Values and the Reality of Problems

Transcription

1 Published in: J. Bransen & M.Slors (eds), The Problematic Reality of Values. Assen: Van Gorcum Publishers, 1996, pp Values and the Reality of Problems JAN BRANSEN, UTRECHT UNIVERSITY I. Introduction That the reality of values is problematic has everything to do with the obscurity that surrounds any idea of the way in which we, embodied, cultivated, sensitive, thinking and acting creatures are involved. In this paper I shall suggest that we have to explore the role we play in the existence of values in three different directions. Though I give no direct arguments for this three-dimensional model of valuing, the paper as a whole can be read as an argument in favour of the distinction between these three different ways of our being involved in the constitution of values. In the following section I shall present my three-dimensional model in outline. Thereupon I shall use the model as a background for an investigation of the kinds of problems an emotivist (who favours, as will become clear, a one-dimensional model of valuing) and a quasi-realist (who favours, as will be argued, a two-dimensional model of valuing) are unable to understand. In conclusion I shall urge the reader to recognize the importance of the philosophical need to determine where to stand on the objectivity-axis, i.e. the axis that maps the dimension concerned with objects that are per se valuable.

2 II. Where do we come in? A three-dimensional model of valuing What is problematic about value realism is the extent to which we, human beings, play a constitutive role in the existence of values, if we understand the latter as putting normative constraints on what should be done. The question actually boils down to whether we are the ultimate sources of the authoritativeness of whatever normative constraint we express, accept or recognize, or the values in whose name we might be said to respect those constraints. Thus, if I am inclined to reprimand my children for making a mess or for needling one another, the problem of value realism concerns the question whether or not I play a constitutive role in the (moral) fact that there are values that put normative constraints on what my children should or should not do. A typical realist will argue (1) that these values or normative reasons for action are simply there whether or not I am aware of them, (2) that they can, at least under ideal conditions, be objectively described independently of my expressing, accepting or recognizing them, and (3) that they spring from the way the world is (meant to be), whether or not I like it that way. 1 A typical anti-realist will disagree with any, or all, of these claims. She will, for instance, argue (1) that there are no values at all: the constraints are imposed by me, merely to release my (dis)approval 2 ; or (2) that their content is essentially dependent on how I express, accept or recognize them 3, or (3) that the constraints are in no way the result of our responding to an independent aspect of reality: it is rather so that by means of endorsing these constraints we project values onto reality. 4 If this picture of the problematic is correct, what we need most is a comprehensive account of where we come in. What do we do when we value something? Just what kind of activity is valuing? What kind of content does it imply and what kind of objects is it about? What I want to suggest in this section is that there is no reason to think there is just one thing we do when we value something. We might come in in at least three different ways, or, to put it differently, valuing is an activity that allows of relevant differences along at least three different axes. Perhaps this implies that it might well be the case that there are three different realism/anti-realism oppositions with respect to values, though I shall not further this suggestion in detail. In the remainder of this section I shall describe the different axes, in 1 See, for instance, the sketch of a realist in Pettit (1991), and in Platts (1979) 2 Cf. the emotivism associated with Stevenson (1946), and the non-cognitivism associated with Ayer (1936) and Hare (1952). 3 Cf. the sensible subjectivism of Wiggins (1987). Most of the more interesting work on value realism investigates possibilities to combine this denial of objectivism with a particular kind of (anthropocentric) realism. See McDowell (1985), Pettit (1991), Slors (forthcoming). 4 Cf. projectivist varieties such as the error-theory of Mackie (1985) and the quasi-realism of Blackburn (1973), (1985), and (1993). [ 2 ]

3 order to give an impression of the great variety of things we might be thought to do when we value something, and, by the same token, of the great variety of relations we might be thought to have with the objects we value. It will be clear from the picture I shall present, that the differences I suggest are grounded both in what I take to be commonsensical considerations concerning the way we talk about our practice of evaluation, and in what I take to be the mental make-up minimally required by the kind of evaluating agents we are. I assume, without argument 5, that an evaluative judgement presents an object as being related in a certain way to the agent who makes the judgement. I take this to suggest that there are at least three different questions that seem to be relevant. There is, to begin with, a question about the origin of the relation presented. If I value the way Jack Nicholson acts in Wolf, we might wonder whether Jack Nicholson s performance occasioned my admiration, whether my taste for detail occasioned the fact that I am struck by Jack Nicholson s performance, or whether none (or both) of these play a significant role in the genesis of my evaluative judgement. Next, there is a question about what the relation presented tells us about the agent. If I value the well-being of my children, we might wonder whether or not this tells us anything about my dispositions to care for them. And, finally, there is, by the same token, a question about what the relation presented tells us about the object presented. If I value the beauty of the Sistine chapel, we might wonder whether or not, and how, this tells us anything about the aesthetic quality of Michelangelo s painting. I shall in what follows suggest that these three kinds of questions are best construed as questions that concern different dimensions of valuing. I The projective-receptive dimension The first dimension is characterised by what I shall call the projection-axis which describes a continuum that ranges from an activity that is radically receptive to an activity that is radically projective. The receptive extreme, according to which the origin of the content of an evaluative judgement is external to the evaluating agent, is associated with a realist kind of activity such as discovering. The projective extreme, according to which the origin of the content of an evaluative judgement is the evaluating agent herself, is associated with an anti-realist kind of activity such as inventing. The idea is that we can think of valuing as an activity that consists, according to one extreme interpretation, in a radically passive awareness of a value that is given with knowing the valued object. This gives us interpretation (1): 5 But see: denk na, maar zie Searle, Pettit, Aquila, Judge, Dennett?, Smith? [ 3 ]

