Parfit on Contractualism

Chapter 15 of Parfit's On What Matters concerns contractualism and the first part of his re-working of the third 2002 Tanner Lectures which I treated previously. Contractualism is summarised by Parfit as based principally upon a claim to rational agreement concerning principles all ought to follow. However, whilst this point is relatively uncontroversial, Parfit quickly introduces a methodological reflection on the understanding of such rational agreement that is far from obvious. This is to the effect that the rational agreement in question would be one that produced outcomes that were expectably-best. In focusing on outcomes, and in relating to them in terms of what would be optimal, Parfit assumes that the best test for a contractualist view would be a consequentialist one.

Parfit further makes a second assumption that comes out in his very brief account of, and reply to, the work of David Gauthier. Gauthier's Hobbesian form of contractualism is faulted by Parfit for its basic use of a state of nature device. The real problem with this device, on Parfit's view, is that it concedes ground in advance to the inequality of power that exists between people and hence allows a kind of threat advantage to dictate the terms of the resultant agreement.  This ensures that many "plain duties" as Parfit calls them are effectively flouted. So this second assumption is to the effect that where there appears to be an intuitive understanding of such "plain duties" that this needs to be accounted for on any plausible contractualist view.

Having these assumptions in hand Parfit turns to examining Rawls' form of contractualism though, notably, the way he approaches Rawls is very narrow. Parfit concentrates not on "justice as fairness" but rather only on "rightness as fairness", the general moral view that Rawls refers to a few times but never systematically developed. Part of Parfit's analysis of Rawls also works on the assumption that Rawls is committed to a desire-based view of reason, an assumption that seems to me faulty. It is not that Rawls assumes "desires" to be the basis of reason but that he does take it that there is a "thin theory" of what all people can be said to want which should guide elementary moral psychology.

Parfit looks at different models of the veil of ignorance that Rawls provides and finds fault with the thicker veil that Rawls appeals to. One of the reasons Parfit does this is distinctly odd, however, since he alleges that if there is a good basis for denying knowledge in the original position then such denial should apply as well even to the view that there are inequalities between people (of strength, intelligence, etc) at all. But the extension of the veil in this way has no practical purpose and even foils part of the point in invoking it. This would be the point of ensuring that the result of the procedure of construction of the original position would ensure that the design of the basic structure was most respectful of the worst off. This could not be achieved if we did not assume that there exists such a thing as a group that is worst off. The reason Parfit gets in to this discussion is that he has a prior agenda of bringing Rawls' view as close as possible to utilitarianism and in doing so he continues his methodological move of favouring axiological criteria of morality but this also cuts against the key constraints of the notion of right that Rawls builds into the original position.

These skirmishes with Rawls are still preliminary to Parfit's key discussion in this chapter which concerns what he terms the "Kantian Contractualist Formula", a formula specified as stating that everyone ought to follow the principles whose universal acceptance everyone could rationally will. This formula is evidently intended as a version of Kant's formula of the kingdom of ends. However Parfit cuts this formula off from the general discussions of contractualism in asserting that it is not based on achieving general agreement. It is instead motivated as a formula that is applied by individuals rather than a group so that the results of many over-lapping thought-experiments are meant to point to a generally agreed result. In arguing for this peculiar move Parfit draws on the Rawlsian argument against utilitarianism which alleges that the problem with the latter view is that it enables some to be sacrificed for the sake of the many. Parfit returns to the basic inequality between persons to reject the search for a rational agreement formula using the example of Gauthier to do so though this is again a pretty odd move given that the process of Rawls' original position does not at all model Gautheir's and shows that search for a rational agreement formula need not favour the strongest over the weakest.

More interestingly Parfit argues for a contractualist formula that does not suppose rational agreement is possible on the grounds that if unanimity is able to be achieved through a formula that is not based on presupposing it then it will be all the stronger an agreement. However what is assumed instead of such agreement is shared search by everyone for well-being that replaces the Rawlsian focus on primary goods. 

Parfit proceeds to make two additional moves in the chapter. Firstly he introduces Thomas Scanlon's notion of contractualism according to which everyone should follow the principles that no one can reasonably reject. In introducing this formula however Parfit appears to move away from his earlier recognition of 'plain duties', a recognition that was used against Gauthier. This is done by denying that we should appeal to judgments about what is wrong in applying the contractualist formula and thus removes the ability to appeal to the 'plain duties' that were invoked against Gauthier. Further Scanlon himself states, and Parfit quotes him stating, that the problem with utilitarianism is that it produces results that are starkly at variance with our "widely held convictions", a move that supports the view that there is some ground for thinking that such convictions do affect the evaluation of contractualist formulas and are thus not irrelevant to their application.

In noting this point of Scanlon's Parfit again returns to the principal anti-utilitarian point made by Rawls to the effect that burdens imposed on some just for the benefit of others are prima facie to be rejected. Given judicious use of thought-experiements Parfit moves away from the strict version of this point and tries instead to restrict its application to special cases (such as describe how doctors should treat patients). In so doing the basic force of the principle is weakened. 

Parfit's final move in the chapter concerns his implicit appeal to common sense restrictions on moral principles and these are now justified in terms of the view that contractualist principles are not themselves sufficient to describe wrong-making properties of actions but that they rather state higher-level properties of wrong-making that are intended to include the lower-level properties. This is meant to give us a reason not to include such lower-level properties in the application of the contractualist principle but rather in evaluation of its application. In making this large concession to intuitive views of what is wrong, however, Parfit also ensures that the examples to which he appeals are ones whose evidential force can be established, something of a tall order.

Parfit and Kant's "Contractualist Formula"

The third of Parfit's 2002 lectures concerns contractualism and involves an extended discussion of what he calls Kant's "contractualist formula". Since the formula in question is not one that Kant himself specifically states and since Parfit's derivation of this formula occurs in the concluding part of the second of the 2002 lectures it is necessary to return to this derivation before the argument of the third lecture can be considered. This is what I will do in this posting, which is devoted only to uncovering the argument by which Parfit arrives at and justifies this formula.


In the final section of the second 2002 lecture Parfit turns to the question of whether, in the course of this lecture, he can be said to have misinterpreted Kant's understanding of universal law. Whilst considering this possible objection Parfit points to the way in which Kant discusses, in the case of beneficence, the application of the law of nature formula by means of appeal not to what "everyone" could will but rather to the nature of the specific person's willing. Parfit also rejects the view that Kant's universal law test should be seen in terms of Rawlsian notions of the veil of ignorance. Parfit presents both Scanlon and Rawls as offering not interpretations of Kantian notions of universal law but as instead providing ways of revising it. This leads to Parfit presenting a complicated diagram of possible ways the universal law formula could be understood. Prominent amongst the possible understandings for Parfit is the treatment given by Scanlon which leads Scanlon to state that an act is wrong "unless everyone could rationally will that everyone acts in this way". 


