A (pretty darn useful) Theory of Justice

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

Okay, I am a dillitante... I have never read all of John Rawls A Theory of Justice (1971) so this post is not an endorsement of Rawls in total. Just an endorsement of this metaphor/thought-experiment Rawls employs, in which everyone decides principles of justice from behind a veil of ignorance. As wiki puts it, this "veil" is one that essentially blinds people to all facts about themselves that might cloud what notion of justice is developed. This post is a follow-on to THIS POST that touches on America's Calvinist character. Rawls' little parable is the opposite of the assumption that virtue is connected to being smart, beautiful, rich, American, etc.

Imagine that all the souls of those yet to be born convene to discuss how they will live when they are born onto Earth.

What system should they plan?

Here's the catch... none of these souls know into what circumstances they will be born.

Some will be born rich. Others poor. These souls may be born with wonderfully efficient brains or born destined to be quite average. Some will be born with grievous deformities. Some will be born in Haiti and some will be born in Beverly Hills.

What would be just?

You would want a world that allows for success and competition because you may be gifted. (And if you are to be average you still want a world where genius can flower because we all enjoy the fruits of genius.) You would want a world that protects the weak because you may be weak. You obviously would want a world without discrimination based on race, gender or sexual orientation because you don't know that you will be on top of such a hierarchy and the odds are you won't be. You wouldn't want a world with weak/poor and strong/rich nations because you don't know into what nation you will be born. (Let's face it... you're probably going to be Chinese!) You may be born a predator but you are likelier to be born as prey so you wouldn't want unrestrained predation.

And so on.

Not surprisingly, a just world so arrived at would probably resemble democratic-socialism... a balance of individualism and social contract.

I love this little conceptual parable. I have drawn more use from it than I ever did from Plato's cave! (Though, as mentioned, not so much that I've ever read the whole book.)

So I thought I'd share.

[NightWatcher]

1. of course. the only ones not in favor of security or protection for the weak

are those that would prey upon them. I've had family members who were raised on meager incomes later become rather comfortable and it has sickened me to see that as soon as THEY no longer need protection or assistance, they are AGAINST it for EVERYONE.

Most people are in favor of security/protection for the weakest of the herd...except for the libertarian predators.

The more I see and think about Libertarians (and Libertarianism), the more I believe that it is some kind of wealth associated sociopathy that the person develops after They have Theirs. "Bootstraps" is Bullshit. These people have gotten on the lifeboat and now want to sink the rest of them. Unlike Psychopaths, the Libertarians are Sociopaths who have developed this Antisocial Personality Disorder.

Psychopathy vs. sociopathy

Hare writes that the difference between sociopathy and psychopathy may "reflect the user's views on the origins and determinates of the disorder."<43>

David T. Lykken proposes psychopathy and sociopathy are two distinct kinds of antisocial personality disorder. He believes psychopaths are born with temperamental differences such as impulsivity, cortical underarousal, and fearlessness that lead them to risk-seeking behavior and an inability to internalize social norms. On the other hand, he claims sociopaths have relatively normal temperaments; their personality disorder being more an effect of negative sociological factors like parental neglect, delinquent peers, poverty, and extremely low or extremely high intelligence. Both personality disorders are the result of an interaction between genetic predispositions and environmental factors, but psychopathy leans towards the hereditary whereas sociopathy tends towards the environmental http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychopathy#Psychopathy_vs._sociopathy

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

2. As an extreme civil-libertarian and quasi-socialist the labels are a puzzlement

I hate what has happened to "libertarian."

I guess a lot of people a generation ago hated what happened to "conservative."

Wing-nuts can wreck anything!

[immoderate]

9. What about Libertarians who haven't made it? There's a puzzle.

I certainly have encountered people in desperate conditions, some living out of their vehicles or crashing in somebody's living room, who still espouse the right wing rugged individual line.

