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Book Description
This digital document is an article from Arena Magazine, published by Arena Printing and Publications Pty. Ltd. on October 1, 2000. The length of the article is 1159 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: LIBERAL POST-HUMANISM?(Peter Singer and genetic engineering)(Brief Article)
Author: Alison Caddick
Publication: Arena Magazine (Refereed)
Date: October 1, 2000
Publisher: Arena Printing and Publications Pty. Ltd.
Page: 13

Article Type: Brief Article

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Book Description
This digital document is an article from Proceso, published by CISA Comunicacion e Informacion, S.A. de C.V. on February 28, 1999. The length of the article is 1312 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Peter Singer, autor de "Liberación animal": "Prefiero que experimenten con seres desahuciados que con monos".(TT: Peter Singer, author of " liberacion animal": I'd prefer to experiment with terminal humans than with monkeys".)(Entrevista)
Author: Roberto Ponce
Publication: Proceso (Magazine/Journal)
Date: February 28, 1999
Publisher: CISA Comunicacion e Informacion, S.A. de C.V.
Page: 64

Article Type: Entrevista

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Book Description
The New York Times bestseller book every American should read before voting in the 2004 elections

More than any president in recent memory, George W. Bush invokes the language of good versus evil and right versus wrong. Here, world-renowned Princeton University professor of ethics Peter Singer shines a spotlight on Bush, analyzing whether or not he has lived up to the values he so often touts in his presidential prose. Called "timely and searching," by the Washington Post, this accessible look at the president reveals his pattern of ethical confusion and self-contradiction, and his moral failure on dozens of hot-button issues. Labeled a "generous critic" by the New York Times, Singer advances devastating arguments that make this the book to give to anyone thinking of voting for George W. Bush in November 2004.

"George W. Bush has met his match. This is a chilling and powerful intellectual indictment of an administration desperate to cover up the damage it inflicts." - David Corn, author of The Lies of George W. Bush and Washington editor of The Nation

"Even Bush supporters will have to admit that, in an age of diatribe, this book elevates the level of political discourse. The more American voters who read it, the better." - Robert Wright, author of Nonzero and The Moral Animal

"Mr. Singer's influence extends to the world beyond the ivory tower partly because he writes with such lucidity and quiet passion about genuinely pressing issues." - The Economist ... Read more

Customer Reviews (37)

THIS BOOK DOES TOO MUCH WRONG
It is obvious the author is trying to put Bush down even though he claims to be being fair to both sides. One way this book is unfair is Saddam's genocide attempts on the Kurds (whom Saddam killed over 180,000 in just one year many more were killed other years plus Saddam got about a million people killed in a war with Iran he mostly started and Saddam killed many tens of thousands of non-Kurdish Iraqis internally in Iraq). Singer mentions Saddam's genocide attempts but gives no incredibly high but true figures on just what a genocide attempt, the untrained
reader is left to guess how many people Saddam killed. But when the author puts Bush down and talks of another mass murdering spree (this one going on in Africa) and Bush not stopping it the death toll murders of this holocaust get quoted (600,000).

This author mostly complains about how the US did not stop Saddam sooner. He fails to understand (or admit)
that the US military was totally and then semi-paralyzed by the powerful pacifist movement of the late60's/early70's. It was not until 30 years after the Vietnam pullout that the uS was finally able to take total military action like the current occupation of Iraq.

WhatifSingeriswrongandBushisamadman?

This is a profoundly disturbing book:if Singer is right, George Bush is a president sadly deficient in decent ethics, and if he is wrong it shows the collapse of basic ethics across much of America.

If he is right, and Singer is arguably the most provocative philosopher now in America, then Bush is merely the public face of a cynical cabal that has nothing but contempt for everyone and everything outside their own limited acumen.Bush may have implemented this conspiracy by his delegation of management policies, after all he is congenitally lazy and inclined to rely on others for his successes.Furthermore, the universally admired genius of evil, Karl Rove, shows Bush knows how to pick sinister subordinates.

On this basis, the Bush White House has the ethical standards of the final days of an Enron.This is the substance of the argument on which Singer feasts;it reminds me of good federal prosecutors who are precise, thorough, detailed and with absolute proof.It's a treat to watch such skill and certainty, and Singer is such a man.

