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.(13) differs from (12) by including a veil of ignorance.On the bestknown version of (13), orRawls s Formula: We ought to act on the principles that it would berational for everyone to choose, as the principles that we would allaccept, if no one knew anything about themselves or their circum-stances.In tomorrow s lecture, my main subject will be Kant s Contractual-ist Formula.If we combine this formula with the right view about rea-sons, we shall reach what may be the best version of contractualism.Weshall also be led to some surprising conclusions.III.CONTRACTUALISM10Most contractualists ask us to imagine that we are all trying to reachagreement on which moral principles we shall all accept.According towhat we can callthe Rational Agreement Formula: We ought to act on the principles towhose acceptance it would be rational for everyone to agree.I shall say that people choose the principles to whose acceptance theyagree.People choose rationally, most contractualists assume, if theirchoices would be likely to be best for themselves.We can start by mak-ing this assumption.Though there are some principles whose acceptance would be likelyto be best for everyone, there are others whose acceptance would be bestonly for certain people.What would be best for the rich, for example,would not be best for the poor.It may seem that, in such cases, therewould be no principle whose choice would be rational for everyone inself-interested terms.But everyone would know that everyone wouldaccept only the principles that everyone chose.So what each person636-p.qxd 4/19/2004 2:00 PM Page 340340 The Tanner Lectures on Human Valuesought rationally to choose would depend on what others were likely tochoose.There would be no point in our choosing the principles whoseacceptance would be best for ourselves, if these principles would not bechosen by everyone else.What we ought rationally to choose would also depend on the effectsof our failing to reach agreement.Most contractualists tell us to supposethat, if we failed to agree, no one would accept any moral principles, sono one would believe that any acts were wrong.This no-agreement worldwould be likely to be bad for everyone.That would give everyone strongreasons to try to reach agreement.And it might be rational for everyoneto choose, not the principles whose acceptance would be best for them-selves, but the principles that other people would be most likely tochoose.This might be everyone s best hope of avoiding the horrors ofthe no-agreement world.Such reasoning is, for some writers, the essence of contractualism.On this view, we should regard morality as if it were a mutually advan-tageous bargain.When people s interests cona
ict, it would be rationalfor everyone to agree on certain principles to resolve these cona
icts.Andby appealing to this fact, these writers claim, we can justify these prin-ciples in the actual world, in which there has been no such agreement.To make this imagined agreement easier to achieve, we can supposethat there would be discussions, and a series of votes.But there wouldhave to be some `
nal vote.It must be true that, if we failed to reachagreement in this last round, we would have lost our chance, and couldnot try again.In earlier rounds, it would be rational for us to try to reachagreement on terms that favoured ourselves.Only in the decisive `
nalvote would it be rational for us to make our full concessions to others.There is now a complication.The no-agreement world would be lessbad for certain people, such as those who control more resources, or havegreater abilities.In a world without morality, such people would be bet-ter able to fend for themselves.These people would have less need toreach agreement, and that would give them greater bargaining power.These people could declare that they would accept only principles thatgave special advantages to them.Such warnings or threats might becredible, since these people would be more prepared to run the risk of noagreement.In some cases, moreover, it would be better for some people if therewas no agreement.One example is the question of how much of their re-sources the rich ought to transfer to the poor.If there was no agreement636-p.qxd 4/19/2004 2:00 PM Page 341[Parfit] What We Could Rationally Will 341on this question, so that no one accepted any principle about what therich ought to give, that would be much the same as everyone s believingthat the rich were permitted to give nothing.That would be `
ne withthe rich.For these and similar reasons, those who had greater bargainingpower could win agreement on principles that gave special advantagesto them, since it would be rational for others to give in to their threats.Some writers accept these implications of the Rational AgreementFormula.These Hobbesian contractualists defend a minimal version ofmorality.On David Gauthier s view, for example, since morality pre-supposes mutual bene`
t, it would not be wrong for us to act in waysthat injure or kill other people, if it would have been no worse for us ifthese people had never existed.Kantian contractualists, like Rawls, reject these implications.AsRawls writes,  to each according to his threat advantage is not a concep-tion of justice. 64 But Rawls s version of contractualism is not, I believe,Kantian enough.11In considering Rawls s view, we can start with his assumptions about ra-tionality.Rawls accepts the Deliberative Theory, according to which weought rationally to do whatever would best achieve what we most wantafter informed deliberation.Of those who accept this theory, many be-lieve that it coincides with the Self-interest Theory, according to whichwe ought rationally to do whatever would be best for ourselves.Thesepeople mistakenly assume that, after informed deliberation, each of uswould always care most about our own well-being.Rawls does not make that assumption.He considers cases in whichjustice requires us to act in ways that would be very bad for ourselves.Even in such cases, Rawls claims, it might be rational for us to do whatjustice requires.We would be acting rationally if we would be doingwhat, all things considered, we most wanted to do.In his words,If a person wants with deliberative rationality to act from the stand-point of justice above all else, it is rational for him so to act.6564TJ, p.134, revised edition (henceforth RE), p.116.65TJ, p.569, RE, p.498.636-p.qxd 4/19/2004 2:00 PM Page 342342 The Tanner Lectures on Human ValuesSince the Deliberative Theory is desire-based, however, Rawls cannotclaim that it would be rational for everyone to act justly.When he dis-cusses people who would bene`
t from injustice, Rawls claims that, ifthese people don t care about morality, we could not honestly recom-mend justice as a virtue to them, since they would not have suf`
cientreasons to do what justice requires.66On desire-based theories, we cannot have reasons to want anythingfor its own sake.If people don t care about something, and would notcare even after informed deliberation, we cannot claim that they havereasons to care.As Rawls writes,knowing that people are rational, we do not know the ends they willpursue, only that they will pursue them intelligently [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]