--imm

[peacetalksforall]

3. I find it complimentary and parallel to two other models I like - one in

psychology, the other in religion/uni-belief. One is Abraham Maslow's Heirarchy of Needs and the other is reincarnation where we come to this life many times - in one life wealthy and in another poor, as a simplistic example. Both theories/practices are based on potential and a word that is hard to pin down, but could be phrased as meaningful purpose, meaningful drive. The Rawls writing fits right in.

Thanks for posting. I want to follow up.

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

4. He was good people

Died in 2002.

President Bill Clinton presented him the National Humanities Medal in 1999 in recognition of how Rawls's thought "helped a whole generation of learned Americans revive their faith in democracy itself."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Rawls

[Larry Ogg]

5. Martin Luther King Jr. had a dream

"that one day men will be judged by the content of their character and not by the color of their skin." I think that would be a good world to be born into, I also believe that it would be a Democratic Socialist world; and who knows - it might also be a world that is with out both predators and government because once predators are eliminated from the gene pool there might not be a need for government; but that's something a future world will have to decide. But for now we have to deal with today's world, or to be more specific: in America where we judge people not by the content of their character, but rather by the "D" or the "R" in front of their name. Of course if anyone thinks that this criteria for judgment serves them well, they might need to take a good look at people like Joe Lieberman who is by no means a unique political character but rather the epitome of political characters; he just woke up one day and forgot to put on his democratic facade, surprising the hell out of all those who would vote for the "D" in front of the name no matter what.

Another subject being discussed (with out mentioning the term) in both this and your previous OP, is the term "social adjustments" which simply means; your lot in life is based on family fortune in lue of natural ability. Now I have heard and accept the argument that nature plays a genetic role in determining whether one is a problem solver, a laborer or a predator. Unfortunately to the chagrin of the predator class minority, nature doesn’t concern itself with family fortune when it comes to handing out abilities or brains. But still, predators - who have no conscience or other useful abilities - acquire the ability to rise too the top of the social pyramid by their uncanny use of deceit, fraud, bribery, theft, murder, mayhem, terror etc…; and of course let’s not forget to mention how good they are at blaming someone or something else for their evil deeds. And being able to get away with blaming someone or something else means that they have to (on their rise too the top) get those pesky truth telling problem solvers out of positions of authority, because they make predators look bad. Unfortunately when society looses the genius of the problem solver through downward social adjustments, the social infrastructure and institutions that civil societies depend on begin to crumble, and as history has shown, the reason empires collapse into ruin.

Of course society could do something really unprecedented in human history, it could make Dr. Martin Luther King’s dream come true and start learning about character, and I think in that way maybe the unborn souls yet to come might have something to look forward too; except there will be no predators allowed...

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

6. I wish the unrec'rs would explain... is it something about Rawls?

[leftstreet]

7. What are you, nuts?

We're 'Mericans! We'd never be born into some other place or time!

How could we pull ourselves up by our bootstraps in some weird place like Haiti, huh?

Do they even have boots there?

:hi:

K&R

[peacetalksforall]

8. I was thinkgin about unrecs yesterday - and told myself - if only they were

required to state why they unrecommended.

[troubledamerican]

11. COINTELPRO does not exist, nor did it ever exist

Stop the tinfoil madness. There are no such thing as fascist infiltrators here. If you continue to make such insinuations, you will be removed.

[rooftoprevolutionary]

10. Ah, Utopia

I look forward to that day when I sit amongst other question marks of people waiting to enter the world.

Having grown up in Sweden, I agree that the socialist model does offer advantages. Americans don't realize but the boogey man of socialism is already implanted into our society...do you have to write a check when the fire department comes to your burning house? Do you have to pay the cop to pull you over when you're too drunk to drive? (maybe you should).
However, socialist government for sure, has its drawbacks.
For a government to work, I believe there has to be a mixture. If someone clings too blindly to a certain ideology, they are in no place to govern. One size does not fit all and as an elected official, you must realize this and work around your own beliefs, constantly changing them and molding them to fit your constituents.

I could go on, but I'll leave the soap box for later. Suffice it to say, I concur Kurt and Hunter!

[defendandprotect]

12. Reincarnation . . . !!

Which was at one time taught by all the world's major religions!!

Became inconvenient for the elites!!