My Afternoon in the Original Position

So, I was just in the original position. And yes, really.

This afternoon, I was involved in a social science experiment at the PLESS laboratory in Green Hall. The aim of the experiment was to determine what a group of five people would do if asked to allocate (our) future resources among individuals in the group.

The experiment took place in this way:

1. We were presented with 4 conceptions of potential redistribution, including justice as fairness, Nozickian no-distribution, a resource floor, and a maximum range (though the options were entitled differently, of course). We took a quiz to make sure we understood each of the theories fully.

2. The five of us sat around a table discussing how we would like the monetary results of a forthcoming test to be divided up among the individuals in the group. We did not know what kind of test we would have to take (ie manual labor or math problems).

3. We took the test (it ended up being a spelling test), and were paid based on the results of our test and the resource distribution we had chosen.

So, here's what happened. We did agree, as Rawls thought we would, unanimously; however, we did not choose justice as fairness! We chose to set an income floor! I, being the liberal I am, almost argued for a range of 0 (meaning we would all receive the same payoffs) and also almost argued for justice as fairness, but decided that an income floor would be fairest. That way, our mini-society would still reward hard work (there would still be incentives to succeed on the test), though the worst-off would still be provided for insofar as they did not walk away with nothing. Fortunately for me, the test did not involve manual labor (though I can probably do more pushups or sit-ups than the average person), and I ended up doing the best on the spelling test, meaning I walked away with $23. I'm rich! However, I learned that, if the group had chosen not to redistribute money at all, I would have made more than $30. To be honest, this made me slightly upset, which is what in fact is upsetting to me right now. Though I could have made $7 more, why do I deserve those $7? I, just as Rawls argues, happen to be a decent speller, at least compared to the others in the group. Why do I deserve anything more than anyone else? I do not.

Still, that we did not choose justice as fairness and chose to institute a monetary floor did not surprise me, as I have learned that similar studies have found that others do the same thing. The argument against justice as fairness based on the experimental evidence is convincing: this is not theory; there was real money involved, yet we still chose to only institute a floor, and not completely redistribute income as justice as fairness would have us do.

There were problems with the study, however. To be honest, I knew that I would probably do better than average on the test, as it likely could not involve manual labor due to legal issues. I also knew that I'm fairly good at trivia games, and mathematically quick (ironically, spelling is likely to be one of my worst abilities). I was tempted, for a second, with the veil of ignorance drawn back, to go for no-redistribution. But, I tried to pretend that I did not have this unfair knowledge--restore the veil--and ended up back with an income floor, which is what the group chose.

After experiencing the original position for myself, I feel that I understand it much better. That those in the group did not choose justice as fairness as our conception of justice is troubling for Rawls' theory, though there were problems with the experiment. After living through having to choose it or not, I still agree with Rawls, though I'm not sure anymore. Either way, I'm $23 better for it.



Sources:
http://www.springerlink.com/content/1w55w6419k1pw032/fulltext.pdf