This is

This is Philosophy Bites with me Nigel Warburton and me David Edmonds

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How much do you value your best pair of shoes?

How would you feel about losing your valuable watch?

Are you so attached to this watch that you would let a person die rather than have it broken. A life is surely worth more than shoes or watch.

So what follows from this thought? Here's Larry Tamkin of Rutgers University.

Larry Tamkin, welcome to Philosophy Bites.

Thanks very much. It's great to be back.

The topic we're going to focus on is the obligations of the Needi.

We're going to begin with this very famous thought experiment that Peter Singer wrote about,

as talked about numerous times, The Pond.

Right, so Peter had this example.

It says you're walking by a pond, you see a child drowning in it, you're wearing

your clothes and your shoes and you realize that if you go in and you save the drowning child,

you'll get your clothes all muddy.

And then you think, but that's insignificant compared to the loss of life

so you think I've got to go in and save the child and you do and that seems like the right thing to do

so what conclusion are we supposed to draw from that example?

Right, so the striking thing is that many people have drawn

from this example, and Singer seems to draw from this example,

...