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  • THE GOOD CITIZEN

  • We turn to Aristotle

  • after examining theories,

  • modern theories, of justice

  • that try to detach

  • considerations of justice and rights

  • from questions of moral desert and virtue.

  • Aristotle disagrees with Kant and Rawls.

  • Aristotle argues that justice is a matter of giving people what they deserve.

  • And the central idea of Aristotle's theory of justice

  • is that in reasoning about justice and rights

  • we have, unavoidably,

  • to reason about the purpose, or the end, or the telos,

  • of social practices in institutions.

  • Yes, justice requires giving equal things to equal persons,

  • but the question immediately arises, in any debate about justice,

  • equal in what respect?

  • And Aristotle says we need to fill in the answer to that question

  • by looking to the characteristic end,

  • or the essential nature,

  • or the purpose, of the thing we're distributing.

  • And so we discussed Aristotle's example of flutes;

  • who should get the best flutes.

  • And Aristotle's answer was the best flute-players.

  • The best flute-player should get the best flute

  • because that's the way of honoring

  • the excellence

  • of flute playing.

  • It's a way of rewarding the virtue of the great flute-player.

  • What's interesting though,

  • and this is what we are going to explore today,

  • is that it's not quite so easy to dispense with teleological reasoning

  • when we're thinking about social institutions

  • and political practices.

  • In general it's hard to do without teleology

  • when we're thinking about ethics, justice, and moral argument.

  • At least that is Aristotle's claim.

  • And I would like to bring out the force in Aristotle's claim

  • by considering two examples.

  • One is an example that Aristotle spends quite a bit of time discussing;

  • the case of politics.

  • How should political offices and honors,

  • how should political rule be distributed?

  • The second example is a contemporary debate about golf

  • and whether the Professional Golfers Association

  • should be required to allow Casey Martin,

  • a golfer with a disability,

  • to ride in a golf cart.

  • Both cases bring out

  • a further feature

  • of Aristotle's teleological way of thinking about justice.

  • And that is that when we attend to the telos, or the purpose,

  • sometimes we disagree and argue about what the purpose

  • of a social practice really consists in.

  • And when we have those disagreements

  • part of what's at stake in those disagreements

  • is not just who will get what,

  • not just a distributive question,

  • but also an honorific question.

  • What qualities, what excellences,

  • of persons will be honored?

  • Debates about purpose and telos

  • are often, simultaneously, debates about honor.

  • Now, let's see how that works

  • in the case of Aristotle's account of politics.

  • When we discuss distributive justice these days

  • we're mainly concerned with the distribution of income and wealth and opportunity.

  • Aristotle took distributive justice

  • to be mainly not about income and wealth

  • but about offices and honors.

  • Who should have the right to rule?

  • Who should be a citizen?

  • How should political authority be distributed?

  • Those were his questions.

  • How did he go about answering those questions?

  • Well, in line with his teleological account of justice,

  • Aristotle argues that to know how political authority should be distributed

  • we have, first, to inquire into the purpose, the point,

  • the telos, of politics.

  • So, what is politics about?

  • And, how does this help us decide who should rule?

  • Well, for Aristotle the answer to that question is,

  • politics is about

  • forming character,

  • forming good character.

  • It's about cultivating the virtue of citizens.

  • It's about the good life.

  • The end of the State, the end of the political community,

  • he tells us in Book Three of the Politics,

  • is not mere life, it's not economic exchange only,

  • it's not security only,

  • it's realizing the good life.

  • That's what politics is for according to Aristotle.

  • Now, you might worry about this.

  • You might say, "Well, maybe this shows us why those modern theorists of justice,

  • and of politics,

  • are right".

  • Because remember, for Kant and for Rawls,

  • the point of politics is not to shape the moral character of citizens.

  • It's not to make us good.

  • It's to respect our freedom to choose our goods,

  • our values, our ends,

  • consistent with a similar liberty for others.

  • Aristotle disagrees.

  • "Any polis which is truly so called,

  • and is not merely one in name,

  • must devote itself to the end of encouraging goodness.

  • Otherwise political association sinks into a mere alliance.

  • Law becomes a mere covenant,

  • a guarantor of man's rights against one another,

  • instead of being - as it should be -

  • a way of life such as will make the members of a polis good and just."

  • That's Aristotle's view.

  • "A polis is not an association for residents on a common site,

  • or for the sake of preventing mutual injustice

  • and easing exchange." Aristotle writes.

