The pure subjectivist must deny that there are standards independent of an individual's perspective according to which his value-judgments can be measured. Yet, this position simply misses the entire purpose of the concept of "value", which is to act as an intersubjective adjudicator, to settle differences of ethical opinion, not to declare them unresolvable. The pure subjectivist is ignorant of Wittgenstein's important injunction against the idea of mental privacy: maybe such evaluative privacy exists, but it certainly could not be the subject of intersubjective communication. "Private value" is a kind of contradiction in terms, and therefore as a definition of value it leads inexorably to nihilism.
We must recognize, therefore, that those who have occasionally flirted with this kind of position have been mistaken to do so. We may concede that when it has reared its head, perhaps in certain "postmodern" circles, this kind of theory has been most unhelpful. However, we must recognize that pure value-objectivism is equally absurd, and that it can slip, unnoticed, under our philosophical radar, leaving us vulnerable to the most stunningly comical arguments.
That human life is itself a misfortune is the conclusion of one value-objectivist, David Benatar. Benatar's work stands as a profound example of what can go wrong when an intellectual culture affords automatic, unquestioning authority to any project that dons the trappings of "science". When objective measurement becomes the goal of value-inquiry, we have already embraced nihilism, because value-objectivism is no less absurd and meaningless than its polar opposite, value-subjectivism.
To see why this is so, consider that a key part of Benatar's argument is devoted to showing that people are mistaken in their retrospective judgments of life's value:
I dare to make such a claim partly because there is excellent empirical evidence for the conclusion that people’s judgements cannot be trusted as a reliable indicator of how good their lives really are. For example, research psychologists have shown that people are prone to optimism and to optimistic (that is, inaccurately positive) assessments of their own lives. There are many manifestations of this phenomenon. People are more prone to remember good experiences than bad ones; they have exaggerated views of how well things will go for them in the future...Note: "how good their lives really are". What must we assume in order to let a phrase like this pass us by? What must we assume in order to think that research psychologists can "show" that people remember more "good" experiences than "bad" ones?
Benatar's work is occasionally reviewed in high-level journals. I count six reviews, all negative, but all engaging with the argument on its own terms. Yet, surely, we should not feel obliged to enter any mode of discussion whatsoever. I, for one, am no more willing to talk about the purely objective value of a human life than I am willing to discuss the existence of a square circle. Any discussion that assumes, right off the bat, a confused and self-contradictory definition of its central concept cannot produce anything worthwhile.
Just as the concept of value loses all meaning when described in terms that give pure priority to the subject and her "private" mental experience, the concept loses all meaning when it no longer makes any contact with that experience. When the "value" of my life is conceptually divorced from the feelings I have about its value, the concept no longer serves one of its essential functions, which is to motivate me to action. We have this word because we need to come to intersubjective agreement about what to do and how to live, and in order for this process to be efficacious at all, we must use the word "value" in ways that allow individuals to be consistently motivated by its use.
Since our motivational system revolves around our deepest and most enduring value-judgments, any definition of value which completely denies any priority to these judgments is just not using the word correctly. For what could possibly be more central to a human motivational system than the judgment that the system itself is valuable or worth preserving?
Note: this does not mean that people must be correct about their deepest value-judgments. This would involve the same mistake that is fatal to a pure subjectivism. However, it does mean that these judgments must posess some de facto authority: that I think my life is valuable must be evidence for its value. Benatar's thesis--that no human life is good--denies all authority to all such judgments, and does so in the name of "science". In doing so, it lapses into incoherence about value, which is the same thing as nihilism.
"God is Dead," wrote Nietzsche, "but given the way of men, there may still be caves for thousands of years in which his shadow will be shown." We understand much when we understand that the idea of "pure objective value" originated in Platonic-Christianity, and that any historical re-iteration of the idea is unlikely to be able to shed the implications that this same tradition had for human life. By pinning the concept of value to an otherworldly, mysterious and unknowable being, the Christian tradition slowly lost the ability to reliably motivate human beings in the actual world and paved the way for a kind of nihilistic disorientation. In the same way, pinning the concept of value to the fantastical chimera of pure scientific observation leads inexorably to nihilism, to an inability to use the word "value" correctly.
Our task, however difficult, is to steer a course between the poles of pure objectivism and pure subjectivism in order to find a way to talk about value that makes contact with subjective impressions while allowing for those impresions to be mistaken or inappropriate. The simple, easy, cowardly way out of this project is to make a god out of "self"... or out of "science".
3 comments:
By pinning the concept of value to an otherworldly, mysterious and unknowable being, the Christian tradition slowly lost the ability to reliably motivate human beings in the actual world and paved the way for a kind of nihilistic disorientation. ... Our task, however difficult, is to steer a course between the poles of pure objectivism and pure subjectivism ...
