Philosophy and Human Values-- I.

9 – Ian Barbour
1) How does concept of cost-benefit analysis relate to utilit? What are the advantages of this approach to
economics? What in Barbour’s view are the DIS of cost-benefit analysis to ethical theory?
2) Is it necessary in Barbour’s view for rights and obligations to be “absolute” – that is, allowing no exceptions?
How can one understand rights and duties as both binding and flexible?
3) What is Rawls “original position”? Explain how this idea leads him2 propose theory of justice in which
social and eco inequalities should be arranged 2 promote the greatest benefit of the least adv.
4) How does Barbour define the idea of positive and negative freedom? What are some examples of freedom of
each of these kinds that he thinks are critical in a technological society? Explain.
5) How can the ethical principles discussed in this selection help us evaluate technological choices involving
issues such as increased surveillance, genetic enhancement, or protecting the global commons? Discuss.
1) Cost-benefit analysis = the view that social policies should be arranged so as to maximize the ratio of benefits to
costs, when all of the benefits and costs are measured in economic terms. Assuming that all of the relevant benefits and
costs can be measured in economic terms, CBA operationalizes utilitarianism.
--Cost benefit analysis doesn’t work w/ ethical theory b/c if the total good were the only criterion, we could justify a
small social gain even if it entailed gross injustice. But if justice were the only norm, we would have to correct a small
injustice even if it resulted in widespread suffering or social harm. Thus, both justice and total good must be
considered. This CBA is only good when comparing a small range of options and there is a narrow range of very
specific objectives.
--Also, CBA is dis-adv b/c policy choices usually entail value judgments among incommensurables, and therefore, the
basic decisions must be made through political process, not by technical experts using formal analytic techniques.
Also, utilitarianism judges entirely by consequences. But there are some acts such as murder or experimentation on
humans subjects without their voluntary concent which we do not condone eve if they have good consequences.
2)
3) Rawls original position states 1) “Each person is to have an equal right to the most extensive total system of equal
basic liberties compatible w/ a similar system of liberty for all. “ 2) Social and economic inequalities must be: to the
greatest benefit of the least advantaged. || attached to positions open to everyone.
--Why does he want to develop a theory of justice? If he were a member of some disadvantaged group, we might think
that he was constructing it as a weapon. Academic competition? Intellectual motives probably played a large part. But
perhaps also benevolence, philanthropy, concern for the general happiness. Mankind generally will be better off if we
all accept the difference principle, b/c we will all live better lives in the more secure and friendlier, harmonious, more
willingly co-operative, society that this principle would generate. Well, if that's the motive, it is pretty much like
Utilitarianism, a concern for the happiness of mankind generally. Perhaps the game played in the Original Position is a
device that a rule-Utilitarian might adopt for formulating the rules.
4) Freedom - Negative and positive aspects
Negative: Freedom from interference, absence of external restraints.
Examples – freedom from coercion or direct influence imposed by other people or institutions.
Positive:  Freedom to pursue ones goals, presence of opportunities.
Examples – freedom to choose among genuine alternatives requires a range of real options and the power to act to
further the alternatives choices.
--W/ regard to tech, the forms of freedom that are most relevant and can be understood positively as opportunities to
participate in the decisions that affect our lives are:
1. Free participation in the marketplace. Problems:  leads to significant economic inequality.
2.  Participation in the political process: Problems: leads to significant inequality w/ respect to political influence.
3.  Participation in work-related decisions: Problems: Unions protect workers but harm hiring, innovation and improv
--W/ regard to negative freedoms, political freedom are limits to the powers of government, such as censorship and
arbitrary arrest. Also, we mustB protected from Invasion of privacy via electric surveillance and misuse of person info.
--W/ regard to positive aspects, institutions of political self determination and democratic forms of government making
processes. Civil liberties, such as freedoms of speech, assembly, and the press can be defended.
Also, in technological societies, the right to governments to intervene to protect health, safety and welfare has been
expanding to include even wider areas, as the uses of private property have had more far reaching public consequences.
5)

