Tutorial # 7. Social Contract Theory. Discussion Questions

In light of the Introduction to Part X Contractarianism in Shafer-Landau R. ed., 2007 Ethical Theory: an anthology, and after having read "The Stag Hunt" by Brian Skyrms, think about the following questions.

• Where do norms come from?
• How should we study the origin and justification of citizens' duty to obey the law? Should we look at anthropology, history, sociology, etc?
  
• What does generate a duty to obey the law?
• What's the nature of the agreement envisaged by contractarianists? Does it need to be real, explicit and formalised? Consider Hobbes's state of nature and Rawls's original position.
• How should we characterize the contracting parties (ie the people who are about to agree on a "social contract")? Should they be smart? omniscient? emotional?
  
• How should we conceive of their conditions of choice? Are deliberations sensitive to time? Is there any external pressure? Should debate be allowed? Are all parties in the same position?
  
• What should the subject matter of the negotiations be? Should all aspects of social interaction be discussed? What kind of rules (particular or very abstract) should be fixed?
  
• Do you find it reasonable that you renounce in part to your liberty to be protected from murder, stealing and cheating?
• Why don't people generally free-ride (ie break some rule to reap a windfall) in our society?
• Do we have good reason to do something only if doing it will serve our self-interest?
• In which sense the Stag Hunt is the 'prototype of the social contract'?
• What are the differences\similarities between the prisoners' dilemma and the stag hunt?
  
• What is an "equilibrium"? Take a look at the game theoretic definition of the stag hunt.
  
• Are evolutionary game theoretic explanations of social phenomena irrelevant to understand the nature and dynamics of morality? Think about the kind of explanation of the social contract given by Skyrms.

Tutorial # 7. Social Contract Theory. The Stag Hunt

Many authors focus on the prisoner's dilemma as the game that best represents the problem of social cooperation.
Some authors believe that the the prison's dilemma is the wrong game to understand social cooperation.

The prototype of the social contract is instead the stag hunt.

The Stag Hunt
Rousseau, in A Discourse on Inequality:

"If it was a matter of hunting a deer, everyone well realized that he must remain faithful to his post; but if a hare happened to pass within reach of one of them, we cannot doubt that he would have gone off in pursuit of it without scruple..."


For a formalization in game theory of the stag hunt check HERE

Tutorial # 7. Social Contract Theory. Few Definitions

Fig. from Principiacomica

See also Contractarianism by Ann Cudd (SEP)

Contract theory places the foundation of morality in an agreement struck and kept by all moral agents. As with consequentialist and deontological theories, there are many variants of the theory.

Contract Theory –
The family of moral and political theories concerned with contract or agreement.

Contractarianism - (Hobbes, Gauthier).
Morality concerned with constraints in the face of rational pursuit of self-interest.

Contractualism – (Rawls, Scanlon).
Morality concerned with understanding and respecting others as rational beings who can justify their actions

Tutorial # 6. Deontologism at Work. Kant on Animals. Discussion Questions

After having read "Fellow Creatures: Kantian Ethics and Our Duties to Animals" by Christine M. Korsgaard, think about the following questions.

• What are the criteria for moral standing according to Kant?
• Do non-human animals have moral standing (moral importance)?
• If animals are not rational nor autonomous, is it okay to treat them in any way we like?
• We kill, eat, hunt, experiment on, "enslave" a wide range of animals. Humans have destroyed large parts of the natural environment depriving animals of a place in which to live. Does any of this matter morally? Why?
  
• Does Kant think that non-human animals have rights? Does he think that we have duties to them?
• Does deontologism really implicate that animals have only instrumental value? Do you agree with Korsgaard's "reading" of deontology?
• Are animals means to men’s ends?
• Is there anything intrinsically wrong in torturing animals?
• Is it a moral duty to be vegetarians?
• Is it immoral to use animals for scientific experiments?
• Do non-human animals have desires and beliefs that can be satisfied/frustrated and true/false? Why is it morally important to answer that question?

