The Aristotelian idea that there is no need for universal rules in order to apply moral judgment in different circumstances naturally suits Ophir’s own philosophical tastes (in this Ophir is similar to the postmodernist Jean-Francois Lyotard, whose book Just Gaming, on the idea of justice, borrows from Aristotelian ethics).³⁰ But because he rejects the possibility of knowing “the good,” Ophir inverts the Aristotelian equation: Instead of maximizing the good that may be derived from any given situation, Ophir contends, man is to choose that course of action which minimizes unnecessary evils. According to Ophir, it is this calculative element that keeps him safe from the abyss of moral relativism, for “at any given moment there can be only one true answer to the question of which principled conception, which strategy of action, and which patterns of discourse among those available in a given situation may limit the ‘volume’ of superfluous evils.”³¹

In this respect, Ophir’s philosophy looks much like utilitarianism, which posits that moral actions are to be determined as the product of a rational calculation aimed at maximizing total benefits and minimizing total costs, rather than according to fixed, abstract principles. Ophir himself writes that “the desire to reduce the volume of evils is simply an inverse formulation of the desire to maximize general happiness or benefit.”³² These two approaches, however, differ markedly in the nature of their ethical calculations: While the utilitarianists are interested in profit and loss as seen from the perspective of the community or society, which in turn are perceived as extensions of the individual’s own self, Ophir’s theory is guided by a concern for the “other,” for individuals or groups which are precisely not extensions of the moral actor, but are alien to him. “The moral interest,” he writes, “is interest in the other, who is mired (or in danger of becoming mired) in his distress, in his suffering, in concern for his own welfare…. The ethical knowledge is guided by an interest in the unnecessary evils that befall others or threaten to befall them; moral judgment and the intentions behind moral activity are guided by a concern for others who are afflicted by unnecessary evils.”³³

This ethical interest in the “other” is what places Ophir’s theory squarely in the postmodernist camp, distinguishing it from earlier schools such as utilitarianism. The ethical discussion of the other is principally identified with the thought of Emmanuel Levinas, which had a lasting effect on the leading figures of postmodernist philosophy, including Jacques Derrida, Jean-Francois Lyotard, and Zygmunt Bauman. Levinas maintains that ethics is based on the limitless and unconditional devotion to the other—a mindset which he describes as a kind of obsession, an absolute devotion.³⁴ This attachment takes precedence over any value, any conception that reflects a particular social order; it is part of the mold that shapes subjectivity itself. “Moral consciousness,” Levinas stresses, “is not an experience of values, but an access to external being: External being par excellence is the other.”³⁵ Levinas demands that the moral subject recognize his own absolute distinction from the other, and that he deny the urge to see himself in the other or seek any other common element. One must not project oneself onto the other, or, even worse, relate to the other as an object or abstraction. As a result, one’s dedication to helping others cannot be based on any “objective” conception of the interpersonal realm, in which our moral concern is justified because these people are part of our family or society, or even because they are human beings “just like us.” On the contrary, our concern for the other is purely subjective, a total devotion to another in his alien reality.³⁶

Ophir adopts this moral perspective. Like Levinas (and to some extent following Kant as well), he rejects the philosophical tradition that attempted to base moral behavior on the promise of reward or self-fulfillment. He stresses the asymmetry inherent in man’s moral obligation: “Answering the call of the other means conceding and giving without receiving anything in return.”³⁷ Being responsive means sacrificing one’s own interest; the appropriate attitude toward the other disregards all considerations based on personal affinity or inclination. Although Ophir does not completely reject such interests in all of human decisionmaking, he places them outside the bounds of moral discourse. In this he sides with those thinkers who, in the name of a Kantian universalism, have over the centuries called for a completely egalitarian attitude towards all people. Of these, perhaps the leading advocate today is Martha Nussbaum, who has written that to behave morally means “to treat nationality, ethnicity, religion, class, race, and gender as ‘morally irrelevant’—as irrelevant to that equal standing…. The accident of being born a Sri Lankan, or a Jew, or a female, or an African-American, or a poor person, is just that—an accident of birth. It is not and should not be taken to be a determinant of moral worth. Human personhood… is the source of our moral worth, and this worth is equal.”³⁸

The enlistment of “practical wisdom” in the service of a limitless devotion to the other is no simple matter. The term that Ophir uses for this demand, the “rational calculus of waste,” highlights the nature of the problem: On the one hand, Ophir subordinates moral action to practical reasoning, to a completely rational method of calculation; on the other hand, he demands from this reasoning “a type of absorption into the other, devotion without limits, an absurd investment, sacrifice and extravagance.”³⁹ But this is to demand far more than the most generous of human conduct. The insistence upon sacrificing all personal interests, in a calculated fashion, on the altar of the “other” (even—perhaps primarily—on behalf of complete strangers), to act rationally in utter selflessness whenever called upon to do so, is something that no reasonable person can be expected to undertake, because it violates human nature, our understanding of rationality, and common sense.

But what makes Ophir’s moral theory not only extremely difficult to implement, but quite impossible, are the conditions he imposes upon anyone seeking to act ethically. The first obstacle lies in his demand to base practical reasoning on the processing of information that cannot be measured, and that originates primarily in the subjective experiences of the other. Without being able to share the actual experiences of the other, without being able to measure them and weigh them in light of different options available, it is pointless to speak of a “rational calculus” of the type Ophir requires. Ophir, who is aware of this difficulty, contends that those evils to which man is supposed to respond—the damage and suffering caused to the other—are actually an objective matter, and can be identified even when the victim is not aware of them. The coal miner who suffers cumulative damage to his lungs, the woman who lives in an oppressive patriarchal society, are the victims of repression and exploitation without their necessarily knowing it. They need “others, who can adopt a paternalistic or missionary stance,” in order to bring about a change in their consciousness and reveal to them the unnecessary evils from which they are suffering.⁴⁰

Now, it is difficult to deny that people frequently suffer real, objective evils without their knowledge (even if we take issue with one or another of Ophir’s specific examples). The problem, however, is that Ophir simultaneously insists upon the subjectivity of evil, devoting a considerable portion of his massive study to the feelings of damage and suffering as the basis for all moral calculation. Thus, for example, he explains that in order to determine the damage involved in the loss of property, “it does not suffice to determine the occurrence of the transition from presence to absence and from being to not being; it is also necessary to determine the interest of the affected party in what has disappeared and cannot be replaced.”⁴¹ The phenomenon of loss cannot be separated from this personal feeling: When someone loses a unique photograph that captures an important moment from his past, the sense of loss corresponds in no way to any measure of the picture’s “objective” value (its market price, for example). His interest in the photograph is completely subjective, and his suffering ensues from the fact that he has lost something of “sentimental value,” the significance of which lies in his private memory. The attempt by someone else to estimate this sense of loss “objectively,” in order to set damages or as part of some other moral calculation, is doomed to failure. The distress of the other always remains beyond my full perception, no matter how empathetic and attentive I may be.

This gap widens when the “other” is himself incapable of expressing his sense of loss and suffering in terms that I am capable of understanding. This situation, which Lyotard calls differend, limits my ability to respond to his distress, since there is no higher forum in which the gap between different fields of discourse may be bridged. Without a common language, an aggrieved party will often find himself unable to express his position. As Lyotard puts it, “it is in the nature of the victim not to be able to prove that injustice has been caused him.”⁴² When the quality and extent of the loss cannot be articulated, the moral actor has no access to the victim’s subjective state, and the latter is deprived of any hope of redress.