Academia's "doctor death"

Human Life Review, Fall 1998 by Oderberg, David S

Prof. Singer's intellectual mentor is the well-known moral philosopher R.M. Hare, who advocates nearly all of the views espoused by Singer. And yet even he said, in a letter to the German bioethicist Prof. George Meggle (July 1, 1989) who also supports Singer, that if Singer's views were at least comparable to the Nazis' (which he thought they were not), then protesters would be correct to do what they have been doing: "Nobody now advocates practices such as were followed by the Nazis, and it would be right to protest if they did." Furthermore, Peter Singer himself concedes that "some modes of expressing our thoughts may be too dangerous or too offensive to be allowed in a particular place or time."25

If he had added "or some thoughts themselves, irrespective of the mode in which they are expressed," he would have had my unqualified agreement. As it is, it seems that Singer is well aware of why he frightens so many people. The controversy surrounding him will not go away. I invite Princeton University, and its Center for Human Values, to re-examine carefully the appropriateness of their appointment.26

NOTES

1. Practical Ethics (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1993; 2nd ed.; hereafter PE), p. 96.

2. Animal Liberation (London: Random House, 1990; 2nd ed.), p. 8.

12. See "A German Attack on Applied Ethics," Journal of Applied Philosophy 9 (1992), pp. 85-91 at p. 86. 13. PE, p. 183.

14. See P. Singer and H. Kuhse, Should the Baby Live? (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985), pp. 161-71. Singer's disciple Helga Kuhse is now in charge of the Centre for Human Bioethics at Monash University. 15. Ibid., p. 170. 16. Ibid., p. 171. 17. See PE, pp. 192-3. 18. See PE, pp. 99-100, 191-2. 19. PE, p. 192.

20. P. Singer and D. Wells, The Reproduction Revolution (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1984), pp. 148-9.

21. For the definitive account of the Nazi euthanasia programme and its German predecessors, see M. Burleigh, Death and Deliverance: "Euthanasia " in Germany 1900-45 (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1994). 22. PE, p. 357.

23. Ibid., p. 347.

24. "Freedom of Speech and the Public Platform," Journal of Applied Philosophy 11 (1994), pp.

99-105, at p. 104.

25. "A German Attack on Applied Ethics," p. 89.

26. The reader who would like to see the views of a number of academics who have criticized utilitarian or Singer-style bioethics should consult: David S. Oderberg and Jacqueline A. Laing (eds.), Human Lives: Critical Essays on Consequentialist Bioethics (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1997). In particular they should look there at the most comprehensive critique of Singer's own philosophy currently available: J. A. Laing, "Innocence and Consequentialism: Inconsistency, Equivocation and Contradiction in the Philosophy of Peter Singer," pp. 196-224.

David S. Oderberg is currently Lecturer of Philosophy (he has a doctorate in Philosophy from Oxford University) at England's Reading University. A native Australian, he is well acquainted with Prof. Peter Singer's academic career "Down Under." He was asked to write an Op-Ed column for the Washington Times (June 30, 1998) on Singer's appointment to Princeton; we invited him to expand on it, which he has kindly done and then some (this article being several times longer than the original). Oderberg is perhaps best known in American academic circles for his book The Metaphysics of Identity over Time (St. Martin's Press, 1993).