Self-study
P1
The following passage is adapted from a journal article.
P2
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Intro topic ·
Rawl's theory of justice
We first need to understand what Rawls was reacting to.
What Rawls was reacting to ·
Utilitarianism
Philosophy that emphasized maximizing fulfillment of people's preferences. Utilitarianism led to strange results -- it supported executing an innocent person as long as the action increased total satisficaction.
Rawls's criticism ·
Utilitarianism wrongly endorses violating the liberty of the few for the good of the many
P3
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Rawls's alternative to utilitarianism ·
Justice is whatever arises from a fair procedure
(The author calls Rawls's theory "ingenious." This suggests a positive attitude.)
P4
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Elaborate on fair procedure ·
The veil of ignorance
If a child must cut a cake into slices to be divided among others, but doesn't know who will get which slice, he'll likely divide the cake into equal slices. In this way, ignorance about who gets which slice leads to a fair process for dividing the cake.
P5
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Elaborate on veil of ignorance ·
If people were ignorant about their own personal qualities, they'd devise a system where nobody loses
This arrangement would be a just system.
P6
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Assumptions underlying Rawls's theory ·
People want primary goods, and would agree that everyone should get a minimum of these goods
People in the "original position" -- the state of ignorance about their own personal qualities -- wouldn't want to lose out on the bare minimum level of primary goods. (The author says that this "unfortunately" is redistributionist. So, there's an aspect about Rawls's theory that the author doesn't like.)
Passage Style
Critique or debate
Problem-analysis
2.
The purpose of
a
point out an ███████████ ███████ ██ ██████████████
The highlighted question is supposed to illustrate something that seems plausible. Later, the author points out that utilitarianism is not plausible. But the purpose of the highlighted question is to show the initial apparent plausibility of utilitarianism.
b
characterize utilitarianism as ██████████ █████████████
The highlighted question is supposed to illustrate something that seems plausible.
c
establish that utilitarianism ████ ██ ████
The highlighted question is supposed to illustrate something that seems plausible. But the author never establishes that utilitarianism is true. In fact, the author provides a reason to question whether utilitarianism actually makes sense, despite its initial apparent plausibility.
d
suggest the intuitive ██████ ██ ██████████████
This best captures the purpose, which is to illustrate how “at first sight, utilitarianism seems plausible.”
e
inquire into ways ██ █████████████ ██████████████
The highlighted question is supposed to illustrate something that seems plausible. But the author doesn’t try to help utilitarianism or add additional principles to it.