Living high and letting die : our illusion of innocence / Peter Unger
- Bib ID:
- 2612607
- Format:
- Book
- Author:
- Unger, Peter K
- Description:
-
- New York : Oxford University Press, 1996
- xii, 187 p. : ill. ; 25 cm.
- ISBN:
-
- 0195075897 (alkaline paper) (cloth)
- 0195108590 (alkaline paper) (paperback)
- Summary:
-
By sending a few hundred dollars to a group like UNICEF, any well-off person can ensure that fewer poor children die, and that more live reasonably long, worthwhile lives. But even when knowing this, almost all of us send nothing and, among the contributors, most send precious little. What's the moral status of this behavior? To such common cases of letting die, our untutored response is that, while it's not very good, neither is the conduct wrong. How can we best explain this lenient intuitive assessment? In this hard-hitting new book, philosopher Peter Unger argues that, all too often, our moral intuitions about cases are generated not by the basic moral values we hold, but by psychological dispositions that prevent us from reacting in accord with our deep moral commitments. Through a detailed look at how these disorienting tendencies operate, Unger reveals that, on the good morality we already accept, our fatally unhelpful behavior is monstrously wrong.
Confronting us with both arresting facts and easily followed instructions for lessening the suffering of youngsters in mortal danger, Living High and Letting Die can help us live the morally decent lives that agree with our wonderfully deep, and deeply wonderful, true moral values.
- Full contents:
-
- 1. Illusions of Innocence: An Introduction
- 2. Living High and Letting Die: A Puzzle about Behavior Toward People in Great Need
- 3. Living High, Stealing and Letting Die: The Main Truth of Some Related Puzzles
- 4. Between Some Rocks and Some Hard Places: On Causing and Preventing Serious Loss
- 5. Between Some Harder Rocks and Rockier Hard Places: On Distortional Separating and Revelatory Grouping
- 6. Living High and Letting Die Reconsidered: On the Costs of a Morally Decent Life
- 7. Metaethics, Better Ethics: From Complex Semantics to Simple Decency.
- Notes:
- Includes bibliographical references (p. 177-179) and indexes.
- Subject:
- Copyright:
-
In Copyright
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Copyright status was determined using the following information:
- Material type:
- Literary Dramatic Musical
- Published status:
- Published
- Publication date:
- 1996
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