peter singer said the greatest good for the greatest number.
who said the greatest good for the greatest number?
peter singer
published in 1975, "animal liberation" has been cited as a formative influence on leaders of the modern animal liberation movement. the central argument of the book is an expansion of the utilitarian concept that "the greatest good of the greatest number" is the only measure of good or ethical behaviour, and singer believes that there is no reason not to apply this principle to other animals, arguing that the boundary between human and "animal" is completely arbitrary. there are far more differences between a great ape and an oyster, for example, than between a human and a great ape, and yet the former two are lumped together as "animals", whereas we are considered "human" in a way that supposedly differentiates us from all other "animals."
peter singer
to say, for example, that the law is to serve god means that the law is dependent on interest in god. this cannot be the basis for any universal moral law. to say that the law is to seek the greatest happiness of the greatest number or the greatest good, always presupposes some interest in the greatest happiness, the greatest number, the greatest good, and so on. kant concludes that the source of the nomological character of the moral law must derive not from its "content" but from its "form" alone. the content of the universal moral law, the categorical imperative, must be nothing over and above the law's form, otherwise it will be dependent on the desires that the law's possessor has. the only law whose content consists in its form, according to kant, is the statement:
critique of practical reason