But there's a second element, perhaps too speculative for Singer to include.Many years ago I watched a successful "consumer protection" campaign.Once in office, "consumer protection" meant rewarding wise and astute business leaders because they would never ask for anything they didn't need."Consumer protection" was not what ignorant consumers wanted, but was redefined as creating rich and powerful corporations.

Sometimes, "ethics" are bizarre.

Now, for something completely different.Bush considers himself a "born again" Christian whose sins are forgiven.I've met others who make similar claims and lead utterly disreputable lives--they know every sin is forgiven because they "have accepted Jesus".

Consider the result if national leaders assume they can do anything because if it is good it will benefit America and harm no others, and if it is harmful to America or others then God will forgive their sins and errors.Some "born again" Christians truly believe this, and thus consider they have perfect ethics.It may be far from the intended meaning;but, with "born again" Christians as with everyone else, errors are possible.

Singer's weakness isn't that he forgets to try to understand what they actually do;it's that he forgets to try to understand what they actually believe.

Singer is a "prosecutor" who is calm, precise, detailed, clear and convincing when proving a very narrow and carefully defined situation.But after reading this book, it's hard not to have the impression that he is using logic to define the ethics of madmen.

Harsh but fair
Professor Singer does a great job of pointing out Bush's many hypocrisies and lies. He fairly, but ruthlessly, points out Bush's professed goals and morality are pure deceit. One example: Bush is concerned that embryos must not be destroyed because he (supposedly)values life, but has no qualms about killing foreigners in wars or executing prisoners.

My one quibble is that Singer analyzes the war in Afghanistan without taking into account the benefits of removing the Taliban from power. So what- it's still a great book.

A must read for liberals and conservatives
Unfortunately, most political books seek to lower the level of political discourse in this nation.Through half-truths, outright lies, miscalculations, and (for lack of a better word), propaganda, other authors only seek to confuse and enrage their readers into blindly accepting their point of view and perception of reality.

Not Peter Singer.He takes a serious approach at discussing the Bush ideology from every point view, and philosophically examines the hypocrisies inherent in his dialogue and behavior.He does this fairly and with great respect to his readers as to not insult their intelligence.

Conservatives should read this to see the intelligent realities for why others object to their ideology, and how Bush is slandering these ideologies.And liberals should read this to realize that there are better ways to approach political debate without sinking down to the level of a pundit.

The Most Moral President?
Peter Singer's book is very illuminating,if somewhat influenced by an obviously liberal political agenda.No president in recent memory has done as much moralizing as Bush, but I would hardly call him moral. Singer points out many contradictions in Bush's
statements and policies, but that's not hard to do. His policies are replete with contradictions. The easiest policy to target is the one on Iraq. From repeated assurances that Hussein was in cahoots with Al-Quieda, to a public admittance
of "no Iraqi link to that terrorist organization", Bush clearly showed, not only his incompetence in handling such a delicate situation, by rushing to war when there was no clear evidence of WMD, but by blaming his mistakes on
false intelligence. So, if it's the false intelligence that caused him to err, as he claims, then why does he refuse to admit that he even made an error?
Singer's strongest points in the book, are showing the blatant lack of morals that manifested itself in the President's juvenile behavior, and ever present contradictions.
I only gave Singer a 3-star rating however, because his political motives in writing the book were too obvious. ... Read more

Book Description
In this timely collection, some of the world's leading ethicists grapple with the variety of issues posed by human embryonic stem cell research.

• Investigates the moral status of the embryo including the creation of chimeras and paying for gametes (eggs and sperm) and embryos for research purposes


• Provides a thorough evaluation of the ethics and politics of regulating hESC research, and the privacy, confidentiality, and informed consent in the conduct of research and clinical investigations


• Essential reading for scientists, philosophers, policy makers, and all who are interested in the ethical conduct of science


• Contributors include David DeGrazia, Lori Gruen, Elizabeth Harman, John Harris, Jeff McMahan, Don Marquis and Peter Singer

Book Description

Customer Reviews (1)

The life of a very cheerful man
If you like Pete Seeger (and who doesn't?), you'll like this overview ofthe folk scene from someone who was and is well and truly at the heart ofit it.

