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I want to go back to something I said before about the thickness of the veil of ignorance. Rawls needs a veil in order to guarantee impartiality. Fine. But does the veil have to be as thick as he makes it?

A thin veil behind which the parties in the Original Position do not know their future place in society is sufficient to guarantee impartiality. But why not leave it at that? Why not allow the parties to know, for example, that their society is a wealthy one in which very few people will be really poor? If they knew that, would they still take the maximin approach to choosing basic principles of justice? I doubt it.

Rawls claims that the maximin approach makes sense in certain situations. It makes sense, for example, when people cannot estimate the probability of various possible outcomes. But suppose for a moment that the parties know that 85% of the people in their society will not be poor. Then it may not be so prudent and rational for them to maximize the benefit to the least advantaged.

For example, why should the parties in the Original Position seek to maximize the income of the poorest group if they all know that 85% of the people will not be in that group? Why not just assure the people in that group a decent minimum -- one that guarantees them the basic resources to develop their capacities?