Social and Political philosophy based on Plato and John Stuart Mill
Answer each question according to the numbers.
(1) In your own words, explain why Plato does not think that the definition of justice is to help friends if they
are good and to harm enemies if they are bad.
(2) According to Allan Johnson, Societies are patriarchal to the degree to which they are male-dominated,
male-identified, and male-centered. In your own words, define and give an example of each of these terms.
Make sure to explain why the example is an example of the term.
(3) In the Subjection of Women, John Stuart Mill writes:
But, looking at women as they are known in experience, it may be said of them, with more truth than belongs
to most other generalizations on the subject, that the general bent of their talents is towards the practical.
This statement is conformable to all the public history of women, in the present and the past. It is no less
borne out by common and daily experience. Let us consider the special nature of the mental capacities most
characteristic of a women talent. They are all of a kind which fits them for practice, and makes them tend
towards it... For what is called their intuitive sagacity makes them peculiarly apt in gathering such general
truths as can be collected from their individual means of observation. When, consequently, they chance to be
as well provided as men are with the results of other people's experience, by reading and education... they are
better furnished than men in general with the essential requisites of skillful and successful practice.
Name two things Tuana asks you to look for when reading philosophy "as a woman." When you pay
attention to those two things in this text, what do you notice?
(4) Explain why John Rawls thinks the "veil of ignorance" is an important part of "justice as fairness".