However whilst Parfit is favourably impressed by Scanlon's formula he does not leave the matter there. Scanlon's formula is one that Parfit thinks is impartial but that it goes further than we have to since some acts are right without being ones that everyone could perform. This leads Parfit to revising Scanlon's formula so that it becomes, as Parfit terms it, the "formula of universally willed acts" which states: "an act is wrong unless it could be rationally willed by everyone". This formula is now understood to be equivalent to the first half of the Formula of Humanity on Parfit's construal of the latter, which he has earlier termed "the Consent Principle". On the basis of this we treat people only in ways that they could rationally consent to. The wider formula of this that has become the formula of universally willed acts now adds that an act is wrong unless everyone, if they had the choice, could rationally choose the act in question as one that would be done. 


However despite the argument having thus given us a formula that is at least loosely related to something Kant said Parfit is not finished yet. Parfit had earlier invoked the quite different standard that he termed Kant's "moral belief" formula which involved stating that an act is wrong unless we could rationally will it to be true that everyone believed it was permissible. This formula introduces a lot of complicated epistemic issues that Parfit does not really discuss but at this point all he does is argue that the so-called "moral belief" formula is one that can be converted into Scanlonian terms so that it becomes a claim to the effect that an act is wrong unless everyone could rationally will it to be true that everyone believed such acts permissible. This version of the "moral belief" formula interprets the claim about belief in a better way in a sense since it is no longer merely a claim about a given person's belief states and this is surely preferable as otherwise we seem mired in subjectivism. This version of the moral belief claim is meant to be understood as a way of addressing the problem of what general principles of action we could all will. 


Not only is the Scanlonian notion of moral belief a reply to a genuine Kantian question it also has the advantage, according to Parfit, of being suggested by Kant's formulas of autonomy and the realm of ends. The point about the formula of autonomy is that it involves a claim about rational beings giving themselves universal law through the maxims of their will. The understanding of this that Parfit wishes to champion is in terms of the Scanlonian version of "moral belief". The Scanlonian version is also termed by Parfit a "formula of universally willed moral beliefs" but it is shortened and given the name "Kant's Contractualist Formula" so that it becomes: "we ought to act on the principles whose universal acceptance everyone could rationally will". Parfit concludes the second lecture by contrasting this formula with a Rawlsian formula that involves, instead, reference to choice under conditions where we know nothing about the circumstances of others. The contrast between these formulas will motivate the structure of the third 2002 lecture. I am making no comment here on the argument Parfit has given as I wanted merely to draw it out as the basis on which the formula that Parfit consistently in the third lecture refers to as "Kant's" formula, despite not being stated anywhere by Kant, is arrived at.

Parfit and Kant on Impartiality (II)

The version of Parfit's account of impartiality that was given in Climbing the Mountain was treated here. In one respect the version that appears in the 2008 version of On What Matters is vulnerable to an objection that was given to the earlier version in a completely unchanged way. This is that Parfit persists in On What Matters in stating the Silver Rule to which Kant states an objection in the Groundwork as if it was equivalent to the Golden Rule, something that he is, it is true, far from alone in doing. Since in the earlier posting I stated at some length the problems I take there to be with this I won't revisit that point here.


The reason why the whole question of the "Golden" Rule is discussed is because of Kant's account of benevolence in the second part of the Groundwork which arises as one of the examples to which the Formula of Universal Law is related. The rule that Kant objects to as a potential alternative to the Formula of Universal Law is rejected by him for three different reasons. Firstly, the rejected rule does not contain the "ground" of duties to oneself, secondly it does not contain the ground of duties "of love" towards others and thirdly it does not contain the ground of "duties" owed to others. The duties of "love" include benevolence and Kant indicates here that the rejected rule does not lead to a duty of benevolence since, on its basis, one can say that one won't help others as one does not require help from them.


The rejected rule is one that Parfit states provides help to others on the basis of the need the others possess and this would be sufficient on its basis to provide an obligatory basis for one helping others. However the rule as Parfit states it is simply that we treat others "as we would want others to treat us" and Kant's point is that if we reject the need for help we can thereby reciprocally deny the need to supply it. This point appears not to be grasped clearly by Parfit. Parfit seems to be arguing, firstly, that the objection misses its target which it does not and secondly that it would apply to FUL which it would not. FUL does not focus on need but on the ground of obligation and the ground of obligation is one that requires universalisation of maxims in accordance with formal rules. These latter do not permit the exemption begged by the one who does not wish to be helped.


Parfit goes on to consider Kant's argument to this effect treating it as a requirement of rationality. When seen this way Parfit appears then to think that the rejected rule would make the same requirement but in doing so he fails to note the reciprocity stated in the rejected rule which is what allows the begged exemption to be stated and which is not involved in FUL in terms of needs. In an attempt to capture some of the force of this idea Parfit restates the rejected rule as follows: "We ought to treat others only in ways in which we would rationally be willing to be treated by others". However this restated form of the rejected rule is one that is then given an objection by Parfit in terms of a different type of begged exemption. Given the reformulation the begged exemption this time does not refer to need but instead is formulated in racist terms with the example being someone who is willing to universally treat those of another race in a way that denies them treatment of a sort that would not be denied to himself. The point that Parfit makes in response is that such a begged exemption misunderstands the reformulated rule which asks us to treat others as we would be treated by them were we in their position.


This additional requirement leads Parfit to restate the rejected rule in a new way: "We ought to treat others only in ways in which we would rationally be willing to be treated, if we were going to be in these other people's positions, and would be relevantly like them".  This point brings in a form of imaginative identification and in so doing is meant to counteract the racist move. Having reached this point Parfit assumes that he has reached a formula that is not subject to Kant's objection that the rule be rejected because it does not supply a basis for duties of "love" towards others and turns instead to Kant's objection that the rule does not cover duties "owed" to others. That objection was stated in a form that was appropriate to a duty of right since Kant stated that we need a formula that does not lead - absurdly - to the situation that a convicted criminal can argue with his judge that the judge would not wish to be imprisoned and thus has no right to imprison others. Parfit concedes that certain kinds of view of the rejected rule would have this result. However the right interpretation of the rule would not have this effect and in making this point Parfit revises the rule again: "We ought to treat other people as we would rationally be willing to be treated if we were going to be in the positions of all of these people, and would be relevantly like them".  This rule is meant to rule out the absurd result but has the effect that the nature of its application is much harder to see.