4 (1) I value X = I am aware of the value of X According to the other extreme interpretation along this axis we can think of valuing as an activity that consists in a radically active projection of value onto an object, without any inkling of the properties of the thing that would make it valuable in itself. This gives us interpretation (2): (2) I value X = I project value onto X Let me stress that both extremes function as limiting concepts, giving meaning to a dimension on which to map certain features of our evaluative activities and the associated evaluative judgements. The complete absence of the relevance of anyone s interest in the valued object that follows from interpretation (1) should be understood as a limit that could be approached but cannot be reached. And the same holds on the other side: the complete absence of the relevance of the properties of the valued object that follows from interpretation (2) is such a limit as well. Think of an absolutely unconcerned awareness of the beauty of the flora of the Spanish Pyrenees as a kind of valuing that nears the former extreme, and of the blind love for a disgusting bastard as a kind of valuing that nears the latter. II The obliging-noncommittal dimension The second dimension is characterised by what I shall call the motivation-axis which describes a continuum that ranges from an activity that is radically noncommittal to an activity that is radically obliging. This continuum differs from the one discussed above, although the two are often conflated. But the point of the motivation-axis is not to shed light on our role in the genesis of evaluative judgements with cognitively accessible contents, but on our role in enabling these contents to be normatively constraining. The idea is that we can think of valuing as an activity that consists, according to one extreme, in a radically noncommittal recognition of the value of an object without any inclination to pursue it. This gives us interpretation (3): (3) I value X = I noncommittally recognize that X is valuable According to the other extreme along this axis we can think of valuing as an activity that consists in radically being motivated to respect and follow a normative constraint, whether [ 4 ]

5 or not this constraint has its origin in a value existing outside of my motivation. This gives us interpretation (4): (4) I value X = I am motivationally constrained to pursue or defend X Again it is important to stress that both extremes function as limiting concepts, giving meaning to a dimension on which to map certain features of our evaluative activities and the associated evaluative judgements. The complete absence of any motivational feature that follows from interpretation (3) is a limit that could be approached but cannot be reached, just as the complete absence of an external dimension of a normative constraint that follows from interpretation (4). Think of the recognition of the value of a delicious piece of pastry you notice late at night after more than enough drinks and refreshments as a kind of valuing that nears the former extreme, and of the wholehearted urge to finish a paper on value realism as a kind of valuing that nears the latter. III The analytic-arbitrary dimension The third dimension is characterised by what I shall call the objectivity-axis which describes a continuum that ranges from an evaluation that is purely a matter of (tautological) words to an evaluation that is purely a matter of (private, privileged) taste. As will be evident from the argument I shall develop in the next section, this dimension is, unjustifiedly, most easily neglected in discussions on value realism, or supposed to be not really an independent dimension differing from (one of) the others. Perhaps the best way to get an idea of it is by taking a close look at evaluative judgements from a grammatical point of view. Ordinarily, a judgement contains a subject term and a predicate term. The first is used to pick out the object the judgement is about in an unproblematic way, and the second is used to subsume the object under a concept; in the case of evaluative judgements typically a moral, or otherwise evaluatively significant, concept. If the subject term of a particular evaluative judgement is itself an evaluative term, the subsumption brought about by the judgement is, as far as its evaluative function is concerned, purely an analytic affair; tautologically true but devoid of any information. To maintain that the villain over there is a bad guy, is not to say very much. The point of such a statement is most likely rhetorical; to compromise the audience by making them coresponsible for unproblematically picking out that man over there as a villain. Because of the words used the judgement is likely to be understood as objectively true, but, of course, its objectivity is merely a consequent of the inner structure of its own content. [ 5 ]

