The main problem with the veil of ignorance, or at least with discourse surrounding it, is that people can't agree on what exactly it means.
For example, is inequality resulting from returns to cognitive ability problematic? What about returns to conscientiousness? Some people seem to be endowed with much greater conscientiousness than others, and in a sense this is problematic, but the returns to conscientiousness are mediated through hard work, which it does not seem problematic to reward.
As a result, two people imagining themselves to be behind a veil of ignorance may be imagining two radically different probability distributions. One person may decide that the veil of ignorance means that he's going to be the same sort of person he is in reality, but with a different body and different parents. This person is sure that he's not going to be a good-for-nothing layabout, and thus proposes a society in which the returns to being a good-for-nothing layabouts are very low.
A second person decides that the veil of ignorance means that he might in fact turn out to be the kind of person who becomes a good-for-nothing layabout and thus proposes a society in which the returns to being a good-for-nothing layabout are somewhat higher.
Whether video games are constitutionally protected speech and whether restrictions on sales to minors are unconstitutional are two independent questions, as can be seen with pornography (constitutionally protected, but restrictions on sales to minors are not unconstitutional).
Did this case address both questions, or was it already established that video games qualify for first amendment protection?
"Nozick can only assign liberty the overriding value he does, argues Metcalf, by assuming that absent government interference, recompense naturally lines up with talent and hard work, and so to interfere would always be unjust."
No, not really. Primacy of liberty is a good heuristic because government failures tend to be more severe than market failures. I freely concede that a omnibenevolent, omniscient, omnipotent dictator could design a system of interventions that would improve on a minimalist libertarian state. The government we actually get is none of these things.
Interventionists see the motes in libertarians' eyes and call for more government, ignoring the beams in their own eyes.
I suspect that there was a minor golden age of reporting due to the establishment of a broadcast oligarchy in the 20th century. An oligarchy can afford to uphold standards, but once you introduce competition, you have to give the people what they want in order to maintain mass-market appeal, and this is not compatible with standards, at least not very high standards.
Prior to the broadcast oligarchy, local newspapers competed with each other, and you had yellow journalism. Then the broadcast media grabbed everyone's attention, and they could maintain standards because there were only a few options. This doesn't mean that their reporting was any good, necessarily, but there was no one to challenge them, so they at least lied politely. Then cable news, talk radio, and the Internet broke the power of the broadcast oligarchy, and we're back to yellow journalism.
I'm not entirely convinced that this is correct (why didn't the broadcast networks compete more vigorously?), but I think there might be something to it.
*Comment archive for non-registered commenters assembled by email address as provided.
On “Rawlsekianism Reloaded: Normative justification”
The main problem with the veil of ignorance, or at least with discourse surrounding it, is that people can't agree on what exactly it means.
For example, is inequality resulting from returns to cognitive ability problematic? What about returns to conscientiousness? Some people seem to be endowed with much greater conscientiousness than others, and in a sense this is problematic, but the returns to conscientiousness are mediated through hard work, which it does not seem problematic to reward.
As a result, two people imagining themselves to be behind a veil of ignorance may be imagining two radically different probability distributions. One person may decide that the veil of ignorance means that he's going to be the same sort of person he is in reality, but with a different body and different parents. This person is sure that he's not going to be a good-for-nothing layabout, and thus proposes a society in which the returns to being a good-for-nothing layabouts are very low.
A second person decides that the veil of ignorance means that he might in fact turn out to be the kind of person who becomes a good-for-nothing layabout and thus proposes a society in which the returns to being a good-for-nothing layabout are somewhat higher.
On “Video Games are Protected Speech”
Whether video games are constitutionally protected speech and whether restrictions on sales to minors are unconstitutional are two independent questions, as can be seen with pornography (constitutionally protected, but restrictions on sales to minors are not unconstitutional).
Did this case address both questions, or was it already established that video games qualify for first amendment protection?
On “Ignoring the Thrust”
"Nozick can only assign liberty the overriding value he does, argues Metcalf, by assuming that absent government interference, recompense naturally lines up with talent and hard work, and so to interfere would always be unjust."
No, not really. Primacy of liberty is a good heuristic because government failures tend to be more severe than market failures. I freely concede that a omnibenevolent, omniscient, omnipotent dictator could design a system of interventions that would improve on a minimalist libertarian state. The government we actually get is none of these things.
Interventionists see the motes in libertarians' eyes and call for more government, ignoring the beams in their own eyes.
On “When did the American political system jump the shark?”
I suspect that there was a minor golden age of reporting due to the establishment of a broadcast oligarchy in the 20th century. An oligarchy can afford to uphold standards, but once you introduce competition, you have to give the people what they want in order to maintain mass-market appeal, and this is not compatible with standards, at least not very high standards.
Prior to the broadcast oligarchy, local newspapers competed with each other, and you had yellow journalism. Then the broadcast media grabbed everyone's attention, and they could maintain standards because there were only a few options. This doesn't mean that their reporting was any good, necessarily, but there was no one to challenge them, so they at least lied politely. Then cable news, talk radio, and the Internet broke the power of the broadcast oligarchy, and we're back to yellow journalism.
I'm not entirely convinced that this is correct (why didn't the broadcast networks compete more vigorously?), but I think there might be something to it.
*Comment archive for non-registered commenters assembled by email address as provided.