The judge is apparently to be asked, in response, to commit the act of imaginative identification not merely of the state of the criminal but of those affected by the criminal's acts. Due to this the judge would not be sympathetic to the criminal's plea. Seen this way, however, it would be the case that the rule has to be viewed as much more extensive than the initial formulation suggested and that might well lead us to the view that it is no longer the same rule that Kant objected to. 


The final objection that Kant made to the rejected rule was that it does not disclose the basis of duties to oneself. Parfit first suggests that it is not meant to do this and so this is not an objection to it but concedes that failure to describe such duties might also distort our sense of obligations to others. In order to meet this objection, however, Parfit makes a move that appears questionably consequentialist. It is to reformulate the rejected rule as follows: "We ought to treat everyone as we would rationally be willing to be treated if we were going to be in all of these people's positions, and would be relevantly like them". This response is meant to cover the objection based on duties to oneself by treating oneself, as Mill famously put it, as "one and no more than one" which is precisely the grounds on which Rawls stated that utilitarianism abstracts from the separateness of persons. After all, one is not simply equivalent to others and to treat one in this way is to view obligations as an occasion for maximisation. In fact Parfit does state an awareness of this point but does not attempt to reformulate further the rejected rule in order to meet it.


Rather than do this Parfit looks again at FUL and at Onora O'Neill's view that it is intended to pick out the intuitive idea that we should not treat ourselves as worthy of special treatment. Parfit does specifically mention Rawls' separateness of persons objection and concedes that one person's burdens are not compensated by another's benefits. 


Parfit next considers some objections that can be made against universal impartial principles beginning with the Rarity Objection that applies to actions that would be "too rare" to have significant effects on others. This includes cases in which some might be punished for crimes they have not committed on the maxim "let others be punished for my crimes", a maxim that Parfit thinks could pass the Law of Nature test. In appearing to think this Parfit reveals a lack of understanding of the test since the only way this could be taken to be a rule universally applicable is if one could will it applying universally so that others could likewise state it something that would provide a clear contradiction in the will. Parfit seems to think that this is an insufficient response since he thinks this is only a question of a calculated risk not of a real Law of Nature despite affecting to consider the application of the Law of Nature formula. Parfit thus does not really consider the application of the Law of Nature formula in this case at all.


A different objection that Parfit considers is what he terms the High Stakes Objection where performing some kind of act would be undertaken due to it being the case that not to perform would have unusually high consequences for the one in question. So, for example, unless I steal a particular drug from another who also needs it, I'll die. In such a case there is a particularly strong incentive to perform the act in question and this undercuts the appeal to the Law of Nature formula. In fact although it might well be particularly difficult to follow the advice of the Law of Nature formula here this example does not undercut it since, again, application of the maxim in question as a universal law of nature would also render me vulnerable in the same way and thus still be problematic as a universal law to will.


The next point Parfit makes is that the rejected rule is more direct in its impartiality than is the Law of Nature formula. However it is not obvious this is so. The rejected formula requires an act of imaginative identification which fails to include a real sense of agency in it whereas the Law of Nature formula, by contrast, in making its appeal directly to the conditions of agency, could be said to be more direct in its appeal. If what is meant with the claim of indirectness here is that the Law of Nature formula is less directly about the others affected the point is that it is only the ground of the duty, it is not the duty itself which is to the others directly but not directly about them in ground.


The next objection Parfit states is what he calls the Non-Reversibility one which is meant to say that in some cases there is a lack of symmetry between self and others that the Law of Nature formula does not capture. So: "we may know that, even if everyone did these things to others, no one would do these things to us". However this point views the universality tests as if they are meant to seen in terms of actual effects on us rather than as applying to the world in which we would live through the laws that would apply. Such laws would apply to how others related to us in general even if not in specific terms with regard to a given act. Seen like this I fail to see how a non-reversibility claim can be made. Parfit assumes that the racist case cannot be ruled out on the basis of the Law of Nature formula but this is only because he does not think of the racist formula as one that can be used by all races against each other and that this is what is precisely not being willed by the racist (who is therefore "begging an exemption").


Similarly Parfit rightly points out that in many cases privileged people are acting on maxims that allow them to be privileged in appropriate ways. However the point is one not of whether privilege as such is to be viewed as given but of whether behaviour is to rightly based on the ground of duty expressed in the Law of Nature formula. And this does not allow begging of exemption on the part of groups any more than on the part of individuals. So Parfit's examples of treatments of women or slaves are not counter cases to the Law of Nature as treating other groups as inferior on the basis of certain characteristics is not relating to them as rational beings who themselves have the capacity to state and govern themselves by universal laws. It is here that the wrong of such maxims resides.


Parfit fails to grasp this and thus thinks that a different type of rule to the Law of Nature requirement is needed to address specifically disadvantaged groups. This is why he refers to the kinds of imaginative identification that was involved in his reformulation of the rejected rule. This is taken to be preferable to Kant's insistence on a first-personal reference in the Formula of Universal Law. However the point of such reference is to bring out that it is a question of willing that is at issue and this is not involved as clearly in Parfit's reformulation of the "Golden" Rule. Parfit prefers to the Law of Nature formula a version of Moral Belief that is stated on the grounds of a proposal from Thomas Scanlon as follows: "It is wrong for us to  act on some maxim unless everyone could rationally will it to be true that everyone believes that such acts are morally permitted". This reference to moral belief has the advantage of bringing in a kind of publicity requirement although the way it does it is not notably preferable to the form of publicity involved in mandating laws to hold as laws of nature. Parfit thinks that the formulation from Scanlon addresses the situation of oppressed groups better but I have seen no reason to accept this.


Parfit's argument concludes with a suggestion that the best way of viewing the situation of rational willing is in terms of a further revision that is expressed as the Kantian Contractualist formula as follows: "Everyone ought to follow the principles whose universal acceptance everyone could rationally will". This formula assimilates Kant to Scanlon but leaves open all the questions about the relationship between the two.

Samuel Freeman's Review of Parfit

In the latest issue of The New York Review of Books there is a review of On What Matters by Samuel Freeman. Since I have previously covered reviews of the work by Simon Blackburn and Philip Kitcher it seems only right to provide a general summary and response also to this one by Freeman.


