One of the historical election landmarks last year had nothing to do with race or the presidency. Rather, it had to do with pigs and chickens -- and with overarching ideas about the limits of human dominion over other species. I'm referring to the stunning passage in California, by nearly a 2-to-1 majority, of an animal rights ballot initiative...

THE LIFE YOU CAN SAVE Acting Now to End World Poverty By Peter Singer 206 pages. Random House. $22. Are you a good person? The proper answer to that question is, of course, ''Go away.'' But you might reply that it depends on how one defines the word good. In a world of easily identified devils -- Osama bin Laden, Kim Jong-Il, Bernard Madoff -- most...
Spain's parliament recently passed a resolution granting legal rights to apes. Reaction has been mixed. Peter Singer, a Princeton University bioethics professor and animal liberation activist, declared the vote to be of ''world historical significance.'' The comedian Stephen Colbert -- flashing a photo of a performing chimpanzee -- insisted that...
Peter Albert David Singer (født 6. juli 1946 i Melbourne) er en australsk moralfilosof af østrigsk-jødisk afstamning. Han regnes som utilitarist og er særlig kendt som en tilhænger af aktiv dødshjælp og for sit forfatterskab af bogen Animal Liberation, der af mange betragtes som dyreretsbevægelsens bibel. Hvad angår dyrerettigheder, kan Singers synspunkt se i forlængelse af den anglo-saxiske utilitarisme: Dyrs lidelser og lykke skal medtages i betragtningerne, når det gøre op, om en handling er god eller dårlig.
Han er i øjeblikket professor ved Princeton University i USA.