While also thinking about the prominent case of the United States Supreme Court "PGA vs Casey Martin" and the possible objections to Aristotle's account of teleology in the case of slavery. Reviewing Professor Micheal Sandel's lecture at Harvard: https://youtu.be/MuiazbyOS
What we are essentially debating in this question is whether teleos or the purpose of social institutions and political practices should determine how honors and offices are distributed. Unlike Modern theorists who merely concern themselves with distribution of income, opportunity and wealth by detaching themselves from consideration of virtue in aspects of justice and rights, Aristotle argues justice is simply giving people what they deserve i.e. “Justice is a matter of fitness -fitting virtues with appropriate roles.” Thus, while determining the distribution of a particular thing, we have to inevitably think about the characteristic end/teleos/purpose of the thing we are distributing. Let us utilise the virtue of flute playing to demonstrate this point. Professor Michael Sandel ( in this lecture) asks his class, who should get the best flute? Of course, according to Aristotle the best flute player should get the best flute because it is a way of honoring the virtue or excellence of flute playing.
Now let's briefly address Kant and Rawls before comparing them with Aristotle’s teleological account of justice. Rawls looks at justice as fairness. He refers to it as the ‘principles of justice’ on which all else that follows must rest i.e. the society and its institutions as we know them, today. He proposes a thought experiment where a pre-birth condition is expressed as the ‘original position.’ In this position, man is unaware of the status, race, gender or even the generation he will be born into. This is because he exists behind a ‘veil of ignorance’ which forces him to adopt principles that bring equality for all. Rawls states that if man has no knowledge of what might benefit him or what doubles his interests, then he will try to strive for a system that benefits all, especially the least fortunate. Kant looks at things from the perspective of categorical imperative. For him motive determines the moral worth of an action. He believes in the principle of self and acting freely; self for Kant is not a means but an end. He says an action is just only if it is self autonomous and can follow the principle of universalizability.
For Kant and Rawls, the basic criticism against Aristotle is that justice and rights cannot be based on a particular conception of good, end or teleos of a social institution or a political practice but instead should provide a general framework of rights, allowing people to be free to choose their conception of good and purposes of their life. Unlike Aristotle, Rawls does not believe that fitting persons to social roles is justice. He considers Aristotle’s teleological reasoning of justice as a threat to equal basic rights of citizens. For both Kant and Rawls, politics must respect our freedom to choose our goods and ends consistent with a similar liberty for others. They hold that because people in a pluralist society would disagree on the nature of a good life, justice should not be based on a particular teleos of a political or social institution.
In a more contemporary world, Professor Michael considers the PGA vs Casey Martin case in the light of Aristotle’s teleological social practices. He questions his audience to draw the conversation towards the purpose of golf and decipher whose side they are on. Tom, a student in the hall, says that he sides with PGA because “since the inception of golf, walking the course is intrinsic to golf playing and thus Casey Martin should not be allowed to use a golf cart.” This is countered by Jenny who proposes that the PGA should provide everyone the option to use a golf cart so anyone who wants to use a cart can access it. What is most important here is to determine the purpose of golf and whether or not walking the course is a virtue of golf playing. If we consider Tom’s perspective and regard golf as an athletic sport and not a game of skill, the walking is part of golf playing and thus Casey Martin should not be allowed to use a golf cart because it would unjustly allow him to compete for the honor of PGA tournament. Supreme Court’s Justice Scalia, however, rules against Aristotle’s perspective and regards golf as a mere amusement despite the testimony of professional golfers like Tom Kyte and Jack Nicklaus. I believe Casey Martin should be allowed to use the golf cart as he has already established himself as a professional golfer and thus attained the virtue of golf playing. A golf cart is an invention that performs the same purpose as “walking the course” and thus, does not violate the intrinsic value of golf playing.
Virtues aside, slavery was pretty ingrained in the culture of Athens. Aristotle being a conservative accepted the institution of slavery without questioning that perhaps things ought to be changed. He developed a defense of slavery by labelling it as necessary. He held that if citizens are to deliberate about politics in a political community and engage in the life of the polis, they must be free from other household chores and worries, while at the same time there need to be men who devote themselves particularly to maniacal, meagre labor. He defends his position by saying that it is inherent within some people’s nature to only be fit as slaves. Slavery is only unjust to Aristotle, if it is coerced and not natural like people enslaved post-war. The major criticism about Aristotle’s teleological account of slavery is that it is arrogant enough to assume that some people must live their life in slavery and unending labor because “they are only fit to do so”. He does not leave room for an individual’s freedom to determine his social role but assigns it to him based on a particular virtue. Aristotle neglects the fact that ‘if we take up the social roles according to our nature, then shouldn’t it be for us to decide what those roles are?’ To me, a question arises who is going to determine our nature, who will then decide what we are fit for? If we ourselves are to explore what our nature truly is, then of course we ourselves shall determine our social roles. No one then, I’d say, would assume their natures fit for low social roles or in this case the wan life of slavery.
One of my major takeaways from this lesson is how brilliant of a thinker was Aristotle. The fact that he considered exercise of language as a capacity to decipher between right and wrong has only recently been ratified by science as the prime reason why we outlived other homosapiens. I also appreciated the fact that Aristotle renders happiness as an activity of the soul in accordance with virtue. This legitimises the unrest one feels when they are prevented from exercising their real talent. However, no scholar is beyond criticism in Aristotle’s own words and thus, when Aristotle says virtue is only acquired by exercise and practice, it is paradoxical for me that at the same time, he argues that “fitting persons to social roles is justice... “
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