Beyond Sustainability: Fulfilling Our Obligations to the Environment

Peter Singer, one of the most influential modern philosophers, argued that we have a moral obligation to donate to charity. The argument put forward in his 1971 book Famine, Affluence, and Morality is simple.

Premise 1: Suffering is bad.
Premise 2: If one is able to prevent something bad from happening without sacrificing anything of comparable moral importance, one ought morally to do so.
Premise 3: One can reduce suffering through donating to charity without incurring a loss in standard of living comparable in moral significance.
Conclusion: One ought to donate to charity until any further donations would result in a loss in standard of living comparable in moral significance.

This is demonstrated through the thought experiment in which one is walking through a park when one notices a child drowning in a pond. If there is no alternative to save the child, ought the walker sacrifice material possessions (such as an expensive suit) to save the child’s life? The answer is a resounding yes. If one ought to save the child, one must have an obligation to donate money to save children from other sufferings such as famine, conflict and disease.

Each decision becomes a moral issue, and each luxury becomes a moral wrong. According to Singer, each individual should donate as much money as they can. Thus, even basic luxuries such as going to the cinema and eating at a restaurant become moral questions as the money could have otherwise been spent on reducing significant amounts of suffering. Whilst there are potential arguments which justify some luxuries under this moral view (which are not discussed in this article for the sake of brevity), the ramifications require a fundamental reevaluation of our lifestyles. The implications seem extreme to some, but this does not discredit the truth that each sum of money not used for sustenance or future income growth (to donate) is money which could have otherwise been spent towards our moral obligation of reducing harm. That this is an uncomfortable truth does not impact its truth value.

According to Singer, seemingly benign actions like going to the cinema is a choice not to donate to charity and, therefore a failure to reduce harm.

Singer then responds to several common counterarguments. It is hopefully clear to the reader that physical proximity to suffering is not a morally relevant variable to the significance nor moral obligation to prevent the suffering. Thus, if one can save a child drowning in a pond next to you or a child suffering from famine in another continent, it should make no difference. Singer also acknowledges that if everyone donated money to charity, the amount that you ought to donate would be reduced significantly as the donations would be spread among a greater number of individuals. However, as not every individual donates to charity and as each increase in donations will lead to less suffering, each individual ought to donate as much as they can.

This framework has important repercussions for the climate movement. The moral significance of suffering caused by environmental over-exploitation, like all suffering, is location independent. Many activists promote the idea that a just distribution of resources is one in which the sustainable limits are equally divided across the entire population. Thus, each individual has an equal claim to emitting the same amount of greenhouse gases or using the same amount of freshwater, land or minerals within planetary boundaries. If everyone acted in this way, society would be fair and sustainable. Therefore, it is argued that individuals should reduce their environmental impact to the level of their ‘fair share’.

This makes the same mistake as the individual arguing that they needn’t donate much to charity because if everyone contributed to charity, no individual would need to give a significant amount. Whilst both arguments work if others behave in a morally just way, the reality is that not everyone does donate to charity, and not everyone has limited their environmental impact to their fair share. Consequently, just as one has an obligation to compensate for the failure of others to donate to charity, one has an obligation to compensate for the environmental failures of others. In practice, this means that an individual should not only reduce their greenhouse gas emissions to the level of their fair share, but rather to the lowest possible level without causing a morally significant loss to their own standard of living. In some cases, this may entail positive contributions to the environment (such as net-negative emissions or similar).

The following example formalises the argument:
Premise 1: Suffering is bad.
Premise 2: If one is able to prevent something bad from happening without sacrificing anything of comparable moral importance, one ought morally to do so.
Premise 3 One can reduce suffering through reducing their environmental impact without incurring a loss in standard of living comparable in moral significance.
Conclusion: One ought to reduce their environmental impact until any further reductions would result in a loss in standard of living comparable in moral significance.

It is important to grasp quite how demanding this conclusion is. Simple decisions such as whether to eat potatoes or pasta or rice become morally relevant even if the consumer is well within their fair share of carbon emissions (or water, land, or fertiliser use etc.). Other actions, such as taking flights for leisurely holidays, are also moral failures. However, this conclusion can be drawn from Singer’s charitable obligation even before its application to one’s environmental obligations.

Consumption beyond planetary boundaries results in additional harm, even when the individual remains within their own fair share.

There are three main counterarguments which can be levied against this thought. The first two mirror the main grievances raised with Singer’s original argument: those of physical proximity and a theory of justice based on one’s fair share. The latter has already been discussed in detail, as has the idea that one’s proximity to the suffering of others is of moral significance. However, it may also be argued that it is not clear that environmental exploitation will lead to increased suffering.

This can be due to two reasons: over-determination and geographic constraints. Over-determination occurs when the outcome of an event is not changed, even if an individual is removed from the event. For example, one could argue that most individuals, even those with resource-intense lifestyles, do not cause additional suffering. After all, although climate change will lead to many deaths, it may seem unlikely that one individual’s existence alone will tip the scales to cause an additional death. However, this reasoning is flawed for several reasons. It may be the case that any individual’s existence is enough to tip the scales and add to increased suffering, and suffering is not binary thus, even marginal emissions may lead to some additional suffering. Furthermore, emissions are cumulative and certain to increase. Thus, even if additional suffering is only caused for every 2 units of greenhouse gases emitted and individuals A and B each only emitted 1 unit, they are equally responsible for the additional suffering even if neither individual alone would have contributed to additional suffering. Finally, an individual may have a positive environmental impact (e.g. they have net negative emissions) and thus reduce others’ suffering. Hence, a failure to have a positive environmental impact where not at the cost of a loss in standard of living of comparable moral significance is a failure to act morally.

It may also be argued that some environmental actions are geographically constrained, unlike carbon emissions. For example, using large amounts of fresh water in an area with abundant lakes and no feasible way to transport the fresh water to areas of scarcity would not be immoral as no additional suffering occurs due to this consumption. In an area of freshwater scarcity, excessive use may result in others’ inability to access water and accordingly lead to suffering. Yet, this does not challenge the argument, as premise three can be adapted to each individual’s circumstance. For some people, freshwater use may be less problematic than for others, even if each individual would have an equal claim to freshwater use in an ideal world. However, this is a problem of logistics, not philosophy, so the argument still stands.

Ultimately, all individuals have an equal claim to all resource use within our planetary boundaries. However, as this just society does not exist and individuals can reduce suffering by reducing their environmental impact as much as possible, individuals should reduce their environmental impact until this would result in a loss in standard of living comparable in moral significance. The actions required from this conclusion are not impacted by the geographic location of suffering caused by resource use but may be impacted by certain resources’ distribution. Even if an individual’s actions alone will not lead to additional suffering, they are responsible for part of the suffering caused as calculated by their share of the resource use leading to it. Though there are valid defences of resource use beyond the point at which one ought to reduce their environmental impact until any further reductions would result in a loss in standard of living comparable in moral significance, these changes broadly follow an effective altruist argument, and the overall conclusion remains similar. Each individual should reduce their resource use even beyond what may be considered their fair share.

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