Life's "ultimate meaning", and the value of money

[The_Exodus]

This is one of those conversations that use big words and quickly drifts off into a philosophy I don’t understand.

I have no idea what points either of you are making

It’s difficult to follow because Touchstone seems to continually talk out of both sides of his mouth. Some examples:

touchstone:

To live as if it did is to invest meaning…Behold the parallel:To live life as if it had meaning IS to give it meaning.

post 23

VS

touchstone:

Apprehension or observation don’t matter. If something obtains objectively, it obtains independently of mind or will. The reality exists without any dependency on a subject, on the will, choice or mind of anything.

post 54

In the first place, he claims that we can “give” something to human existence by willing it, so to speak, or some sort of vague terminology employed by pragmatism. In the second place, he readily admits that if something obtains (e.g. value) it obtains independently of mind or will.

Now, his point may very well be that therefore value does not obtain except in the mind or will of the subject. But, if this is what he maintains, he is merely reaffirming the theists point, that therefore “value” is a relative term, and no one’s values are truly (i.e. objectively, independent of human mind or will) more “right” or “wrong” than another. This is fine, if he believes this, but it entails nihilism, and also means he cannot give a reason why he is any more right than anyone else, except due to the arbirary fact that he “feels” differently.

He further raises a red herring having to do with value dependent on God’s mind and will, but doesn’t understand that “an objective thing” is predicated convertibly with “an existent thing,” and therefore values are just as objective as material reality, on the supposition that God, who is existence itself, wills them to exist.

Another example:

touchstone:

Language is difficult. It’s better when we have practical referents to work with… but if we press in a deconstructive way on what you mean by “intrinsic”, it because patent handwaving and incoherent, meaningless terms, very quickly (like immediately).

post 24

VS

touchstone:

It’s as incoherent on your views as it is on mine, you are just (and this is common so take heart) bewitched by the lazy language and thinking of Catholic apologetics. You use “objective” where you actually, demonstrably mean “subjective”.

In the first place, he claims that language is “difficult.” But what does he mean? He demands a sort of exhaustive, irreducibly concrete definition from theists concerning their terms, but he simply gives “language is difficult” as sufficient to support his entire philosophy (which is postivistic and materialistic.)

In the second place, he again inherently admits what he denies, i.e. that language can lead to truth or certainty, by asserting that “lazy” language is responsible for “bewitching” these two incoherent views (one of which he claims is his own). But if this is true, and if language cannot give us truth, what can he mean when he speaks, or when he asserts a thing as true? What can he be denying in his denials, if not that what is asserted if false, and therefore not true?

These are just two examples though. He further appeals to pragmatism (i.e. “what works”), as an end alone, sufficient in and of itself for all human actions and knowledge. Yet he fails to realize that the concept of “end” presupposes an end which is “known.” Thus he does not account for how this knowledge is reached, but runs viciously in a circle claiming that a thing is true insofar as it works, and what works works, insofar as it is true.

This, in short, is why the thread is difficult to understand.

 

[The_Exodus]

It couldn’t be more purely subjective than God’s relationship to reality, on Catholicism. You’ve just admitted as much, right here. Reality is what it is by the will of God. All of it, every little last nuance of it, exist as the result of God’s will. It’s the theoretical maximum subjectivity you are describing.

There is no point in pursuing this red herring (this is a red herring by the way, as I’m sure you’ve noticed). It is evident that uou do not understand what you are attempting to rebut by the above.

touchstone:

Objectivity doesn’t obtain by the basis of knowing.

Unless knowledge is the cause of existence… again, this is hopeless. You continue to equate the epistemology of humans and God, and my efforts to explain the difference a) presuppose an agreement between human epistemology which we obviously don’t have b) would take time and effort that I think would fall on deaf ears; and c) would contribute to this enormously bright red herring that you’ve brought into the topic.

touchstone:

Well the import of my thread here was to show the incoherence of the theist notion of “objective value” or “intrinsic meaning”.

So by showing view A false you therefore show view B true?

touchstone:

No, I meant that “objective value” is incoherent…

Dude, you’ve already admitted numerous places that a thing’s objectivity (i.e. it’s existence) is true or real, regardless of whether or not a human conceives it. Therefore you are already making an object vs. subject distinction. Now, since subjects can conceive of value, it is not “incoherent” to say that value does not exist outside subjects, but that it is “untrue” that value exists outside subjects. To say it is “untrue” however is to say that it is not true that “value” obtains with “object.” Therefore, it is true that objective values do not obtain, or do not exist.

