Contracts are about Law and Economics. Immoral people make and abide by contracts. Satan himself is depicted as offering contracts which even a learned mdn like Dr. Faustus find tempting. Highly moral people may breach contracts or not be in a position to make them in the first place.
What happens if you pretend that contracts are about moral philosophy? You get nonsense. The Stanford Encyclopaedia says-
Scanlon introduces contractualism as a distinctive account of moral reasoning. He summarises his account thus:
'An act is wrong if its performance under the circumstances would be disallowed by any set of principles for the general regulation of behaviour that no one could reasonably reject as a basis for informed, unforced, general agreement. (Scanlon 1998, p. 153).'
It is reasonable for anybody with a good knowledge of 'Law & Econ' to reject any set of principles for the general regulation of behaviour. It is a different matter that there may be particular protocols which it is prudent to observe when engaged in certain sorts of transactions in certain jurisdictions. But it is folly to subscribe to general principles save by way of 'cheap talk'. This is because there are no nomothetic Economic or Legal Principles-though maxims of various types may be quoted from time to time.
But Scanlon’s version of contractualism is not just concerned with determining which acts are right and wrong.
Contracts are not concerned with right or wrong. They are concerned with the passing of consideration and due diligence and specific performance and third party effects. Many contract are incomplete. It makes sense to renegotiate them as unanticipated contingencies arise. Contracts aren't ends in themselves. They are business arrangements.
It is also concerned with what reasons and forms of reasoning are justifiable. Whether or not a principle is one that cannot be reasonably rejected is to be assessed by appeal to the implications of individuals or agents being either licensed or directed to reason in the way required by the principle.
This is foolish. Contracts are about Law & Econ. They exist so as to facilitate business transactions and relationships. One may as well say that Plumbing is about general principles regarding hygiene and the philosophical motivations plumbers need to have so as to do the job they are paid to do.
Scanlon’s version offers an account both of (1) the authority of moral standards
economic motivations suffice for contracts to be effective even absent an enforcement mechanism. A person who is too lazy or impulsive or incompetent to fulfil contracts will soon find himself shunned or else there is a wider market failure.
It is not the case that you need a priest or a philosopher standing over the parties to a contract reminding them not to stab each other or masturbate incessantly instead of carrying through the terms of that agreement. Grown ups don't need to be terrified with stories of Hell fire or to be provoked to mirth by the moronic musings of philosophers so as to do sensible things.
and of (2) what constitutes rightness and wrongness.
Which shitheads- e.g. philosophers- don't know fuck about.
As to the first, the substantive value that is realised by moral behaviour consists in a relation of “mutual recognition”.
This is true of any sort of social behaviour. No doubt, these nutters think there is a 'moral recognition' undergirding every tennis ball struck by a racquet in a game of mixed doubles.
As to the second, wrongness consists in unjustifiability: wrongness is the property of being unjustifiable.
No it isn't. Moral rightness may be unjustifiable from the legal or economic point of view. However, good people may agree that some acts are repugnant even if they are required as part of a contract or righteous even if contrary to custom.
The wrongness of an action is not to be equated with the properties that make it unjustifiable. Rather, it is to be equated with its being unjustifiable;
by whom? How do we know a clever person- not a shithead who teaches worthless shite- can't justify it? However, that justification will be based on some supposed property of the action in question.
the character of wrongness is captured by the higher order fact that wrong acts are unjustifiable.
These shitheads can't justify shit. But smart peeps can justify anything.
What wrong acts have in common is that they cannot be justified to others.
Fuck off! Wrong acts, if remunerative, have splendid justifications provided for them by really smart people. Since moral philosophy is useless, these shitheads are not able to provide a sensible justification for the stupid shit they are making a living by shitting out.
Thus the various moral considerations that guide our substantive moral reflection are unified by a single normative subject matter.
Any given person would deal with very different normative 'subject matters'. Different norms apply at work, on the street, at home, and at your sister's wedding. It's one thing to be drunk at work but sis will slap you silly if you spoil her big day.
In this way, contractualism guides our substantive reflection about wrongness.
Nope. Contractualism guides our substantive reflections on the business side of things. Even a marriage or membership of a Church can be viewed as a contract
Wrong is the primary moral predicate; right is defined as “not wrong”.
It is immoral to say something is wrong rather than to suck off the person doing that wrong thing so as to distract him for a few moments so less of the wrong thing gets done. Right is defined as having your teeth removed so as to improve the quality of the fellatio you provide to all and sundry.
One reason for focusing on wrong is to draw attention to the domain that contractualism is concerned to map, concerning what it is for one person to have been wronged by another.
A moral philosopher who isn't very publicly giving beejays to hobos is wronging all those who would enjoy watching the spectacle. It is fine to claim to be wronged or benefited by the actions or, indeed, the bare existence, of others. It is also fine to tell those who make such claims that they should be sucking the dicks of hobos or, if they happen to be your father, not sucking random dick instead of buying you a bicycle already.
Moral requirements determine what it is to respond properly to the value of persons as rational agents.
Responding to persons has to do with being a person relating to another person like a fucking human being. It has nothing to do with being a 'rational agent' or worrying about 'moral requirements'.
The distinctive value of human life lies in the human capacity to assess reasons and justifications.
Fuck off! Some humans may have to earn a living by assessing excuses or adjusting claims or evaluating justifications. But that is the distinctive drawback, not the value, of being human. Why not claim instead that what sets man apart from the beasts is the ability to queue up at the DMV?
Therefore, appreciating the value of a person involves recognising her capacity to appreciate and act on reasons.
No. It involves appreciating the way she makes you feel all warm and gooey inside. Also Mummies and Wifies and so forth can't possibly have any reason to appreciate us to such an extent as to cook nice things for us rather than call an exterminator to get rid of the horrible infestation we represent.
The way to value this capacity is to treat persons in accord with principles they could not reasonably reject.
I don't want to be treated in accord with principles. I want to be loved or envied or, considered a fun drunk rather than a crashing bore with the personality of the aardvark voted as most likely to bore everybody to death by other aardvarks who were merit students at the Institute for Boring Shite
In doing so, the agent is guided by a principle that can rightly be characterised as one that the person herself authorised that agent to be guided by, in thinking about the appropriate way to relate to her.
That principle is give me all your fucking money or, if you are a genuine, non-boring as shit, human being, don't. Get a job and live well. The invisible hand will do the rest. It is not the case that the noumenon is the moral eschaton. It is utility and part and parcel of the mysterious economy of the katechon.
Contractualism illuminates the compelling Kantian insight that we ought to treat persons never as mere means but always as ends in themselves.
No it doesn't. Contracts have nothing to do with Heaven or Hell or the 'Kingdom of Ends'. Kant tried to find a substitute for Augustinian Grace and predestination by invoking shite about Reason and everybody trying but failing to create what ought to be Heaven if Heaven ought to be the most boring and joyless place ever.
It interprets this as treating them according to principles they could not reasonably reject.
Solomonoff explained whyy you can either have completeness or computability- not both. That's why Principles and Categories are mischievous unless they are merely provisional and thus not Principles or Categories at all.
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