Think is a journal of the Royal Institute of Philosophy and is published quarterly by the Cambridge University Press. Each edition contains roughly a dozen essays on topics broadly relating to philosophy. The publication is touted as "Philosophy for everyone" although most contributors are academics. I can't recommend it highly enough.A great example of the kind of gems you can find in Think is an article entitled "Justice as a Natural Phenomenon" by Ken Binmore (pictured above). Binmore is currently a visiting professor of Philosophy at the London School of Economics. He is also one of the founders of the modern economic theory of bargaining and has made important contributions to the foundations of game theory, experimental economics and analytical philosophy. Suffice it to say that he is a exceptionally smart fellow and typical of the contributers to Think.
In his Justice article, Binmore posits what I consider to be a fairly self-evident proposition: that fairness evolved as Nature's answer to the equilibrium selection problem in human coordination games. In other words, the Golden Rule is a device which naturally evolved to solve a host of picayune problems such as: who should take how much of a particular dish when there isn't enough to go around? who goes through the door first? who gets that parking space? If conflict arose every time these problems arose, society would obviously fall apart.
Binmore uses game theory to explain how bargainers who employ the Golden Rule end up achieving results far superior than what they would achieve under what he describes as the "state of nature". He then goes on to explain that our learned cultural norms will determine precisely how we make our small-scale fairness judgments (i.e. whether the outcome is utilitarian, egalitarian or somewhere in between). This is where moral relativism sneaks. Even though fairness seems to be written in our genes ... the appropriate standard of interpersonal comparison varies with the culture in which a fairness norm operates.
I loved Binmore's concluding quote which he offers up as an example that the social contract only gets reformed when people with similar aspirations are sufficiently close to the levels of power:
As General Napier said when asked to tolerate the Hindu practice of suttee:
"You say that it is your custom to burn widows. Very well. We also have a custom: when men burn a woman alive, we tie a rope around their necks and hang them. Build your funeral pyre; beside it, my carpenters will build a gallows. You may follow your custom. And then we will follow ours."
Why do you equate fairness with the Golden Rule? The Golden Rule is about justice and human rights, not really about fairness. In fact, many have criticized the Golden Rule for being unfair, which explains why the Platinum Rule evolved: do unto others as they would want you to do.
ReplyDeleteIf A has distinctly different tastes than B and C, then A's adherence to the Golden Rule benefits none of A, B or C.