ABSTRACT
This chapter shows how the insight of John Rawls, based on an abstract understanding of the problem of cooperation, produces the only procedure that necessarily ensures cooperative behavior in every situation. It outlines the basic parts of moral theory, called Contractarianism. Since Contractarianism arises from optimal moves in cooperation games, moral patients are anything capable of playing a cooperation game. Contractarianism therefore rejects "ecocentric" moral theories that confer inherent moral value to the environment. If morality is based on agreement to a contract, then it seems like the only objects to which it applies are rational humans, since they are the only ones capable of understanding a contract and agreeing to it. The distinction between primary and secondary goods allows us to determine exactly where moral rules are going to be applicable. Primary goods solve the problem that moral theories like utilitarianism face when they try to compare one person's happiness to another person's suffering.