You inherently admit this, though you try to make this distinction “merely conceptual” or “not real.” Yet this cannot be “merely” conceptual, or it would itself be entirely subjective, and therefore would not reflect the very relationship you’re trying to establish: namely, that values are not in objects, but in subjects, giving them to objects. In short, there are subjects, and there are objects, and there are properties of each. Some properties obtain in subjects, some in objects.

touchstone:

I was saying that “objective value” is a “square circle” for the Catholic and atheist alike.

The easiest claim in the world for a pragmatists or Kantian idealist to make…“this is not real, it is merely conceptual.” The problem, however, is that when you predicate something of reality as “reality,” i.e. as it objectively exists, independently of your mind, you are predicating either truth or falsehood. Even being able to say that reality exists is predicating something outside the mind, and not a mere a priori construct.

There is no distinction between “what is meaningless” conceptually, and what does not obtain in reality. As soon as you say that these two things can be different, and that a meaningless thing can exist in the mind, but not in reality, or vice versa, you are taking up an a priori epistemology which traps you in your own being.

In order to say “this is meaningless, like a squared circle” and for this to be true you must be making some sensible reference to reality. Otherwise, YOU are the one which is saying meaningless things. (This is at heart why Kant’s criticism failed: because IT appealed to the ontological argument.) In other words, unless you make some referent to reality or some object when you say “values do not obtain” you are not making the claim about reality proper, but about your own subjective existence.

“Bewitched by language” does not mean language is not meaningful, nor self-defeating, nor impractical. It is useful, effective, and practical. But it’s power in those respects are seductive, and tempt us to ascribe meaning and coherence and utility where none obtain. It’s very effectiveness is the reason it’s so easy to BS oneself and others, by falling for the “appearance of meaning and coherence”.

-TS

Is this poetry? From a self proclaimed materialist, such a “tangible” definition defies comprehension.

 

[The_Exodus]

Language is effective, meaningful, practical.

You’ve just substituted one meaningless combination of letters for another. “Effective,” “meaningul,” and “practical” mean precisely what? It is truly remarkable that you think such words, granting that language cannot really penetrate reality and know what is, mean anything.

touchstone:

It’s not vague – we humans have a psychological disposition toward intentionality – designs, plans, goals…etc

Yet when this telic phenomena (deisng, goal, etc) is promoted as evidence of God’s existence, it is passed off as “categorical” or “imposed onto reality.”

In truth, you can never say why language is either vague or not until you answer the question of whether or not it can express *certain *truth about reality. Can it? Can language penetrate to what is real?

touchstone:

It’s “right” because God said so, or willed it thus, or however you want to express his adoption, his personal nature.

If you grasped what it means for a being to possess existence as essence, you would understand better what Craig meant.

 

[Touchstone]

Unless knowledge is the cause of existence…

No, this wouldn’t change anything. It would be a subjective reality if it obtains from mind. Knowledge-as-cause doesn’t alter the subjectivity at all.

again, this is hopeless. You continue to equate the epistemology of humans and God,

I don’t need any such equation, and haven’t asserted such. The epistemologies maybe starkly different (and on my understanding of (Catholic) theology, God doesn’t “know” anything in the sense we use that term for humans, which establishes disparate epistemologies right there, if it even makes sense to ascribe “epistemology” to God…), it wouldn’t matter. If the nature of a thing’s existence depends on the subject, you have subjectivity. It doesn’t matter what the epistemology is, only that the dependence establishes the primacy of the subject.

and my efforts to explain the difference a) presuppose an agreement between human epistemology which we obviously don’t have

As above, I don’t presuppose such, don’t require such, and don’t find that even relevant to the concepts of objectivity and subjectivity.

b) would take time and effort that I think would fall on deaf ears; and c) would contribute to this enormously bright red herring that you’ve brought into the topic.

Irony, I tell ya. I’ve not invoked epistemology, never mind demanding parallel epistemologies between man and God. That’s a distraction that doesn’t attach to “independent of any mind or will”. If X obtains objectively no mind/will matters in the obtaining. I said above that “knowing” didn’t matter – it doesn’t. How or if any mind or will knows, conceives, believes, chooses is perfectly nothing for any X which obtains objectively. “Knowledge” or epistemology are not factors in the subjective/objective distinction.