6 If, on the other hand, the subject term of a particular evaluative judgement is purely descriptive (granted that this is understood as implying that the subject term is absolutely devoid of any evaluative content), the subsumption brought about by the judgement might, as far as its evaluative function is concerned, be considered to be a purely arbitrary affair; highly informative but without any ground in the object picked out by the subject term. To maintain that this dime, which is a dime a dozen, is the most precious coin you have ever seen, is not to say something very intelligible. If you are not inclined to explain what you are trying to say, people are most likely to shrug their shoulders, saying if they are kind that there is no arguing about taste. To sum up, the idea is that we identify the objects we value, according to one extreme, only by means of value terms. This implies that these objects are analytically valuable, not because of some substantial truth concerning their intrinsic value, but just because of the fact that the object has to be identified by means of a term that implies its being valuable. This gives us interpretation (5): (5) I value X = I identify X as, inherently, valuable According to the other extreme along this axis the objects we value are merely arbitrarily valuable, not because of an acknowledged fact that they lack intrinsic value, but just because their initial identification makes use only of purely neutral terms. This gives us interpretation (6): (6) I value X = I am struck by the value of X Once more both extremes function as limiting concepts, giving meaning to a dimension on which to map certain features of our evaluative activities and the associated evaluative judgements. The radical impossibility to identify a valuable object without referring to their valuable aspects that follows from interpretation (5) should be understood as a limit that could be approached but cannot be reached, just as the radical possibility to identify a valuable object without referring at all to their valuable aspects that follows from interpretation (6). Think of the Platonic Good as the paradigm of an analytically valuable object, and, speaking strictly for myself, of a mathematical proof as an object that nears the extreme of an arbitrarily valuable object. [ 6 ]

7 A B a analytic priori C D projective noncommittal obliging receptive E F contingent arbitrary G H Figure 1 It will be evident from the fact that I have grouped these interpretations in couples of opposites around three different axes, that I think we can imagine a three-dimensional account of the act of valuing, as depicted in Figure 1. The idea of the figure will be intuitively clear: valuing is apparently a broadly defined activity, which means that any particular case of valuing can be located in the three-dimensional space characterised by the projection-, the motivation- and the objectivity-axis. That is, though paradigmatic evaluative judgements are, according to the model, most likely to be situated near the center, displaying receptive and projective, noncommittal and obliging, analytic and arbitrary features, we can easily imagine cases of valuing that are situated near one of the edges, displaying, for example, a strikingly [ 7 ]

8 projective character, or, to give another example, a remarkable combination of both obliging and arbitrary features. Of course the model can be debated. One might argue, for example, that some of the corners are bound to be empty; or that the distinction between the three axes is not clear; that there are merely two; or that one of them is erroneously characterised by misleading or implausible extremes. An exhaustive defense of the model should obviously answer such objections. This paper, however, aims not to defend the model; it merely intends to explore it. In the next section I shall continue my exploration in a rather indirect way: by using the three-dimensional model to help us understand the way in which particular meta-ethical positions concerning the reality of values make it (im)possible to recognize specific problems that arise in quite ordinary situations in which we find ourselves forced to engage in evaluative practices. III. Problems worth having There is, of course, a large class of meta-ethical problems that concern the meaning of the noun value and the verb to value ; problems that play the first fiddle in that desperate dispute between realists and anti-realists so nicely characterised by John Heil as a family quarrel in which outsiders are apt to find enthusiasm disproportionate to substance. 6 Such problems concern the (un)intelligibility and/or the (ir)reducibility of any or all of the interpretations I have put forward in the previous section. In what follows I shall approach these problems only from an indirect angle. As I have already emphasized, I am not going to pay attention to the pros and cons of my three-dimensional model. Instead I shall use it to explore the kinds of problems people may encounter if (1) they do not have any metaethical problem and (2) come across someone who disagrees with one of their value judgements. To make the topic manageable, I shall discuss the fortunes of an emotivist, convinced by Ayer 7 to have no meta-ethical problems, and of a quasi-realist, convinced by Blackburn that there is no reason to worry about meta-ethical issues. 8 6 Heil (1989) p Ayer (1936), chapter 6. 8 Blackburn (1993) [ 8 ]

9 I. How to disagree with an emotivist? Take Archie. Archie has read Ayer s Language, Truth and Logic and he has come to believe that he does not have any meta-ethical problem with the meaning of the noun value and the verb to value. If he values something he has positive, approving feelings towards the thing, and a tendency to show these feelings. They might be written all over his face, or, if he is in a communicative mood, he might evince them by the words he uses. From Archie s point of view there is no significant difference between saying You stole that money in a peculiar tone of horror and saying You acted wrongly in stealing that money. 9 The use of moral, or aesthetic, terms such as right, wrong, good or beautiful is merely to give expression to the kind of (dis-)approving feelings one has. It is, actually, not very clear what Archie thinks he does when he values something. His having certain feelings might sometimes seem to be all there is to his valuing, but at other times, it seems as if part of the valuing consists in expressing feelings, or arousing them to stimulate action. Part of the unclarity is due to the fact that it is, on Humean grounds, often taken for granted that the having of feelings entails the having of motivating reasons for action. This Humean background leads to the view that Archie can be understood as favouring intrepretation (4) introduced above: (4) I value X = I am motivationally constrained to pursue or defend X It is important to stress that Archie did not solve his meta-ethical problems in terms of my three-dimensional model of valuing. He has read only one chapter of Ayer s early book, from which he has remembered the problem as being one-dimensional: either moral language states propositional facts, or it is used to express feelings of moral (dis)approval. This implies that Archie s understanding of what he does in valuing is actually both more and less specific than interpretation (4) suggests. We can bring this to the fore by means of the following reformulation: (4*) I value X = I am emotionally constrained to pursue and defend X This is more specific because the constraint is supposed to flow from emotions; but it is less specific because it is not explicitly recognized that evincing a feeling implies being 9 Ayer (1936), p. 30 [ 9 ]