  • "The end and purpose of a polis is the good life,

  • and the institutions of social life are means to that end."

  • Now, if that's the purpose of politics, of the polis,

  • then, Aristotle says, we can derive from that

  • the principles of distributive justice;

  • the principles that tell us who should have the greatest say,

  • who should have the greatest measure of political authority.

  • And what's his answer to that question?

  • Well, those who contribute the most

  • to an association of this character,

  • namely an association that aims at the good,

  • should have a greater share in political rule and in the honors of the polis.

  • And the reasoning is,

  • they are in a position to contribute most

  • to what political community is essentially about.

  • Well, so you can see the link that he draws

  • between the principle of distribution for citizenship and political authority

  • and the purpose of politics.

  • "But why," you'll quickly ask,

  • "Why does he claim

  • that political life, participation in politics,

  • is somehow essential

  • to living a good life?"

  • "Why isn't it possible

  • for people to live perfectly good lives,

  • decent lives, moral lives,

  • without participating in politics?"

  • Well, he gives two answers to that question.

  • He gives a partial answer, a preliminary answer,

  • in Book One of the Politics

  • where he tells us that only by living in a polis,

  • and participating in politics,

  • do we fully realize our nature as human beings.

  • Human beings are, by nature,

  • meant to live in a polis.

  • Why?

  • It's only in political life that we can actually exercise

  • our distinctly human capacity for language,

  • which Aristotle understands is this capacity to deliberate about right and wrong,

  • the just and the unjust.

  • And so, Aristotle writes in Book One of the Politics,

  • that the polis, the political community,

  • exists by nature and is prior to the individual.

  • Not prior in time,

  • but prior in its purpose.

  • Human beings are not self-sufficient,

  • living by themselves,

  • outside a political community.

  • "Man who is isolated, who is unable to share in the benefits of political association,

  • or who has no need to share,

  • because he's already self-sufficient,

  • such a person must be either a beast or a god."

  • So we only fully realize our nature,

  • we only fully unfold our human capacities,

  • when we exercise our faculty of language,

  • which means when we deliberate with our fellow citizens

  • about good and evil,

  • right and wrong, just and the unjust.

  • "But why can we only exercise our capacity for language in political community?"

  • you might ask.

  • Aristotle gives a second part, a fuller part,

  • of his answer in the Nichomachean Ethics;

  • an excerpt of which we have among the readings.

  • And there he explains that political deliberation,

  • living the life of a citizen,

  • ruling and being ruled in turn, sharing in rule,

  • all of this is necessary to virtue.

  • Aristotle defines happiness

  • not as maximizing the balance of pleasure over pain

  • but as an activity, an activity of the soul

  • in accordance with virtue.

  • And he says that every student of politics must study the soul

  • because shaping the soul is one of the objects of legislation

  • in a good city.

  • But why is it necessary to live in a good city

  • in order to live a virtuous life?

  • Why can't we just learn good moral principles at home

  • or in a philosophy class or from a book,

  • live according to those principles,

  • those rules, those precepts,

  • and leave it at that?

  • Aristotle says virtue isn't acquired that way.

  • Virtue

  • is only something we can acquire by practicing,

  • by exercising the virtues.

  • It's the kind of thing we can only learn by doing.

  • It doesn't come from book learning.

  • In this respect, it's like flute playing;

  • you couldn't learn how to play a musical instrument well

  • just by reading a book about it.

  • You have to practice,

  • and you have to listen to other accomplished flute-players.

  • There are other practices and skills of this type.

  • Cooking;

  • there are cookbooks

  • but no great chef ever learns how to cook by reading a cookbook only.

  • It's the kind of thing you only learn by doing.

  • Joke-telling is probably another example of this kind.

  • No great comedian learns to be a comedian just by reading a book

  • on the principles of comedy.

  • It wouldn't work.

  • Now, why not?

  • What do joke-telling and cooking

  • and playing a musical instrument have in common

  • such that we can't learn them just by grasping a precept or a rule

  • that we might learn from a book or a lecture?

  • What they have in common is that they are all concerned with

  • getting the hang of it.

  • But also what is it we get the hang of when we learn how to cook,

  • or play a musical instrument, or tell jokes well?

  • Discerning particulars, particular features of a situation.

  • And no rule, no precept,

  • could tell the comedian or the cook or the great musician

  • how to get in the habit of, the practice of,

  • discerning the particular features of a situation.

  • Aristotle says virtue is that way too.

  • Now, how does this connect to politics?

