(TDD Note: This post has become much longer than originally intended. But I would strongly encourage you to take the time to read it--and particularly the relevant links--in order to get a clear understanding of Peter Singer and why we all must pay attention to the world he would have us create.)
Truth be told, my time with Peter Singer might not officially count as a formal "conversation" per se, but I did have the opportunity to engage with him at the IUPUI event last Tuesday evening (more on that later...). As I mentioned earlier this week, my dad and I headed to downtown Indy to hear Peter Singer speak. (By the way, I was glad to see at least one of our own TDD readers there. Nate, you can keep me honest, and make sure I'm relating the evening accurately. :)
Mr. Singer was in Indianapolis to promote his latest book, The Life You Can Save, the premise of which is that we all need to be doing more to help alleviate poverty around the world. Given the extent of the evening and the limited space here, I simply want to try to include some of the highlights from my perspective and some of the thoughts I have related to the experience.
As I have mentioned previously, Mr. Singer actually established his career helping the modern animal rights movement gain traction in the 1970's with his seminal book, Animal Liberation. But it is his most recent bioethical positions which have gained him considerable attention and notoriety on the issues of euthanasia and infanticide among others. (In fact, his more recent emphasis on alleviating poverty is somewhat of a new arena for him.) For example, he has publicly written that parents should have up to 28 days after a child is born to determine if that child is viable. And if not, they should have the right to kill the child. Beyond that, he publicly advocates the right to kill the mentally and physically disabled and has had no qualms about presenting his positions in writing. (In fact, after Tuesday evening's event, I went to our local Barnes & Noble and transcribed about 10 pages from his book, Practical Ethics in which he logically articulates his positions on infanticide. For any of you who may not be familiar with his specific positions, I would strongly recommend that you take a few minutes to read these pages from his book--and pass them along to everyone you know. Essentially, he summarizes his infanticide position this way on page 191 of his book, "...the main point is is clear: killing a disabled infant is not morally equivalent to killing a person. Very often it is not wrong at all.")
It was no wonder then that there were a small handful of protesters on hand Tuesday night, including a couple of ladies who were in wheelchairs. All were holding placards and silently letting their voices be heard concerning the right to life and dignity for all human beings. When Dad and I arrived at the venue we went over to the protesters and made a point of talking with them, thanking them for their courageous stand, and letting them know that we were symbolically standing with them in their effort.
We arrived early, found a seat up near the front, and watch the room gradually fill to an almost-capacity crowd of perhaps 300-400 in attendance. As one might imagine, it seemed to be a more liberal, and therefore friendlier, audience for Mr. Singer. After his introduction by the head of the main philanthropy group at IUPUI, Mr. Singer spent the next hour making his case that we should all exert a greater effort in addressing global poverty. It was evident that he has spent much time considering this issue, and if you didn't know where he stood, you might have mistakened him for someone representing an evangelical Christian non-profit world relief organization. He talked about the needs, the giving percentages and practical suggestions about how to move forward in this effort. He also highlighted the website he has developed to further this cause.
Given Peter Singer's radical reputation, the evening's topic may have proven a bit anticlimatic for some. After all, who among us would not be in favor of ending poverty? We all were on the same page concerning that issue. It was interesting to note his challenge for people to give 1% of their annual income to address this crisis. This seemed a bit ironic coming from an atheist such as Singer, because if he were taking a Christian position, it would be biblically-sanctioned to challenge people to give 10% (not that Christians are always doing a consistent job of that, but the biblical foundation for a deeper commitment to ending poverty is certainly there.)
