CAS PH 150 Lecture Notes - Lecture 6: Thought Experiment, Original Position
8 Feb 2017
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Lecture 6- Refugee Example and Rawls Intro
Refugee Overview
● The average refugee remains in that state for 17 years
● A refugee is classified by the UN as someone who has been FORCED to flee their
country because they have been persecuted/fears persecution on the basis of:
○ Religion
○ Nationality
○ Political opinion
○ Membership in a political group
○ Race
● The US has a rigorous screening process
○ Takes 2-5 years
○ Background checks, interviews with you and family members by several US
intelligence agencies, 3 separate fingerprinting and biometrics
○ If ANYTHING changes (birth, death, marriage), you start at square one
○ The process is so thorough that only 20 out of the 3,252,493 people who have
been allowed into the US have even had connections to terrorism
■ None of these people killed anyone/planned attacks, they just sent money
to organizations in their home countries
■ Your chances of being killed by a refugee are 1 in 34 billion
Mill on Refugees
● If Mill were alive today, he would say to allow refugees to settle in the US
○ Their suffering is so extreme that it outweighs the current US cost (money, time,
and 1 in 35billion chance of terrorism) and thus produces net happiness
● If there was a legitimate terrorism threat from refugees, however, Mill would support the
ban
○ Utilitarian right action is subject to change
Rawls Theory of Justice
● The rules that govern society should be as fair as possible
● Original position
○ Thought experiment characterized by the veil of ignorance
○ Veil of Ignorance: you don’t know anything about how you were born into society
■ Religion, socioeconomic status, gender identity, etc
○ Rawls argues that based on this, you cannot make rules that put you at an
advantage over others
■ Ex: you could be homeless or you could be a billionaire… you don’t know
■ You would make rules with the risk of being homeless as the priority,
because you know that as a billionaire you will not need the rules to favor
you in order for basic quality of life
● Even if a rule isn’t great for the advantaged, they can’t complain
about the rule because, under the veil of ignorance, they agreed
to something like welfare before knowing they had money
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Document Summary
The average refugee remains in that state for 17 years. A refugee is classified by the un as someone who has been forced to flee their country because they have been persecuted/fears persecution on the basis of: The us has a rigorous screening process. Background checks, interviews with you and family members by several us intelligence agencies, 3 separate fingerprinting and biometrics. If anything changes (birth, death, marriage), you start at square one. The process is so thorough that only 20 out of the 3,252,493 people who have been allowed into the us have even had connections to terrorism. None of these people killed anyone/planned attacks, they just sent money to organizations in their home countries. Your chances of being killed by a refugee are 1 in 34 billion. If mill were alive today, he would say to allow refugees to settle in the us.