Tech and Responsibility: Reflections of the New task of Ethics -- I.10 – Hans Jonas
1) What are the three characteristics of traditional “neighbor ethics” that Jonas isolates, and in what respects
has modern tech made traditional ethics obsolete?
2) How does Jonas’s view that man himself has been added to the objects of tech”
3) hat do you think Jonas means when he says “We need wisdom the most when we believe in the least”
Answers:
1) Justice, charity and honesty. Modern tech has made traditional ethics obsolete by more has been added to what
mad has to be responsible for. In current times, due to tech, man must consider the whole biosphere of the planet b/c of
our power over it. Also, the containment of nearness is gone by the spatial spread and time-span of the cause-effect
trains which technological practice sets afoot. No previous ethics had to consider the global condition of human life,
and the far-off future, even existence, of the race. Thus, old ethics is obsolete and a new concept of duties and rights,
for which previous ethics and metaphysics don’t provide the principles or a ready doctrine. For example, w/ regard to
artificially prolonging life, no principle of former ethics which took the human constraints for granted, is good enough
to deal w/ this specific concern.
2) Man himself has been added to the objects of tech is three mains ways. The first way involving mans morality.
Certain advances in cell biology to prolong a person’s life by counteracting the chemical process of ageing.
--Another is behavior control by chemical means, or by direct electrical action of the bran via implanted electrodes.
This could be used for social management, or for performance increases for imployees.
--Also, another way man has applied tech on humself via genetic control of future men for preservation of for
improvement of his own design.
Do we have the right to do it? Who will be the image makers and by what standard?
3) B/c contemporary man is quite ignorant and denies the very existence object value and truth, and b/c we are
constantly confronted w/ issues whose positive choice requires supreme wisdom, and effects the total condition of
nature on our globe, we need wisdom, b/c it would be argued that we believe in very little.

Tech and Social Justice -- I.11 – Freeman Dyson

1) Dyson begins his discussion by giving some historical examples of technological innovations that he claims
have increased social justice? What are his examples? Can you think of any others?
2) Why does Dyson bele “the advent of electrical appliances liberated the servants and shackled their mistres’”?
3) Dyson argues that ethical and religious values can and should influence technological change, and he
mentions Max Weber’s seminal work The protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism as providing evidence
that this is possible. Do you agree?
4) In the concluding section, Dyson presents a vision in which the nascent technologies of solar energy, generic
engineering, and global internet communications are combines to help billions of poor people all over the
earth to attain a higher standard of living. Do you think this vision is attainable? Why or why not?
1) Dysons examples of tech innovations that increase social justice:
-Printing – brought book and education out of the monasteries and spread them among people.
-Public Health –(clean water supplies, sewage treat, vaccine&antibiotics) only help the rich if also offered to the poor.
-Synthetic materials – cheap materials that look like rich fabrics. No longer tell a woman’s social class by her clothes.
-Household appliances – made servants unnecessary, and made servant owners work themselves.
2) The tech of household appliances likewise brought a step backward to the different levels of society. Electrical
appliances took the place of servants, thus the mistresses were far less liberated b/c they had to do manual labors such
as cooking and cleaning which in a sense shackled the woman to the home.
3) I do not agree w/ the ideas presented in Max Weber’s work b/c he merely states coincidences of ethic and religion
and their involvement in the rise of capitalism and the technologies associated w/ it. Such coincidences as Isaac
Newton, and King Henry where not very well supported, and their roles in the rise of tech could be based on many
different factors not relating to religion or ethic.
4) I do believe that through nascent technologies of solar energy, generic engineering, and global internet
communications can help raise the standard of living b/c w/ all these sectors of technologies constantly being advanced
and innovated upon, not only in the form of function, but the lowering of the cost and increasing the accessibility of
these technologies, poorer individuals and countries are able to utilize these technologies, which makes everyone on a
more level playing field.

Tech Subversion
I.12 – David Strong
1) What does the author mean be the term technological availability? What specific values does this
concept embody?
2) What is the vision of the “good life” that our modem technological society offers us? Why does the
author question the goodness of this way of life?
3) What are the main differences between what Strong calls “things” and what he calls “devices”?
What values do we sacrifice when we choose the device paradigm over engagement w/ things?