10 motivated to respect and follow a normative constraint; a constraint that might be the object of cognition. I shall return to this difference in my discussion of the quasi-realist. Let us find out the problems Archie is (un)able to address by imagining a dispute between Archie and Bob that results from the former s tendency to wear his heart on his sleeve. This time Archie upsets his pal by complaining Hey, you can t afford to work that slow!, to which Bob replies Why? Just you wait and see. I m doing all right. A row results. Suppose their disagreement lingers on, and late at night Bob is thinking for himself how on earth he will be able to explain to Archie what is troubling him. Well, how will he? The first thing to notice is that Archie will be unable to accept that they were having a dispute about values. As he has learned from Ayer, Archie never questions the appropriateness of his or anyone else s feelings. Those are just to occur. If there is an argument, it has to be about the facts. 10 But which facts? One possibility for Bob is to think that Archie refers to some kind of standard imposed by their boss or established by mutual agreement; a standard constraining the speed with which they should proceed. But of course, as Bob knows for sure, there is no such standard, at least not in a way that would make Archie s complaint some kind of ordinary sociological proposition. In maintaining that he was doing all right, Bob was, therefore, not making a statement about such a standard known to both to regulate their job. If, however, we want to maintain that somehow Bob was referring to such a standard, we have to think of his words as proposing the appropriateness of a standard to regulate the performances of both men. This standard might, accordingly, be used both to articulate the value of Bob s productivity, and to determine the (in)approriateness of Archie s feelings. That is, Bob realizes that Archie s conviction that disputes can only be structured as implying that one of the opponents must be mistaken about the facts, makes it impossible for Archie to understand the kind of problem that troubles Bob. For part of Bob s contribution to their disagreement should not be understood as merely expressing feelings, nor as arousing feelings, nor as stimulating actions, but as an attempt to point to a standard or value that should regulate their job and the appropriateness of their (dis)approving feelings. And the point is not that Bob wants this standard to be established in order to prevent or resolve future disagreements, but also because he thinks he is right in behaving right now as if this standard is already governing the suitability of their actual performances and feelings. 10 ibid. p. 33 [ 10 ]

11 We might use my three-dimensional model to explain Bob s misery. Bob is unable to point out to Archie what troubles him, because, being an emotivist, Archie is unable to understand the projective-receptive dimension. This is the dimension that considers the consequences of the fact that valuing implies the positing of particular entities, values, that are not merely noncommittal state of affairs nor merely motivating feelings. They are standards, or measures; instruments by means of which we seem to translate immediately perceivable properties of things that do not as such figure in an evaluative domain into properties or aspects that do figure in evaluations. We might compare this with the standard metre in Paris, which is an instrument to translate, or better, articulate the immediately perceivable, natural length of a thing by means of a metric length. Of course, this comparison is tricky, since it is clear that the natural lengths of things are lengths, and the standard metre merely a semantic convention to give a name to these lengths, i.e. to articulate their natural value in terms of metric values. But in the case of moral or aesthetic values we should at least allow for the possibility of a, perhaps very weak, supervening relationship between the properties that do not figure in an evaluative domain and those that do. Granted even the radically projective possibility that the so-called natural (that is in this case non-evaluative) properties of a thing play no role whatsoever in the determination of its evaluative aspects, the standard Bob might be thinking of can be understood in this way: as a device to regulate his and his pal s behaviour by appreciating this behaviour from a new perspective, namely by focusing on its evaluative qualifications that might either be read into or read from it. 11 Well, Bob s misery might be serious, if he is ready to credit Archie with the sincere inability to understand the idea of a moral fact. For it will turn Bob into someone who has to explain the difference between a circle and a square to somebody who is only acquianted with the one-dimensional lines that would remain by looking at circles and squares from aside. And that is indeed what happens, for Archie knows well how to reply. Bob s problem, he says, is not a real moral or ethical problem. In the end it s a problem of clashing ideologies, of incommensurable upbringings. 12 He, Archie, is ready to accept that it is impossible to argue with Bob on these matters, and he, Archie, feels at home with the feelings he has, and he would even understand it if Bob would suggest that that means that he, Archie, feels his own system of values to be superior, but according to Archie that is redundant. For it 11 This is not a new criticism of the non-cognitivist position. Mackie s attempt, for instance, to dissociate his cognitivist, anti-realist error theory of values from Hare s non-cognitivist, anti-realist prescriptivism, might be said to have been motivated by the awareness of a relevant distinction between the projective-receptive dimension and the noncommittal-obliging dimension. Cf. Mackie (1977), chapter Cf. Ayer (1936), pp [ 11 ]

