What is justice? -Rawls's theory
The first time I got to know Rawls, I went to the library last semester in my sophomore year. My thirst for knowledge makes me stay in the library greedily and can't wait to read all the books in the library. I have read many books on literature and history, and think this kind of thing is too superficial and meaningless. I like to debate, and the debate goes on. As soon as others carry out Marx's so-called contradiction theory and idealistic materialism, especially Hegel's famous saying that "reality is reasonable" (I almost hate this sentence), I am at a loss, so I decided to break through myself and understand what philosophy is and what idealism is. I study business administration without any knowledge of politics and philosophy. At that time, as long as I saw the words "academic classics", my eyes turned red and I felt that this thing was worth reading. Under such circumstances, I saw Rawls' masterpiece A Theory of Justice. At that time, I saw Qi Ying introduce that this book is the representative work of liberalism in the 20th century. I thought to myself, as long as I understand what justice is, I won't be confused and ignorant when arguing with others. I borrowed this book from the library and read it with Kant's Critique of Pure Reason. I read Critique of Pure Reason when my mind is good. This book is so profound that I can hardly read it without an excellent mood. I read Rawls' Theory of Justice in my spare time. Looking back now, there were too few times. But I'm not afraid now. With a deep knowledge of Kant and philosophy, it seems much easier. I have always wondered why Rawls opened the topic "A Theory of Justice". This topic smacks of the title party. It's called A Theory of Justice, but it only talks about justice as fairness, so the title should be called A Theory of Fairness and Justice. Thinkers have a common fault, which is paranoia. He thinks what he has done is the greatest thing. They often look at things with doubts, what is morality and what is justice. These questions lead them to think, but only they know how they think. When he thinks about morality, he may only think about part of it, but he must insist that it is all morality. The same is true of Rawls, who only thinks about fairness and justice, but regards these as justice. The result is just countless ideological debates. Therefore, thinkers should be sincere, know what they know and not know what they don't know. If you can't understand Hegel's "finite infinity" like Wittgenstein, it means that this is a language game. If you don't understand, let's say you don't understand. What's the big deal? We should treat our thoughts sincerely. Therefore, there are two principles of justice: ① Everyone has the right to have the same freedom as others. (2) Social and economic inequality should be arranged in such a way that people can reasonably expect that this inequality is beneficial to everyone and that their status and position are open to everyone. These two principles are the principle of fairness. How terrible it is to establish this principle of justice, as if the savior had come. As a firm believer in liberal democracy, I never dare to say that liberalism is just. People will ask me, "What makes you?" Or they will ask me, "What is justice?" I immediately had to stand there stupefied, thinking about where Socrates should start to retreat. When people ask me, why do you insist on freedom and democracy? Isn't that for you? I'll tell you, it's not so-called justice, but that you should judge things like this. All beings should be equal and independent, and no one has the right to oppress others with public power. People are born free. You can call me a liar. I have never seen anyone born free. I just want to tell you that everyone should be happy, and everyone's happiness can only be judged by themselves, so human freedom is essential. Rawls is a disciple of Kant, but he doesn't care about Kant's warning in Critique of Practical Reason. Justice can only be formal, and any material of experience will limit justice to experience, but it can't be perfect in essence. Rawls actually regards the distribution of social wealth as a means to achieve justice, which I can never accept. This is the biggest failure of a theory of justice. It is this failure that makes contemporary communitarian scholars and liberals launch fierce attacks on it. Gentile attacked it morally, Walther questioned it from the field of justice, and Nozick questioned it from the theft of wealth. I have no doubt that American politics is too materialistic, not to mention Huntington's group of political scholars, and even political philosophy is inevitable. The so-called commercial country is like this. American culture is really vulgar in western culture. -Gossip) When I saw those economic curves to demonstrate that wealth distribution should be tilted towards the most vulnerable groups, I threw the book away and shrugged it off. Rawls almost never forgets to criticize bentham and mill's utilitarianism. I think this is the starting point for Rawls to write this book, but he narrowed his eyes by criticizing utilitarianism. Utilitarianism is a very vague theoretical system, and no one knows how to operate the so-called greatest happiness of most people in practice. Moreover, under the condition that freedom and human rights are guaranteed, utilitarianism has only room for publicity. Whether ordinary people are willing to be utilitarian or virtuous is a personal matter, and utilitarianism can't control it. The biggest utility of utilitarianism in public space is to maximize the current interests, that is, to make the cake bigger in economics to facilitate people's more material distribution. Rawls introduced a kind of political creative thinking, namely the famous veil of ignorance. No one knows his origin, gender, age and nationality, that is, no one knows who he is. He is just a simple subject, generalizing people as establishing a fair political system and assuming a series of national development for veil of ignorance. This is undoubtedly deeply influenced by Kant's transcendental philosophy, or what Kant is about to say. The fair system introduced in veil of ignorance will certainly take care of everyone's equal status and try to take care of all members in distribution. Rawls himself created the later distributive justice system. I don't think Kant would say that. I can't help admiring his touching feelings. But we forget that an old woman can be emotional and reasonable with me, and then make me emotional and lose my judgment, but we must not be poisoned by Rawls' feelings. We can take care of major groups in distribution, but it doesn't mean that it should be. It's like I'm rich, and many people have no food or clothes to wear. I can do charity, but it doesn't mean I have to do it. This is actually a compulsion to force people to do it with morality. What does Rawls want to criticize utilitarianism? This is a very serious problem. You don't criticize utilitarianism, but you think utilitarianism is flawed. For example, you say that the maximization of the current interests of utilitarianism may lead to the misfortune of future generations. Rawls grasped this point profoundly and criticized it morally. But Rawls, we must remember that there is another possibility in terms of possibility. Maximizing current interests may also bring great happiness to future generations, and happiness may be too unfortunate. Rawls, what we want to discuss with you is that freedom is a negative value, and we should not use its positive value to build a moral siege. People can be as full of moral compassion as you are. Hume said that morality comes from emotion, I agree. But remember, don't be fascinated by moral feelings. Reason is the right way. Hayek has declared in Law, Legislation and Freedom that justice is only an illusion and the so-called justice is always negative. However, I have always wondered, you live in the same era, why is there no big debate?