  • The only way we can acquire the virtues that constitute the good life

  • is to exercise the virtues, to have certain habits inculcated in us,

  • and then to engage in the practice of deliberating with citizens

  • about the nature of the good.

  • That's what politics is ultimately about.

  • The acquisition of civic virtue,

  • of this capacity to deliberate among equals,

  • that's something we couldn't get living a life alone outside of politics.

  • And so, that's why, in order to realize our nature,

  • we have to engage in politics.

  • And that's why those who are greatest in civic virtue,

  • like Pericles, are the ones

  • who properly have the greatest measure of offices and honors.

  • So, the argument about the distribution of offices and honors

  • has this teleological character,

  • but also an honorific dimension.

  • Because part of the point of politics is to honor people like Pericles.

  • It isn't just that Pericles should have the dominant say

  • because he has the best judgment,

  • and that will lead to the best outcomes,

  • to the best consequences for the citizens.

  • That's true, and that's important.

  • But a further reason people like Pericles

  • should have the greatest measure

  • of offices, and honors, and political authority,

  • and sway in the polis,

  • is that part of the point of politics is to single out and honor

  • those who posses the relevant virtue,

  • in this case civic virtue, civic excellence, practical wisdom,

  • to the fullest extent.

  • That's the honorific dimension

  • bound up with Aristotle's account of politics.

  • Here's an example

  • that shows the link

  • in a contemporary controversy;

  • the link to which Aristotle draws our attention

  • between arguments about justice and rights on the one hand

  • and figuring out the telos or the purpose of a social practice on the other.

  • Not only that, the case of Casey Martin and his golf cart

  • also brings out the link between

  • debates about what the purpose

  • of a social practice or a game

  • is, on the one hand

  • and the question of what qualities should be honored on the other;

  • the link between teleology

  • and honor-based

  • principles of distributive justice.

  • Who was Casey Martin?

  • Well, Casey Martin is a very good golfer.

  • Able to compete at the highest levels of golf

  • but for one thing;

  • he has a rare

  • circulatory problem in his leg

  • that makes it very difficult for him to walk;

  • not only difficult but dangerous.

  • And so he asked the PGA,

  • which governs the pro tour in golf,

  • to be able to use a golf cart

  • when he competed in professional tournaments.

  • PGA said no,

  • and he sued under the Americans for Disabilities Act;

  • he sued in a case that went all the way to the United States Supreme Court.

  • The question the Supreme Court had to answer was,

  • does Casey Martin have a right

  • that the PGA provide him, allow him,

  • to use a golf cart on the tour,

  • or not?

  • How many here

  • think that,

  • from a moral point of view,

  • Casey Martin should

  • have a right to use a golf cart?

  • And how many think that he should not have a right to a golf cart,

  • in the tournaments?

  • So the majority are sympathetic to Casey Martin's right,

  • though a substantial minority disagree.

  • Let's first hear from those of you

  • who would rule against Casey Martin.

  • Why would you not say that the PGA must give him a golf cart?

  • Yes.

  • Since the inception of golf,

  • because it has been part of the sport

  • it is now intrinsically part of golf;

  • walking the course.

  • And thus, because it's intrinsic to golf,

  • I'd argue that not being able to walk the course

  • is just not being able to perform an aspect of the sport,

  • which is necessary to performing at a professional level.

  • Good. Stay there for a minute.

  • What's your name?

  • Tommy.

  • Are you a golfer, by the way, Tom?

  • Not so much but, yeah,

  • a little bit.

  • Are there any golfers here,

  • I mean, real golfers?

  • Thank you, professor, that was...

  • No, no.

  • I'm just taking your word for it.

  • Is there someone here on the golf team?

  • Yes?

  • Tell us your name,

  • and tell us what you think.

  • My name is Michael

  • and I usually take a cart.

  • So . . .

  • I'm probably the wrong person to ask.

  • Is that why your hand went up slowly when I asked?

  • Yes.

  • Alright, but Tom is saying,

  • Tom said a minute ago that at least at the professional level

  • walking the course is essential to the game.

  • Do you agree?

  • I would, yes.

  • You do? Then why do you take a cart?

  • And you call yourself a golfer?

  • No, no, no.

  • I'm kidding, I'm kidding.

  • What do you say to that?

  • When I have walked the course

  • it does add tremendously to the game.

  • It makes it a lot harder. It really does.

  • Yeah?

  • Alright let's hear, Michael and Tom stay there,

  • let's hear from people who

  • say that he should have a right to a golf cart.

