PT148.S2.P1.Q4 > Analytics

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The following passage is adapted from a journal article. ███

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Intro topic · Rawl's theory of justice

We first need to understand what Rawls was reacting to.

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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.

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Rawls's criticism · Utilitarianism wrongly endorses violating the liberty of the few for the good of the many

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.)

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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.

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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.

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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

With which one of the █████████ ██████████ █████ ████ █████ ███ ███ ██████ ██ ███ ███████ ██ ████ ██████ ██ ██████

Question Type

Author’s perspective

Implied

The author expresses a clear opinion in P1 — the author thinks utilitarianism is “incredible” (meaning, implausible) because it would have to endorse the execution of an innocent person to appease a mob, if it would increase total satisfaction. Rawls agrees with the author’s opinion, which is why he offers a different theory of justice.

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Supported by P1. The author thinks utilitarianism is “incredible” (meaning, implausible) because it would have to endorse the execution of an innocent person to appease a mob, if it would increase total satisfaction. Rawls agrees with the author’s opinion, which is why he offers a different theory of justice. This implies that both the author and Rawls think it’s not just to execute someone just because the majority of people would benefit. In other words, sometimes one person’s preferences (the innocent person who might be executed) is more important than fulfilling the majority’s preferences (the mob that would benefit from the execution).

38%

Unless individuals set █████ █████ ███ ██████████████ ████ ██████ ████ ████ █████████ █████ ███ ████████████ ██ ██████

Actually, Rawls’s theory is based on individuals’ own self-interest. Rawls doesn’t think that people need to set aside their own self-interest in order to make fair judgments about how to distribute goods.

27%

If an individual █████ █ █████ ███████ ████ █████████ ███████ ████ █████ ████ ██ ████ █████ ██████ ██ ████ ███████

The author doesn’t agree. Although the last sentence of the passage sounds like the author’s agreement, it’s actually not. It’s the author’s description of how one aspect of Rawls’s theory is a redistributionist idea. And since the author says it’s “unfortunate” that Rawls’s theory involves a redistributionist idea, the implication is that the author doesn’t think society should take from others to provide a good.

23%

Most people agree █████ █████ ██ ███ ███████ █████ ██ ███ ████ █████████

We don’t know what the author and Rawls think about the “most valuable” primary good and whether “most people” would agree on that good.

It is fair ██ █████████ ███ ████████████ █████████ ██ █████ ██ ████ ████████ ███ ████████████ ██ ███ █████████

The author and Rawls would disagree with (E). This is why the author calls utilitarianism “incredible” and why Rawls comes up with an alternate theory of justice.

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