This means that you are operating under the veil of ignorance. You should make sure that the morality you decide on is beneficial whoever you are, once it takes effect.
Why would I not instead maximise my expectation, instead of maximising the worst case?
It’s an exercise in applying ethics widely. The goal is to find agreement with others.
The Veil of ignorance/veil of oblivion comes from political philosophy. It’s a famous idea in theory of government. John Rawls.
Decisions made under this rule are considered more moral by Rawls. Practically, I would answer that they have broader public consensus and hold up better under public pressure.
I know where it comes from, and it has always seemed arbitrary to me. Why Rawls’s maximin rather than average, or some other weighting? In everyday life, people make decisions for themselves and for others all the time without being certain that they will turn out well. Why not the same for ideas for how society as a whole should be organised?
You have half a dozen job offers. Which one do you take? The one with the biggest potential upside? The lowest potential downside? Expected value? Expected log value? Depends on your attitude to risk.
You have half a dozen schemes for how society should be organised. From behind the veil of ignorance, are you willing to risk the chance of a poor position for the chance of a better one? Depends on your attitude to risk. Even behind the veil, different people may rate the same proposal differently.
I must admit to not having read Rawls, only read about his veil of ignorance, but I am sceptical of the very idea of designing a society, other than for writing fiction in. Any designed civilisation will drift immediately on being set in motion, as people act as they see fit in the circumstances they are in. Planned societies have a poor track record. The static societies of the past, where once a cobbler, always a cobbler, are generally not regarded as something we would want to bring back.
As a pure thought experiment, one can imagine whatever one likes, but would this bridge, or that distant rocky tower, stand up?
Artist credit: Rodney Matthews. I love his art, and that of the very similar Roger Dean, but I appreciate it as fantasy, and am a little sad that these things could never be built. Notice that the suspension bridge is only suspended on the nearer half.
You have a dictator enforcing the rules here. That’s what prevents drift.
Anyway, the whole point of the post is indeed to remind people of this, that we don’t have a way to just impose a neat morality that everyone agree on.
Why would I not instead maximise my expectation, instead of maximising the worst case?
It’s an exercise in applying ethics widely. The goal is to find agreement with others.
The Veil of ignorance/veil of oblivion comes from political philosophy. It’s a famous idea in theory of government. John Rawls.
Decisions made under this rule are considered more moral by Rawls. Practically, I would answer that they have broader public consensus and hold up better under public pressure.
I know where it comes from, and it has always seemed arbitrary to me. Why Rawls’s maximin rather than average, or some other weighting? In everyday life, people make decisions for themselves and for others all the time without being certain that they will turn out well. Why not the same for ideas for how society as a whole should be organised?
Can you offer an example with explanation?
You have half a dozen job offers. Which one do you take? The one with the biggest potential upside? The lowest potential downside? Expected value? Expected log value? Depends on your attitude to risk.
You have half a dozen schemes for how society should be organised. From behind the veil of ignorance, are you willing to risk the chance of a poor position for the chance of a better one? Depends on your attitude to risk. Even behind the veil, different people may rate the same proposal differently.
I must admit to not having read Rawls, only read about his veil of ignorance, but I am sceptical of the very idea of designing a society, other than for writing fiction in. Any designed civilisation will drift immediately on being set in motion, as people act as they see fit in the circumstances they are in. Planned societies have a poor track record. The static societies of the past, where once a cobbler, always a cobbler, are generally not regarded as something we would want to bring back.
As a pure thought experiment, one can imagine whatever one likes, but would this bridge, or that distant rocky tower, stand up?
Artist credit: Rodney Matthews. I love his art, and that of the very similar Roger Dean, but I appreciate it as fantasy, and am a little sad that these things could never be built. Notice that the suspension bridge is only suspended on the nearer half.
You have a dictator enforcing the rules here. That’s what prevents drift.
Anyway, the whole point of the post is indeed to remind people of this, that we don’t have a way to just impose a neat morality that everyone agree on.