Monday, February 23, 2009

On 115 Lyons is talking about how rights are not absolute, but exist as thresholds. It seems like the argument he makes is that utilitarians want to promote welfare, even if it is only by a small amount. Lyons argues for rights because tiny increases in welfare aren’t enough to outweigh a right.
He talks about morally neutral rights, and how just because a legal right exists doesn’t mean it is more. On the other hand in the Bentham section he talks about how rights can legally exist but not matter because they are not enforced. I don’t feel like I understand the full scope of his argument here though.
I think it becomes clearer on 120 when his says about Mary and that “her rights make a difference to the evaluation of her and others’ conduct , a difference that unrestricted utilitarian reasoning cannot accept”. He also says “from the mere fact that net utility would be maximized by encroaching on her rights, we cannot infer that one is justified in encroaching on them.”(120)

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