Tutorial # 6. Deontologism at Work. Kant on Animals

Second Formulation of the Categorical Imperative:
Humanity as an End in Itself
(see Shafer-Landau, Ethical Theory. Introduction to part IX)

- Good Will: Motivation to do one's duty for its own sake.
- Only rational and autonomous beings have a will.
- Autonomy: The capacity to form goals free of external constraints/influence.
- Rationality: The faculty to reason appropriately about the implications of one's goals.
- Autonomy and Rationality generate the moral demand to treat others with respect.

Principle of Humanity:
"Act as to treat humanity, whether in thine own person or in that of any other, in every case as an end withal, never as a means only"

+ Immanuel Kant "We Have No Duties to Animals"
(from Lectures on Ethics - in Ethical Theory. An Anthology, pp. 395 - 396)

"If a man shoots his dog because the animal is no longer capable of service, he does not fail in his duty to the dog... but his act is inhuman and damages in himself that humanity which it is his duty to show towards mankind. If he is not to stifle his human feelings, he must practice kindness towards animals, for he who is cruel to animals becomes hard also in his dealing with men. We can judge the heart of a man by his treatment of animals."

"... so far as animals are concerned, we have no direct duties. ... Our duties towards animals are merely indirect duties towards humanity."

"Vivisectionists. who use living animals for their experiments, certainly act cruelly, although their aim is praiseworthy, and they can justify their cruelty, since animals must be regarded as man's instruments."

Tutorial #5. Deontologism. Discussion Questions

Try to think about these questions in light of "The Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals" by Immanuel Kant (pp. 525 - 536 On our "Ethical Theory" textbook) .

Another very good reference is the "Deontological Ethics" entry by Larry Alexander & Michael Moore in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy:
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ethics-deontological/

• What should motivate moral action, according to Kant?
• What is the ‘good will’ and how does Kant argue that it alone is good without qualification?
• What is a categorical imperative and is Kant right about the validity and content of the categorical imperative?
• Do you think the good will is something subjective? In what sense?
• Kant writes (Groundwork, in Feinberg&Landau p. 626): “… in a being that has reason and a will, if the proper end of nature were its preservation, its welfare, in a word its happiness then nature would have hit upon a very bad arrangement in selecting the reason of the creature to carry out its purpose. For all the actions that the creature has to perform for this purpose … would be marked out for it far more accurately by instinct”. Do you agree? Does instinct serves happiness better than reason?
• Kant (Groundwork, in Feinberg&Landau p. 627) argues that “the true vocation of reason must be to produce a will that is good in itself”. The premises of the argument are three: (I) “Reason is not sufficiently competent to guide the will with regards to its objects and the satisfaction of all our needs” (II) “Reason is nevertheless given to us as practical faculty, that is, as one that is to influence the will” (III) “Nature has everywhere else gone to work purposively in distributing its capacities”. Assess this argument.
• How do we know that an action is made not only in conformity with duty but also from duty?
• Can love be commanded?
• How does the representation of the law determine the will? Is respect for the law a causal relation?
• “You shall not murder”, or “You shall not lie” are examples of categorical imperatives: That is, they are duties that all rational beings ought to respect (recall Kant’s “I ought never to act except in such a way that I could also will that my maxim should become a universal law”). Now, do you think we ought to respect a categorical imperative - no matter what?
• Consider this maxim: “Steal when you are too poor to feed yourself”. Would it pass the universalizability test? Would it be a moral law?
• Does Kant give us a moral theory that we can follow?
• Would the universalizability test solve moral dilemmas? E.g. consider the following. A mental with a gun in her hand ask you where your best friend is because she wants to kill your friend. Should you tell the truth to the mental? Or should you lie in order to protect your friend?
• For Kant the consequences of an action don’t bear on the moral status of the action. Do you agree? Imagine, e.g., a baby-sitter who by acting from duty keeps a baby warm by putting it in the microwave. Do you think that an unintentional bad consequence of an action made from duty don’t bear on the moral status of that action?

Tutorial # 5. Deontologism. Kant's Fun

Some funny stuff about Kant...

A Rant about Kant by Neven Sesardic

Kant Attack Ad