Thanks for your thoughtful discussion of some important issues that I have also discussed.

          I don’t have time for a full response, but I can clear up the question you raise here: “Given the frequency with which he recurs to cases of famine, hunger may be the motivational impulse that dominates his style of ethical thought, though it may also be grief or grief avoidance, as his examples commonly concern fatalities. Both are associated with narrative prototypes.” The motivational impulse that dominates my ethical thought is the same as that which dominated the thought of Jeremy Bentham, John Stuart Mill, and Henry Sidgwick – the three great nineteenth century utilitarians: the reduction of suffering and the increase in happiness and well-being.  If I frequently mention hunger and grief, that is because they are very common and often very severe forms of suffering.  But, of course, they are not the only ones.

          As you mention my example of the drowning child in the shallow pond, it might be useful to add the place where I first wrote about it: “Famine, Affluence and Morality,”Philosophy and Public Affairs,vol 1, 1972.  The essay also appears in a book with the same title, published by Oxford University Press.