Hardin's lifeboat ethics: the case against the poor no! you cannot come in garrett hardin writes about saving the poor in his essay lifeboat ethics: the case against the poor found in the blair reader. Hardin writes about how the rich countries are in the lifeboat and the poor countries are swimming in the ocean. Hardin feels that if the government keeps helping other countries and letting people in then america will also drown. We must convince them if we wish to save at least part of the world form environmental ruin page 765. Why should i help the poor countries? why should i let the immigrants in? i see no reason for helping someone that is not an american. I am tired of the united states of america giving my money to the poor countries. If we do let an extra 10 people in our lifeboat, we will have lost our 'safety factor,' an engineering principle of critical importance page 757.

The money used to help the poorer countries can be very useful in the united states. The government helps poor families with food, housing, education and many more things. The rich have more money than they need, but the middle class is left struggling. It makes me mad that the poor americans do not take advantages of some of the opportunities available for them. The middle class people sometimes work two or three jobs to pay for their own or their children's college education. The government should use the money they are sending to other countries to help the taxpayers. Why should they give my money to other countries? the government will not help my family because our gross income is too high to receive any help.

Well true maybe our gross income is high, but we do not take all that money home. The government is taking money out of my paycheck, money that i struggle for, and giving it to other countries. The government also tells me that if i had gotten a used car with cheap payments then i would have extra money left over.

Why should i have to get a used car? if i get a used car, i will only be spending more money getting it fixed. The only reason the government cannot help me is because they do not have the money. The only reason the government does not have the money is because they are giving it to other countries. Hardin says but aren't we all immigrants, or the descendants of immigrants? page 764. Nevertheless, what gives the immigrants the right to come in my boat and take my money? i have no objections to those immigrants who come here to work or bring work.

What i do have a problem is with those that come here and take advantage of our welfare system. These new immigrants did not deposit money into the welfare system so why should they be allowed to withdrawal.if the immigrants were not taking our tax money then there would be more money for our people. Who is going to help me? no body is going to help me, not even my own this essay is an original work by genghis khant. It does not necessarily reflect the views expressed in rationalwiki's mission statement.

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Lifeboat ethics, or the lifeboat problem, is the moral dilemma created by imagining the following situation: you are the captain of a lifeboat that can only hold 15 people, but there are currently 20 in it. How do you decide whom to throw off? this lifeboat problem is often taught in public school in order to persuade students to accept utilitarianism, or situational ethics. Increasingly the hypothetical scenario includes specific traits of lifeboat passengers, such as a physical handicap, and old age, or other perceived defect to be considered in your decision. Often the student is simply told that he must expel a certain number of passengers and he is to pick which passengers, with which characteristics, to throw off.

Andy's description of lifeboat ethics appears to be a conflation of two different things an old fashioned balloon debate where a sinking hot air balloon carrying an assortment of usally notable figures, requires one be jettisoned in order to save the rest, and the lifeboat ethics dilemma described by garrett hardin 1 where a lifeboat is almost full and the question is who to let on, not who to throw off. Hardin's essay subititled the case against helping the poor is basically an anti liberal tract concerning things like immigration and resource distribution. So rather than condemning lifeboat ethics doesn't andy actually support them? i am 95% certain that andy's stance on immigration is actually to keep most of the rest of the world out of the usa, rather than allowing them unrestricted access and relying on ingenuity and prayer to circumvent any problems. Since we all share life on this planet, they argue, no single person or institution has the right to destroy, waste, or use more than a fair share of its resources. But does everyone on earth have an equal right to an equal share of its resources? the spaceship metaphor can be dangerous when used by misguided idealists to justify suicidal policies for sharing our resources through uncontrolled immigration and foreign aid.

In their enthusiastic but unrealistic generosity, they confuse the ethics of a spaceship with those of a lifeboat. A true spaceship would have to be under the control of a captain, since no ship could possibly survive if its course were determined by committee. Spaceship earth certainly has no captain the united nations is merely a toothless tiger, with little power to enforce any policy upon its bickering members.

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