  • Why? Who is prepared to defend that position?

  • Yes.

  • Well, I think the PGA should definitely

  • be required to give him a golf cart

  • because they argue in the decision that it's not just a matter of,

  • he's not experiencing fatigue.

  • For him he's still walking about a mile,

  • the cart can't go everywhere with him,

  • and in that mile he is still experiencing more fatigue and pain

  • than a healthy player would.

  • So, it's not as if you're removing the disadvantage.

  • What's your name?

  • Riva.

  • Riva, what do you say to Tom's point

  • that walking the course is essential to the game?

  • It would be as if

  • a disabled player could play in the NBA

  • but not have to run up and down the court.

  • Well, I think there are two responses to that.

  • First, I don't think it's essential to the game,

  • because most golfers who play, particularly recreationally,

  • play with a cart. -- Like Michael.

  • And on several of the tours

  • you can play with a cart;

  • on the Senior PGA Tour,

  • on the Nike Tour,

  • in a lot of the college events.

  • And those events are just as competitive

  • and just as high level as the PGA Tour.

  • So, really it's just a matter of selective reasoning

  • if you argue it as an important part of the sport.

  • But, even if it is he still does have to walk,

  • he still plays golf standing up,

  • it's not as if he's playing golf from a wheelchair.

  • Alright.

  • Who else?

  • Go ahead.

  • I think the whole point of a competition

  • is that it calls out the best, you know, from the second best or from the third best.

  • And when we're talking about the national level,

  • we're talking about the highest of the highest.

  • I think what they're arguing about here is the purpose of competition.

  • And I think in the sake of competition you can't change the rules.

  • So, the purpose of the competition includes walking?

  • That's an essential, you agree with Tom.

  • And what's your name?

  • David.

  • The Supreme Court ruled

  • that the PGA did have to accommodate Casey Martin

  • and they did it on grounds that Riva mentioned,

  • that walking isn't really part of, an essential part of the game.

  • They cited testimony saying that walking the court

  • consumes no more calories than you get eating a Big Mac.

  • That's what walking is in golf,

  • according to the majority.

  • Scalia was in dissent.

  • Justice Scalia agreed with David.

  • He said

  • there is no purpose,

  • and it's certainly not your course to try to figure out the essential purpose of golf.

  • Golf is like any game, it's strictly for amusement.

  • And if there's a group that wants to have one version of the game

  • they can have that version of the game.

  • And the market can decide whether people are amused

  • and like and show up for that and watch the television broadcasts.

  • Scalia's dissent was an anti-Aristotelian dissent,

  • because notice two things about the argument;

  • first we're thrust into a discussion about what the essential nature,

  • or purpose, or telos of golf really is.

  • Does it include walking?

  • And, here's something I think is rumbling beneath the surface of this debate,

  • whether walking partly determines whether golf is really an athletic competition.

  • After all, the ball sits still.

  • You have to put it in a hole.

  • Is it more like basketball, baseball, and football?

  • Golf, an athletic competition?

  • Or is it more like billiards?

  • The ball sits still there too.

  • You can be out of shape and succeed.

  • It involves skill

  • but not athletic skill.

  • Could it be that those professional golfers,

  • who excel at golf,

  • have a stake in golf being honored and recognized as an athletic event,

  • not just a game of skill like billiards?

  • And if that's what's at stake, then we have a debate about the purpose,

  • the teleological dimension,

  • and also a debate about honor.

  • What virtues,

  • really,

  • does the game of golf honor and recognize?

  • Two questions to which Aristotle directs our attention.

  • We'll continue on this case next time.

  • What's strange and seems paradoxical to me

  • about Aristotle's view point

  • is that if you walk like a pirate and you talk like a pirate

  • you shouldn't be an investment banker,

  • because that's not what you're inherently supposed to do.

  • If you have a peg leg and an eye patch

  • and a disgruntled disposition, you know,

  • you should be on a pirate ship on the high seas.

  • So he doesn't . . .

  • Some would say

  • that the distinction between the two vocations

  • is not as clear as you suggest.

  • When we ended last time we were talking about

  • whether Casey Martin has a right to ride in a golf cart

  • in the PGA Tournament.

  • And it's worth remembering how we got into this debate

  • and what's at stake for an understanding of political philosophy.

  • Remember, we were looking at Aristotle's theory of justice

  • and one way of describing his approach to justice,

  • we've called it 'teleological'.