12 means nothing more than that Archie feels well if he feels well. And indeed he does!, he says, with a smile on his face. Bob sighs, for the time being unable to point out to Archie the qualitative difference implied by the distinction between first- and second-order feelings; that is, between feeling well in particular circumstances, and feeling well about the fact of feeling well in those circumstances. I think it is only natural to sympathize with Bob and to urge him not to credit Archie with his apparent intellectual handicap. The ordinary use of moral language as well as the phenomenology of value suggest that Archie could only have reached his position after he read Ayer (1936), and it is evident that there should be a sharp distinction between explaining away certain problems and being unable to recognize them. It is clear, I take it, that moral problems are not merely ideological problems, but I shall not dwell upon this point here for there is more to learn from another misfortune. II. How to disagree with a quasi-realist? Mabel has learned a great deal from Simon Blackburn s writings. She has gradually come to think of herself as a quasi-realist anti-realist by birth, she has learned to understand that it is harmless both (1) to think that values are projected onto the natural world, i.e. that we understand everything there is to be known about them if we think of them as posits that follow from our sentimental attitude towards the world, and (2) to think that truth is the aim of judgement; that our disciplines make us better able to appreciate it, that it is, however, independent of us, and that we are fallible in our grasp of it. 13 Mabel knows exactly what she does when she values something. To begin with she ordinarily expresses an attitude towards the thing she values, judging it to be valuable, to be worth respecting, pursuing, defending. But there is more than that. Mabel can think quite well of her performances of valuing as performances of knowing something, a standard, constraint or obligation (if not to say a value) and as evaluating a particular thing, action or state of affairs in the light of this standard. Thus, Mabel can think of valuing as an act of noncommittally recognizing that something is valuable, as in counterfactual statements like even if we had approved of it or enjoyed it or desired to do it, bear-baiting would still have been wrong. 14 Knowing a standard, however, does not mean perceiving, describing, or responding to an independent aspect of reality. The standards she might be said to know in 13 Blackburn (1993), p Blackburn (1985): (1993), p. 153 [ 12 ]

13 an act of valuing are projected onto the world by propositional reflections. Such a reflection is a statement that makes claims about attitudes in the guise of a claim about states of affairs, their interrelations, and their logic. 15 Thus, Mabel might value a particular chaise longue, even though she could not imagine herself to approve of having such a piece of furniture, and even though she actually thinks that they are all awful. All she does in such an act of valuing is making a claim about an attitude of approval that connects certain beliefs (e.g. that there are properties a chaise longue should have to deserve admiration; that this specimen has these properties) with certain attitudes (e.g. being fond of Louis Quatorze interiors, and admiring this particular piece of furniture). We might conclude that Mabel favours interpretations (2), (3), and (4), as introduced in the previous section. By means of (2) (2) I value X = I project value onto X she might be said to escape from the patently unacceptable consequences of (3) and (4). That is, since knowing a standard means, for Mabel, focusing upon the consequences of a sentimental attitude, she can accept (3) I value X = I noncommittally recognize that X is valuable without thereby accepting the complete absence of any motivational feature. Likewise, since propositional reflections enable Mabel to use notions like truth, belief, and implication, she can accept (4) I value X = I am normatively constrained to pursue or defend X without thereby accepting the complete absence of an external dimension of normative constraints. One is likely to suspect, and rightly so, that I am under the impression that Mabel did not solve her meta-ethical problems in terms of my three-dimensional model of valuing. Since Mabel is not aware, as I shall argue, of the analytic-arbitrary dimension, there will be a difference between my understanding of (2) and hers. This parallels the difference between my (and Mabel s) understanding of (4) and Archie s understanding of (4) as equivalent to 15 Blackburn (1973): (1993), p [ 13 ]