1) Technological availability is described by the four standards, and it is said that for a tech to encompass these
attributes, it would result in less effort, time and learning skills required by the user of this tech: to be instantaneous (ex
not having to wait for the house to heat up), ubiquitous (warmth is provided to each corner of the room), safer and to be
available.
2) The good life offered by tech not only relieves humans of burdens, but it would make available all the goods of
the earth. Tech promises to bring the forces of nature and culture under control and liberate us from miser and toil and
enrich our lives. It would make us more comfortable, healthier, excite us. Borgmann calls this the “promise of tech”
--The author questions the goodness of this life it could turn out that the technological errors will impose burdens far
greater than those we were relived from in the first place. It was also said that tech will fail its own standards, bringing
disaster upon us. In addition, it could be said that at the bottom of concern for technological availability is an
aspiration for freedom and happiness.
3) A thing is said to engage us bodily and socially w/ the things in this world. Things also focus practices. Practices
call for skills and the development of character.
--On the other hand, in current times, the thing has been replaced by the device. The device provides a commodity, one
element of the original thing and disburdens people of all the elements that encompass the worlds and engaging
character of the thing.
--We sacrifice our skill, strength, attention that we put towards activities. We also sacrifice out understanding of means
for the direct consumption of ends. Basically, devices eliminate the coherent and engaging character of the world
before modern tech was implemented.

Globalization, Economics, and Human Rights -- II.1 – Thomas Friedman

1) How does Friedman define globalization? What is the dominant culture of globalization and how
might this be perceived as a threat by some groups of people?
2) How is globalization system different from the Cold War system that preceded it? What are the
defining characteristics of each of these systems of international relations?
3) Freidman claims that globalization has its own defining structure of power. What are the main
elements of this new structure of power and how have new technologies produced these new kinds
of power balances?
1) Globalization is an international system, the dominant system after the fall of the Berlin Wall. Globalization has
one overarching feature – Integration (interwoven world). A person’s threats and opportunities arise from who you are
connected to. Globalization is also characterized by the Web. Globalization is dynamic and ongoing process: it is the
inexorable integration of markets, nations states and technologies to a degree never witnessed before – in a way that is
enabling the world to reach into individuals, corporations and nation states farther, faster, deeper, cheaper than ever b4.
--The dominant culture of globalization was homogenization. Culturally speaking, globalization has tended to involve
the spread (for the better and for the worse) of Americanization – from Big Macs to iMacs to Mickey-Mouse.
--Also, the essence of globalization economics is the notion that “innovation replaces tradition. Nothing matters so
much as what will come next, and what will come next can only arrive if what is here now gets overturned. While this
makes the system a terrific place for innovation, it makes is a hard place to live, since most people prefer some measure
of security about the future to a life lived in almost constant uncertainty.

2)
Cold war Globalization
Over arching feature – division Over arching feature – integration
Frozen Dynamic and ongoing
Computerization, miniaturization, digitization, satellite
communication, fiber optics and the internet
Weight (throw weight of missiles) Speed (speed of commerce, travel, communication,
innovation)
The treaty The deal
Friends and Enemies Competitors
Exposing threats form the other side of the wall Expose threats coming from within wall

3) Cold war was a drama of two states, in globalization, built on three balances: states bumping up against states (US
sole dominant power and other nations are subordinate to it in one way or another), states bumping up against
supermarkets (US can destroy you by dropping bombs, and the supermarkets can destroy you by downgrading your
bonds b/c global markets are made up of millions of investors moving money around the world w/ a click of a mouse),
states bumping up against super-empowered individuals (Osama Bin-Laden , and also Jody Williams who’s ban on
landmines occurred without government and against major powers b/c of email)
The technologies used to create these new types of balances were internet, cell phones, email.

International Economics: Unlocking the Mysteries of Globalization-- II.2 – Jeffrey Sachs

1) What are the four major issues related to globalizations impact on both developed and developing
countries raised by Sachs in this reading?
2) In what ways does this article suggest it is possible that the “increasingly dense network of
economics interactions” between countries could prove to be problematic?
3) What might be some long-range impacts on employment and the environment if globalization
continues at its present rate?
1) First, will globalization promote faster economics growth, especially among the four-fifths of the worlds
population still living in developing countries?
Second, will globalization promote or undermine macroeconomic stability? Are the sudden and unexpected collapses
of emerging market economics in recent rears the result of deep flaws in the globalization process, or are they manage,
perhaps avoidable bums in the global road to greater prosperity?
Third, will globalization promote growing income inequality, and, if so, is the problem limited to low skilled workers
in the advanced economics, or is this inequality a deeper result of intensifying market forces in all parts of the world?
Fourth, how should the governmental in situation at all levels – regional, national, and international - adjust their
powers and responsibilities in view of the mergence of a global power?
2) Increasingly dense network of economics interactions between countries such as international capital flows,
forgiven direct investment, foreign direct investment thought country funds, bank loans, bond lending which is further
increased due to the fact that developed and developing countries are opening their capital markets to foreign
investment, causes international financial liberalization of a poorly capitalized banking system, in an invitation to over-
borrow and eventual financial crisis. Also, in international lending (international bank loans to emerging markets)
failure in the form of financial panic happens when a group of creditors suddenly decide to withdraw loans from a
borrower, out of fear that the other creditors are doing the same thing.
3) Inter-industry trade which involves the US export of high tech goods to Asia, in return for inexpensive labor
intensive goods imported from Asia causes workers on both sides of the deal to loose w/ regard to employment. In light
of low-wage competition, unskilled workers in the country importing labor intensive goods may suffer relative or even
absolute income and job declines while workers in countries importing high tech goods also loose out.