  • Teleological, because he says to allocate rights

  • we first have to figure out the purpose, or the end,

  • of the social practice in question.

  • Another way of describing Aristotle's account of Justice

  • is that justice is, for him, a matter of fit;

  • it's a matter of fitting persons with their virtues and excellences

  • to the appropriate roles.

  • Now, I want to finish our discussion

  • about Casey Martin and his claim for a golf cart,

  • and then go back to one more consequential application in Aristotle,

  • namely, the question of slavery.

  • What do you think about Casey Martin's request?

  • Should there be an accommodation or not,

  • given the nature of the game and of the tournament

  • and its purposes?

  • "Isn't it discrimination if he's not provided the golf cart as an accommodation",

  • say some.

  • Others reply, "No, if he got a cart it would be unfair to the other golfers

  • because they exert themselves,

  • become winded, fatigued, walking the course".

  • That's where we left it.

  • What about the fairness argument?

  • OK, Jenny.

  • My question was

  • why doesn't the PGA just make the option of a cart

  • available to all golfers?

  • From our readings I learned that there are many golf tournaments,

  • other than the PGA, where using a cart is not prohibited.

  • For instance, the Seniors Tournament it's even allowed and encouraged.

  • So why doesn't the PGA just do that?

  • Let everybody use a cart?

  • Give everyone the option of using a cart

  • and let them pick.

  • So then the traditionalists can then still say,

  • "Well, I still choose to walk the course

  • but I do that knowing that I will be more tired at the end

  • than the people who took the cart."

  • Good.

  • Alright, so what about Jenny's solution?

  • For the sake of fairness,

  • don't give Casey Martin an advantage,

  • if indeed there is an advantage to riding in a cart.

  • Let everyone who wants to

  • use a cart.

  • Is everyone happy with that solution?

  • Does it put to rest this whole dilemma?

  • Who has an answer for Jenny?

  • Yes.

  • As was brought up last time,

  • if you do that you kind of ruin some of the spirit of golf

  • as a lot of people like to see it.

  • If you let everybody take a cart.

  • Even though it gives everybody the same playing field now,

  • it sort of makes golf less of an athletic game,

  • like people pointed out last class.

  • It's just like if someone decides to go into another sport

  • and they want an advantage.

  • Like, if you have swimming

  • and then you say, "OK, he wants flippers

  • so why don't we just allow everyone to have flippers when they're swimming?"

  • And what would that do to the Olympic Swimming Competition,

  • if people were free to use,

  • Jenny, we better let Jenny reply to this.

  • Da says it would sort of spoil the spirit of the athletic competition

  • as if in Olympic swimming you let anyone who wanted to

  • swim with flippers.

  • Alright, Jenny, what do you say to Da?

  • It would spoil the spirit of it.

  • You're also ruining the spirit of golf

  • by not letting people who are really passionate about the game,

  • and very good at it,

  • compete simply because of an aspect of golf which is not,

  • the main point of golf is you use the club to make strokes

  • and hit it into a hole.

  • I'm sorry, I'm not a golfer

  • but that's basically the gist of the game from what I see it.

  • And I was reading the PGA versus Casey Martin decision

  • that was one of the sentences that they said

  • is because walking the course is not an inherent part of golf,

  • only swinging the club is.

  • Good. So, Jenny replies to Da,

  • well, it isn't really essential anyhow to walk the course.

  • So, we're back to the purpose.

  • I mean, I'm sure there are, like wheelchair basketball,

  • there are certain different competitions

  • that can be made for people who may only be able to use their arms.

  • Right. Yes.

  • Michael what do you think?

  • Jenny just said that there is stuff like wheelchair basketball

  • where if you can't play basketball there is another option.

  • I think there are other options in the PGA Tour.

  • But the PGA Tour is the best, is the pinnacle,

  • and you have to have certain requirements fulfilled to perform.

  • Alright, Michael, you want to say to Casey Martin

  • there is such a thing as a Special Olympics

  • for those who are disabled.

  • Go play in the golfing version of the Special Olympics.

  • That's what you would say Michael? -- Yeah.

  • I think that walking is part of the sport of golf.

  • And Casey Martin, you know if he can't walk the course

  • then I don't think he should be able to play in the PGA.

  • Alright, well thank you very much

  • for that exchange.

  • What comes out of this exchange

  • that goes back to Aristotle's theory of justice?

  • Well, one thing is the question,

  • is walking an essential part of golf?

