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from the perspective of the person leading that life.' Singer seems to be
after the level of preference satisfaction at which a person judges his
life not worth continuing. If all people above this unfortunate level are
replaceable, then most of us are.
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Those who would still score negative on Singer's amended welfare
scale would not be replaceable. But that would hardly be an advantage.
Remember that one of the conditions for the Replaceability Argument
to be applicable is that the beings in question have positive welfare. If
the life of a being is miserable, i.e. if it scores negative on the welfare
scale, there is no need to replace it. Simply killing this being would be
the best one could do
ceteris paribus
with respect to overall welfare. So,
those with negative future welfare do not even need to be replaced.
Furthermore, if a zero level were established at a point where a suffi-
cient amount of preferences were satisfied, a being with significantly
more satisfied preferences would seem to be on the positive side. This
being would have positive welfare, and therefore, its life would be a
good thing. Thus, as Singer now admits, bringing into existence such a
being could compensate for the killing of another being. Thus, it would
no longer be the case that persons would not be replaceable.
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Hence,
Singer's account of welfare cannot restrict the Replaceability Argument.
5.6 Singer's most recent strategy
Singer's most recent strategy for restricting the Replaceability Argument
to non-persons includes the moral ledger model. This model, as we have
seen, implies that all of us would be better off having not lived:
There is, however, one serious objection to this account of prefer-
ences: if the creation of each preference is a debit that is cancelled
only when the desire is satisfied, it would follow that it is wrong,
other things being equal, to bring into existence a child who will on
the whole be very happy and will be able to satisfy nearly all, but
not quite all, of her preferences. Because everyone has some unsatis-
fied desires, even the best life anyone can realistically hope to lead is
going to leave a small debit in the ledger. The conclusion to be drawn
is that it would have been better if none of us had been born!
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Thus, according to the moral ledger model, an unsatisfied desire counts
negatively on the welfare scale, and the fulfilment of a desire can only
cancel out the negative score. Welfare can never be positive. In order
to avoid the implication that all of us would be better off having not
lived, Singer has earlier proposed to modify the moral ledger model,
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