Freeman's review opens with comments aimed at the general reader concerning the philosophical attempt to explain the purposes of common sense moral rules and to resolve moral dilemmas. Freeman refers to Kant almost immediately afterwards mentioning both the unconditional character of moral demands on Kant's conception and the Formula of Humanity. The argument of the first part of the Groundwork is implicitly referred to when Freeman mentions the view that the categorical imperative "justifies" our common sense duties to one another and also provides a "more fine-grained method of reasoning" concerning what we ought to do. Following Parfit's own startling conjunction of names in the "Preface" to On What Matters Freeman moves from Kant to Sidgwick and the latter's argument in The Methods of Ethics that it is the principle of utility that truly "justifies" common sense morality. The move from Kant to Sidgwick also allows Freeman, however, to refer to the Rawlsian challenge to the dominance that the utilitarian tradition had, until recently, in the area of social theory.


The introduction of the account of utilitarianism into Freeman's narrative also allows him to mention that the method of ethical appraisal promoted by this school is really a specific form of the general notion of consequentialism and that many consequentialists today have abandoned a simple commitment to hedonism and do not necessarily view utility as the best way of assessing consequences. After mentioning the shift within moral theory from utilitarianism to consequentialism Freeman fills out his picture of the general state of contemporary moral reflection by mentioning Thomas Scanlon's notion of "contractualism", a much more recent theory than Kantian and consequentialist ones. Scanlon is presented by Freeman as someone who modified the Rawslian view so that it was applied not to the theory of justice but instead to personal duties or duties towards others. Not only is this the basis of contractualism according to Freeman but this view is related by him to the Kantian one in terms of recognising the equal status of persons as integral to moral reasoning and, in making this emphasis so significant, as ensuring that these accounts stand together against consequentialism.


As Freeman mentions in a footnote, the three theories of Kantianism, consequentialism and contractualism are the centre of Parfit's book and are related together by him as the key traditions that have to be brought together, a point that ensures that virtue theory is simply left without consideration by Parfit. Parfit intends overall to articulate what he terms a "Triple Theory" that will combine optimific considerations with Kantian and contractualist ones thus producing what Parfit calls a "Kantian rule consequentialism". This argument for a "Triple Theory" of normative ethics is combined by Parfit with a general account of moral reasons that is aimed at showing their objectivity with the arguments in favour of this claim being the centre of the first and the sixth parts of the book. The latter claim is specifically presented by Parfit in response to subjectivist views of reasons and in riposte to a claimed nihilism with regard to values said to characterise much contemporary theorising about morals.


Parfit's attack on subjectivism is rightly presented by Freeman as mainly consisting in responses to the "Humean" theory of reasons that understands reasons primarily through the prism of desires. In response to such a claim Parfit insists on an account of objective reasons based on a view of intentional objectivity but the nature of the specific theory Parfit here elaborates and the problems with it are not considered by Freeman who simply presents it as laudable that Parfit attacks relativistic subjectivism without discussing whether such an attack is, as stated, either too blunt or unconvincing. This is a peculiar weakness in Freeman's review and is likely connected to a dialectical strategy of refuting the "Triple Theory" but upholding the significance of Parfit's book in terms of the defence of "objectivity" in morals. One of the reasons why Freeman may have taken this tack is due to the prevalence of forms of the "Humean" theory in contemporary economics and the need to challenge such a model as applied there.


Freeman looks at Parfit's treatment of the Formula of Humanity and chides Parfit for considering it in separation from Kant's general moral theory. However there are further significant problems both in terms of how Freeman views Parfit's discussion of the Formula of Humanity and with how Freeman understands the place of the Formula of Humanity in Kant's own theory. With regard to Parfit's treatment Freeman stresses the way that the discussion of the "mere means" requirement appears to be favoured by Parfit above other considerations though this point is here not well made given that Parfit considers another point to flow from the Formula of Humanity than this. Parfit also stresses a notion of "rational consent" that he articulates as the basis of the first part of the Formula and, whilst Freeman may not find this a persuasive reading of the Formula it is remiss of him to simply present Parfit as viewing the Formula only through the "mere means" requirement. It is true that Parfit does not view the Formula in terms of a "respect requirement" but Parfit does provide arguments for not viewing the "respect requirement" as really providing further normative guidance and this requires to be discussed and answered.


Freeman indicates some awareness of the "respect requirement" but moves rather quickly from referring to it to an account of some themes from Kant's philosophy of right including the "innate right to freedom" and the notion of independence from being constrained by another's choice. Since these themes belong not in Kant's general moral theory but to the account of right it is not at all clear why they are referred to by Freeman and it is not remiss of Parfit to have failed to engage with them when formulating his notion of a Kantian consequentialism. It is correct to argue that the Formula of Humanity appears to include a constraint on action in terms of describing something one should not act against but Freeman fails to bring this point out and generic reference to the notion of "individual rights" is insufficient to make clear the specific problem with Parfit's view of the Formula of Humanity.


Parfit is, in any case, as Freeman recognises, more concerned with Kant's discussion of universal law than with the Formula of Humanity. The discussion of universal law is interpreted by Parfit in accord with a principle taken from Thomas Scanlon so that it becomes understood as prescribing the requirement that everyone ought to follow the principles whose universal acceptance everyone could rationally will. This notion of a "Kantian Contractualism" is one that requires viewing the notion of universal law in terms that are not derived from Kant himself but Freeman emphasises more the application of the principles that follow for Parfit. Freeman terms Parfit's application "peculiar" and part of what is thus peculiar is the way the combination of Kant with Scanlon is meant to underpin rule consequentialism. Parfit requires us to see the reference to what makes things go best as grounded on some kind of formal rule process built into an understanding of rational willing. This has the result, as Freeman puts it, that "morality is then a kind of efficiency in promoting universal good". 


Once we have a concentration of this optimific sort ethics clearly becomes axiological and this is part of what Freeman rightly regards as controversial in Parfit's view. Kant and Scanlon are generally taken to have provided moral views that are not consequentialist (although there are other varieties of "Kantian consequentialism" such as the one articulated by David Cummiskey). In making the move of bringing Kant and Scanlon into alliance with consequentialism Parfit follows the method inaugurated by Sidgwick who made a similar move the centre of The Methods of Ethics. Freeman suggests that this move on Parfit's part will have particular effect for Kantians since he claims that: "Parfit's consequentialist interpretation of the categorical imperative will stimulate philosophers for years to come".


