Analysis Of Lifeboat Ethics By Garret Hardin

Within his article titled "Lifeboat Ethics: The Case Against Helping the Poor", Garret Hardin, a well-known philosopher of ecology, analyzes the difficulty associated with providing aid to underprivileged nations. Hardin's argument for the preservation of well-to-do societies is symbolized by his extended metaphor of each society as a lifeboat, with the citizens of rich nations riding amongst a sea of drowning destitute people. Hardin used imagery of a lifeboat to pose and answer a single question, “what should the lifeboat passengers do?” (290). In this scenario, Hardin placed the reader into a metaphor where the passengers of a lifeboat represent the rich in their nation and those drowning as the citizens of poor nations. If the passengers let all of those drowning into their small boat they would go over capacity and capsize, causing everyone to drown. Hardin's answer was to defend the boat against all trying to board. If anyone felt guilty about this course of action they should feel free to swap places with a drowning man and give them their seat. Hardin concluded that the survival of the passengers mattered above all. Ultimately, Hardin argues for a very harsh thesis: regardless of the situation, privileged populaces should not provide allow the citizens of poor countries in their own. Although Hardin's argument appears logic-based, his excessive metaphors fail when applied to real-life scenarios, he repeatedly twists and distorts facts to support his claims. Additionally, Hardin destroys any opposition and avoids accurate data that undermines his wild claims. Immediately after the introduction, Hardin reveals the lifeboat analogy upon which this essay is almost entirely founded, although shortly after it is presented one can see a loophole he cleverly ignores. The metaphor he creates is, nonetheless, coherent, and is used to describe the limited carrying capacity a lifeboat, can hold. In Heinz’s dilemma, William Crain described Kohlberg’s six stages, Hardin’s metaphor pushed the reader into Stage 4, “where the respondent is more concerned with the entirety of society” (285). In Moral Inquiry, Ronald white states that those with deontological based ethics are duty bound to help others (281). If the reader is more deontological based they believe that the people in the boat should let in enough people to fill the empty spaces in the boat, but Hardin berates the reader for thinking this and tells them all the reasons why this is a terrible idea. The passengers would lose their safety net, the extra space ensured the survival of the passengers and the could …show more content…
Where there is data Hardin leaves out parts of it that contradicts the statement he builds on it. Hardin states that one-third of the world is rich and two-thirds was notably poorer. He then builds his argument on it saying there are rich nations and poor nations. Firstly, many of these rich nations are in extreme debt and many of its citizens are in poverty. Next, Hardin says that one third of the world is rich but he doesn’t explain how it is distributed, the way he builds on this it seems the rich are in one or two nations that are well off but that is not true. one percent of the worlds populace is richer than average. These one percenters live all around the world, they live in underdeveloped countries and developed ones. By neglecting to tell the reader this Hardin makes his paper seem even more