6.3 Capability approach  (Page 6/6)

Ix. what you are going to do

Exercise one

• Podcasting technology used in Zimbabwe to provide farmers information about cattle.
• The XO Laptops distributed to school children in the Global South as a part of the One Laptop Per Child program.
• The redesigning of airplane cockpits around specifications that fit better the requirements of women as pilots.
• The redesigned and implemented irrigation project implemented in India described by the “people’s choice” article.
• Automobiles as used by Amish communities in the US Midwest.

Exercise two

• Capabilities emphasize practical reason and human sociability and responsiveness.
• Nussbaum in “Aristotle on Human Nature” talks about how both Greek philosophy and drama carry out thought experiments that invite readers and audiences to ponder about the boarders of human being.
• Specifically, humans are contrasted with gods who lack mortality and vulnerability. Plato and Aristotle both argue that a life without these two defining limits cannot be considered or conceived as human.
• Aristotle also sets forth practical reason as a capability that enters into all the other characteristics that humans share with other living things, transforming these functionings into human functionings; e.g. humans eat but they eat in a peculiarly human manner.
• Finally, humans are political animals; this refers to both sociability and responsiveness (to other human individuals).
• Putting these concepts discuss the following in terms of what they share and do not share with humans. (Examples are taken from the Lord of the Rings.)

1. Orcs and goblins . Orcs were bred from Elves in a process that clearly implies a degradation of the elf. How would orcs and goblins compare with Cyclops, Minotaurs, and other beings classified in Greek literature as beasts lacking fundamental human attributes. What would these attributes be? Are there, for example, distinctions to be made between the pleasures of a human and, say, those of a beast?
2. Hobbits . Are Hobbits human in the Greek sense? (What characteristics do they share with humans? Are there any significant, boundary characteristics lacking? Are they more or higher than human in some sense(s)?)
3. Elves (and dwarves) . Both are immortal (or, in the case of dwarves, live much longer than humans). Nevertheless, both are vulnerable; e.g. both can be killed in battle. How would these differences serve to distinguish what was a fulfilling for these beings versus human beings?
4. Wizards . Wizards can change shape and possess magical powers. At least the movie implies that they come from beyond the earth. They are immortal but vulnerable. (Gandalf went through a death of sorts in his fight with the Balrog.) Discuss how this mode of being would be different from that of humans.

Works cited

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26. Mark Coeckelbergh, ““How I Learned to Love the robot”: Capabilities, Information Technologies, and Elderly Care.” in The Capability Approach, Technology and Design , Illse Oosterlaken and Jeroen van den Hoven (eds). New York: Springer: 77-86.
27. Martha C. Nussbaum, Capabilities and Human Rights, 66 Fordham L. Rev. 273 (1997). Available at: http://ir.lawnet.fordham.edu/flr/vol66/iss2/2