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Saving Strangers: What does morality demand?

Saving Strangers: What does morality demand?
Saving Strangers: What does morality demand?
Each year, millions of children die from starvation, malnutrition or easily-treatable illnesses. UNICEF estimates that in Niger and West Africa alone over a million children need to be treated for life-threatening malnutrition. It is relatively cheap to help: “Just £5 will help UNICEF feed a child for a week. With the right treatment, a child can recover in six weeks.” If we take these figures at face value, then it seems as if we can save a child’s life for £30.
How should we respond to this striking fact? This may be one of the most important questions in applied moral philosophy. While very few of us actually have to choose whether to kill in self-defence or when to go to war, if you are an ordinary member of an affluent nation, you face this question. How you respond is, quite literally, a matter of life and death for a large number of human beings.
1574-9630
41-46
Woollard, Fiona
c3caccc2-68c9-47c8-b2d3-9735d09f1679
Woollard, Fiona
c3caccc2-68c9-47c8-b2d3-9735d09f1679

Woollard, Fiona (2012) Saving Strangers: What does morality demand? Dialogue, (38), 41-46.

Record type: Article

Abstract

Each year, millions of children die from starvation, malnutrition or easily-treatable illnesses. UNICEF estimates that in Niger and West Africa alone over a million children need to be treated for life-threatening malnutrition. It is relatively cheap to help: “Just £5 will help UNICEF feed a child for a week. With the right treatment, a child can recover in six weeks.” If we take these figures at face value, then it seems as if we can save a child’s life for £30.
How should we respond to this striking fact? This may be one of the most important questions in applied moral philosophy. While very few of us actually have to choose whether to kill in self-defence or when to go to war, if you are an ordinary member of an affluent nation, you face this question. How you respond is, quite literally, a matter of life and death for a large number of human beings.

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Published date: April 2012
Organisations: Philosophy

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Local EPrints ID: 385869
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/385869
ISSN: 1574-9630
PURE UUID: e7e29d66-c2ef-49cf-b960-182fbcdfdc40

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Date deposited: 25 Jan 2016 14:19
Last modified: 14 Mar 2024 22:24

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