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Peter Singer

Peter Singer

Writing for PS since 2001
237 commentaries
1 videos & podcasts

Peter Singer, Founder of the nonprofit organization The Life You Can Save, is Emeritus Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University. His books include Animal Liberation, Practical Ethics, The Ethics of What We Eat (with Jim Mason), Rethinking Life and Death, The Point of View of the Universe, co-authored with Katarzyna de Lazari-Radek, The Most Good You Can Do, Famine, Affluence, and Morality, One World Now, Ethics in the Real World, Why Vegan?, and Utilitarianism: A Very Short Introduction, also with Katarzyna de Lazari-Radek. In April 2021, W.W. Norton published his new edition of Apuleius’s The Golden Ass. In 2013, he was named the world's third "most influential contemporary thinker" by the Gottlieb Duttweiler Institute. He is a co-author (with Shih Chao-Hwei) of The Buddhist and the Ethicist (Shambhala Publications, 2023).

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  1. Protesting Ethically
    singer235_DAVID CANTINIAUXAFPTVAFP via Getty Images_mona lisa DAVID CANTINIAUX/AFPTV/AFP via Getty Images

    Protesting Ethically

    Sep 3, 2024 Peter Singer & Martin Skladany apply four tests of proportionality to nonviolent demonstrations in democratic societies.

  2. Will We Survive the Next 100 Years?
    singer234_Westend61_worldbreaking Westend61/Getty Images

    Will We Survive the Next 100 Years?

    Aug 7, 2024 Peter Singer urges governments to treat existential risks to our species with the seriousness they deserve.

  3. Will Biden Spoil It All?
    singer233_ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDSAFP via Getty Images_biden ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDS/AFP via Getty Images

    Will Biden Spoil It All?

    Jul 2, 2024 Peter Singer thinks the US president should step aside, or, like other one-time heroes, risk tarnishing his legacy.

  4. Organ Donation Can Save Donors’ Lives, Too
    singer232_Leon NealAFP via Getty Images_organdonation Leon Neal/AFP via Getty Images

    Organ Donation Can Save Donors’ Lives, Too

    Jun 19, 2024 Peter Singer shows why a recipient of a new liver or kidney is not necessarily the only one who benefits.

  5. When Is Criticism of Israel Anti-Semitic?
    singer231_Michael M. SantiagoGetty Images_college protests Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images

    When Is Criticism of Israel Anti-Semitic?

    May 9, 2024 Peter Singer rejects comparisons of the recent US campus protests to the actions of Nazi student groups in the 1930s.

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  1. frankel165_CHRISTINE OLSSONTTTT NEWS AGENCYAFP via Getty Images_nobelwinners Christine Olsson/News Agency/AFP via Getty Images
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    What Causes Prosperity?

    Jeffrey Frankel shows how this year's Nobel Prize-winning economists tackled a once-insoluble problem.
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    Ukraine’s Post-Colonial Future

    Michael Ignatieff believes that what is at stake in the war with Russia is the fate of the last European imperialism.
  3. obstfeld6_Anthony KwanGetty Images_tariffs Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images
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    Donald Trump’s Tariffs Would Hurt US Workers and Businesses

    Maurice Obstfeld shows why targeting an overall reduction in imports would reduce America’s real wages and national income.
  4. kenewendo6_ LUIS TATOAFP via Getty Images_green energy africa LUIS TATO/AFP via Getty Images
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    Africa’s Green Future Starts with Debt Relief

    Bogolo Kenewendo & Patrick Njoroge propose large-scale relief to ensure that the continent’s countries can invest in climate action.
  5. james159_getty images-inflation Getty Images
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    Diane Coyle on economic progress, tech monopolies, artificial intelligence, and more

    Diane Coyle advocates a new public philosophy that rejects viewing “government” and “market” as opposites, explains why time-use data must shape technological development, warns that policymakers are devising AI regulation in a thick conceptual fog, and more.
  6. banga4_PATRICK FORTAFP via Getty Images_rainforest PATRICK FORT/AFP via Getty Images)
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    A New Paradigm for Standing Forests

    Ajay Banga, et al.

    While forest carbon markets have created new revenue streams, they usually reward only those countries, communities, or project developers who are focused on reducing their emissions from deforestation. Something more is needed to tie financial rewards to forests that aren’t under immediate threat.

     present a new mechanism to generate financial returns for countries that prevent deforestation.
  7. woods59_ Brandon BellGetty Images_labor Brandon Bell/Getty Images
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    Working-Class Antiheroes

    Ngaire Woods advocates using domestic labor legislation that supports unionization – not tariffs – to protect workers.
  8. op_brown2_TIERNEY CROSSAFP via Getty Images_IMFworldbank Tierney Cross/AFP via Getty Images
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    Toward a Fifth World Order

    Gordon Brown & Mohamed A. El-Erian

    Historically, massive revisions to the international system have come about only after a complete breakdown of the previous order. With today's global institutions sorely in need of reform, can the transition to a new order be achieved without incurring the costs and pain that such a breakdown would entail?

     explain why multilateral institutions urgently need to be reformed, and why the G20 is the right forum for it.
  9. kruger76_Justin SullivanGetty Images_shipping Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
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    US Tariffs Will Not Bring Back Jobs from China

    Michael R. Strain decries both parties’ reluctance to prepare Americans for the employment opportunities of today and tomorrow.

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