Freddie Sayers meets Peter Singer. Accompanying article here: https://unherd.com/thepost/peter-singer-despite-everything-im-still-a-cosmopolitan/ Any decent list of the most influential living philosophers will include Peter Singer. For nearly 50 years, the Australian ethicist has been at the forefront of progressive politics — his ideas about animal rights and effective altruism have shaped those debates ever since the 80s and his brand of utilitarian progressive thought continues to dominate. More controversially, his writing against the sanctity of life and in favour of the morality of ending the lives of highly disabled infants have angered the Conservative Right as much as the disability lobby on the Left. He has been “cancelled” before the term even existed, with invitations to speak retracted multiple times over the years. Now he is co-Editor of a new “Journal of Controversial Ideas” which seeks to provide anonymity and safe publication for philosophical essays that touch on topics that might otherwise get the authors “cancelled.” I wanted to know whether the brand of ultra-utilitarian, universalist, progressive thought of which he is such a famous proponent has somehow got out of hand and come back to haunt him? Does he feel that defining virtue by our ability to overrule the natural order of things and care as much for faraway people as we do our loved ones in any way led to the populist backlash of 2016? Now that he is founding publications to protect against cancel culture, is he running from a monster that he helped create? I put these questions to him, and and more (including a discussion about his new book ‘The Golden Ass‘), in a highly enjoyable conversation. Many thanks to Peter for sparing the time. // Timecodes // 00:19 Introductions 01:09 Journal of Controversial Ideas 02:23 Cancel culture 05:11 Hoisted by your own petard 07:02 Transgender 10:29 Gender vs race 13:35 Race as a religion 15:44 Social media and anonymity 19:55 Populism and universalism 24:00 Human nature 27:07 Immigration and social cohesion 33:33 The Golden Ass 37:44 Is humanity getting better or worse? #openborders #identitypolitics #progressives