Justice as Fairness

Rules Behind a Veil

How would you design a society's rules if you didn't know who you'd be inside it? John Rawls imagined choosing from an 'original position' behind a 'veil of ignorance'-blind to your class, talents, race, or beliefs. Not knowing whether you'd land rich or poor, you'd refuse to gamble on the bottom being crushed. Rawls argued you'd secure equal basic liberties for all and permit inequalities only when they help the least advantaged.

“Justice is the first virtue of social institutions, as truth is of systems of thought.”

Where this sits in the course

“Justice as Fairness” is lesson 5 of 5 in How Should We Act?, a course about turn from what is true to what should be done.. The lessons are sequenced rather than a menu, so this one assumes what came before it.

How Should We Act? is itself one of 18 courses in thinkr. The set opens with what philosophy is, moves through the Stoics and the Eastern traditions, then into what can be known, what exists, how to act and how power works — closing on practical reasoning you can use in an argument this week.

In the app this lesson is followed by 5 exercises that check whether the idea actually landed — and every answer, right or wrong, is explained rather than scored. That is the part a written page cannot reproduce.