On October 26 2008 08:29 Jibba wrote: You don't hide the natural stratification though. The veil provides ignorance of future circumstances, but not current/past. We know a rich dude probably has more characteristics that make him more likely to succeed, I don't think Rawls wanted to discount that entirely. But he did want to create a system where everyone has some opportunity, so when you combine that with minimax you find that you should attempt to eliminate the very worst conditions. So everyone gets the adequate minimum and the talented person can still excel well beyond that line. Now of course much of the funding would come from the rich, which may be unjust initially, but there is a trickle up effect as well. Part of Rawls' inequality is that it must have an overall advantage (or minimum disadvantage) so I think just as you can use it to justify trickle down economics, you can also justify tricle up (healthcare being the main example.)
I haven't actually read his newest book (the one right before he died) but I think it gives much better clarifications and more practical explanations.
Your characterisation of the veil of ignorance is not quite correct. The veil of ignorance considered as a device of representation does indeed hide natural stratification since this would fall under the heading of "morally irrelevant information" which Rawls states the veil of ignorance is intended to exclude from consideration.
Parties in the original position do not know their social position, nor their peculiar talents and abilities; they do not know how they have fared in the natural lottery. They do know and allow for the possibility of different “native endowments”; that is they know that some people may well fare better than others in the natural lottery but they have no idea of their own or any other particular person’s native endowment nor do they have any idea of their own social situation.
"The aim is to use the notion of pure procedural justice as a basis of theory. Somehow we must nullify the effects of specific contingencies which put men at odds and tempt them to exploit social and natural circumstances to their own advantage. Now in order to do this I assume that the parties are situated behind a veil of ignorance. They do not know how the various alternatives will affect their own particular case and they are obliged to evaluate principles solely on the basis of general considerations." Theory of Justice, Revised Edition, Harvard University Press 1999.
I don't have Theory of Justice on hand with me, but from Stanford's Encyclopedia:
Instead of requiring choosers to be impartial, he required them to be purely self-interested--though, of course, in an extended sense; his choosers act to advance the interests of their principals. And by requiring unanimity among the various trustees or agents, Rawls ensured that individuals’ interests are not sacrificed to that of the collective; each individual can veto, through h/er agent/trustee, any social settlement that isn't adequately respectful of h/er individuality. The veil of ignorance is of importance in this context. It ensures impartiality, despite the self-interestedness of the choosers, by preventing them, through lack of knowledge, from choosing in accordance with partial perspectives that might be favored by their principals. My agent A cannot hold out for some social settlement that favors people with those characteristics; s/he doesn't know what they are. S/he will therefore have to protect my interests, as s/he must as their trustee, only by holding out for a social settlement in which no one's interests are given short shrift. H/er impartiality is a product of h/er self-interestedness plus h/er ignorance. And the latter, crucial to this procedure, is a product of the veil of ignorance.
The person is not ignorant of their own principles, but only for those whom they're deciding over. Ok, so I suppose when you look at it based on relativity (as talent/money/etc. should be) Headbangaa is right.
Insofar as the quotation you cite bears on the specific point at issue it supports my post.
Speaking more broadly, even if one were to mistakenly believe that the parties in the original position were aware of their own social situation one would have good reason to suspect that this was a misinterpretation since it would make a nonsense of the role of the veil of ignorance in Rawls' theory: if a party were aware of his own high (or low) social position he would be tempted to generally advantage individuals in such positions. But this goes against the very idea which motivated the veil of ignorance in the first place: to "nullify the effects of specific contingencies which put men at odds and tempt them to exploit social and natural circumstances to their own advantage". Revised edition, p118.
Imo, the more moralist party always tryes to keep theyr base ignorant and zealot so they can feel free to do theyr policies with the least amount of questioning from theyr own base.
that's probably one of the dumbest ads i've ever seen. i was raised catholic and i think it's pretty stupid, time to GIVE IT UP about abortion already. i don't know any or many catholics that would change their vote because of abortion, it's just not a major issue. i'll vote for economic security before i vote to tell a woman what she can and can't do with her body, and i don't want them to resort to scrambling eggs with a coat hanger.
Catholics standing for "the good of the world", showing me a picture of a poverty-struck African child, while preaching the sinfulness of condom use in a continent ridden with AIDS. Claiming JFK was a good leader because he was catholic. Claiming you can only be for family and moral values if you genuflect to their particular doctrine. Maybe you should stop covering up for the pedophiles you help create, maybe you should learn what humility is before claiming you have the creator of the Universe on your side or you are the only ones that know what he wants from us, maybe you should stop numbing people's minds with anti-scientific propaganda, maybe then some of us might actually think you have the "good of the world" in mind.
50% of people in Massachusetts are Catholics, which makes that state the second or first in highest percentage of any state. Massachusetts was the first state to legalize gay marriage (yes, notice that brief gay marriage mention in the video) and the only state other than California to have it now, and Prop 8 in California has a very good chance of passing which would overrule gay marriage in California. Massachusetts is possibly the most democratic leaning state in the country, outside of maybe Hawaii (and DC, which I wasn't counting). The amount of likely voters in Massachusetts that support abortion is 70%, compared to 29% that don't, according to this recent poll: http://www.surveyusa.com/client/PollReport.aspx?g=93cd3109-8247-421f-8469-bbaec86f89c7 Point is, kind of funny that one of the most democratic and liberal state in the country is also the state with the highest percentage of Catholics.
edit: Catholics also seem to vote much more for Democrats from all data I've seen. So it seems apparent abortion is not most Catholics' top priority whatsoever.
