Tsunami and Morality

Strewth. Now I feel guilty. We donated £50 to the appeal on the Web, and then wondered if it was enough. The answer, of course is no. Neither is £100 enough, nor £1000,000 and so on.

Yes, we did spend more on buying Christmas presents than we spent on the aid. I think I'll go and hide my head in a bucket.

It does raise a question. Given an individual's financial situation, what's an appropriate amount for them to give to the disaster fund? Should it be dependent on what they can afford, or what the fund needs? Aristotle, where are you?

Another interesting fact. As of about yesterday, the US had given to the fund about one and a half day's worth of what it's spending on the Iraq war. Hmm.... Better than nothing? Good or bad? There seem to be many moral questions here, which I don't know the answer to.

Yesterday, Newsnight (A Brit news comment programme) had the Catholic bish (or is he an archbish) Cormac Murphy O'Connor (why does he use his middle name?), a Muslim and the atheist Peter Atkins from Oxford in discussion about why a good and moral God would do something like this. (Or, if he's omniscient and omnipotent, why he would let it happen). Atkins said that if God exists, he's a worse terrorist than Bin Laden, and O'Connor waffled ineffectually. The Muslim talked off the point, and it all ended very inconclusively. It would be interesting to see a proper staged debate on such a topic.

Anyway, Happy New Year to those of you who are still alive and can stand it. What a world.