The Buddhist and the Ethicist: Conversations on Effective Altruism, Engaged Buddhism, and More

In their eye-opening new book, an unlikely duo – the preeminent philosopher and professor of bioethics Peter Singer, and Venerable Shih Chao-Hwei, a Taiwanese Buddhist monastic and social activist—join forces to talk ethics in lively conversations that cross oceans, overcome language barriers, and bridge philosophies. Peter Singer will discuss their shared insights; please join us.

The dialogues collected in The Buddhist and the Ethicist share unique perspectives on contemporary issues like animal welfare, gender equality, the death penalty, and more. Together, these two deep thinkers explore the foundation of ethics and key Buddhist concepts, and ultimately reveal how we can all move toward making the world a better place.

Peter Singer is Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University. He is best known for Animal Liberation, first published in 1975 and widely considered to be the founding statement of the animal rights movement; and for The Life You Can Save, which led him to found the charity of the same name. His other books include Practical Ethics and The Most Good You Can Do. In 2005, Time magazine named him one of the World’s 100 Most Influential People. Robert Wright is the author of Why Buddhism is True: The Science and Philosophy of Meditation and Enlightenment. His other books include The Evolution of God, which was a New York Times bestseller and a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, The Moral Animal and Nonzero: The Logic of Human Destiny. In 2009 Wright was named by Foreign Policy magazine as one of the top 100 global thinkers.

Cosponsored by Princeton University’s Humanities Council, the University Center for Human Values, Religion Department, and Office of the Dean of Religious Life.