Justice And Rights Flashcards
How does Mill respond the the moral outrage extreme utilitarianism can inspire?
Our sentiments of justice are not a ‘revelation of some objective reality’ = they are an animal rather than intellectual response
Legal rights as a form of justice
it is unjust to deprive anyone of what they possess by legal right
Moral rights as a form of justice
laws which violate peoples moral rights are unjust - such as freedom from arbitrary arrest (Jean example)
Moral Dessert as a form of justice
violations of the principle that those who do good deserve good and those who do evil deserve evil are seen as an injustice
Contracts as a form of justice
Breaking faith with anyone or disappointing expectations we have voluntarily engendered is regarded as unjust
Impartiality as a form of justice
Allowing one’s judgement to be influenced by irrelevant considerations, such as a person’s race or sex, is, as all will admit, often unjust
Equality as a form of justice
This notion, says Mill, is close to that of impartiality. Some communists, for example, think that goods should be distributed according to need: equal needs give rise to equal claims to goods. The link with impartiality is obvious: the only relevant characteristic to be used when distributing goods is need, while attention to other characteristics will count, for these communists, as partiality and injustice
imperfect obligations
actions that are required, but not at any particular time. So, I have an obligation to be charitable, but not on any specific occasion; when and to whom I am charitable are up to me
perfect obligations
Mill considers it more precise to spell out the distinction between perfect and imperfect with the idea of rights. If I have a perfect obligation, then some other person has a correlative right. In the case of charity, no person has a right to my assistance
Mill’s stance on protecting individuals
no stance other than ‘general utility’ - no protection for the individuals beyond this
most of the more specific principles of justice we find to be merely instrumental to satisfaction of utility - but no principls of justice are absolute - they do not trump utility
Problem with Mill’s definition of perfect obligations (justice)
too broad - any moral obligation i have to a specific person not only gives rise to a crrelative right possessed by another person but also gives an obligation of justice
Example of when a violation of duty does not incur injustice nor give rise to a right
If I nurse you through your old age, it is plausible enough to say that you have some kind of duty to leave me at least something in your will. You’re not doing so will be unjust, but I have no right to any inheritance
Mill, rights and harm
a right rests on the notion of harm to an assignable individual
Homelessness, rights and harm (objection)
a homeless person begging for food from you, will be harmed if refused but has no right to your food
Mill response to homelessness objection
Mill would say it’s indirect harm and thus there is no right because there is no direct harm -> someone else is capable of waiving that harm and there are other means of aquiring food - them going hungry is merely one outcome (but he believes in actual consequences so this doesn’t make sense)
define natural law
here were natural duties compliance with which would certainly benefit man - things to be done - that achieve man’s natural end - but not natural rights
define special rights
rights that arise from specific special transactions between individuals or out of some special relationship - both have rights ans those who have corresponding obligation are limited to the special relationship/ transaction
ie: promises
define special liberties
one person is exempted from obligations to which most are subject - not a right
define general rights
when some unjustified interference is anticipated or threatened, in order to point out that it is unjustified - to have them is to have a moral justification for determining how others shall act - ie that they cannot interfere- the moral justification does not arise from the character of the particular action to the performer of which the claiment has a right
Justice and the distribution of resources
there is no central distribution of resources - no group entitled to control this
should commiting injustices in past time effect the distribution of justice / rights / resources?
distribution in accordance with the perceived benefits given to others, leaving room for complaint that a free society does not realise exactly the pattern
What does Mill’s approach to distribution of resources resuppose?
1) all will want to maintain the pattern or distribution
2) that each can gather enough info about his own actions and ongoing activities of others to discover which of his actions will upset the pattern
3) that diverse and far-flung persons can coordinate their actions to dovetail into the pattern
Taxation objection to Mill’s distribution of resources and why it fails
Taxation is taking money for hours worked - basically slave labour since a worker doesn’t see this money
But they do reap benefits from taxation so its an imperfect objection
The problem of family units in redistribution of resources
Should family units be treated as a conglomerate collectively entitled to a certain amount of resources inorder to maintain the equality of distribution - or should loving acts of giving be forbidden ?
Principle failure of Mill: failure to acknowledges the seperation of individuals
Problem of redistibution as regards to rights
it is a violation of individuals rights because people are entitled to keep what is there’s already / what they have worked for - more prove that rights can very easily be violated in Mill’s to the point where it’s unclear whether they should be maintained at all
Problem of reducing resources to the physical
People value different things - some prefer longer hours and more physical possessions whilst other want less possessions and more leisure time -> should leisure time be taxed in the same way a quantitative wealth ?
Lockean Proviso
individuals have a right to private property from nature by working on it - within the perameters of there being enough and as good left for others
problem of quantifying resources purely on their utility (objection to Mill but supports Locke)
finds substance with rare healing capabilities and appropriates the whole supply - at this point no one is worse off because without him it would never have been discovered - but as time goes on and likelihood of someone else finding it goes up, his behaviour violates provisio
‘In order to be a valid political system utilitarianism must not only claim truth of itself but also the falsity of competing systems’
Response to Nazi objection
what about a nazi - shouldn’t his political preferences be satisfied like anyone elses? No, because the nazism preference occupies the same space as the utilitarian theory - though utilitarianism must be impartial/ neutral in preferences between push-pin and poetry but on matters of political theories and theories of justice it must play its role in dispelling false theories
Main tension between Utilitarianism and Justice
if utilitarianism is the only first principle - it leaves no space for the concept of justice or the feelings of injustice we experience when our perceived rights are infringed upon despite it resulting in the greater good
Terrorism objection to Utilitarian concept of justice
A police department want to catch a terrorist before he commits his next crime. In order to receive necessary funding they must make an arrest now - they arrest an innocent and in doing so save thousands of lives but infringe upon the right to not be falsely detained held by the innocent individual - the innocent person is surviving a punishment that have not justly earned and thus is enduring unfair treatment
Possible Utilitarian response to terrorism objection
This takes the moral dessert approach to justice - other theories of justice exist
Mill on how the etymology of Justice points to Utilitarianism
our ideas of justice stem from our desire to fulfil the potential of utilitarianism on a societal level. Since the root of justice is in a wide-scale judicial environment as a means to reinforce behaviours that are good on a large scale and punish behaviours which endanger societies as a whole, our impulse to enact justice in all scenarios comes from its core in the legal sense which we have now internalised
Mill and the etymology of justice (problem)
where is his evidence? he doesn’t cite any sources - isn’t he supposed to be an empiricist
Diminishing Marginal Utility
The more you have, the less aquiring more makes you happier
Levelling down wealth
Cintingent on idea that people are unhappy if they are poor by comparison rather than because the their empirical wealth in itself
logical solution is to make everyone poorer
How act utilitarianism can be reconciled with justice
rights as rules of thumb to be followed most of the time - the reason we have internalised them is because they work most of the time
How can utilitarians cast doubt on justice
Most people reach a point intuitively where they will violate individual rights in order to serve a greater good - so they can’t really be morally intuitive even naturally occuring they are largely rules of thumb
is egalitarianism the best form of distribution (think levelling down objection )
prioritisation fails at a certain point (Helen-lover’s example or the fact that depressed people will gain less happiness from distribution - so should they be removed from the equation?)
