Priority or Equality Flashcards
Explain Nagel’s 2 child case
The parents of two children are choosing whether to move to the suburbs or stay in the city. One of their children is seriously disabled and will be able to access the special care she needs in the city, the other child is able-bodied and loves the outdoors - she will flourish in the suburbs. The gain in well-being to the able-bodied child from the suburb is greater than the gain to the disabled child from the city. Suppose the following units of well-being or utility:
Healthy Child:
- Move to city: 20
- Move to suburb: 25
Disabled Child:
- Move to city: 10
- Move to suburb: 6
How would a utilitarian respond to the 2-child case? Why?
Move to city total utility: 20+10 = 30
Move to suburb total utility: 25+6 = 31
Therefore move to the suburb - more total well-being
How would Nagel respond to the 2-child case? Why?
there are overriding egalitarian grounds to move to the city - an improvement in the situation of the worse off child is more important than an improvement in the situation of the able-bodied child - it is more urgent to benefit the disabled child.
Think of it as reducing the gap between the well-being of the healthy and disabled children.
Move to the city: healthy: 20 disabled: 10 total: 30 GAP: 10
Move to the suburbs: healthy: 25 disabled: 6 total: 31 GAP: 19
You should pick the city because the gap is far smaller between the well-being of the children especially in comparison to the minor decrement in the total utility of the city vs the suburbs (only 1).
Note: Nagel points out that quality is not the only value to be considered and it depends on the worse off situation of the child
what is the principle of equality? why is it insufficient on it’s own?
it is in itself bad if some are worse off than others (through no choice or fault of their own) [as opposed to the view that inequality is bad because it results in corruption/rights violations/ poverty etc,.]. The principle of equality is not sufficient on it’s own because it doesn’t account for why it’s better for all to be equally better off than equally worse off. You must combine with some other principle e.g. principle of utility: it is better if people are better off.
What are some objections to egalitarianism?
Levelling down objection: it implies it is better to have an equally bad outcome than an outcome in which some are mildly better off and everyone else badly off e.g. the blind scenario - if half are sighted an egalitarian might argue that it is better if all were blind.
RESPONSE: but is a balance between utility and equality. COUNTER: but egalitarians must maintain even if they don’t agree with the choice that everyone being blind is IN SOME WAY better - it is in no way better
RESPONSE: it is in some way better
What is the Priority view? What are it’s strengths?
Benefiting people matters more the worse off these people are. This is not egalitarian because it does not maintain that it is in itself bad that some are worse off than others just that benefits/ moral decisions should be made to benefit the worse off. Parfit believes that this is how Nagel should be interpreted.
Strengths:
- not subject to Levelling down objection because it is in no way better if all go blind in the blind-scenario because the worse off are no better off than they were in half-blind world.
- considers need and absolute level of well-being rather than relative levels - Altitude analogy: people at higher altitudes find it harder to breather. But they would still find it harder to breathe if there were no people at a lower level - benefits to them matter not because of relative inequality but because of their lower absolute level.
Use the one-child case to show a problem with Prioritarianism.
One child case: you now have a single child who has a 50% chance of developing a serious disability and a 50% chance of being healthy. You can either move to the city where the child will getting special care if disabled or move to the suburbs where the child, if healthy, will flourish. The benefit to the child of the suburb if healthy is greater than the benefit of the city if disabled.
The problem: Prioritarianisim requires interpersonal trade off’s - when considering the fate of one person in isolation from the fate of others (e.g. Altitude analogy) what benefits should we provide this person? Voorhoeve and Otsuka argue that this demonstrates the need for a utilitarian rather than a prioritarian ethic. In the one child case you should aim to maximise the child’s expected utility - move to the suburbs.
There is a shift from the choice in the two-child case (city) to the one child case (suburb). This is inconsistent with the priority view.
This shows that the moral appeal is essentially comparative:
- either invokes the disvalue of unfair inequality (luck egalitarianism)
- or they assess each person’s claims in the light of the comparative strength of the claims of others (competing claims view)
Where utilitarianism fails because it treats the two-child case like the one child case, prioritarianism fails because it treats the one child case like the two-child case and thus ignores the unity of the individual.
What is Rawls separateness of persons objection to utilitarianism?
it doesn’t take account of individual rationality and the different forms it takes in different people - applies one conception/ life on everyone
Does prioritarianism account for the separateness of persons?
YES:
- accounts for individual circumstances/lives - those who are worse off have more weighted benefits.
NO:
- it doesn’t account for when the life that goes well or badly is the same possible life (one-child case)
- insensitive to presence (one child) or absence of prudential justifications (two child)
- insensitive to presence or absence of competing claims (in two child)
What is the prudential justification argument (Otsuka, Voorhoeve) for moving to the suburbs in the one-child case but not in the two child case?
In the one child case, maximising expected utility means moving to the suburbs. If the child does turn out to be disabled, the parents can offer a prudential justification to the child by saying they made the decision in the best interests of the child, although it was a gamble that didn’t pay off. In the two-child case, such a justification could not be offered because the parents always knew that the disabled child would be worse off in the suburbs - they did not consider her actual or expected utility - they looked at combined utility which went against the preference of the disabled child but for the preference of the healthy child.
what is the competing claims based justification for moving to the city in the two-child case (absent in one-child)? Otsuka and Voorhoeve
the disabled child has a greater complaint against moving to the suburbs than the healthy child has against moving to the city because moving to the suburbs would benefit the already better off child at the expense of the worst off child.
RESPONSE: a utilitarian would argue that the strength of a complaint comes solely from how much an individual might benefit in welfare terms
COUNTER: the strength of an individuals claim is a function of how much they benefit in welfare AND from what baseline level of well-being relative to others
