How is 'A Theory of justice' relevant to Indian society?

Rawls' A Theory of Justice is relevant to just about everyone, and perhaps India most of all, because India contains so many of the world's poorest and most disadvantaged people.

The core message of A Theory of Justice is that we should conceive of justice as if we were reasoning from behind a "veil of ignorance", where we did not know who we were or what part of society we would end up in. We might end up rich or poor; we might end up men or women; we might end up White or Black, Brahmin or Dalit. So we should try to construct a society that is minmax, that is, where the minimum standard of life is maximized. That way, even if we end up being put in the most disadvantaged group, we will still have a good life.

Of course, in practice we do know what status we have. We are not behind a "veil of ignorance". But this central idea of trying to maximize the welfare of those at the bottom, those who are most disadvantaged, is a very compelling one.

And the most disadvantaged in India are very disadvantaged indeed. 29% of the population---some 370 million people, more than the entire population of the United States---is below the national poverty line, which is set at a nominal income of as little as $0.44 per day. Even once you adjust for purchasing power, most of these people live below the UN poverty level of $2 per day. Add to that the rampant discrimination against women and remnants of the caste system, and life as, say, a Dalit woman in a poor rural village is living an extremely disadvantaged life.

If Rawls is right---and I think he basically is---then this is a grave injustice. India, as well as other countries, should be trying to raise the standard of living of these very poorest people, even if it means sacrificing some wealth for those of us at higher standards of living. In many cases it will not; most discrimination is not actually economically efficient, and removing it would make life better for almost everyone. But in some cases it might, and Rawls argues that it is our responsibility to do it anyway---that it is morally wrong for us to continue to live so rich while leaving so many others so poor.

Is there a word/phrase for "unperformant"?

As a software engineer, I need to sometimes describe a piece of code as something that lacks performance or was not written with performance in mind. Example: This kind of coding style leads to unmaintainable and unperformant code. Based on my Google searches, this isn't a real word. What is the correct way to describe this? EDIT My usage of "performance" here is in regard to speed and efficiency. For example, the better the performance of code the faster the application runs. My question and example target the negative definition, which is in reference to preventing inefficient coding practices. Answer This kind of coding style leads to unmaintainable and unperformant code. In my opinion, reads more easily as: This coding style leads to unmaintainable and poorly performing code. The key to well-written documentation and reports lies in ease of understanding. Adding poorly understood words such as performant decreases that ease. In addressing the use of such a poorly ...

nouns - what do you call the person who passes the trophies to the prize giver/presenter?

The person who gives out the trophies to the winners are called award presenters. So what do u call the person who passes the trophies to the presenter? Thanks!

Is 'efficate' a word in English?

I routinely hear the word "efficate" being used. For example, "The most powerful way to efficate a change in the system is to participate." I do not find entries for this word in common English dictionaries, but I do not have an unabridged dictionary. I have checked the OED (I'm not sure if it is considered unabridged), and it has no entry for "efficate". It does have an entry for "efficiate", which is used in the same way. Wordnik has an entry for "efficate" with over 1800 hits, thus providing some evidence for the frequency of use. I personally like the word and find the meaning very clear and obvious when others use it. If it's not currently an "officially documented" word, perhaps its continued use will result in it being better documented.

Notes

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