This is a brilliant piece of advertising, this is really quiet a contrast with any and all rubbish the presidential campaign brought us thus far. And it is also very subtle, and instead of telling you what to do it makes you think. You can agree or disagree with catholic position on abortion but you have to respect the way they conducted this message.
This is a brilliant piece of advertising, this is really quiet a contrast with any and all rubbish the presidential campaign brought us thus far. And it is also very subtle, and instead of telling you what to do it makes you think. You can agree or disagree with catholic position on abortion but you have to respect the way they conducted this message.
I disagree, I thought it was complete fluff and BS and said nothing at all. And who is actually going to watch this ad? Who the hell has even heard of catholicvote.com, and they obviously have zero money to spread this ad. I wonder how Savio even saw this ad. And where was gas $4.59 a gallon? That seems like an exaggeration to me, where was it this high I'm curious. Brilliant advertising? This movie says nothing and if you read my post above Catholics care a lot less about abortion than you would think, I think it's other Christian sects that care about abortion a lot more than Catholics do.
Hey soybomb, you can post links in TL without having to add HTML like url=, they will link themselves, and if you add a link that's a youtube video they will embed themselves like this:
On October 26 2008 10:49 Doctorasul wrote: You know, that kind of thing really gets to me.
Catholics standing for "the good of the world", showing me a picture of a poverty-struck African child, while preaching the sinfulness of condom use in a continent ridden with AIDS. Claiming JFK was a good leader because he was catholic. Claiming you can only be for family and moral values if you genuflect to their particular doctrine. Maybe you should stop covering up for the pedophiles you help create, maybe you should learn what humility is before claiming you have the creator of the Universe on your side or you are the only ones that know what he wants from us, maybe you should stop numbing people's minds with anti-scientific propaganda, maybe then some of us might actually think you have the "good of the world" in mind.
I think many of them are changing those notions. However, it is not that hard to understand their point of view. Take a look at Ghandi's revolution. Everyone thought he and his followers were idiots for doing nothing while being beaten up, and while watching their families get beaten up. But the point was that if they had enough faith in their prinicples, what looked like a tough situation would get better without them having to compromise their principles. It's the same with the Catholics.
Basically, whatever is convenient is not always the right thing to do, which is something we can all relate to.
Can someone explain the American view of two terms that have been used a lot in this election: liberal and socialist?
McCain says Obama is "liberal" as if it's something bad, but I thought the US was supposed to be liberal. Isn't that what it was founded for? Doesn't the right to bear arms, freedom of worship and the right to live any way you want as long as you don't hurt anyone make the country liberal already? So what exactly does he mean by "liberal"?
Now he's also saying that he's a "socialist". The country already has a minimum wage, welfare, powerful unions, government aid to prop up failing industries and government incentives to distort the free market (ethanol subsidies etc.). Now it also owns a large chunk of the banking system (although I accept that that is not the regular state of affairs). How socialist does it have to get before the country is considered "socialist"?
"She [Sarah Palin] is a diva. She takes no advice from anyone," said this McCain adviser. "She does not have any relationships of trust with any of us, her family or anyone else.
"Also, she is playing for her own future and sees herself as the next leader of the party. Remember: Divas trust only unto themselves, as they see themselves as the beginning and end of all wisdom."
I wonder if the same thing would have happened to the Obama campaign if he had chosen Hillary Clinton as his running mate.
Liberal means completely different things between 1776 and 2008. And political parties throw around words all the time during campaigns, doesn't mean they have much truth to them. The average American has no idea what socialism means and that word is simply being used as an insult because average Republicans think it's an insult. Average Americans are idiots (although average people from all countries are pretty dumb, although that would contradict the terms "average" and "dumb", anyway you get my point I think).
On October 26 2008 10:49 Doctorasul wrote: You know, that kind of thing really gets to me.
Catholics standing for "the good of the world", showing me a picture of a poverty-struck African child, while preaching the sinfulness of condom use in a continent ridden with AIDS. Claiming JFK was a good leader because he was catholic. Claiming you can only be for family and moral values if you genuflect to their particular doctrine. Maybe you should stop covering up for the pedophiles you help create, maybe you should learn what humility is before claiming you have the creator of the Universe on your side or you are the only ones that know what he wants from us, maybe you should stop numbing people's minds with anti-scientific propaganda, maybe then some of us might actually think you have the "good of the world" in mind.
I think many of them are changing those notions. However, it is not that hard to understand their point of view. Take a look at Ghandi's revolution. Everyone thought he and his followers were idiots for doing nothing while being beaten up, and while watching their families get beaten up. But the point was that if they had enough faith in their prinicples, what looked like a tough situation would get better without them having to compromise their principles. It's the same with the Catholics.
Basically, whatever is convenient is not always the right thing to do, which is something we can all relate to.
Did you just defend the anti-intellectual, anti-contraception, pro-thought-crime crowd? I'm sorry, but it is hard to understand their point of view, since it is utter bullshit. Are you saying it isn't? Those that are backpedaling on some of these issues do so not because of their religious guidance, which would happily close their minds to the world forever, but because of common sense, reason and because people around them are calling them out on their stupidity and ignorance.
As for the comparison to Ghandi, are you serious? What does the conviction of one's beliefs have to do with whether or not they are true or with whether or not they will help them? Suicide bombers have a lot of faith in their principles; if that's your criteria why aren't you making that comparison instead? What nonsense.
EPT