  • And the very fact that deciding whether there is a right

  • for Casey Martin that the PGA must respect,

  • seems to depend, as Aristotle suggests it must,

  • on debating and resolving the question,

  • is walking essential to the game of golf?

  • That's one moral of the story.

  • But there's a second moral to the story

  • from an Aristotelian point of view.

  • What's at stake here, this is the second Aristotelian

  • stake in this debate,

  • is honor.

  • Casey Martin wants the accommodation so that he can compete

  • for the honor

  • of winning the best tournaments.

  • Now, why is it

  • that the professional golfers, the great golfers,

  • testified in this case - Jack Nicklaus, Tom Kite -

  • in the readings,

  • against letting him use a cart

  • and they, I would suspect, would be equally vehement, Jenny,

  • in opposing your suggestion of letting everyone ride in a cart,

  • and this goes back, in a way, to Da's point.

  • How to put this gently?

  • Professional golfers are sensitive

  • about whether their sport is really a sport.

  • Because if everyone rode around in a cart, or could,

  • then it would become clear,

  • or clearer, depending on your point of view,

  • that golf is not really an athletic competition

  • but rather a game;

  • a game of skill but not a sport.

  • And so not only the question of debating the purpose,

  • the teleological feature,

  • but also from the standpoint of viewing debates about the purpose of golf.

  • What's essential to golf?

  • Those debates, Aristotle suggests,

  • inevitably are also debates about the allocation of honor.

  • Because part of the purpose of golf

  • is not just to amuse spectators;

  • Scalia's wrong about that,

  • from Aristotle's point of view.

  • It's not just to provide entertainment,

  • it's not just to make people happy.

  • It's not a mere amusement.

  • It's honoring, it's rewarding,

  • it's recognizing a certain kind of athletic excellence,

  • at least those who have achieved the highest honors

  • have a powerful stake in maintaining that view.

  • Now, some of you took the position the Scalia position.

  • "This is an incredibly difficult and silly question", Scalia said.

  • "What is the essential nature of golf?"

  • It's not the kind of thing that the United States Supreme Court

  • is equipped to decide, or should decide.

  • That's Scalia.

  • But he only he says that

  • because he takes a very strong, and as it happens,

  • anti-Aristotelian position

  • on what a game is.

  • "It is the very nature of a game

  • to have no object," no point,

  • "except amusement" says Scalia,

  • "That is what distinguishes games" he says, "From productive activity."

  • You can just imagine what kind of sports fan Scalia must be.

  • "And so", he says, "It's impossible to say that any of the game's arbitrary rules

  • is essential."

  • And then he quotes Mark Twain's disparaging remark

  • about golf.

  • He says, "Many consider walking to be the central feature of golf.

  • Hence, Mark Twain's classic criticism of the sport

  • 'a good walk spoiled'."

  • But Scalia misses

  • an important feature of games

  • and the arguments about rights and fairness

  • that arise from games,

  • when he casts games, sports, athletic competitions,

  • as solely for the sake of amusement;

  • as solely an utilitarian activity.

  • But an Aristotelian view of sports says,

  • no it's not just about amusement,

  • real sports, real athletic events,

  • are also about appreciation, not just amusement.

  • And people who follow sports and care about sports

  • and play sports know this.

  • Which is another way of saying,

  • there's a difference between a sport and a mere spectacle.

  • And the difference is that a sport is a practice

  • that calls forth and honors and prizes

  • certain excellences, certain virtues.

  • And the people who appreciate those virtues

  • are the true fans, the informed fans,

  • and for them watching the sport is not mere amusement.

  • But that means that it's always possible to make sense

  • of the debate about

  • what feature of a sport is essential to it.

  • We can make sense of these arguments.

  • Never mind the question whether the court should decide.

  • The PGA in its own internal deliberations

  • can make sense of that debate,

  • which is why they cared very much

  • about their view, insisting on their view,

  • that walking, an exertion, and fatigue

  • are essential, not peripheral, parts of sport.

  • Well, this is all to illustrate

  • the teleological and the honorific feature

  • of debates about rights,

  • which Aristotle says we need to take account of

  • in thinking about justice.

  • Now, I want to begin for us to consider

  • whether Aristotle's theory of justice

  • is right or wrong;

  • whether it's persuasive or unpersuasive.

  • I want to get your thoughts about that.

  • But I want to anticipate one obvious and important objection.

  • If justice is about fit, fitting persons to roles,

  • matching virtues

  • to the appropriate honors and recognition.

  • If that's what justice is,

  • does it leave room for freedom?