Despite making the suggestion that Parfit's reading of Kant is one that is likely to be philosophically significant Freeman rejects quite central aspects of Parfit's methodology. One of the elements of Parfit's work that provoked Simon Blackburn's ire was the insistent use of Trolley problems in the work and Freeman joins with Blackburn in finding recourse to them problematic. One of the reasons Freeman gives for rejecting the use of Trolley problems is that such problems can be varied with resultant differences of appraisal. Freeman also cites Susan Wolf's reply printed in the second volume of On What Matters in which she claims that there is "no single principle" underlying our moral intuitions in Trolley type cases. In citing Wolf (and also Allen Wood) in opposition to the use of these cases, however, Freeman seems simply content to state their objections to Parfit's procedure without considering the extensive replies Parfit includes to interlocutors, something which certainly seems rather odd. Freeman also seems to rest content with claiming that if Trolley problems really are of little use in moral philosophy that this in itself undermines Parfit's 'Triple Theory' thereby implying that there are no substantive arguments given by Parfit with regard to the formulation of the 'Triple Theory' that are separable from the use of Trolley Problems and this contention, as put, seems a rather strong reading of the recourse to Trolley Problems.


Freeman's overall evaluation is strongly negative since he argues that Parfit does not address the questions as to why we should view morality axiologically or provide us with a view of what the ultimate good is that we are to optimise. However, the first point is stronger than Freeman himself ultimately puts it since he recognises a strain in Parfit's work that derives from Sidgwick and is based on the notion of a general impersonality. It may be, as Freeman says, a kind of "refined philosophical sensibility" that prefers this concentration to one on personal affairs of the sort provided by Scanlon but it is the basis of a ground for axiological conceptions of morality. In so being it is, as Freeman rightly stresses, somewhat out of key with Kantian and Scanlonian views of morality and this cuts against the sense that the basis of the three views Parfit treats can easily be reconciled. However in considering why Parfit takes it that there is an ultimate ground of unity between the views Freeman retreats again to the assertion that Parfit's argument substantively depends on an inductive generalisation from the consideration of Trolley problems and this argument is one I think over-states the importance of the Trolley problems Parfit considers.  


It is a separate problem and a better point to argue that Parfit is never specific about the general good that is to be optimised though it seems to me that part of the basis of this general good is to be found in the view of objective reasons that Parfit defends and which Freeman fails to challenge. Freeman concludes his review with a statement to the effect that Sidgwick's syncretic project has been brought to a point by Parfit that ensures it has a greater range than even Sidgwick would have thought possible. Whilst this might be true the grounds of the difficulty with the 'Triple Theory' cannot simply reside within normative ethics alone but must also be grounded on the account of the "objectivity" of ethics that Parfit articulates, an account that Parfit himself presents as importantly in tension with the kind of Rawlsian view that Freeman himself defends and to which therefore Freeman should have taken time to respond in his review.

Parfit and Kant on Impartiality

In my last posting on Parfit I looked at Chapter 9 of Climbing the Mountain, the first manuscript-length version of what has recently been published as On What Matters. In this posting I'm going to look at Chapter 10 of Climbing the Mountain where Parfit addresses the notion of impartiality, including, thereby, the relationship between the Formula of Universal Law and the "Golden Rule". 


This chapter opens with a description of Kant's view of beneficence indicating that the duty to beneficence is conceived of by Kant as a duty we owe to others on the grounds that we expect such conduct from others towards ourselves. This way of capturing the duty of beneficence leads Parfit to invoke the "Golden Rule" of the Gospels, famously formulated as do unto others as you would they did unto you. Kant is generally taken to have rejected this rule, a rejection based on citation of a footnote in the Groundwork:

"Let it not be thought that the trivial quod tibia non vis fiery etc. can serve as the benchmark or principle here. For it is, though with various limitations, just derived from the latter; it can be no universal law, for it does not contain the ground of duties to oneself, not of duties of love to others (for many a man would gladly agree that others should not benefit him if only he might be exempt from showing them beneficence), finally not of owed duties to one another; for the criminal would argue on this ground against the judges who punish him, and so on." (Ak. 4: 430n)

A few points are worth making about this citation, the first of which is that Kant does not here cite, as Parfit supposes, the Golden Rule but, rather, the so-called "Silver" Rule, which is a negative formulation to the effect, do not do unto others as you would not have them do unto you. This point is significant since the problems listed with the Silver Rule by Kant may well not transfer simply to the Golden Rule and, arguing on this basis, it has been suggested by some, that Kant therefore did not mean any direct criticism of the Golden Rule at all.


Kant introduces the cited footnote just after discussing the false promising maxim in relation to the Formula of Humanity, hence, not in connection with the Formula of Universal Law at all. So, when Kant claims that the Silver Rule is "just derived" from the latter, he presumably means by "the latter" the reference to consideration of the ends that are contained in the person of others. The subsequent point is that the Silver Rule is not a "universal" law which, given its negative formulation, is not that surprising a point. It will only operate to forbid conduct, not to promote it and when Kant goes on to the consideration of the third example in relation to the Formula of Humanity (to do with cultivation of talents) he introduces precisely considerations for thinking that there is a positive as well as a negative sense to this formula, thereby demarcating it from the Silver Rule. Kant next amplifies the point about the lack of universality of the Silver Rule pointing out that it is not possible to arrive at the "ground" of a number of duties from it. This argument repeats the point about the essentially negative character of the Silver Rule as it is expansive duties that cannot be arrived at on its basis including duties to oneself and duties of love. Both these kinds of duties are explored not in the Groundwork but in the Doctrine of Virtue where duties of love cover duties with regard to beneficence, gratitude and sympathy so the point clearly again is that such duties cannot be derived from a purely negative formula such as the Silver Rule. Similarly, with duties towards others generally, the Silver Rule is open to the kinds of problems Kant lists with regard to both maxims of indifference and the conduct of the criminal towards the judge.


Unfortunately Parfit conflates the actual rule Kant cites and distances himself from (the Silver Rule) with the rule from the Gospels (the Golden Rule) that Kant does not give and does not discuss. This is a shame, not least since, as the Golden Rule is stated in a positive form, it is not as evidently open to the same riposte Kant sets out against the Silver Rule. Parfit in fact goes further than pursuing the case Kant sets out against the Silver Rule as if it were an argument against the Golden Rule, he also turns Kant's case against another formula that was not at issue for Kant in the citation given, namely, the Formula of Universal Law. Textually problematic as this is Parfit opens with an account of the maxim of indifference and states that if people wish to be helped then they should also wish to help others. Having put the point this way as a case that the Golden Rule can enable to be stated against the maxim of indifference, Parfit argues that the maxim of indifference could be formulated in accord with the Formula of Universal Law although it cannot accord with the Golden Rule. This claim is problematic on a number of levels, not least that Kant at no point relates the Formula of Universal Law to duties but only refers the Formula of the Law of Nature to them. Not only is this so but the maxim of indifference is specifically rejected when related to the Formula of the Law of Nature on the grounds that it could not be "willed" to hold everywhere as a law of nature (the contradiction in the will test). This point is part of showing that the Law of Nature formula has two dimensions and that one of these involves a sense of consistency of willing, not merely of conception.


