lol
lol i need to change the blog template. first the titles don't show, then i realise it's silly posting a shout-out when obviously i don't have a tag board or anything similar.
anyway i will change the template soon. why am i online? yes, you've rightly guessed, i am meant to be doing work now. the work is interesting but tedious. i need to, however, discuss/write out something which i find is very thought-provoking.
it concerns our conception of justice. what does it mean to that an act is just? it can be just according to law, but what makes law just? well maybe because we have agreed to that law, tacitly, through our act of voting; or more plausibly because we intuitively see that abiding by the law is in our interest, it protects us should the event arise.
anyway i digress. my aim is actually see examine what it means for something to be just. suppose there is a just distribution of all social and economic goods - how will that distribution look like? i would imagine most of our intuition will be that the distribution is largely independent of your social and economic background, but must it preclude your natural talent? which is to say, intuitively a just distribution is one that distributes initially NOT according to social and economic background, but is there room for a smarter person to get more in the initial distribution? someone might argue, well no, because the smarter person will get more anyway - there is no need to start him off an unfair basis (does it make sense to compensate someone who is so much better-off than you, already? even if it makes sense is it 'just'?). alternatively just like social and economic backgrounds are not considered because they are morally arbitrary, so shouldn't natural talents be equally morally arbitrary, since no one chose their talents, and furthermore such conditions are merely facts that cannot be assessed morally?
but this conception of justice, ie that a distribution is just if it does not distribute goods based on morally arbitrary factors, though intuitive (i agree, almost unreservedly to the first reading of this conception), conflicts with another equally compelling one. if natural talents are undeserved, this implies that the rewards we give to someone who works hard is to some extent undeserved as well. how clearly can we distinguish a person who works hard because of her choice, as opposed to her character? yet i clearly want to say that someone who works hard should unambiguously be rewarded, because this is linked to the crucial idea that we are responsible for our actions.
say we think of justice as entitlement. justice is giving someone what she deserves, what she is entitled to, the function of the reward being the level of effort consciously chosen. i am entitled to what i produce (even the carbon dioxide i produce though luckily the goods we are concerned here is a lot more eh significant), but because i can only produce with raw materials, i have to get the raw materials. how can i get them? i can purchase them, or i can appropriate them. even if i buy them it leads back to the question of appropriation, because the person who sold it to me must have appropriated it from somewhere etc. so when is appropriation legitimate, or more accurately when is appropriation just? if we believe Nozick (and Locke) an initial appropriation is just if we leave "good and enough" for others. cryptic words huh, a problem of impossible regression here. suppose in the state before any government or any authority existed, a just appropriation that left "good and enough" for others happened for everyone in the initial state. the distribution then is just. nothing about equality of social, economic, natural talents. indeed the person who can run faster, maybe build faster, or maybe sleep less, will fence off more land. since the distribution in this first stage is legitimate, how can we justify a redistribution even in the face of large economic inequalities? According to Nozick it is perfectly permissible, perfectly within one's rights (i haven't thought about rights, whole new can of worms i am not going to touch yet) to turn away a hungry beggar who watches you throw your scraps into a filthy bin instead of just passing the food to her. it is perhaps morally reprehensible, but it is, dare i say it, just, provided the way in which you obtained your food was legitimate. oh, by the way, if the government were to tax you to pay for the food for the hungry beggar it is unjust, in fact more strongly the government is violating your rights (heaven forbid huh) - it is no different from enslaving you for a couple of hours to work for the government.
why have we thought about this? well i wanted to say, normatively, that a just distribution should incorporate some form of distribution from the rich to the poor, but at the same time a just distribution is one which provides you the fruits of your labour (or alternatively the punishment for your wrongdoings). how is it that to derive such a theory i must necessarily preclude one from the other, when my intuitions on this matter are so strong?
in the case that someone is still interested, i recommend reading the book by Rawls - A Theory of Justice, and Nozick - State, Anarchy and Utopia (don't you just love the title) for the two views of the case. Rawls presents the argument for justice as fairness, while Nozick presents the argument for justice as entitlement. they're definitely a lot more entertaining and cogent than i am.
i still haven't found a conception that adequately gives weight to the 2 notions i'm afraid. and i've become so extremely picky about the words i use.
