Death in a Shallow Pond: A Philosopher, a Drowning Child, and Strangers in Need

Philosopher Edmonds (Wittgenstein’s Poker) offers an insightful assessment of the Shallow Pond thought experiment and the effective altruism movement it influenced. Proposed in 1972 by moral philosopher Peter Singer, the experiment posits that not rescuing a drowning child in a shallow pond for fear of ruining one’s expensive shoes is equivalent to not sacrificing the relatively modest resources required to save the lives of those who are geographically distant. In Singer’s view, the parallel indicts much of the affluent West, which “walks by” the struggles of the developing world daily. Edmonds traces the thought experiment’s influence on the effective altruism movement founded in the 2000s by Tony Ord and Will MacAskill, which aims to quantify the extent to which philanthropic organizations have an impact and spawned such entities as Give What You Can, which encourages people to pledge 10% of their earnings to charity. Edmonds also analyzes the movement’s weaknesses, including its reliance on thought experiments (which describe “bizarre” situations that scramble one’s natural “moral intuition”); its links to utilitarianism; and its promise of outsize influence to a “few mega-rich individuals” and alignment with the “interests of the Silicon Valley investor community.” To cover so much ground, Edmonds sacrifices deeper exploration of some philosophical points that could use more unpacking; still, his analyses provide fascinating commentary on the ironies of a world in which extreme wealth coexists with poverty, famine, and preventable death. This is sure to spark debate. (Sept.)