Parfit does note that Kant discusses this riposte of contradiction in willing but rejects it as inadequate on the grounds that it involves people wanting to be helped whereas it is possible that there could be people who never want to be helped and that with regard to them the reference to universal law will be insufficient. There are further problems with these remarks including the point that wishing to be helped is not an optional extra in human life even though there are situations in which some may be convinced they will never require help. As such the discussion involved in Kant's account of beneficence with regard to universal law includes a sense of what it is that has to apply to finite rational beings due to the nature of their finitude.


Parfit again recognises this point and formulates a response with regard to what he terms "rational" willing. Having recognised it he proceeds to reformulate the Golden Rule in such a way that it includes a similar recognition as appears in Kant's discussion of universal laws. This reformulation on Parfit's part renders it as follows: "We ought to treat others in ways in which, if we had the choice and were rational, we would choose that others treat us". This formulation is condensed further into a reference to what we would rationally choose. Having reformulated the Golden Rule in this way Parfit has significantly altered its scope and understanding. This is furthered when he extends application of the new rule not just to the "actual world" but also to imaginary cases.


Having reformulated and extended the Golden Rule in the ways indicated Parfit next considers cases that might be thought to present difficulties for it including one in which a racist claims to be applying the Golden Rule when refusing admission to his hotel to anyone not of his race. This can be done if the racist assumes only that the rule applies simply to those of different races and not to any of his own race and thus endorses such treatment as applicable universally given that his own race is always in the favourable position. In response Parfit claims that the racist in question has misunderstood the Golden Rule since the rule requires that one relate to others as if one might be in their position. So application of the Golden Rule requires imagining changes not just in other things but also, potentially, in ourselves so that we were as the others we treat now are. This gives the third formulation of the "Golden Rule" that Parfit has: "We ought to treat others only in ways in which we would rationally choose that we ourselves be treated, if we were going to be in these other people's positions, and if we would also be relevantly like them".


This conception of the Golden Rule involves a form of imaginative identification and in so doing is well on the way to being something like an impartial spectator model of moral reasoning. It is clear, however, that the reasoning and the model has reached a point very far removed from the formulation of the Silver Rule Kant criticised in the Groundwork.


Returning to the Groundwork text Parfit refers to the example of the criminal arguing with the judge concerning punishment that Kant gives towards the conclusion of the footnote discussing the Silver Rule. Parfit suggests that the rule Kant is here rejecting is more like a rule that states we ought to treat each other person "only in ways in which we would choose that we ourselves be treated if we were going to be in this person's position". This formulation, the one Parfit imagines Kant to be actually reading into the Silver Rule is like the third formula of the Golden Rule that Parfit has given in the sense that it involves a form of imaginative identification. It however does not include the sense of rational willing that Parfit has built into his third formula of the Golden Rule. Parfit indicates that the kind of identification he takes Kant to be involved in the rule he objects to is one that it is, indeed, right to reject. The reason Parfit rejects it, however, is that it implies a kind of egoistic position. In response Parfit gives another kind of formulation of the Golden Rule that cites it as stating that we "ought to treat other people as we would rationally choose that we be treated if we were going to be in the positions of all of these people, and would be relevantly like them". This extension of the process of imaginative identification clearly makes it impersonal since, if we are to be asked to think of what it would be like to be in the positions of "all" of them then no particular characteristics can be at issue (unlike in the earlier formula where Parfit was precisely building in particular characteristics to forestall the racist move).


The readings of the Golden Rule that involve the kinds of imaginative identification Parfit has in mind are formulated to prevent the kind of appeal the criminal is imagined to be capable of making working on Kant's conception of the Silver Rule. Parfit does, however, simply now adopt the impersonal reading of the Golden Rule and appears just to drop his earlier interpretation of imaginative identification. This is meant to show that punishment is quite capable of being morally justified. 


Parfit next considers the objection Kant makes to the effect that the Silver Rule provides no basis for duties towards oneself and recognises that failure to do this will ensure that others appear always to have priority over oneself, something that is implausible. Given this point Parfit further refines the Golden Rule to meet this point and arrives at another formulation of it. This formulation states: "We ought to treat everyone as we would rationally choose that we be treated if we were going to be in all of these people's positions, and would be relevantly like them". This point is meant to indicate that we are part of the "everyone" in question though, notably, it abstracts from the separateness of persons in precisely the manner Rawls famously objected to utilitarianism for doing.


Parfit next returns to comparing the "Golden Rule" in the formula in which he has now arrived at with the Formula of Universal Law and points out that both involve appeals to claims about what it would be rational for people to choose and include the basic egalitarian point that everyone matters equally (though the way the latter point is recognised in Parfit's "Golden Rule" is quite different from how it is recognised in the Formula of Humanity). The difference between them that Parfit registers concerns the manner in which thought experiments are conducted. The "Golden Rule" is meant to address the question, on Parfit's view, "what if that was done to me" rather than, as he takes to be required on Kant's Formula of Universal Law, "what if everyone did that"? 


Parfit takes the use of Kant's Law of Nature Formula to require reference to different possible worlds and to apply the laws in question as if they were ones everyone followed in these worlds. This differs from another kind of test Parfit attributes to Kant in which we ask what would happen if everyone had certain kinds of moral beliefs. Parfit next invokes the notion of an ideal impartial observer who is not involved in any events and judges as it were from the standpoint of the "universe" (as Sidgwick puts it in The Methods of Ethics) and he contrasts this with the "Consent Principle" that he previously formulated as the first part of the Formula of Humanity.


Parfit confesses, however, that the "Golden Rule" in his account of it faces the objection that it might lead us to ignore the fact that, in the "actual" world, ideal redistributions of benefits and burdens could produce irretrievable losses for some that, at least for them, are not compensated and that this matters when we are considering distributive justice. Due to recognition of this point Parfit thinks that the "Golden Rule" is, as he puts it, "theoretically" inferior to the Impartial Observer Formula and to the "Consent Principle" he earlier stated as the first part of the Formula of Humanity. The point Parfit should here have noted however is that the "Golden Rule" is not the only one of these principles open to this objection and, if it were, it would be not "theoretically" but "practically" inferior to the other formulas.


Parfit next considers some questions that he thinks create difficulties for Kant's discussion of universal laws. The first point considered here is that wrong-doing often involves acts that can only be rarely performed, a point Parfit formulates as the "Rarity Objection" and which is given an example in the case of someone who is willing to let another be punished for a crime that they committed. The question that is asked with regard to this person is whether their maxim falls foul of the Law of Nature Formula. Parfit suggests that the universalisation of the maxim of the person in question is plausible though, in making this point, he does nothing to test the maxim with regard to the criterion Kant uses in the Groundwork in terms of types of contradiction. In failing to refer to the tests in question Parfit simply pre-judges his case against the Formula of the Law of Nature. Similarly Parfit considers an egoistic maxim here and imagines a case where we have an egoist who could live in a world of other egoists, thereby ignoring the points made about this case when Kant discusses consistency of willing.