The book takes the form of a pleasant, almost feelgood ramblethrough Pete's life, with lots of photos and play-it-yourself music(traditional, his own, Woody Guthrie's..) sprinkled throughout. Overall, itmakes a very rewarding read.

Oh - and the cover's fantastic. ... Read more

Book Description
The expanded and revised edition of Bioethics: An Anthology is a definitive one-volume collection of key primary texts for the study of bioethics.

• Brings together writings on a broad range of ethical issues relating such matters as reproduction, genetics, life and death, and animal experimentation.
  
• Now includes introductions to each of the sections.
  
• Features new coverage of the latest debates on hot topics such as genetic screening, the use of embryonic human stem cells, and resource allocation between patients.
  
• The selections are independent of any particular approach to bioethics.
  
• Can be used as a source book to complement A Companion to Bioethics (1999).

Customer Reviews (3)

Bioetics
A good collection of philosophy papers. I wasn't that interested in it only b/c I am not interested in philosophy enough to truly appreciate the book.

Essential Articles but very one sided
This book has some great papers in it, but the editors really show their colors in the bioethics debate in the papers presented.For example the book presents a declaration by the Catholic Church denouncing euthanasia, but fails to present any of the background material that led to this declaration (or even references to it).It also presents a good number of papers that rely too heavily on anecdotes.

To get a feel for Singer and Kuhse's (two very big names of the field) opinons the book is great.To get a balanced treatment of the bioethics debate, the book fails.

Bioethics, for genreal interest and further study.
The Blackwells Anthology on Bioethics provides a strong material based support for courses in Bioethics or applied Philopsophy. It's two best features are that it contains the articles that most Bioethics courses willrequire you to read (Response to Purdy, for example) and yet most of thearticles are in easy to understand language and require little or noprevious knowledge. Also, far from being the dry tomes one associates withphilosophical essays, the articles are genuinely engaging.

There are afew articles where if you haven't read Kant or Mill before you might bestuck, but most are easy to read and some entries are written by lay peopleabout their experiences, including one mans suicide note as an argument foreuthanasia and a couples experiences of IVF.

The editorial really helpsto highlight the issues in the book and it is arranged in an acessibleformat, so that one can skip areas that aren't of interest.

Useful tostudents or acaedemics (in Medicine or Philosophy) and fascinating foranyone who wants to look into this area. ... Read more

Book Description

"What binds us pushes time away," wrote David Oppenheim to his future wife, Amalie Pollak, on March 24, 1905. Oppenheim, classical scholar, collaborator and then critic of Sigmund Freud, and friend and supporter of Alfred Adler, lived through the heights and depths of Vienna's twentieth-century intellectual and cultural history. He perished in obscurity at a Nazi concentration camp in 1943. More than fifty years later, philosopher Peter Singer set out to explore the life of the grandfather he never knew.

Customer Reviews (3)

well-crafted tribute
Australian philosopher Peter Singer, now a professor of bioethics at Princeton University, has written a thoughtful, well-researched portrait of his grandfather, David Oppenheim, who perished in the Theresienstadt concentration camp in 1943. "We all know that six million Jews died," writes Singer in the Prologue, "but that is a mind-numbing statistic. I have a chance to portray one of them as an individual."

His grandfather was a classical scholar in Vienna, a teacher of Greek and Latin at a prestigious gymnasium (high school), and an active participant in the city's psychoanalytic circles as a collaborator, then critic of Sigmund Freud, and a friend and supporter of Alfred Adler, the first of Freud's colleagues to defect from his inner circle over basic disagreements about psychoanalytic theory.

Oppenheim's wife, Amalie (a math and physics scholar in her own right) was also sent to Theresienstadt, but she survived, the only one of Singer's four grandparents to do so. She moved to Australia in 1946, the year Singer was born, and lived with his family for nine years until her death in 1955. Singer went on to study philosophy at Oxford and teach at Monash University in Australia, but always in the background there was a cloud of sadness and silence that hung over his family's recent past. (On his mother's side he comes from a long line of rabbis stretching back to the seventeenth century.)