-TS

 

[In_Spiration]

Is this supposed to be a sermon against greed?

 

[tonyrey]

Your criticism is based on your assumption that values are entirely subjective. My point is that some things - like life - are valuable even if their value is not recognised.

Do you regard animals as subjects? Were animals’ lives valueless before human beings existed?

Even on Catholicism, the value of human life is perfectly subjective; any value assigned to human life by God is just that – assigned. It doesn’t obtain independent of will or mind, which is the necessary condition for any “objective value”. It is assigned, subjectively by God.

False! God does not create life and assign value to it. He creates life because existence is valuable. He doesn’t assign value to His own existence; it is intrinsically valuable. God is goodness just as God is love. Catholics believe life is valuable even if no one recognises its value.

Do you believe in something being an “objective favorite”? If that seems problematic, and it should, then I think can grab a handle-hold on the idea that will show the folly of your usage above. “Favorite” by definition is subjective, it’s the allocation of favor by a subject, an activity of the self. It can’t obtain objectively, it’s an incoherent term. Where “favorites” are chosen, you necessarily have subjectivity.

To favour is a matter of preference whereas to recognise value is not. Like Schopenhauer you may prefer life never to have existed on this planet but you are not justified in doing so. Or do you agree with him?

If you don’t value your power of reason you are certainly ignorant! To value reason is to be realistic because without it you cannot even know what value is. It is valuable whether we recognise the fact or not.

Even if I don’t recognize it, and human life is valued by God, it’s still just as subjective as can be, it’s just the will/mind of God doing the choosing, God’s autonomy/sovereignty at work rather than mine. It’s perfectly non-objective.

For one thing you don’t believe in God. For another I have already pointed out that God does not assign value as if value is distinct from life. He wouldn’t have created life if it were not valuable. Everything is good because He created it knowing that it is good to exist.

The basic problem running through your arguments here is that you are confused, thoroughly, on the subjective/objective distinction.

The basic problem running through your arguments here is that you are unwittingly contradicting yourself! Do your valid arguments cease to be valuable if you think - or aren’t sure whether - they are valid?

Where you have value, you necessarily have a subject allocating priority or importance. “Objective value” has no meaning or coherence at all. Value is only meaningful in relation to a subject.

You are confusing value with the recognition of value. Life is valuable because it is a source of opportunities for development, fulfilment and enjoyment. Animals are unaware of its value but their lives do not thereby cease to be valuable.

 

[ProVobis]

Does our money have “ultimate value”? Even if one looks at a “gold backed” currency, a money system where cash is indexed to an assigned amount of gold or other precious metal (or other precious resource), money has no “ultimate value”.

Christ Himself was given the gift of gold at birth. Certainly it has value.

It’s just paper, this $20 bill in my hand, after all (just like we as humans are “just chemicals”, perhaps). What gives?

Take a $1 bill and compare the two. Same amount of paper, same weight, same amount of ink. Why is one worth 20 times more than the other? Trust, that’s what gives any value at all.

Your paper US bills have the words “Federal Reserve Notes” on them. What are notes? They are I.O.U.s. I could simply give you a piece of paper saying I.O.U. $20 and if you accept it, even until I pay you otherwise, we’ve just expanded the money supply.

But the note says it’s legal tender, which means that you MUST accept it as payment of a debt. And the Federal Reserve, courtesy of Ben Bernanke, seems to be willing to give you as much as you want.

So basically we have no real money of significance anymore. Just debt. If in doubt, substitute the word “debt” anytime you read the word “money” in the Bible as see if it makes sense.

 

[Betterave]

This is one of those conversations that use big words and quickly drifts off into a philosophy I don’t understand.

I have no idea what points either of you are making

LOL! Thanks for the honesty. Feel free to interject a request for clarification here or there. It might benefit TS too, who, with due respect, also clearly doesn’t understand very well the big (and little) words he is using. I don’t mean to be unkind, TS, but when someone demonstrates the kind of brash glibness that you do, it is very difficult to penetrate his haze of incomprehension.