words, words, words. they are all we have to go on. was it that, from Rosencrantz and Guildenstern?
anyway i will change the template soon. why am i online? yes, you've rightly guessed, i am meant to be doing work now. the work is interesting but tedious. i need to, however, discuss/write out something which i find is very thought-provoking.
it concerns our conception of justice. what does it mean to that an act is just? it can be just according to law, but what makes law just? well maybe because we have agreed to that law, tacitly, through our act of voting; or more plausibly because we intuitively see that abiding by the law is in our interest, it protects us should the event arise.
anyway i digress. my aim is actually see examine what it means for something to be just. suppose there is a just distribution of all social and economic goods - how will that distribution look like? i would imagine most of our intuition will be that the distribution is largely independent of your social and economic background, but must it preclude your natural talent? which is to say, intuitively a just distribution is one that distributes initially NOT according to social and economic background, but is there room for a smarter person to get more in the initial distribution? someone might argue, well no, because the smarter person will get more anyway - there is no need to start him off an unfair basis (does it make sense to compensate someone who is so much better-off than you, already? even if it makes sense is it 'just'?). alternatively just like social and economic backgrounds are not considered because they are morally arbitrary, so shouldn't natural talents be equally morally arbitrary, since no one chose their talents, and furthermore such conditions are merely facts that cannot be assessed morally?
but this conception of justice, ie that a distribution is just if it does not distribute goods based on morally arbitrary factors, though intuitive (i agree, almost unreservedly to the first reading of this conception), conflicts with another equally compelling one. if natural talents are undeserved, this implies that the rewards we give to someone who works hard is to some extent undeserved as well. how clearly can we distinguish a person who works hard because of her choice, as opposed to her character? yet i clearly want to say that someone who works hard should unambiguously be rewarded, because this is linked to the crucial idea that we are responsible for our actions.
say we think of justice as entitlement. justice is giving someone what she deserves, what she is entitled to, the function of the reward being the level of effort consciously chosen. i am entitled to what i produce (even the carbon dioxide i produce though luckily the goods we are concerned here is a lot more eh significant), but because i can only produce with raw materials, i have to get the raw materials. how can i get them? i can purchase them, or i can appropriate them. even if i buy them it leads back to the question of appropriation, because the person who sold it to me must have appropriated it from somewhere etc. so when is appropriation legitimate, or more accurately when is appropriation just? if we believe Nozick (and Locke) an initial appropriation is just if we leave "good and enough" for others. cryptic words huh, a problem of impossible regression here. suppose in the state before any government or any authority existed, a just appropriation that left "good and enough" for others happened for everyone in the initial state. the distribution then is just. nothing about equality of social, economic, natural talents. indeed the person who can run faster, maybe build faster, or maybe sleep less, will fence off more land. since the distribution in this first stage is legitimate, how can we justify a redistribution even in the face of large economic inequalities? According to Nozick it is perfectly permissible, perfectly within one's rights (i haven't thought about rights, whole new can of worms i am not going to touch yet) to turn away a hungry beggar who watches you throw your scraps into a filthy bin instead of just passing the food to her. it is perhaps morally reprehensible, but it is, dare i say it, just, provided the way in which you obtained your food was legitimate. oh, by the way, if the government were to tax you to pay for the food for the hungry beggar it is unjust, in fact more strongly the government is violating your rights (heaven forbid huh) - it is no different from enslaving you for a couple of hours to work for the government.
why have we thought about this? well i wanted to say, normatively, that a just distribution should incorporate some form of distribution from the rich to the poor, but at the same time a just distribution is one which provides you the fruits of your labour (or alternatively the punishment for your wrongdoings). how is it that to derive such a theory i must necessarily preclude one from the other, when my intuitions on this matter are so strong?
in the case that someone is still interested, i recommend reading the book by Rawls - A Theory of Justice, and Nozick - State, Anarchy and Utopia (don't you just love the title) for the two views of the case. Rawls presents the argument for justice as fairness, while Nozick presents the argument for justice as entitlement. they're definitely a lot more entertaining and cogent than i am.
i still haven't found a conception that adequately gives weight to the 2 notions i'm afraid. and i've become so extremely picky about the words i use.
words, words, words. they are all we have to go on. was it that, from Rosencrantz and Guildenstern?
posted by colours at
12:37 AM
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