His aunt's master's thesis about her father inspired Singer to learn more about his grandfather and write this book. Hecollected his grandfather's personal papers, letters between his grandparents before their marriage that he retrieved from his aunt's attic, and letters his grandparents wrote to his parents and aunt after they emigrated to Australia in 1938. Singer also travelled to Vienna to see where his grandparents lived and visit the school where his grandfather taught. He searched for additional pertinent information in the Austrian archives, interviewed his grandfather's surviving students, and went to Theresienstadt to see for himself where his grandfather died. Singer believed that reading through his grandfather's vast collection of writings in German, most of them in longhand that was difficult to read, would be "to undo, in some infinitely small but still quite palpable way, a wrong done by the Holocaust."

The final part of the book describes the departure of the children to Australia in 1938 after the Anschluss, the illusory hope that life would somehow go on, the desperate efforts from faraway Melbourne to save the parents from the impeding catastrophe, and finally Theresienstadt. During his research Singer also learned what happened to his paternal grandparents: the Germans transported them to Lodz in Poland (after that they were probably gassed at Chelmno).

Professor Singer's well-crafted tribute to his grandfather and the lost world of Jewish Vienna is a valuable contribution to Holocaust remembrance and mourning.

--Charles Patterson, Ph.D., author of ETERNAL TREBLINKA: Our Treatment of Animals and the Holocaust

The Missing Element
An excellent and important story that needs to be told over and over again.But for those of us who use non-fiction books such as this for research as well, this book lacks a crucial element--an index.I could not recommend this book to someone researching information on the Holocaust because there is no way for someone to retrieve important information without laboriously searching page by page through the book.When will publishers learn what researchers and librarians know, a non-fiction book without an index is not complete?

Compelling and moving memoir
This is a compelling and frequently moving account of the author's grandparents' lives from the turn of the century in Vienna to the middle years of the twentieth century. The grandparents, David and Amalie Oppenheim, had both the good and bad fortune to live through some of the most interesting and tragic times of the last century. As young, educated, middle-class Jews living in Vienna at the beginning of the twentieth century, they experienced the last days of the Hapsburg empire, the intellectual currents of the time and place (including being part of Freud's circle), the first world war, the depression, anti-semitism, Nazism and the Holocaust, as well as the great intellectual achievements of Austro-German culture.

The book is a fascinating account of the period, as well as the curious relationship between David and Amalie, whose homosexual feelings towards others seem to lead them into marriage and children of their own. The final chapters, describing post-Anschluss Vienna, the ghetto conditions in which they were forced to live, and finally Theresienstadt concentration camp are harrowing and moving. As a memoir rather than a history, the book is written well and reads easily; though there are references to other works, it is not in any way dull or academic. The author's frequent comparisons between his grandfather's way of thinking and his own are I feel a little forced, but this is only a minor quibble, especially when the humanity of both the author and the grandparents about whom he is writing is evident. Highly recommended.

One book which Singer refers to frequently is Stefan Zweig's "The World of Yesterday", which I would also highly recommend to anyone interested in the period or subject matter. ... Read more

Book Description
This digital document is an article from New Criterion, published by Foundation for Cultural Review on February 1, 2005. The length of the article is 415 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: P. W. Singer: Children at War.(Shorter Notices)(Book Review)
Author: Stefan Beck
Publication: New Criterion (Magazine/Journal)
Date: February 1, 2005
Publisher: Foundation for Cultural Review
Volume: 23Issue: 6Page: 75(2)

Article Type: Book Review

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Book Description
Collection of historical, theoretical and applied articles on the ethical considerations in the treatment of animals by human beings. ... Read more

Book Description
Great Political Thinkers contains introductions to four of the most influential political theorists in the Western tradition.Written by experts in the fields of history, philosophy, and political science, these concise yet authoritative essays examine the thought and works of Machiaveilli, whose name lives on today as a byword for duplicity; Hobbes, the first great English philosopher; Mill, a liberal thinker and champion of individual liberty; and Marx, whose theories have exerted the single most profound effect on twentieth century politics.Small masterpieces of compression and readability, these studies offer readers important insights into past masters whose ideas still affect the way we think today. ... Read more