Summary Of The Singer Solution To World Poverty

I am going to discuss Singer’s thesis in his article “The Singer Solution to World Poverty.” His thesis is as follows:
• If you don’t donate to organizations like UNICEF and Oxfam America, you’re acting just as badly as Bob.
The reason why Singer believe this is because Bob’s situation resembles that of people able but unwilling to donate to overseas aid organizations like UNICEF and Oxfam America. Singer paraphrases one of philosopher Peter Unger’s book, Living High and Letting Die example in his argument. It is about a man named Bob who just invested most of his savings in a very rare and valuable car old car, a Bugatti. Bob loves his car and takes pleasure from driving and caring for his car, but also, it's rising market value that he could always be able to sell the car and live …show more content…
One day Bob parks his Bugatti by a railroad track and gets out to take a walk. He sees a runaway train, with no one abroad speeding down the tracks, heading towards a child off in the distance. In this situation, Bob now has a choice; he can throw the switch which will divert the train down the siding where his Bugatti is parked or he can just not do anything and let the train hit the child. Bob decides not to throw the switch, and the child is killed, but Bob’s Bugatti is unharmed. Singer relates Bob’s situation to the argument about Americans not donating to the needy in that just as Bob did not know the child; Americans do not know the child that will receive the donation. Also, the consequences of not throwing the switch are similar to the consequences of not donating to help poor children as it result in the