  • And this is one of the main objections

  • to Aristotle's teleological account of justice.

  • If certain roles, social roles,

  • are fitting, or appropriate, to me

  • where does that leave my right

  • to choose my social roles,

  • my life purposes, for myself?

  • What room does teleology leave for freedom?

  • And in fact, you may remember,

  • Rawls rejects teleological accounts of justice

  • because he says that

  • teleological theories of justice

  • threaten

  • the equal basic rights of citizens.

  • So, let's begin to examine

  • whether Aristotle is right, and in particular,

  • whether his teleological way of thinking about justice

  • is at odds with freedom.

  • Now, one obvious reason to worry

  • is Aristotle's defense of slavery.

  • He defends slavery,

  • which existed as an institution in the Athens of his day.

  • Well, what is his defense of slavery?

  • Two things, two conditions, have to be met

  • for slavery to be just.

  • First, it has to be necessary.

  • and Aristotle says, at least in our society,

  • slavery is necessary.

  • Why is it necessary?

  • If there are to be citizens

  • who are freed from manual and menial and household chores

  • to go to the assembly, to deliberate about politics,

  • there have to be some who look after those menial tasks;

  • the mere necessities of life.

  • He says, unless you could invent in some science-fiction

  • a technological fix

  • then there are going to be those who have to do

  • the hard and difficult and menial labor

  • if there are going to be citizens deliberating about the good

  • and realizing their nature.

  • So slavery is necessary

  • for the life of the polis

  • for there to be open to citizens.

  • The life of deliberation, of argument,

  • of practical wisdom.

  • But there's a further condition that has to be met.

  • Slavery has not only to be necessary for the community as a whole to function,

  • but it also has to be the case, remember the criterion of fit?

  • It also has to be the case that there are some people

  • for whom being a slave is the just, or the fitting,

  • or the appropriate condition.

  • Now, Aristotle agrees that by his own standards,

  • both of those conditions must be met, must be true,

  • if slavery is to be just.

  • And then, in a deplorable passage,

  • he says, well, it is true

  • that there are some people who are fit by nature

  • who are cut out to be slaves.

  • These are people who differ from ordinary people

  • in the same way that the body differs from the soul.

  • These are people who are meant to be ruled,

  • and for them

  • their nature is best realized if they're slaves.

  • They can recognize reason in others

  • but they can't partake of it, they can't exercise it.

  • And somehow we can know this.

  • Now, Aristotle must have known that there was something dodgy,

  • something strained about this claim ,

  • because he quickly acknowledges that those who disagree may have a point.

  • And what those who disagree point out is

  • that there are a lot of people in Athens

  • who are slaves

  • not because they were born to be slaves,

  • or fit to be slaves,

  • but because they were captured, they were losers in a war.

  • And so, Aristotle admits that as practiced in ancient Athens,

  • slavery didn't necessarily line up with who actually is fit

  • or born to be a slave,

  • because some actual slaves just were slaves by bad luck,

  • by being captured in a war.

  • And on Aristotle's own account

  • even if it's necessary to have slavery for the sake of citizenship

  • it's unjust if people who aren't properly slaves

  • are cast in that role.

  • There is a misfit.

  • Aristotle recognizes that slavery for those who aren't fit for the task

  • is a kind of coercion.

  • The reason slavery is wrong is not because it's coerced.

  • Coercion is an indicator that it's wrong,

  • because it's not natural.

  • If you have to coerce someone into a role

  • that's a pretty good indication that they don't belong there,

  • that that role isn't fitting for them.

  • And Aristotle recognized this.

  • So, all of this is to say the example of slavery,

  • Aristotle's defense of it,

  • doesn't show that there isn't anything wrong in principle

  • with teleological argument, with the idea of justice as fit

  • between persons and roles,

  • because it's perfectly possible within Aristotle's own terms,

  • to explain what's wrong with this application,

  • this practical application

  • that he made of his theory.

  • I want to turn to the larger challenge to Aristotle in the name of freedom.

  • But before I do that

  • I want to see what people think

  • of Aristotle's account of justice as fit,

  • his teleological way of reasoning about justice

  • and the honorific dimension of rights

  • and of distributive justice

  • that immerged in our discussion of flutes and politics and golf.

  • Questions of clarification about Aristotle

  • or objections to his overall account.

  • Yes.

  • My objection to Aristotle

  • is that he wants to match a person to a role.