Where the evening got the most interesting for me was during the Q & A session following his talk. There were some good questions asked, most of which centered on the primary subject of the evening. I managed to secure a microphone in order to ask him a question that I was wrestling with concerning his overall philosophical consistency. Essentially, I brought the discussion back to the controversial positions has has taken on life and death issues and how all of that fits with his current emphasis on ending poverty. I anonymously referenced Dinesh D'Souza's article in Christianity Today particularly where he writes,
[Singer] argues that we are not creations of God but rather mere Darwinian primates. We exist on an unbroken continuum with animals. Christianity, he says, arbitrarily separated man and animal, placing human life on a pedestal and consigning the animals to the status of tools for human well-being. Now, Singer says, we must remove Homo sapiens from this privileged position and restore the natural order. This translates into more rights for animals and less special treatment for human beings. There is a grim consistency in Singer's call to extend rights to the apes while removing traditional protections for unwanted children, people with mental disabilities, and the noncontributing elderly.
My point to Mr. Singer was that assuming that this assessment of his position was true and that his goal is to elevate the status of animals and simultaneously remove human beings from their currently privileged status in order to better equalize the natural evolutionary continuum, then why should we help the poor? (Mind you, as I explained in my question, I think we should be helping the poor, and I applauded his efforts to do so. But the case has been made by some of my atheist friends that the dangers of overpopulation, as just one example, would make saving all of the poor actually counter-productive to the overall well-being of humanity in the long run. From a utilitarian [the ends justify the means] viewpoint, it may serve us all better to allow those who are on the lower end of the evolutionary continuum to suffer the natural consequences of the evolutionary order.) If Peter Singer's ultimate goal is to promote a utilitarian philosophy and work to create such an equilibrium, then his noble efforts to eradicate poverty seem to elevate the human race to a more privileged status. And more to my point Tuesday night, they seem to go against the overall philosophical positions he has taken concerning any kind of inherent dignity of human beings.
His answer to me centered on the thread of suffering. It is his goal, he said, to see suffering alleviated. For those at the end of the life cycle, euthanasia is warranted to alleviate their pain. For those suffering from poverty, we have "a moral obligation," as he put it, to reach out and help improve their circumstances. Concerning the killing of infants, suffering is also one of the primary motivations for his position--namely, that by killing disabled infants we are alleviating the potential suffering they would presumably experience in life.
I wish I had the time and space to carry out the conversation I would want to have had with Peter Singer as a result of his answer to me. But this post is already growing longer than you may have time for. Suffice it to say, my final observation of the evening is what affected me the most, as I witnessed the audience's reaction to the justification of his position on killing infants. As he was articulating his answer to me, many of the people sitting around us were knowingly nodding their heads in silent assent. It was a very surreal moment to personally witness the seduction of the masss by this mild-mannered, articulate orator. How could so many in that crowd sit and give him support as he justified the extermination of those infants (and other disabled adults) who are deemed "less-than" the rest of us? Who are we to presume that we have the wisdom or the right to determine which lives are "not worth living"? And what is so insidiously dangerous about Peter Singer is that he is not as big of a pariah as he should be. There are many people who espouse extremely radical positions, and most often they are banished as outcasts to the fringes of society. But not so with Mr. Singer. Instead, he has been given a prominent platform at one of this country's leading universities (Princeton) in which to promote his outrageous views. Tragically, that fact alone is less of an indictment on him than it is on us and the deteriorating culture in which we find ourselves.
As I expected, it was a very interesting experience. I was glad to go, and certainly glad to be able to stand up and even attempt to present an alternative vision of the moral universe. I'm not sure how much good it did, but as I gave a thumbs-up to the disabled protesters in the back of the room on the way out the door, I'd like to think it was an encouragement to them if nothing else. 
UPDATE: Just ran across this article in NUVO, the alternative newspaper here in Indianapolis, which apparently had someone covering the Singer event. The article actually makes passing reference to my question during the Q & A. Glad to know someone was listening. :)
UPDATE: I said that Nate would keep me honest in my assessment of the evening with Singer, and indeed, he has. What I should have written to more accurately reflect Singer's emphasis on alleviating poverty versus his more controversial bioethical positions is that his controversial positions on infanticide and euthanasia have very much overshadowed his other emphasis on poverty. The suggestion that he is best known for his bioethical views was unintentionally overstated on my part. Thanks for the correction, Nate.