I may very well regret responding to you because it may elicit offensive talk on your part, as I've experienced before, but you've started out quite innocuously so I'll give it a try.

I'm just two minutes in and this is the type of philosophical discussion I enjoy.

TRADITIONAL JUSTICE (applying the same rules and standards to everyone)
VS
COSMIC JUSTICE (equalizing the prospects for everyone)


I insert a question here. What say you to this:

People are not born into equal situations. We all can understand, accept and agree upon that. And of course, the crowd that is born into better situations is often going to argue for "traditional justice", so that they can keep their advantage. Status quo is working for them!

But what if that advantage was gained and accumulated over generations through injustice?

What if my grandfather stole your grandfather's labor and my family thus has a great estate while your family lives in a shack?

What if while your grandfather was laboring to build my grandfather's house, my grandfather was at Harvard getting an education, while your grandfather was legally barred from learning to even read and write?

Traditional justice works for you here. But does that feel morally right?

If it doesn't feel morally right to you, then it seems a measure of cosmic justice should be applied.

I don't have time to continue the video right now but that first question popped in my head.

concordtom said:

---

I may very well regret responding to you because it may elicit offensive talk on your part, as I've experienced before, but you've started out quite innocuously so I'll give it a try.

I'm just two minutes in and this is the type of philosophical discussion I enjoy.

TRADITIONAL JUSTICE (applying the same rules and standards to everyone)
VS
COSMIC JUSTICE (equalizing the prospects for everyone)


I insert a question here. What say you to this:

People are not born into equal situations. We all can understand, accept and agree upon that. And of course, the crowd that is born into better situations is often going to argue for "traditional justice", so that they can keep their advantage. Status quo is working for them!

But what if that advantage was gained and accumulated over generations through injustice?

What if my grandfather stole your grandfather's labor and my family thus has a great estate while your family lives in a shack?

What if while your grandfather was laboring to build my grandfather's house, my grandfather was at Harvard getting an education, while your grandfather was legally barred from learning to even read and write?

Traditional justice works for you here. But does that feel morally right?

If it doesn't feel morally right to you, then it seems a measure of cosmic justice should be applied.

I don't have time to continue the video right now but that first question popped in my head.

---

Good point. I would note that about 3 minutes in he turns to Rawls who grapples with these things.

My point is post modern (surprise!!). It is that what Sowell call's "Traditional Justice" and a framework of rules equally applied often disguises ways in which those "rules" reflect underlying conditions of power (and that by embracing the more libertarian defense of them often supporters are blind to that condition).

Consider (since Sowell does) aptitude tests like the SAT and the ACT and using them in admissions. It seems like we have a "fair" rule as anyone can take the test, the grading is done largely by machines and is anonymous. Seems "fair" and traditional justice.

But social science research is is near determinative on the question (albeit opposed by the big testing duopoly) that test prep matters. That more test prep matters more. Added to the equation is that much of non-math parts of the exam measure "social currency" - the vocabulary of the upper-middle class. The large volumes of literature that have looked at this suggest that really what those tests are best correlated to is social class - the richer the student the higher the score. Like all statistical relationships there are outliers (the scion that slacks off and bombs, the poor kid that aces the 1600) and MAGA love to talk about the outliers that bolster their case. But with a large "n" the relationship is pretty stark.

Thus in this case the "traditional" justice rules, Rawls would argue. isn't really justice. It is an outcome determined by (his words) the "genetic lottery". Born rich, more likely to score high.

But I also think a strawman in the extreme. I have yet to really meet anyone other than some really weird and ahistoric communists who are trying for "cosmic justice." Application of rules might be hamfisted and imprecise but most efforts by those Sowell opposes are not really about that sort of micromanagement.

It is telling that most examples that really animate the right come from the wacky world (that really is fairly inconsequential) of highly competitive admission higher ed. Yes, many humanity programs got taken over by the left. But there were frankly "traditional justice" rules that lead to this outcome. Tenure is supposed to go to faculty that are contributing significantly to the growth of knowledge in their fields. It just is going to be a LOT more difficult to do that if your passion is Shakespeare because 10s of thousands of scholars have done that. Either you have to use a new framework (Femism, marxist) to plow new fields or look at under researched contemporaries of him that often will come from more marginal groups. "traditional justice Rules" (around tenure) that lead to outcomes Sowell hates. Boo hoo..

Or consider from academia DEI admissions policies. I would hope all Bears would recognize that if you have 2 kids, both on the edge for admissions to Cal, the one that went to Oaktech (calls out to Marshawn) to achieve that academic record has more grit than the kid from Cardinal Newman. Maybe true even if a .1 of a GPA score lower. The idea isn't that admission to Cal is some "prize" (though we have done that with college admission) it is that by admitting the student you believe they have qualities that will allow them to persist (aka graduate) and that by assembing a student body that looks a particular way you will enhance the peer-to-peer learning going on. THat second factor has changed over time but isn't about leveling the playing field - it is is rather goals that have shifted overtime. If we go back to the 50s the idea of admissions was to assemble a class that would produce the leaders of the post-war world - overwhelmining white, male, episcopalian not because admission officers were awarding a prize but because of a profound sociatal consensus that WASP males were the best in doiing that. Fast forward to 2020 were the idea is that peer-to-peer learning in a multi-ethnic world is best accomplsihed by a class with a wide range of experiences and backgrounds.

And to get personal - in the end SCT Jr. is at Cal and not Reed because of a worry that a place that is so undiverse like Reed would not prepare him. Great learning place. Scholarship valued. But overwhelming white and drawn from the 1%. We passed.

concordtom said:

---

I may very well regret responding to you because it may elicit offensive talk on your part, as I've experienced before, but you've started out quite innocuously so I'll give it a try.

I'm just two minutes in and this is the type of philosophical discussion I enjoy.

TRADITIONAL JUSTICE (applying the same rules and standards to everyone)
VS
COSMIC JUSTICE (equalizing the prospects for everyone)


I insert a question here. What say you to this:

People are not born into equal situations. We all can understand, accept and agree upon that. And of course, the crowd that is born into better situations is often going to argue for "traditional justice", so that they can keep their advantage. Status quo is working for them!

But what if that advantage was gained and accumulated over generations through injustice?

What if my grandfather stole your grandfather's labor and my family thus has a great estate while your family lives in a shack?

What if while your grandfather was laboring to build my grandfather's house, my grandfather was at Harvard getting an education, while your grandfather was legally barred from learning to even read and write?

Traditional justice works for you here. But does that feel morally right?

If it doesn't feel morally right to you, then it seems a measure of cosmic justice should be applied.

I don't have time to continue the video right now but that first question popped in my head.

---

I hear you, but the difficulty I have with cosmic justice is, "How do you apply it fairly?" If you apply it to groups it seems to me that you're going to end up giving an advantage to people who don't need it and denying it to people who deserve it. My take on this probably stems from my own background. White, but from a poor family. One grandfather raised without indoor plumbing or electricity. When I was born my family lived in a one room apartment with no TV, telephone or car. Not even a refrigerator, but an ice box. No one in either parent's family had gone to college. Many didn't even make it through high school because they needed to work. Started working part time at 16. Did well in school and very well on the SAT. Put myself through Cal.

Does cosmic justice afford more of an advantage to me or to a 'disadvantaged' minority both of whose parents are physicians and from families in the upper middle class? So I think cosmic justice should be applied individually, but I can't imagine how you'd do that.