14 (4*); that is, between Archie s tendency to think period after being motivated by a feeling, and our awareness of the fact that being motivated by a feeling implies being motivated to respect and follow a normative constraint that might be the object of cognition. Let s find out more about Mabel s understanding of (2), by imagining a conflict between her and Hannah. Both are sensitive women, inclined to respect one another s views to a considerable extent, and liable to avoid delicate subjects. The following, painfully clear difference of opinion was hit upon just by accident. They were talking about life, their jobs, their plans, and the like, and all of a sudden Mabel confesses that she is so happy with her job that she cannot imagine herself without this job. Just, think of me, she says, having children!, and a rippling of horror passes over her face. But then, there is this icy stare in Hannah s eyes, and with a trembling voice she tells Mabel that only five days ago she has had a miscarriage. There is much to be said, but eventually much left unsaid. As Hannah lies in her bed, thinking of possibilities to return to the topic and to explain her frustration, she wonders what, in effect, remained unsaid. For perhaps everything was said, Hannah fears, but yet there is this nagging feeling that Mabel did not understand her. Somehow it seems to Hannah as if Mabel was unable to grasp what she, Hannah, was talking about. For it is clear, to Hannah, that she was not talking about just one of a number of alternative courses her life might have taken if she did not had this miscarriage. There is no way, for Hannah, to think of her being a mother and having children without the absolutely clear awareness of the precious value of such a possible state of affairs. And it was so damn evident that Mabel was unable to follow her in this respect. She just did not know what they were talking about! Hannah is convinced that Mabel must be wrong if she would argue that they were talking about the possibility of having children and about hers and Hannah s sentimental attitude to such a possible state of affairs. Mabel must be wrong if she would argue that Hannah was projecting value onto being a mother by means of a propositional reflection that would further the claim that she, Hannah, has an attitude of approval that connects certain beliefs about being a mother with certain attitudes towards having children. Hannah knows that Mabel must be wrong in this way, because she, Hannah, has seen a feature of having children that is its valuability. Of course Hannah is ready to admit that she herself plays a crucial role in this discovery. It is clear that one has to be in a certain position to discover [ 14 ]

15 the value of being a mother, but the same is true of discovering that tomatoes are red, as she is suddenly happy to remember from her philosophy classes. 16 We might use my three-dimensional model of valuing to explain Hannah s sadness. Hannah is unable to point out to Mabel what makes her feel desolated, because, being a quasirealist, Mabel is unable to understand the analytic-arbitrary dimension. This is the dimension that considers the consequences of the fact that valuing implies not merely the relevance of motivating feelings and applicable standards but also the presence of valuable objects. These are objects that one way or another are identified by the valuing subject as having valuable properties, that is, as being subsumed under moral, or otherwise evaluatively significant, concepts. It is definitely clear to Hannah that the valuing attitude plays a crucial role in the identification of the object she is talking about, in such a way that it is impossible to think of this object without being aware of its value. This might, in terms of the analytic-arbitrary dimension, be thought of as something to be located on a continuum that ranges from this being a purely analytic consequence of the language used to identify the object as an object for thought, to this being a purely arbitrary consequence of the way in which the valuing subject thinks of this object. This is not the same as saying that the role of the valuing subject in the identification of the object consists in the projecting of a value onto this object, whether this is conceived as presupposing a nominalistic labelling of this object with value-laden terms, or as presupposing the inimitable assumptions of the valuing subject s taste with respect to this object. No, there is no this object independent of the value it has. The role of the valuing attitude is not one of actively, creatively inventing the possibility of this object as valuable, but instead one of passively, contemplatively being struck by its actual value. If one is not aware of this value, as Mabel apparently isn t, then one is not at all thinking of this particular object, but merely of another object sufficiently like the valued one to provoke disagreement. There is no need to fear an incredible proliferation of objects that might be implied by this line of reasoning. For there is no such proliferation, at least not in a queer way. The point is that Hannah is talking about and thinking of herself, Hannah, being pregnant, giving birth to a child, and being a mother. And this alternative of herself is per se valuable. But what is Mabel talking about? Most likely she is not talking about or thinking of anything that concrete. Of course, her initial exclamation was about herself, Mabel, having children, but during the painful conversation that followed, she proved unable to think with sufficient clarity of Hannah s mothership as if it were her own and still valuable. Consequently, her 16 Cf. the substantial literature on the topic of response-dependence and the parallel between values and secondary qualities. McDowell (1985), Wiggins (1987), Johnston (1989) and (1993), and Pettit (1991). [ 15 ]

16 words turned out to be about something more abstract, the mothership of a working woman near the end of the twentieth century, or something like that. It is sufficiently like Hannah s mothership to provoke disagreement, but it isn t the valuable object. This is not meant to be an argument against quasi-realism. At least not yet, and not as such. My approach so far is not meta-ethical. I am exploring possible problems that follow from our evaluative practices, and our question now is: Should Hannah credit Mabel with her intellectual handicap, with her sincere inability to understand the idea of a valuable object? If Hannah does, her desolation will linger on. It will turn her into someone who has to explain the difference between a sphere and a cylinder to someone who is only acquianted with the two-dimensional circles that would remain by looking at spheres and cylinders from exactly one perspective (if the cylinder stands right up, this is the prespective from above). For Mabel will continue to believe that there is, from whatever natural point of view, no difference at all between this or that mothership. And, if forced, she will even argue that Hannah might discover this for herself by thinking of her, Mabel s, mothership, recognizing that the value she might think of as being essential to this object is definitely projected onto it by Hannah s inability to take sufficient distance from her own painfully thwarted desire for a child. Of course, Hannah s response that Mabel is unable to perceive the real value of her own possible mothership because she is unwilling to take sufficient distance from her present preferences, is in vain. Well, what should we do? Is it again, analogous to our sympathy for Bob, only natural to sympathize with Hannah and urge her not to credit Mabel with her apparent intellectual handicap? Is it evident that Mabel could only have reached her position after being exposed to the indoctrinating rhetoric of Simon Blackburn? Is it evident from our ordinary use of moral language as well as from the phenomenology of value that Mabel is explaining away certain problems she used to be able to recognize very well? These are pressing questions. I think that it is indeed a consequence of Mabel s philosophical training that she holds the views she has, but that is not, of course, to say that she has unjustifiably explained away a real problem. It might well be that her philosophical training has learned her how to solve, or, rather, dissolve, what seemed, from a commonsensical point of view, to be more than just a problem of disturbed communication. That is, there might be a sense in which Mabel s intellectual maturity makes her able to understand why there seems to be a problem for Hannah whereas there is none. I suspect that we are all familiar with this phenomenon, i.e. with those terrible discussions with [ 16 ]

