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From: laura@utzoo.UUCP (Laura Creighton)
Newsgroups: net.politics.theory
Subject: Re: Re: Rawls's Theory of Justice and Slavery
Message-ID: <5471@utzoo.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 13-Apr-85 13:46:34 EST
Article-I.D.: utzoo.5471
Posted: Sat Apr 13 13:46:34 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 13-Apr-85 13:46:34 EST
References: <576@whuxl.UUCP>, <3532@alice.UUCP> <5427@utzoo.UUCP>, <579@whuxl.UUCP> <5451@utzoo.UUCP>, <586@whuxRe: Re: Rawls's Theory of JuSat, 13-Apr-85 13:46:34 EST
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
Lines: 47

No, Tim, the question is will Rawls's theory of justice work. And I
maintain that it will only work in a homogenous society where everybody
has the same notion of ``fair''. And, historically, it is clear that
people have sincerely had incompatible notions. Are you saying that
there is some force which prevents a person from believing that a
Black is inferior to a White? I have not seen any evidence that this
force exists. Today it is unthinkable to consider Blacks animals -
but was it really unthinkable then? And given that sincere people
could be *so* wrong about an issue *so* basic as few as 100 years
ago -- do you think that we are any better today?

You do not have to convince me that slavery was wrong -- but, do you
think that you could have convinced the southerners in 1860? If
you could have, do you think that you could also have convinced them
that they did not have the right to cede out of the union? or that it
was not in their interest to maintain trade with nations that the
north did not want to trade with? Or could you have gotten the
norther leaders to agree to any of these southern grievances? 


I don't think so. In daily usage we run into disagreements as to
what is ``fair''. The other day I was rereading the BLTJ second
UNIX issue -- in particular the ``Fair Share'' system of Henry.
If you are not running this system you find that, on average,
every process gets an equal share of the CPU. Therefore, if Y
runs a shell pipeline with 7 processes, and X runs a huge
bloated and inefficient C program Y gets 7 times as much CPU as
X does. This was considered ``unfair''. Given that X and Y
are the only users of the machine, X should get 50% and Y should
get 50%.

So it was changed. This change will sit well with some people's notion
of fairness but not with others. Y is using UNIX in an elegant and
efficient way and X is using a horrible inefficient program. It
is fairer to give Y more of the CPU, since Y is using it well, to
discourage X from writing such  inefficient and un-UNYX-tool like
programs.. After all, everyone suffers if X's programs take 7 times
as long to run, on average, as if he had used a pipeline and we will
all benefit if he can be taught to write better code.


What is fair? It depends on what  your basic notion is -- and until
a society can be said to have one notion Rawls' theory of justice
will fall short of it aim.

Laura Creighton
utzoo!laura