The problem with "Christian tradition" is not the "pinning ... of value" to God; rather, the problem is that the characteristic of the pinning which has become the tradition is not the only possibility which follows from the notion of a God who in some way, whatever way, is relevant to the matter of value. To be very brief about it, value is traditionally associated with obedience (which might also be described as conformity). However, the traditional notion of obedience is itself dependent upon the idea that even value is a determinate (or wholly prescribed or wholly circumscribed) matter, and related to this presumed need for determinateness are all sorts of other traditional notions about God, such as the notion that the future is always a determinate matter and that there is no change to be associated with God. Accordingly, it could be said that the problem of the pinning of value to God rests with certain erroneous notions about God.
Associating value with God is not in and of itself a problem, because what this association indicates is that there is something about value that is other than the strictly subjective. This something that is other than the wholly subjective is commonly referred to as authority. Authority is, in common parlance, frequently identified with the intersubjectivity of the social (whether imposed or agreed to); however, it often has been recognized, across many cultures and throughout history, that value (and the related if not identical matter of virtue) is not merely a matter of agreement amongst humans.
Were (at least sorts of) indeterminateness to be regarded as compatible with God, then value could be conceived of as not fully expressed and even as not fully formed, certainly in the sense of not having been made fully manifest within Creation. Humans would not be merely created; humans would also be participants in Creation. Value would be something other than, something in addition to, human subjectivity (and intersubjectivity), and, yet, any manifestation of value - and the manner of the manifestation, the shape or form of value - would also be dependent upon human subjectivity.
The issue then becomes a matter of discerning the qualities, the characteristics of the extra-subjective authority so that whatever is to be made manifest by humans is of authoritative rather than only human value. This necessary discernment would be never-ending; it is forever fraught with uncertainty, but this is only to say that value may always only be partly knowable - just as God, if actual, would only be partly knowable. However, one thing worthy of note is the means by which extra-subjective authority becomes at all knowable, and that means would have to be in conjunction with the subjective; otherwise, the extra-subjective would devolve into a wholly alien objective.
Sorry Michael, your description of a working Christian value-discernment system only confirms my point. Human beings cannot pin their deepest committments and ideals to an arcane process that is "fraught with uncertainty". Too often, this process becomes either fantastically removed from earthly reality (thus losing motivational power), or it becomes a vehicle for particular subjects to push their own moral agendas on the rest of us.
It must be said that God does not help things by refusing to arbitrate despite his overwhelmingly sufficient power to do so.
Human beings cannot pin their deepest committments and ideals to an arcane process that is "fraught with uncertainty". Too often, this process becomes either fantastically removed from earthly reality (thus losing motivational power), or it becomes a vehicle for particular subjects to push their own moral agendas on the rest of us.
Even if the process ultimately turns out to be arcane (and in some way successful, of course), that would in no way demonstrate that it were necessarily arcane. In fact, a process which neither demands elimination of the subjective nor minimizes the part (or importance) of the subjective would be a process that would tend to severely downplay the status commonly associated with those called prophets (while, at the same time, not denying the relevance of varying abilities).
As to whether humans can deeply commit to anything fraught with uncertainty, of course they can. In fact, they do so all the time - notwithstanding the bravado or mental gimmickry employed in attempts to not notice the contextual uncertainty. Despite the uncertainty, there can still be commitment to maintain the course of pursuit, and even this commitment can include a willingness to reconsider the course to which commitment has been made.
To the extent that the term "earthly reality" indicates a diminution of the subjective for the sake (maybe the relative comfort) of the intersubjective, then, it is true, that recognition of and commitment to authority (as per the description of authority in my previous comment) can result in a refusal to deprecate the subjective or surrender the self to the earthly as it is. However, this refusal would actually be the opposite of "losing motivational power".
It is also worth noting that a process which encouraged maintenance of the subjective while acknowledging authority as real could be a process which would shy away from the imposition of "moral agendas". After all, as Hannah Arendt noted, authority (of the sort being discussed here) is not and can never be imposed; accordingly, the imposition of moral agendas would amount to an attempt to diminish or eliminate the subjective for the sake of the alien objective and not for the sake of authority.
It must be said that God does not help things by refusing to arbitrate despite his overwhelmingly sufficient power to do so.
Here a reference to the risk of love would handily deflect the common identification of God and power, but my remarks have not been intended to be about the actuality of God. In fact, even if God is actual, reference to God is not even necessary. Whether cast in terms of value(s) or virtue(s), the issue at hand regards the problems had with both "pure objectivism and pure subjectivism" (as well as with pure intersubjectivism) and whether the long common notion of authority could provide some sort of improvement if not a solution. If that type of authority were real, it need not be God, and, if it were God, reference to God would help very little if at all, because the prime issue would still be the matter of how each of us intermingles (so to speak) the subjective and authority to give form to value, to make value manifest in the world.
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