In reply to  R.C.Macaulay's message of Sun, 27 Jan 2008 15:16:24 -0600:
Hi,
[snip]
>The biggest problem in the world is jealousy, vanity, lust and greed. Add 
>drugs to this equation and witness a decay in civilized society. 
>An attorney friend remarked tha he no longer knew what justice is as a result 
>of his work in the court system.
>I explained the definition of the word "justice" as  " love of order, that 
>which preserves it, we call justice."
[snip]
A fascist dictatorship preserves order, but I would hardly call it just,
therefore, I think your definition is somewhat lacking.

My definition is that a just system is one in which *all* are treated equally
before the law. I suspect this doesn't exist anywhere on Earth.

This is different BTW from a *fair* society which tries to treat all members
equally, and also from a *free* society, which tries to give all members the
greatest possible freedom.

A fair society would need to restrict the freedoms of some in order to ensure
that all get an equal share, while a free society allows some to exploit others
resulting in an unequal distribution of wealth.

IOW fairness and freedom are usually to a considerable degree exclusive of one
another. Fairness is epitomized by pure communism, while freedom is epitomized
by pure capitalism.

Most societies end up opting for a mixture of the two, with some restrictions on
freedom designed to ensure that exploitation is limited to some degree.

Regards,

Robin van Spaandonk

The shrub is a plant.

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