Thompson-Assigned Readings: Globalization

"Philosophers have hitherto only interpreted the world in various ways; the point is to change it."

 That's the motto of my globalization professor this semester, Frank Thompson. He's the guy in the picture. The quote is from Karl Marx and it's emblazoned, as you see, on a wall in Humboldt University, Berlin. I really like Professor Thompson. He's very kind, with a voice as deep as his convictions. His office hours take place after class in a hookah lounge.

Hookah

The readings for this class have been all over the place, from Singer's famous article "Famine, Affluence, and Morality" to an economic growth textbook: 

 

 Singer, Peter. "Famine, Affluence, and Morality"
Singer makes a logical argument here:
Premise 1: Suffering is bad.
Premise 2: Much suffering can be alleviated through charitable giving.
Premise 3: If we can eliminate something bad without sacrificing something of comparable moral value, we ought to.
Premise 4: Giving more money to charity is not a sacrifice comparable to starvation.
Conclusion: We ought to give more money to charities like UNICEF.
He also convincingly uses the example of a man who walks by a pond, notices a child drowning, and does nothing. We know that this man did something wrong by failing to save that child. So what's the difference when we know that children are dying in faraway places, yet do nothing? He argues that whatever difference exists is inconsequential.
There are a couple of ways to get around his argument...