A much better case is made by Parfit when he moves from the discussion of rarity to one of "high stakes" and imagines cases where the perceived benefit of maxims for those considering them is very great compared to the alternatives. Such cases do show a ground for action in which it is hard to imagine people being persuaded to act in terms of what would be best overall given their own good is so great to them at the time but they do not count against a formal process in which abstraction from questions of the good is required. So again Parfit builds into his case assumptions that do not allow considerations of Kant's point.


The next objection Parfit considers is that the Law of Nature Formula is insufficiently impartial or not impartial in the "right way" unlike the "Golden Rule". The reason for this claimed difference is that Kant's rule does not build in a specific reference to the actor in question. Kant does, however, fail to do this for a specifically good reason that Parfit recognises which is to abstract away from the consideration that the egoist wishes to hold to. However Parfit suggests that this abstraction fails to recognise a key problem, that he terms "non-reversibility" where it is possible that we do to others something that no one is able to do to us in the same way (for whatever reason). This is, in fact, a problem much like the earlier racist suggestion Parfit considered and shows still that the case is being considered continuously in relation to material benefits that are not relevant to Kant's formula with conditions that do not allow for universality of application so, once again, beg the question against Kant's formula.


Parfit seems to think this "non-reversibility" claim is an important one simply due to the realities that something like it may well be involved in many cases of social injustice. So, for example, if men believe rape of women justified this may be because they are not women and not capable of being treated in the same way. However, even should such beliefs be actually held in such situations they are simply not relevant to the consideration of Kant's formula since, in holding to such beliefs the actors in question are not subjecting themselves to the standards of universality Kant is stating.


Parfit considers a response of this sort to his cases of "non-reversibility" but does so through Thomas Nagel's suggestion of a form of imaginative identification much like the one Parfit himself earlier built into the "Golden Rule". In responding to this point Parfit cites the response Kant made to the maxim of indifference in which Kant pointed to the contradiction in the will as being to do with what it would state about the one who formulated this maxim in a world governed by it. This point is taken by Parfit to indicate an illicit partiality in the formula rather than a consideration of the cases of all as in his own "Golden Rule". However the point surely is that cases of "non-reversibility" do not require the introduction of imaginative identification of the sort Parfit has invoked any more than Kant thought of such as involved in the response to the maxim of indifference. It was rather a question of reaching the maxim in question and formulating it as a universal rule that did the trick. Similarly, assuming something like a principle of "non-reversibility" is at work in much wrong-doing let's articulate its general assumption as something like the following: "I will take advantage of the ways in which others are differently vulnerable to myself in order to have mastery over them" and then think of its universal application. Are there are any cases in which this could not be applied to the disadvantage of the one formulating the maxim? It is enough to ask the question to point to the answer.


Parfit does not consider a response like the one I have given but he does mention Rawls' "veil of ignorance" notion only to suggest that Kant does not include reference to anything like it but, in so doing, he fails to discuss the ways in which Rawls interpreted Kant's typic of universal law in order to show considerations of the "veil of ignorance" type were at work there, thus, once again, he merely assumes his point. Similarly, Parfit considers Thomas Scanlon's interpretation which produces an account of universality that asks us to consider what everyone could rationally will only in order to rebut it by mentioning that Kant does not explicitly state things this way which is no answer to Scanlon. 


Parfit subsequently proposes to revise Kant's formulations in order to meet his notion of "non-reversibility" which is done by importing considerations of the sort Scanlon was concerned with when he referred to what everyone could rationally will. Having done so Parfit concludes the chapter with what he terms is the "Kantian Contractualist Formula" and which is stated as: "Everyone ought to follow the principles whose universal acceptance everyone could rationally will". Such a formula assimilates Kant to Scanlon.

Parfit and Kant on Universal Law

When I last looked at Parfit's 2002 Tanner Lectures, the "Ur-text" of On What Matters, it was to discuss the first of those lectures, and, not least, to examine how there Parfit interpreted Kant's Formula of Humanity. In this posting I'm going to look at Parfit's second 2002 lecture where he turns, by contrast, to the discussion of Kant's Formula(s) of Universal Law.


Parfit opens the second of his lectures with a discussion of the nature of Kant's references to "maxims" in his account of the rightness of acts. Parfit lists some statements that are described by Kant as "maxims" and then proceeds to describe what he terms Kant's "stated criterion of strict duties" which is: "it is wrong to act on maxims that could not be universal laws" though this seems to be based on Ak. 4: 424 where Kant in fact, by referring to at least two types of contradiction, refers to notions of "conception" and "willing" to distinguish them, a distinction that Parfit appears to make nothing of. Parfit looks instead at the notion that what is tested by the reference to universal laws is the "permissibility" of certain maxims (not their "possibility" of being experienced which is what Kant discusses). The notion of "permissibility" is not, in any case, taken by Parfit to be a very helpful way of understanding Kant's notion of universalisation and he raises questions about maxim-formation that have been circulating in the literature for some time in terms of the "test" of universality being either under-determined or over-determined. 


In the process of raising these points Parfit criticises ways of understanding universal laws that have been made by Onora O'Neill which culminates in a switch from the initial "stated criterion of strict duties" to a different "actual criterion of strict duties" which latter states that: "it is wrong to act on maxims whose being universally accepted, or believed to be permissible, would make it impossible for anyone successfully to act upon them". This criteria has the advantage that it appears to make questions of publicity emerge as key to the way universal laws are meant to work. However, it is not this, but instead the notion of "success" that Parfit fixes on, arguing, as he does, that the alleged maxim of coercing others wherever this would benefit me, even if adopted universally, would not be universally impossible to successfully achieve. This objection strikes me as a pretty odd one since such a situation would, if it was the basis of all known and avowed maxims, make rather a large number of actions impossible of success and is the basic reason why, in the Doctrine of Right, Kant can provide an argument for the need for a sovereign power.


Parfit does not consider such a case, however, preferring instead to look at Kant's arguments against lying and stealing which are, however, themselves interpreted by Parfit in ways that are pretty eccentric since he focuses primarily on the question of the egoist, which was not obviously on Kant's agenda at all here. Parfit makes a better point with regard to lying promises since it is here that he sees that the practice of promising is conditional on the notion that keeping them is the general rule to be observed. This leads Parfit to begin to consider the reference to universality in a different way to previously as based not merely on an account of maxims in relation to acts but also in relation to beliefs concerning acts. However Parfit still has difficulties with the kind of criteria that the reference to universal laws seems to involve since, as he can easily point out, there are cases where lying promises might seem to be required. 