  • And, you know, if you walk like a pirate and you talk like a pirate,

  • you know, you should be a pirate. And that is what is right.

  • And so what's strange and seems paradoxical to me

  • about Aristotle's view point

  • is that if you walk like a pirate and you talk like a pirate

  • you shouldn't be an investment banker,

  • because that's not what you're inherently supposed to do.

  • If you have a peg leg and an eye patch

  • and a disgruntled disposition, you know,

  • you should be on a pirate ship on the high seas.

  • So he doesn't...

  • Some would say

  • that the distinction between the two vocations

  • is not as clear as you suggest.

  • Alright, but that's good.

  • I take your point.

  • Yes, go ahead.

  • It just seems to ignore individual rights.

  • So, I might be the perfect janitor in the whole world

  • and I can do that job the most efficiently

  • out of anybody that exists right now,

  • but I might not want to do that.

  • I might want to do any other number of pursuits

  • and it seems to say that that isn't really a good option for me.

  • Alright, and what's your name?

  • -- Mary-Kate. -- Good.

  • Alright, let's take a couple more.

  • Yes.

  • I think that the golf cart exchange

  • sort of brought up what I see as my main objection

  • to this teleological mode of reasoning.

  • I mean, Michael, I think that's your name, right?

  • Believes that walking is an inherent part of golf.

  • Myself, I believe that walking is not an inherent part of golf.

  • And I feel that no matter how long

  • we debate this particular point of contention

  • we're never going to reach an accord.

  • The teleological framework of reasoning, I believe,

  • doesn't really allow us to come to any sort of agreement.

  • Alright, and what's your name?

  • -- Patrick. -- Patrick.

  • Alright, let me try to address this set of objections to Aristotle.

  • Let me start with Patrick's;

  • it's an important objection.

  • We had a debate about whether walking is essential to golf,

  • and even in so seemingly trivial, or at least contained, a case as that,

  • we couldn't agree.

  • How can we possibly hope to agree?

  • When the stakes are higher

  • and when we're debating the fundamental purposes, or ends,

  • of political community.

  • And so, if we can't agree

  • in what the ends or the goods

  • of our shared public life consist in,

  • how can we base justice and rights

  • on some notion of what the end,

  • or the purpose, or the good consists in?

  • That's an important objection.

  • So much so that much modern political theory takes that worry

  • about disagreement over the good as its starting point,

  • and concludes that justice and rights and constitutions

  • should not be based on any particular conception of the good

  • or the purposes of political life,

  • but should, instead, provide a framework of rights

  • that leaves people free to choose their conceptions of the good,

  • their own conceptions of the purposes of life.

  • Now, Mary-Kate said, "What if a person is very well suited to having a certain role,

  • like the role of being a janitor,

  • but wants something else, wants to reach higher,

  • wants to choose another way of life?"

  • So, that goes back to this question about freedom.

  • If we take our bearing as persons

  • from roles that are said to fit our nature,

  • shouldn't it at least be up to us to decide what those roles are?

  • In fact, shouldn't it be up to us to define what roles are suitable to us?

  • And that's going to take us back

  • to the confrontation between Aristotle on the one hand

  • and Kant and Rawls on the other.

  • Kant and Rawls think Patrick has a point.

  • They say precisely because people disagree

  • in pluralist societies

  • about the nature of the good life,

  • we shouldn't try to base justice on any particular answer to that question.

  • So they reject teleology,

  • they reject the idea of tying justice to some conception of the good.

  • What's at stake in the debate about teleology,

  • say Rawlsian and Kantian liberals,

  • is this;

  • if you tie justice to a particular conception of the good,

  • if you see justice as a matter of fit between a person and his or her roles,

  • you don't leave room for freedom,

  • and to be free is to be independent of

  • any particular roles, or traditions,

  • or conventions that may be handed down by my parents

  • or my society.

  • So, in order to decide as between these two broad traditions,

  • whether Aristotle is right , or whether Kant and Rawls are right,

  • we need to investigate whether the right is prior to the good,

  • question one,

  • and we need to investigate what it means to be a free person,

  • a free moral agent.

  • Does freedom require that I stand for toward my roles,

  • my ends, and my purposes as an agent of choice?

  • Or as someone trying to discover what my nature really is?

  • Two big questions and we'll take them up next time.

THE GOOD CITIZEN

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邁克爾-桑德爾:正義什麼是正確的事第10集《好公民》。 (Michael Sandel:Justice What's The Right Thing To Do Episode 10 THE GOOD CITIZEN)

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