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Scanlon What We Owe Each Other Notes

Scanlon's contractualism holds that an act is wrong if it could not be justified to others based on any set of principles that no one could reasonably reject. It aims to derive morality from the notion of reasonable agreement between individuals. Key aspects include that principles must be justifiable to others on grounds they could not reasonably object to, and that an act's wrongness consists of its unjustifiability. Aggregation of harms and benefits across individuals is only done intrapersonally rather than interpersonally. Objections argue Scanlon's view is too idealized and excludes some groups from moral consideration.

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78 views

Scanlon What We Owe Each Other Notes

Scanlon's contractualism holds that an act is wrong if it could not be justified to others based on any set of principles that no one could reasonably reject. It aims to derive morality from the notion of reasonable agreement between individuals. Key aspects include that principles must be justifiable to others on grounds they could not reasonably object to, and that an act's wrongness consists of its unjustifiability. Aggregation of harms and benefits across individuals is only done intrapersonally rather than interpersonally. Objections argue Scanlon's view is too idealized and excludes some groups from moral consideration.

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Kate Teacher
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© © All Rights Reserved
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Scanlon What we owe each :

other
C reated By B Bin Ng
Last Edited Nov 12, 2019 1 03 AM
Property
Property 1

Tags C ontractualism Philosophy Scanlon ethics

Contractualism: Trying to derive the Morality from the notion of agreement


between all those
in the moral domain
Justice: What makes an action right or wrong
by thinking about what could be justified to others on grounds that
they could not reasonably reject.
Normative basis for ethics - Justifying oneself to others.

Motivations
Mutual recognition:

That if you can't justify your actions to others you feel as if you've
done - something wrong.
G ives Moral theory a motivational force and authority.
Reasonable Rejection :
Value of humanity based on the capacity to act on reasons. To
respect it is to treat them according to principles that they could
not reasonably reject.

Sc a nlon: Wha t we owe ea ch ot her 1


💡 Why Reason, Not Rationality?
Rationality: Involves Means and Ends. To be rational is to act
in a way that is in Line with one's ends or means to an end
Reason: Presuppose body of information and a range of
reasons which are taken to be relevant. Then Make a claim
about what these reasons, properly understood, in fact
suppose.

Wrongness :
C onsists of Unjustifiability.
Lack of justification disrespects a others of the Locus of reason,
and to fail to see what is owed to others
To pursue interests in a way that we cannot justify to others who
have their own interests to pursue.

C omplaints: - Governed by the principles of trying to find a


Universal Set of Rules that Regulate how we treat each other,
and behave in a way that people of similar motivations cannot
reasonably reject.
C onditionally Concerned for others.

 Scanlon's contractualism:
An act is wro ng if per formed under circumstances would be

disallowed by any set of principles for the general regulation of


behaviour that no one could reasonably Reject as a basis for
informed, unforced general agreement,

Done by weighing up reasons to Object its prohibition vs its permission


and comparing them
A ssume that the persons are Informed about the verdict and
circumstances. - An enlightened version of you with the knowledge of the
reason-providing facts. Agreed and not forced upon).

Sc a nlon: Wha t we owe ea ch ot her 2


Specifying Reasonable Objection:
Objectivity :

Take into account the consequences of a principle's acceptance in


general, not case by case.
G eneric/ personal reasons:
C ommonly available information about what people would have
reasons to want
reasons that we see people in that virtue or circumstance in general
will have as their aims, capabilityies, conditions in which they place.
involves their wellbeing, aims, status, positions Personal Reasons)
Rejection test:
If principle impose burden on me <b1 , but every other alternatives
impose a greater burden on someone else <b2 , does not give me the
reason to reject the principle.
Instead, withdraw objections and see that b2>b1, and that it is
inescapable.