The first lesson derived from the discussion by Parfit emerges at this point which is to the effect that relating maxims permissibility to a standard of universal successful accomplishment appears to make the universality criteria either much too weak or much too strong. It is only after this point has been stated that Parfit actually states Kant's Formula of Universal Law which is, however, given in a form that Kant never explicitly gives. The Formula in Parfit's telling emerges as follows: "It is wrong to act on some maxim unless we could also rationally will it to be true that this maxim is a universal law". Shortly after giving this formula Parfit also adds the "law of nature formula" and what he terms "the Permissibility Formula" which latter is said to state: "It is wrong to act on some maxim unless we could also rationally will it to be true that everyone is morally permitted to act in this way".  This latter notion is said to be derived from Thomas Scanlon and is freely admitted by Parfit to be one that is not generally recognised.


Nor does Parfit stop here, however, since after giving the "permissibility formula" he adds that Kant's basic assumption in this alleged formula refers to effects of beliefs people hold and thus depends on what Parfit calls a "Moral Belief Formula", something that he implicitly appealed to earlier in the lecture but which is now explicitly presented as stating: "It is wrong to act on some maxim unless we could also rationally will it to be true that everyone believes such acts to be permissible". This formula is, however, implicitly conservative since it appears to require recognition of actual beliefs and thus not to test them. 


As often, however, Parfit moves on to a different question than the one that seems obvious since his question about the alleged formulas given does not turn on any particular type of objection to their coherence but instead he goes back again to the question of the status of "maxims" for Kant. Here Parfit makes the point that when Kant speaks of "maxims" it seems that different types of things can be at issue. Thus, on some occasions it appears that Kant is using "maxim" to indicate the "policy" on which someone is acting, on others to the relationship between "policy" and "aim". Having made this point Parfit returns to the general problem of having a view of maxims that provides a serious wrong-making criteria and indicates that many maxims have a "mixed" status in the sense that it is not always bad to act on them nor always good. This is termed by Parfit the "mixed maxims objection" to the accounts of maxims that have been discussed by him up to this point. In response to it Parfit suggests a revision of Kant's Formula(s). The point of the revision is, however, a rather odd one. Having indicated that his basic problem is with "mixed maxims" Parfit suggests that the way that maxims are referred to should not be by means of policies or aims but instead by what persons are "intentionally doing". In fact, in stating this, Parfit seems unusually poorly informed since making the understanding of maxims refer to "intentions" is a proposal that has been widely considered and it has provoked serious objections from a range of philosophers.


Nor, in any case, is it obvious that what Parfit goes on to do is to discuss a revision that is really based on this notion of "intentions". It is instead Parfit's move to begin discussing rational willing and this appears to involve some sense of instrumental coherence, a notion that requires no explicit reference to "intentions" at all. 


Parfit states that Kant's Formula(s) of universal law work best when 3 conditions are satisfied, namely, that it would be (a) possible to act on the maxim; (b) the effects of the maxim would be much the same however many people acted on it; (c) these effects could be randomly or equally distributed between people. Understanding Kant's formulas in this way brings them close to considerations that are at work in standard decision theories and in games theories (much as Parfit invokes in Reasons and Persons). Parfit's claim is that the problems that arise for the Kantian formulas are related to failure of one of these conditions. The only failure Parfit explicitly considers is (c) which leads to burdens being imposed only on select groups. In raising this point Parfit gets to the notion of "impartiality" and indicates that there is no guarantee of impartial consideration in weighing universal acceptability. The example of this given is one that I find extremely unpersuasive though and appears to me to be a prime example of what is often termed "maxim-fiddling". 


The example is of a racist who takes it that there would be no problem of universalising maxims of segregation and unequal treatment. But in allowing the racist this claim Parfit neglects to conceive of the world that would therefore be being willed which would be a world in which there would therefore be no problem with the racist himself suffering the same treatment whenever they were in the minority. In failing to conceive of the general test in this way Parfit has simply fiddled the maxim in the racist's favour.


Parfit eventually gets to a version of this response when he considers Thomas Nagel's account of the maxims concerning benevolence which is the classic counterpart of the problem with contradiction of the will that I have transposed here to the case of the racist. Nagel appears to view the benevolence example as requiring us to be placed in "everyone else's position" but this is too strong and all that is needed is precisely what Parfit agrees is found in the discussion of benevolence in the Groundwork which is the failure of rational willing even in the case of the one willing non-beneficence. It is due to such failure that Rawls, as Parfit cites, invokes his idea of the "veil of ignorance" as a way of seeing the problem here. It is not that Kant has to have directly supposed that we do need to invoke this veil, as Parfit wrongly assumes. It is rather that the veil is an alternative way to make the same point in the same spirit.


In response to the discussion at this point Parfit invokes another way of understanding Kant's formulas of universal law in terms that recognises the question about impartiality in an explicit form. This leads Parfit to give what he terms the "Formula of Universally Willed Acts" which is as follows: "An act is wrong unless it could be rationally willed by everyone". This formula is an extension of the Consent Principle that Parfit found to be the first part of Kant's Formula of Humanity. It faces at least the problem Parfit himself mentions which is that Kant does not refer in this way to "what everyone could rationally will" though it is evident he does require some sense of rational willing to be understood. However Parfit concludes the second lecture with 2 final formulas. The first is meant to build in a reference to beliefs and produces what Parfit terms "Kant's Contractualist Formula" which is: "We ought to act on the principles whose universal acceptance everyone could rationally will". This version brings Kant into the vicinity of Thomas Scanlon though this point is not explored in this lecture.


Finally Parfit concludes with a formula that explicitly brings in a reference to Rawls' notion of the "veil of ignorance" and is stated simply as "Rawls's Formula" and is given as follows: "We ought to act on the principles that it would be rational for everyone to choose, as the principles that we would all accept, if no one knew anything about themselves or their circumstances".


Parfit concludes the second 2002 lecture with the claim that the third lecture will be devoted to consideration of the contractualist formula though it surely also considers its relationship to Rawls's Formula and indicates a resolution of some sort of the two formulas. However, before looking at the third and final 2002 lecture I will first consider the ways in which the discussion of the second 2002 lecture becomes transformed and reworked in Climbing the Mountain and the pre-publication version of On What Matters to become, eventually, Chapters 12 to 14 of the published book.