In Defense of Globalization -- II.3 – Jagdish Bhagwati

1) What are Bhagwati’s key arguments against those who attempt to portray the current state of
globalization as anti-democratic and anti-egalitarian? Why are you either inclined to accept or
reject his view of the overall benefit of unbridled capitalism and free trade? Discuss
2) How does Bhagwati justify his overwhelmingly positive view of globalization and capitalism? Are
you convinced as he is that the society is no sacrificing “communitarian values:” for the apparent
self-interest of capitalism? What do you feel might eventually happen to our society if his
optimistic view is proven wrong?
3) Discuss both the positive and negative views of globalization presented in this article w/ the points
made in the Friedman Article (II.1)
1) --Bagwati comments that he wonders how many of the young skeptics of capitalism are aware that socialist
planning in countries w/ bureaucratically determined rations of goods and services, worsened rather than improved
unequal access b/c socialism meant queues that the well-connected and the well-endowed could jump, whereas markets
allowed a larger number to make it to the check-out counter.
--Bagwati also mentions that economics analysis can accelerate growth and therewith pull people up into gainful
employment and designed sustenance.
--In addition, Bagwati believes it has become fashionable to assert that the demonstrating youth know much about the
policies they protest, but that is only a sentiment of solidarity w/ little basis in fact.
--Bagwati also mentions that protectionists use words to make policy changes and thus capitalism bad. Such words as
“fair-trade” instead of “tarrif-reform” try to make is seem like there is unfair trade happening. Bagwati refers to these
tactics as linguistic weapons.
--I accept b/c The fundamental point, supported by overwhelming evidence, is that openness to trade and foreign
investment is good for economic growth, and that growth reduces poverty. There is also not much doubt (although here
the calculations are more complicated) that the spread of pro-market policies over the past 20 years - most dramatically
in China and India - has reduced global inequality.
2) Bagwati claims that democracy does not suffer under our current roll-out of globalization. Nothing could be
further from the truth. There is no government on earth w/ any control of its economy b/c the corporations who drive
those economies are beyond their borders, outside their influence, and gov’s have become the puppets of those
corporations.
--Ultimately Bhagwati wants globalization, b/c he believes in the economic integration and the trade and specialization
which comes from an open economy, and which he believes will benefit those in poor countries. But he wants a more
humane version than we have today.
--He does emphasise what should be largely obvious: overall, free trade is the way to go. It will improve the average lot
of citizens, and makes for the possibility of incredible gains -- a possibility that a protectionist economy, or one that
strives for self-sufficiency just can't offer.
3) For Bhagwati, free trade isn't an end in and of itself, but rather: "an often powerful weapon in the policies we can
deploy to fight poverty." In certain areas he admits the failure of free trade as practised now, and he repeatedly warns
against too fast integration into the global financial sys w/o adequate protection against capital outflows
--Bagwati suggest that, overall, the benefits of globalization clearly outweigh the costs. however, too often Bhagwati
insists the problem is not globalization but the policies which are (or aren't) implemented in conjunction w/ it that are at
fault when and if things go bad: "that domestic policies, which the poor countries could change, are the source of the
problem". Common sense might dictate other, better policies, and popular and NGO pressure can force governments to
institute necessary safeguards to prevent the effects of freeing up trade from impacting the economy and individuals too
harshly; unfortunately, not all governments are as vulnerable or open to common sense or outside pressure and proper
policies and safeguards are not always obvious, nor do even academics and professionals agree on them.
Outrageous: There are also missteps in tone that will alienate some. At one point, Bhagwati dismisses a section of the
environmental movement as a bunch of ''old folks turning to protect turtles and ospreys.''