17 someone who fails to see that there is no problem other than those generated by the obscurity of the other s thought. However, my difficulty with this line of thought is that it puts the entire load on Hannah s shoulders. And from our, for the sake of argument preferably impartial, point of view, it is not obvious that we should look at Hannah s and Mabel s predicament in that way. For I am quite certain that we are all familiar with a related phenomenon in which the roles are reversed, i.e. with those equally terrible discussions with someone who is too stubborn to accept that there is a problem neither of us has an evident solution for. My inclination on this score is to think that we, looking as it were from the outside to the situation I have put Hannah and Mabel in, know that they will have to cope with the fact that there are problems they cannot solve, and that this forces us to determine which problems we prefer them to understand as problems, and which we prefer them to solve? Or, to put it this way, we have to determine whether we prefer to confront Mabel with the meta-ethical problem of being unable to give a comprehensive account of the idea of a valuable object, or Hannah with the practical problem of having no words for what she knows she has to say? And, though I must confess that there is a perfectly reasonable cynical interpretation of what I am about to say both for reasons of distributive justice and for reasons of solidarity I am inclined to think we should indeed sympathize with Hannah and confront Mabel with the meta-ethical problem. For even if we grant Hannah the words she needs, even if we grant her the claim that besides thinking of values in terms of motives (i.e. recognizing the noncommittal-obliging dimension) and thinking of values in terms of normative constraints (i.e. recognizing the projective-receptive dimension), it is possible as well to think of values in terms of valuable objects (i.e. recognizing the analyticarbitrary dimension), this will not have the effect of relieving Hannah of her difficulties. For, though this manoevre will confront Mabel with the meta-ethical problem, it will confront Hannah too with the meta-ethical problem of having to account for the idea of an object that is per se valuable. That, then, will give both women one problem, which, from a distributive point of view, only seems fair. Moreover, it will give them the same problem, and that, too, seems a good thing to do in times of sadness, desolation, and disagreement. Of course, it will force them to engage in the practice of philosophy which is, admittedly, not an unqualifiedly positive predicament, and, that too, not a place to find much unanimity. [ 17 ]

18 III. Concluding remarks, or, how to become a philosopher? An objector might ask why Hannah would run into the meta-ethical problem. Could she not learn enough from Mabel s successfully overcoming of the unacceptable consequences of both the emotivist and the noncommittal naturalist extremes? That is, would it not be possible for Hannah to imitate Mabel and to further an interpretation of valuing by means of which she would escape from the patently unacceptable consequences of interpretation (1) and (2)? Such an objection would amount to something like the following. Granted that Hannah is able to identify valuable objects by Q-ing, she would be able to accept (1) I value X = I am aware of the value of X without thereby accepting the complete absence of the relevance of anyone s interest in the valuable object, as well as (2) I value X = I project value onto X without thereby accepting the complete absence of the relevance of the properties of the valuable object. The trouble, for Hannah, of course is that, so far, she has not the faintest idea what Q-ing is supposed to mean. All she can do is identify objects, some of which are per se valuable. That much is evident. But she has no idea how she does it. She is unable to give an account of what she does in valuing being a mother. She just does! A quietist realist 17 might take part in the discussion here by emphasizing the exclamation mark, arguing that there is no need for an explanation of the obvious. After all, do you know how to open a door, or how to move your arm, or how to identify a dog, or your mother? You just do! And I am ready to accept that these how-do-you-do questions most of the time have this typical, terrible philosopher s-question flavour that makes it so hard for philosophers to be taken seriously in the ordinary world of common sense. But sometimes one might suddenly see the point of such a question, as, for example, in the case of identifying a murderer, or in determining whether or not he was responsible, or that too in some cases of identifying the value of particular objects! 17 Cf. Slors (forthcoming) [ 18 ]

