Ignorance is Bliss
In 1742, poet Thomas Gray went onto write a poem, Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College, in which he coined a phrase used by many today- “Ignorance is Bliss.”
However, what he did not know was that two and a half centuries later this phrase will be given its true political meaning in a philosophical thought experiment that would change the conceptions of justice and fairness forever.
Imagine sitting next to God, and They tell you to design a society. That is all the instruction you have. However, as you begin, They veil you, “You will not know who you will be in the society you design.”
A thousand possibilities flood your mind. If the society, you design is anything like the one we will live in today, then your best bet is a highly educated rich white male. However, what if you are not?
Will you be a minority in a majoritarian state? Will you be a woman in a patriarchal world? Will you be gay in a sexist society? Will you be in extreme poverty in a capitalist country? Or will you be an animal bound to be killed by a speciesist world? Anything is a possibility. Anything.
What kind of a society will you design?
In his Theory of Justice, published in 1972, John Rawls introduced what might be argued to be the greatest concept in modern philosophy- “The Veil of Ignorance.” He argued that the society you design will be as just and fair as possible because your ignorance will force you to consider all possibilities and self-preserve in each one of them.
Let’s translate this thought experiment into reality by applying this concept to today’s polity and popularized personal choices.
To begin with, let us consider Garrett Hardin’s economic concept of the Tragedy of the Commons which argues that due to individuals acting in immediate self-interest, public resources are misused and ultimately depleted. However, if one were to wear the Veil of Ignorance, it is impossible to act in self-interest. In applying this to our reality we can take the example of climate change. According to the World Health Organization, if we continue the current rate of carbon emissions and forest degradation, “between 2030 and 2050, climate change is expected to cause approximately 250 000 additional deaths per year.” Not to mention the obvious habitat loss many species will experience. However, as the Tragedy of the Commons states, we will continue to misuse our environment for immediate personal satisfaction. These include preference of personal vehicles rather than public ones, rearing more and more animals to meet our momentary satisfaction of eating animal-based foods, and using fireworks, plastics, and water mindlessly. But what if we wear the veil of ignorance? Do we want to be individuals in highly susceptible areas? Do we want to be endangered species losing our lives? Or do we want to be the families of individuals succumbing to extreme heat? Probably not.
Now let’s apply this to a different example, shall we. If we were to sit behind Rawls’s Veil, would we like to continue providing weapons to Israel? No. We would be afraid of being the father who was recently photographed holding his decapitated newborn in Rafah, or the mother who was filmed returning form the grocery shop only to find her entire family buried in the rubble. We may not recognize it as genocide as individuals sitting in a different part of the world with certain political affiliations and religious biases. But we will consider it a genocide if we end up being an eight-year-old girl who just lost her entire world in a “safe camp.” If we were to sit behind Rawls’s Veil, would we continue buying oil from a President who is responsible for more than 500,000 civilian casualties? No. If we were afraid of being the ones getting invaded, we would try and minimize national corruption, marginally increase taxes on higher income brackets, and reduce funding in some trivial areas to pay the extra $32/barrel.
Similarly, would we be in favor of majoritarian religious states if there were a possibility of us being the vulnerable minority? No, we would not. Would we want the rich to waste money on their fancies if we were to die hungry 20 yards away? No, we would not. Would we look to ban abortions if we could ourselves be a 12-year-old rape victim? No, we would not. Would we choose to eat animals if we could be the animals being eaten? No, we would not. Would we choose to ban gay marriage if we could ourselves be gay? No, we would not. Would we choose to have a caste system in place if we could be the untouchables? No, we would not.
This is the magic of the Veil of Ignorance. It seems to be the perfect tool to create an equitable, just, and moral society. But can every decision be taken with perfection from behind the veil?
There is a concept in law called entrenchment. This allows for current policy makers to make amendments of certain laws or aspects of the constitution, either impossible or very difficult. An argument for entrenchment of law is that it prevents misuse of power in the future, should it fall in the wrong hands. For example, there can be some fundamentals of the constitution which cannot be tampered with- much like the Indian Preamble and the Fundamental Rights. However, could entrenchment not allow for misuse in the present? What if the policy makers choose to create a policy that alienates the minority and then entrenches it into law? Would individuals choose to have entrenchment in the society they design, or no? And is it right to do so? This is an example of a problem that might not benefit from the wearing of the Veil of Ignorance.
It is also worth exploring whether John Rawls is using this theory to endorse natural law over legal positivism. While the former argues for a universal moral law, the latter aims to extract law from authority. The Veil of Ignorance promotes morality. But who decides that my morality is moral in its true sense? Meaning, even though the society I design will be “morally perfect,” will my morality be just?
If I choose to design a society in which the State should not have the power to kill its citizen because it is immoral to do so, will it be moral to let a traitor or a rapist live?
This is where natural law and the Veil of Ignorance fail. We need an authority figure- a judgment, a law, or a constitution to tell us what is legal, rather than just. This is because justice is often blind. It is blinded. Blinded by the Veil of Ignorance. But when we need justice ingrained in laws, and in those instances- ignorance is bliss.