Mick Hartley is, as usual, spot on in his criticism of a recent Peter Singer piece. But what strikes me is that Singer, a Professor of Philosophy, has committed a simple logical error when he asks:
Why do people give generously to earthquake victims, but not to prevent the much larger number of deaths caused by poverty?
Singer is begging the question. He is assuming that giving money to disaster relief is functionally similar to giving money to alleviate poverty when this is in fact a case he has to argue.
A simple, well known, logical error. How strange, from someone in his profession.
