Justification to other people › Using the question precisely

Choose a disagreement and state the relevant permission or requirement in general terms. Describe the positions of those it affects and the reasons each has to object. Then formulate an alternative and ask which burdens that alternative would impose. This keeps the inquiry comparative instead of stopping at the first complaint.

Keep three distinctions visible: an actual objection and a reasonable one; a principle and a convenient exception; a claim about one part of morality and a claim about every value. None of these distinctions produces an answer by itself. Together they make it harder to substitute agreement, power or personal preference for a justification.

Scanlon's central demand is that a defense of conduct answer to other people as holders of reasons. The promise example makes that demand concrete. Your preference for another evening matters, but it has to be considered alongside what you invited your friend to rely on. Moral reasoning begins when both positions receive an answer.