Peter's Rewrite

Introduction

This past semester, a lot of Professor Moglen's class discussion has centered on our ability to resist pawning our licenses to large corporate firms and go to work for ourselves “seeking justice.” But what does it mean to seek justice, and why should I care to? Assuming that my path to success is ever in conflict with the greater social good, why should I sacrifice my own interests in order to benefit someone else who needs my help?

Suppose I am given a choice between the following: 1) Making a million dollars, while one person, unknown to me, is killed, or 2) Making little to no money at all.

From a purely rational perspective, why is it that I would ever choose the first option? What is the source of the impulse that drives such a decision?

This paper addresses some of the sources of altruism that motivate us toward serving the greater good when that pursuit seems to come at the expense of our own immediate material success.

Kin Selection

One idea is the notion of “kin selection.” According to this theory, certain genes prompt altruistic behavior towards organisms we are related to even when that behavior risks our own survival. While the behavior may risk that single person's successful transmission of genetic material, it still increases the gene frequency through the protection of those who also carry them. A major part of this equation, however, is my relatedness to that other person, and thus does not help much to explain why I would ever feel motivated to work for the good of someone outside my family tree.

Reciprocal Altruism

A slightly more far-reaching justification is "reciprocal altruism." Reciprocal altruism, an offshoot of game theory, suggests that we act altruistically in the hope of inspiring repayment in some form at some time in the future. For example, I give a loan to someone in the hope that, if I need help in the future, my good deed will inspire them to help me as compared to if I had not given the loan. But this for of altruism does not explain why I would sacrifice my own self interest for the benefit of someone else. Rather, it is merely the recognition of circumstances in which giving aid to someone else will eventually pay off for me in some way. This is only a choice between myself and someone else in the most narrow and immediate time frame. It the end, reciprocal altruism explains that I act altruistically when it is in my self interest, not in conflict with it, and it mostly only addresses my behavior regarding those people who I will actually come into contact with.

The Guilt Ratio

I think that the answer lies in a combination of a farther looking cost benefit analysis, like that above, and my ability to feel the emotions of empathy and guilt. If my own self perception is developed enough, then I can conceptualize more concretely the ways in which helping someone else actually benefits me in ways beyond those immediately and tangibly apparent.

Assuming that I have a choice like that outlined above, the formula representing this process would look something like this:

[(cost to others)/(benefit to self)] x (percent responsibility)

In this formula, the percent responsibility factor takes in account the guilt that I feel when I know the attendant social harm that results from my decision. In part because of my ability to empathize with an other, the benefit to self factor would be where I would be able to factor in those more ethereal forms of personal gain, such as happiness and pride.

The Choice

The key then, is in realizing that the decision between personal gain and working toward seeking justice need not be a binary one. There are ways both can coexist, but sometimes lowering our guilt ratio takes some work.

Instead of facing this difficult task, many individuals resort to cognitive dissonance based ego defense mechanisms to ignore rather than lower their guilt ratios: delusion, denial, repression, rationalization etc. For example, given the two choices in the earlier decision, I could rationalize killing a stranger by assuming someone else would take the money if I did not, decreasing the "percent responsible" factor.

Eben's class is geared towards breaking down these barriers to self-actualization. The class discussion is intended to make us think deeper about what it is a lawyer does. In many cases, law students take an easy and obvious path to financial success, without any sort of deeper thought about what will really make them happy. Ignorance is bliss because we do not need to live with the guilt of knowing the consequences of our actions, and because we do not need to know that there is a higher form of satisfaction than that we believe we have achieved.

To make the "good" decision, we have a responsibility to question what it is we are actually doing as lawyers. This will help lead us towards making the more "moral" decision. Additionally, the more we attempt to think deeper about our careers and futures, the more we develop our sense of what it is that will in fact make us happy, beyond mere short sided forms of personal “success.”

Conclusion

As I pursue my career as a lawyer, I hope that I can continue not only to open my mind to the needs of those around me, and the consequences of my actions, but also to become more aware of the less obvious sources that my own personal interests. In this way, the hypothetical posed above becomes not so much a decision as two ends of a spectrum within which I can find the space to work for both my own benefit and to use my license to the benefit of others in this world.