2 F actors of ppeal:
A

Internally Gripping

Able to retain what is critical from a first-person deliberative


perspective
Non-Narcissistic

Not self-benefitting
reasonably complaints to principles occupy the moral center stage

💡 Complaint Model

A
:
ll grounds for rejecting principles arise from the generic reasons
that all individuals would have occcupied a certain position in the
situation which the principle applies.

Justifiability depends only on the various individuals reasons to object to


the principles and alternatives to it.

Sc a nlon: Wha t we owe ea ch ot her 3


A ggreg tion a
The summation of reasons to reject a principle among multiple people.
C an only per form Intrapersonal aggregation, NOT interpersonal - Within
lives, not across lives.
Reasons to object are weighed according to a one-to-one format, where
all the reasons to reject for that one person is aggregated and weighed
against the other person's reasons to reject ONLY.

When to aggregate :

Fairness

When there are 2 or more people with burdens/ harms that are
dentical/ qual.
I E

C an't roll a dice to only consider one person's considerations while


treating that of the other(s) as not having existed in the first place -
disrespects the person's locus of reason.
Relevant Harms/ Benefits

B urdens are similar in seriousness and very close to one another


enough to be morally relevant

If harm is serious enough to be morally relevant to the


other (e.g paralysis vs death, it is appropriate, in deciding
whether to prevent a more serious harm at the cost of not
preventing a greater number of less serious ones, to take
into account the number of harms involved on each side.
Objection: Threshold problem
Where do you draw the line in which it is okay to say "its serious
enough to warrant aggregation"?
You can list the incidents down into a smooth continuum and go down
the list such that every nitty gritty bit is considered, and that it
becomes unreasonable to reach a point where you can say "that's it,
you can aggregate".

Sc a nlon: Wha t we owe ea ch ot her 4


Objections against Scanlon
1. C ounter factual
Real world is very different from the theoretical one. Some if not most
people will only partially follow the principles. Trying to strictly adhere
to the principles will therefore just become Counter-productive.
2. Limited Scope
E xcludes those that are mentally disabled, children as well as animals
in order to understand considerations as reasons to reject.
3. E xplanatory Backwards
Wrongfulness of conduct that determines the general agreement to
disallow it

C an C ontract Theory Ground Morality?


Switches traditionally recognised priority of rightness and justification
A ction is right because it is justifiable to others.
- Not exposed to any reaso nable co mplaint

💡 Note: Moral theories need a series of brute reasons e.g. pleasure


and pain,
That justifies the reason-providing factors of that particular
moral theory

some things are just generally reason-providing

a a a a
(A cert in p ttern th t the theory h ve to bring cross) a

Objections:

Sc a nlon: Wha t we owe ea ch ot her 5


D eeper Explanation Worry:
s there some deeper normative feature about the complaint-proof
I

principles that makes them complaint-proof?


f the actions associated with principles that receive a contractualist
I

blessing have a dependent normative character


⇒ H ave to Explain why would people agree/disagree on that set of principles.

Negative Example-

Majoritarian :

💡 Action is right iff it has majority support among those in society


when it occurs

(-): Does not exhibit the pattern


(-): No common reason-providing facts → Only common factor is that they
fulfill the formula

⇒ Link to scanlon: close to a tweaked verson of majoritarians

Wa h t is required is not just to escape complaint, but to be a proof


against complaint, esp reasonable complaints.

Wa h t is Missing is that reasons have to be complaint-proof in virtue


of their inherent nature

There must be something about the actions associated with the complaint-
proof principle, that is independent in character, in virtue which no one can
reasonably reject/raise a reasonable complaint against them.
Therefore Contractualism's definition of Right being Justifiable raises the
question as to why is it the case?

Sc a nlon: Wha t we owe ea ch ot her 6


obvious that there is a property that unites right options at a more
basic level
cannot explain what unifies the principles that are immune to
reasonable rejection

💡 H ence, Contractualism cries out for an explanation that is not


available to them
- Risk falling into consequentialism when they try to define wellfare
beyond just pleasure and pain.

Sc anlon: What we owe each other 7

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