Combining Texts

Ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'Mathematics and Indispensibility' and 'Spheres of Justice'

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2 ideas

24. Political Theory / A. Basis of a State / 1. A People / b. The natural life
Rational animals begin uncorrupted, but externals and companions are bad influences [Chrysippus, by Diog. Laertius]
     Full Idea: The rational animal is corrupted, sometimes because of the persuasiveness of external activities and sometimes because of the influence of companions. For the starting points provided by nature are uncorrupted.
     From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.89
     A reaction: If companions corrupt us, what corrupted the companions? Aren't we all in this together? And where do the 'external activities' originate?
24. Political Theory / A. Basis of a State / 4. Original Position / b. Veil of ignorance
You can't distribute goods from behind a veil, because their social meaning is unclear [Walzer, by Tuckness/Wolf]
     Full Idea: Walzer says behind the veil of ignorance there would be no way to know how a particular good should be distributed, because we would not know the social meaning of the good in question.
     From: report of Michael Walzer (Spheres of Justice [1983]) by Tuckness,A/Wolf,C - This is Political Philosophy 4 'Communitarian'
     A reaction: Is Rawls actually proposing to decide details of distribution from behind the veil? There is just the maximin principle. What that means in practice would surely come once the society was under way.