19 For remember that Hannah is not just unhappy because she discovered an unbridgable difference of opinion between her and Mabel, but that she is unhappy as well because of her recognition of the fact that Mabel mistook her awareness of the value of being a mother for a projection of value onto being a mother, a projection that was supposed to follow from her attitude towards having a baby. But Hannah is convinced that her valuing being a mother is at least as much like being aware of the value of having children as like projecting value onto the having of children. If it is true that she comes in somewhere, and that must be true if she is not just favouring interpretation (1), it is not in the projecting of values, but in the way of identifying valuable objects. But this means, and here she will discover that she has to become a philosopher, that she is bound to develop a view about interpretations (5) and (6) (5) I value X = I identify X as, intrinsically, valuable (6) I value X = I am struck by the value of X That is, Hannah cannot remain quite. She cannot permit not to take position on the objectivity-axis. She must develop an account of what it means to identify valuable objects, an account that will help her understand, and allow her to explain, that what she does is not merely like playing with (analytically true) tautologies, nor merely like hiding behind a privileged (arbitrarily true) taste. She must accept that not being able to explain the obvious might be a position to end up with anyway, but it cannot be a position to begin with. This is not any more the place to discuss plausible positions on the objectivity-axis. A response-dependence theorist such as Philip Pettit will favour interpretation (5). He will take it to imply some kind of anthropocentrism, 18 and I can imagine that Blackburn has a point in saying that this will either lead to some unacceptable ad hoc conservatism or some indefensible vacuous truism. I, however, would prefer to defend a skeptic interpretation of anthropocentrism, which would amount to the recognition of the intrinsically problematic character of any position on the objectivity-axis. 19 Obviously, this does not mean the same as preferring, with the quasi-realist, a twodimensional model of valuing, discarding the analytic-arbitrary dimension altogether. As I 18 See, for instance, Pettit (1991), and Pettit (1993). 19 Cf. Blackburn s remarks in his (1993), pp. 9-10, and my (1994). I argue for the skeptic interpretation of contemporary anthropocentrism in my (1995). [ 19 ]

20 hope I have made clear, I prefer philosophical problems to unbridgable differences of opinion This paper would not have existed, and my views would not have turned out the way they have, if Marc Slors would not have stimulated me on many occasions to think about and write on the problematic of value realism. The paper has profited as well from the opportunity I had to present it at the Department of Philosophy of the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, particularly because of the stimulating and penetrating comments given by Richard Aquila on that occasion. [ 20 ]

21 Literature Ayer, Alfred (1936) Blackburn (1973) Blackburn, Simon (1985) Language, Truth and Logic (London, 1936). References are to the reprint of chapter 6 in Essays in Moral Realism, ed. G. Sayre-McCord (Ithaca, 1988) Moral Realism in Morality and Moral Reasoning, ed. J. Casey (Methuen, London, 1973). Reprinted in Blackburn (1993). Pagenumbers referred to are those of Blackburn (1993). Errors and the Phenomenology of Value in Morality and Objectivity, ed. T. Honderich (Routledge KP, London, 1985). Reprinted in Blackburn (1993) Page-numbers referred to are those of Blackburn (1993). Blackburn, Simon (1993) Essays in Quasi-Realism (Oxford, 1993) Bransen, Jan (1994) Anthropocentrism in Favourable Circumstances, in Inquiry, Vol. 37, Sept. 1994, pp Bransen, Jan (1995) Contemporary Anthropocentrism, Salomon Maimon, and the Problem of Experience, Proceedings of the 8th International Kant Congress, Vol. II,1 (Marquette University Press, 1995), pp Hare, Richard M. (1952) The Language of Morals (Clarendon Oxford, 1952) Heil, John (1989) Johnston, Mark (1989) Johnston, Mark (1993) Recent Work in Realism and Anti-Realism, in Philosophical Books, Vol. XXX, 2, pp Dispositional Theories of Value, in Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Supp. 63, pp Objectivity Refigured: Pragmatism Without Verificationism, in Reality, Representation, and Projection, eds. J. Haldane & C. Wright (Oxford, 1993) Mackie, John L. (1977) Ethics. Inventing Right and Wrong (Penguin, 1977) McDowell, John (1985) Values and Secondary Qualities, in Morality and Objectivity, ed. T. Honderich (Routledge KP, London, 1985). Reprinted in Sayre- McCord (1988). Pettit, Philip (1991) Realism and Response-Dependence, in Mind, Vol. C, 4, pp Pettit, Philip (1993) Platts, Mark (1979) The Common Mind. An Essay on Psychology, Society and Politics, (Oxford, 1993) Moral Reality, chp. 10 of Mark Platts Ways of Meaning (Routledge KP, London, 1979). Reprinted in Sayre-McCord (1988). Syre-McCord, Geoffrey (1988) ed. Essays in Moral Realism (Ithaca, 1988) Slors, Marc (1996) Against the Need for a Separate Ontology of Values, in The Problematic Reality of Values, J. Bransen & M. Slors (eds.) (Van Gorcum, Assen, 1996), pp Stevenson, Charles (1946) Ethics and Language (Yale, New Haven, 1946) Wiggins, David (1987) Needs, Values, Truth (Basil Blackwell, Oxford, 1987) [ 21 ]