> On May 19, 2010, at 2:09 AM, SA wrote:
>
>> In Chomsky's case it's especially unjustified (ha ha) since everyone
>> knows that he neither believes in god nor has ever posited any
>> metaphysical theory (in which justice is a property of the universe,
>> for example) - in other words, they know very well their accusations
>> about his alleged belief in "floating, transcendent" whatnot are,
>> strictly speaking, false.
>
> Well, not exactly. In their article on Chomsky's (largely unstated)
> theoretical underpinnings, Joshua Cohen and Joel Rogers argue that he
> believes in an innate human sense of justice that is repressed and
> distorted by bad institutions (NLR 187, May/June 1991). Their own
> summary:
>
>> To anticipate what follows, we take Chomsky’s social views to be
>> marked by four key claims: (1) human beings have a ‘moral nature’ and
>> a fundamental interest in autonomy; (2) these basic features of our
>> nature support a libertarian socialist social ideal; (3) the interest
>> in autonomy and the moral nature of human beings help to explain
>> certain important features of actual social systems, including for
>> example the use of deception and force to sustain unjust conditions,
>> as well as their historical evolution; and (4) these same features of
>> human nature provide reasons for hope that the terms of social order
>> will improve from a moral point of view.
Okay, but without necessarily endorsing that view, it can be pointed out that none of it is based on anything "floating above human beings," much less God. The opposite is the case - justice is said to be rooted in some characteristic *of* human beings. And by "characteristic of human beings," I assume Chomsky would not be referring to a collection of discrete biological specimens but rather to the collective products of social life in (what used to be called) "civilization." So, it might be accurate to say his idea of justice is a property of civilization - certainly not of the universe or of God. Shane referred to the Theory of Moral Sentiments, and I think those are the kind of ideas this view grows out of.
SA