Social Contract Theory

Social Contract Theory (SCT) derives from the fairly arcane conception of morality that holds that morality is a matter of the necessity of social living for mutual benefit. More precisely,

Principles of SCT

There are two important Reflective Equilibrium challenges to SCT:

The Non-Human Animals Argument

The Non-Human Animals Argument asserts that (premise 1) non-human animals have no moral rights under SCT since they cannot be party to the social contract. The argument then asserts that non-human animals do have moral rights (pre-theoretically--that is, on the grounds of common moral intuition.) Hence SCT is not true.

There are two possible responses to the Non-Human Animals Argument. One response is to argue that Premise (2) is false. It is not terribly difficult to argue that non-human animals have no moral rights, since human animals don't generally afford non-human animals moral status, and the vast majority of ethical theories, with the notable exception of certain utilitarian theories, do not extend moral rights to non-human animals.

For those of us who think that animals do have moral rights and SCT is true, rejecting Premise (2) is an unacceptable alternative. What is left is to reject Premise (1). It is possible to argue that non-human animals have moral rights on SCT grounds, because the conditions which generate prisoner's-type dilemmas obtain between human animals and their environment, and non-human animals are an integral part of that environment. For more on this counter-argument, you are encouraged to read the book, "The Tragedy of the Commons".

The Non-Rational Humans Argument

The Non-Rational Humans Argument asserts that (premise 1) non-rational humans like the mentally handicapped, the very young, or the very old and infirm have no moral rights under SCT since they could not be party to the social contract. But, pre-theoretically and according to the vast majority of ethical theories, non-rational humans do have moral rights. Hence SCT is not true.

The Non-Rational Humans Argument sounds convincing until one realizes that it is making a fundamental mistake. The argument presupposes that there is an actual social contract for which humans sign up, as it were. But the theory only requires that we consider what agreements rational agents would adopt, ideally. No actual contract, social or otherwise, is under consideration. Indeed, since no one could claim to be perfectly rational, no human would have moral rights under SCT if this argument were sound. It follows that premise (1) is false.

Since it is possible to construct a fairly effective counter-argument to the Non-Human Animals and Non-Rational Humans Arguments, we conclude that SCT arguably passes Reflective Equilibrium.