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Part of the problem I have is in the phrase "But the appeal to reason." It is similar to the problem I have with ideas revolving "perfectly rational" persons. I am not sure either of those think objectively exist when it comes to morals and values, they seem subjective constructs. ...
Say a person thinks it is reasonable to take a 0.00001% chance of being a billionaire, against a 99.99999% chance of being a pauper. How would you objectively show that such a stance is unreasonable?
That’s easy. We rely on the concept of “expectation”, from probability theory. If a lottery ticket costs $1, with payout of $1M, and the probability of wining is 1/1,000,000, then the expected value of a lottery ticket is $0. I neither gain nor lose by playing. If the ticket costs $0.50, then I should play, assuming unlimited reserves. And if it costs $2, then I shouldn’t play at all.
In our social-experiment, we can estimate the probability of being a king, a nobleman, a peasant, a slave and so on… and then calculate the “payout” of each station in society. If it’s so lopsided that the probability of being born king is vanishingly small, and the payout isn’t that high… then it would be stupid to gamble.
That’s easy. We rely on the concept of “expectation”, from probability theory. If a lottery ticket costs $1, with payout of $1M, and the probability of wining is 1/1,000,000, then the expected value of a lottery ticket is $0. I neither gain nor lose by playing. If the ticket costs $0.50, then I should play, assuming unlimited reserves. And if it costs $2, then I shouldn’t play at all.
In our social-experiment, we can estimate the probability of being a king, a nobleman, a peasant, a slave and so on… and then calculate the “payout” of each station in society. If it’s so lopsided that the probability of being born king is vanishingly small, and the payout isn’t that high… then it would be stupid to gamble.
I fully agree that you can use expectation and logic as you did above. However you have made the assumption that the expected value is what is "valuable" to people. That is the subjective part I'm talking about.
Someone else (risk averse) may say the expected value is not important, increasing the lowest quartile as high as possible is what is important. Indeed I believe this is what Rawls thinks.
Someone else (pro risk) may say the expected value is not important, increasing the highest quartile as high as possible is what is important.
Within each scenario you can use logic to justify outcomes. But I don't see how you can objectively select between scenarios as to which is better - that is subjective and depends on what is subjectively "valuable" to you.
Yeah...I'm not sure I DO understand this...or, if I do understand this, how could it even work? How would you be able to execute this experiment?
It almost seems like, to me, that people would have to become Stepford Wives of some sort. We navigate our world through our senses and perceptions...to somehow turn them off, it seems like it would more likely make people nervous and panicky...
The veil of ignorance means, would you design a world where homeless junkies sleep on park benches while billionaires fly around in helicopters, if you didn't know if you would be born as a junkie or a billionaire?
The veil of ignorance means, would you design a world where homeless junkies sleep on park benches while billionaires fly around in helicopters, if you didn't know if you would be born as a junkie or a billionaire?
Yes. Rawls seems to argue that if you didn't know if you would be born as a junkie or a billionaire, you would choose for there to be less junkies even if there were less billionaires. He presents this as a logical, objective argument. I'm saying that it is actually a subjective argument and there is no way to logical demonstrate it.
Yes. Rawls seems to argue that if you didn't know if you would be born as a junkie or a billionaire, you would choose for there to be less junkies even if there were less billionaires. He presents this as a logical, objective argument. I'm saying that it is actually a subjective argument and there is no way to logically demonstrate it.
I tend to agree with your position on this topic aross the board.
The veil of ignorance, like classical liberal values of objectivity and tolerance, is not utopian but pragmatic. So I disagree that it requires society to describe an ideal society. Rather it requires them to describe a society that is not bad.
That said, I think you have hit upon a valid criticism of it. Complex societies require different roles from different people, and this variance in roles produces hierarchies. This actually works better than it sounds in theory because people have different preferences. As an example, most people prefer to be followers.
This is also why the Golden Rule breaks down, because you only know how you would react not how someone else would react.
The veil of ignorance is laudable as is the Golden Rule, but it's not perfect and shouldn't be used as a razor when designing a "perfect" social order.
The veil of ignorance is a thought experiment that suggest that people in a society should adopt a "veil of ignorance" before deciding on the moral principles that the society should follow. When behind the veil of ignorance, any given person does not know who they will end up as in the society - they will not know their race gender, social status, wealth, location, etc.
On the surface it sounds very appealing to me. It is a thought experiment that should remove biases based on the positions people have in society.
Now I understand that there are practical problems with it. None of us flawed humans would be able to completely dispose of the biases and adopt the veil of ignorance. But that is not my question.
My question is whether, even in a perfect utopian world, whether the veil of ignorance would get agreement among society as to what the perfect morals principles for that society. I am not convinced that different people behind the veil of ignorance would be able to agree on the perfect conditions for society even if they were able to rid themselves of the biases they hold from their position in society. In other words I think there is a natural variance to human ideals that would exist even if people were able to step behind the veil of ignorance.
What do other people think of this idea?
EDIT
The reason I was thinking of this in the first place, is that I was contemplating how, if at all, society could be made less polarised. Practically I understand the limitations, and that is somewhat simple and obvious. Trump and Ocasio Cortez, for example, regardless of any practically feasible veils of ignorance. But I think that theoretically also there are limitations, even in a perfect world. That is what I wanted to explore.
rigorous self honesty pete. Are we doing the best we can or are we trying to "save others" with a personal emotional belief system?
Are we trying to help, guide, heal? or are we trying to insert what we want?
Both of them require us to have a veil of ignorance, denial, and deceit.
Start there.
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I tend to agree with your position on this topic aross the board.
