Question #1: Near the end of chapter 11 (Smith book—Tocqueville), Tocqueville points out (according to Smith) that happiness in democracies like that in the United States is measured in material terms such as how much money one makes or has, how many things you can buy with this money, how many things one owns, etc. This idea of happiness, according to Tocqueville, will always be disappointing, one can never actually achieve happiness in this way, one can merely endlessly chase after it (until one dies).
Now let us think about Tocqueville’s observation about happiness in terms of what we learned about John Rawls. Rawls treats life like a race, and Rawls’ theory of justice simply wants to make this race as fair as possible for everyone.
Describe an objective—a goal to reach in this race of life, one that you think will actually produce happiness that can be achieved rather than just chased; that is, a goal that does not consist in making or having as much money as possible, or accumulating things that you can buy with money. This will require you to do some deep thinking, but by now you should have some ideas about this based on our readings and my lectures! If “justice” currently involves protecting people’s right to make as much money as possible, and protecting people’s possession of the things they buy with that money, how would the idea of justice need to change to be relevant for the new objective/goal you are proposing (what would justice need to do, to accomplish, to help people actually possess happiness)? Be sure to argue for/defend your solution.
Question #2: ( 6-8 sentences): Discuss something that has sparked your interest in the readings.
Everything is attached.