Looks like Dundee's already beaten me to it...
I used to have a lot of sympathy for the police. I saw them as doing a very difficult task with scant reward. My attitude changed when I actually required police help and when I saw others who needed it. I saw first hand their attitude and intelligence. This view was confirmed when I did a contract with the police. It remains the only contract from which I have walked. I'm sure there are intelligent, dedicated and sensible police officers. Unfortunately they seem few are far between.
As for pop stars. They aren't paid a wage from public funds. I think Robert Nozick argued this line in his Wilt Chamberlain example.
I used to have a lot of sympathy for the police. I saw them as doing a very difficult task with scant reward. My attitude changed when I actually required police help and when I saw others who needed it. I saw first hand their attitude and intelligence. This view was confirmed when I did a contract with the police. It remains the only contract from which I have walked. I'm sure there are intelligent, dedicated and sensible police officers. Unfortunately they seem few are far between.
As for pop stars. They aren't paid a wage from public funds. I think Robert Nozick argued this line in his Wilt Chamberlain example.
THE WILT CHAMBERLAIN ARGUMENT
The Wilt Chamberlain example is supposed to show intuitively that no "patterned" theory of just distribution is defensible: Any distribution which results from free exchanges between persons entitled to their holdings must be just. But free exchanges will always disrupt any favored patterned of distribution. If we have legitimately acquired something, we can dispose of it as we see fit, whatever pattern of distribution results. Some will flourish, some will starve, and this will in turn affect the chances of offspring, etc. But these results, though perhaps undesirable, are not unjust.
1. Let D1 be a distribution according to your favorite pattern for society S, in which each person has Rn holdings. Let S have 1 million members.
2. If D1 is just, then each is entitled to Rn.
3. If each is entitled to Rn, then each may dispose of Rn as she sees fit.
4. Wilt Chamberlain is a member of S.
5. Therefore Wilt Chamberlain has Rn.
6. Suppose each person in S freely contributes .25 of her Rn to Wilt.
7. Therefore, in the resulting distribution D2, Chamberlain has Rn +$250,000 and every other member of society has Rn-.25.
8. The distribution in D2 will now * D1.
9. But D2 resulted from a just initial distribution plus free exchanges.
10. So D2 is just, but violates the pattern that determined D1.
The Wilt Chamberlain example is supposed to show intuitively that no "patterned" theory of just distribution is defensible: Any distribution which results from free exchanges between persons entitled to their holdings must be just. But free exchanges will always disrupt any favored patterned of distribution. If we have legitimately acquired something, we can dispose of it as we see fit, whatever pattern of distribution results. Some will flourish, some will starve, and this will in turn affect the chances of offspring, etc. But these results, though perhaps undesirable, are not unjust.
1. Let D1 be a distribution according to your favorite pattern for society S, in which each person has Rn holdings. Let S have 1 million members.
2. If D1 is just, then each is entitled to Rn.
3. If each is entitled to Rn, then each may dispose of Rn as she sees fit.
4. Wilt Chamberlain is a member of S.
5. Therefore Wilt Chamberlain has Rn.
6. Suppose each person in S freely contributes .25 of her Rn to Wilt.
7. Therefore, in the resulting distribution D2, Chamberlain has Rn +$250,000 and every other member of society has Rn-.25.
8. The distribution in D2 will now * D1.
9. But D2 resulted from a just initial distribution plus free exchanges.
10. So D2 is just, but violates the pattern that determined D1.
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