale in the book that recommends donation in relation to income).
I’m sure skeptics and capo fascists are already penning articles and essays attacking the book and the politics of aid etc but at the end of the day it is way too easy to come up with reasons not to part with the cash.
Pledge your donation publicly at: thelifeyoucansave.com
One point the professor made (that really made me feel like a spoiled western chump) is that: wealthy countries are the cause of climate change, we are completely to blame, we have enforced this on the entire world, the end of the world will be our fault. The very least we could do is make sure every single person has water, food and shelter.
More about the book from Text Publishing:
Most of us are absolutely certain that we wouldn’t hesitate to save a drowning child, and that we would do it at considerable cost to ourselves. Yet while thousands of children die each day, we spend money on things we take for granted, and would hardly miss if they were not there. Is that wrong? If so, how far does our obligation to the poor go?
According to the World Bank 1.4 billion people live on less than US$1.25 per day. This entails a vast amount of suffering and avoidable loss of life. The Life You Can Save offers a solution to world poverty. With his trademark clarity, logic and intellectual flair Peter Singer shows us not only that this solution is possible, but also that we have a moral obligation to be part of it.
All author royalties from the sale of this book will be donated to Oxfam. Five per cent of Text Publishing’s revenue from this book will be donated to Hamlin Fistula Relief & Aid Fund.
james 
