COMM 2273 Lecture Notes - Lecture 58: Social Contract, Mother Teresa, Practical Reason
10 Feb 2020
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First, mother theresa proves that human beings are not driven by their egos. Rather than acting in self-interest, her life was characterized by her gift of service to those in need. Second, contractarianism fails to guide action because it is impossible to know another person"s expectations with certainty, or to conclusively determine one"s own preferences. Third, it may be in our best interest to make and then break contracts, so the notion of contract setting doesn"t follow from the notion that individuals are self-interested, and contractarianism doesn"t account for the nuances of individual self-interest. A belief that it is in our best interests to form contracts may be practical, but that doesn"t appeal to the epistemic truth of that belief. Eighth, self-interest doesn"t necessarily take precedence over external values, for example many human beings are religious, and treat their self-interest as secondary to their faith.
