> The way to do that is simple: we should consider whether we would be content to live the lives that the least fortunate in our society actually live.
I like this framing a lot. It's sort of the aggregate societal-level Golden Rule. Would you be willing to play "Real-Life the MMO" if you didn't know which character you'd be dropped into?
However, there is an interesting wrinkle you can apply to it that I think explains many of the moral differences along the progressive-conservative spectrum that I see in the US today. Consider:
* Would you be content to live the life that the least fortunate in our society lives?
* Would you be content to live the life that the least fortunate in our society lives including the personal choices they have made?
In other words, how much are you willing to chalk up misfortune to personal responsibility versus random unfair vagaries of life? Would you still be willing to play "Real-Life the MMO" if you might be dropped into a level 20 character with an already established history and had to take their life from there?
The conservative American perspective stated hyperbolically is that all bad outcomes are a result of poor choices. Many even seem to imply a just-world hypothesis that random events like disease are the universe magically punishing people for moral failings. The equivalent hyperbolic progressive view is that no one ever deserves any bad outcome and that misery is always a result of systemic factors outside of the individual's control.
Somewhere in the middle is probably closer to the truth.
I like this framing a lot. It's sort of the aggregate societal-level Golden Rule. Would you be willing to play "Real-Life the MMO" if you didn't know which character you'd be dropped into?
However, there is an interesting wrinkle you can apply to it that I think explains many of the moral differences along the progressive-conservative spectrum that I see in the US today. Consider:
* Would you be content to live the life that the least fortunate in our society lives?
* Would you be content to live the life that the least fortunate in our society lives including the personal choices they have made?
In other words, how much are you willing to chalk up misfortune to personal responsibility versus random unfair vagaries of life? Would you still be willing to play "Real-Life the MMO" if you might be dropped into a level 20 character with an already established history and had to take their life from there?
The conservative American perspective stated hyperbolically is that all bad outcomes are a result of poor choices. Many even seem to imply a just-world hypothesis that random events like disease are the universe magically punishing people for moral failings. The equivalent hyperbolic progressive view is that no one ever deserves any bad outcome and that misery is always a result of systemic factors outside of the individual's control.
Somewhere in the middle is probably closer to the truth.