 

[MissesE]

Intrinsic value? Hmmm. As compared to what? Extrinsic value? Doesn’t that idea presuppose that there is an inside of things that is really real while what we experience of those things is only just the outside or some illusion? Why would anyone need to think that reality is hidden from us in that way?

 

[Touchstone]

So what? Simply because a person’s nerves act a certain way, therefore “existence” or “life” somehow gains something meaningful?

Yes, that’s what we mean by “meaning” – the relationships between subjects and objects, as concepts in the mind. “meaning” is a mental construct.

But it can’t be the case it already is meaningful, since existence is just a bald fact on atheism.

Right. No minds, no meaning, by definition.

Our nervous system does not change reality. It just makes it, for the moment, appear as such. I.e. it is still, presently, a manifest illusion.

No, meaning is not a property of the referent, the object. It’s a conceptual relationship in the mind between subject and object. Reality is what it is, and meaning is a means of interpreting and processing the (name removed by moderator)ut from the world around us.

No, nihilists simply understand the ramifications of epistemology. A human’s thought does not change the nature of reality. It doesn’t matter what you think, there is either life in another galaxy, or not. The same goes for God. No matter how practical you think the idea, there either is a being which made the universe, which exists independently of your thought, or there isn’t.

Value isn’t knowledge. Even on a nihilist epistemology, valuation is still a subjective commitment by a mind.

The situation then is: I have certain “feelings” about objects in reality. I have a “feeling” there is life on Mars, or that my wife is telling the truth, or that this food is good for me. Now, experience tells us that our feelings don’t determine any of these things. So when we come up to the question of “I feel I ought to do x,” or some sort of moral problem, it is linked to another assumption, i.e. “x is right/worth doing/meaningful etc.” Thus, if I say I feel I ought to pray for Touchstone, because I think he is headed for Hell, I must ask myself if I find this proposition actually true, because, prima facie, it is obvious that my “feelings” on the matter don’t mean a thing.

No, they do, or can. If you really do believe an unbeliever is headed for Hell, that’s likely to cause an empathetic person some distress – a negative emotion. The emotion is a human reflection, a manifestation of your beliefs. The emotion isn’t “true” or “false”, it’s an emotion, but it obtains (in this case) from beliefs which may or may not be true. None of that changes the structure of reality, this is cognition. But those emotions can be an important prompt to do something or maybe just to bear in mind the empathetic cause of action… prayer, in this case, I guess.

You are entirely missing the point.

The nihilist certainly does act as if there was meaning, but what he holds is that the object of his thought - i.e. reality - is not really any different. He knows it doesn’t matter what he thinks. He simply is just willing to live a lie.

Please, read Nietzsche or Sartre. They would both here laugh at you and say "So what? Why not live a lie? Who cares if I’m inconsistent?

Even this retort confirms my thesis. Valuation (in this case, assignment of low priority to consistency or honesty).

That’s an odd, unrecognizable rendering of Nietzsche, in any case. Nietzsche was particularly interested in and devoted to *redlichkeit, *for example. But in any case, Nietzsche would be the first to confirm what I’m saying, that meaning and vallue are features of a mind, subjective commitments. You know his famous line:

There are no eternal facts, as there are no absolute truths.

from *Human, All too Human, *IIRC.

-TS

 

[Touchstone]

Thank you for telling me that your life has no meaning whatsoever then, to me, or to you, or anybody else.

OK, now you’re tempting me to gloat. Per the original post in this thread, this is precisely the complaint that the twenty dollar bills have no value whatsoever. Objectively, and intrinsically, you’re right, but it’s not a problem. That’s not how meaning or value obtain.

My life and yours have value because we subjectively assign it value; this is our biological nature, we are wired to think in ways that prize our survival and hold our well being to be precious.

I know you think your thinking the opposite somehow changes this, but your thought has no more influence on the meaning of your life than it does on the existence of life in other galaxies, or on the existence of God.

And in the most elegant way, your response just underscores my point. This is your subjective valuation at work, understanding that you assign value to x, y or z, no matter what I think. Bravo, you’ve made my point.

By no means whatsoever does this follow. I live life as if Santa Clause is real, therefore he exists, right? Of course not. “But he exists to you!” you’ll say (as well as every pragmatist and existentialist). So what? My thought doesn’t somehow mold the character of Santa into existence proper. He exists simply as a figment of my imagination.

No. but existence is a good example what valuation is NOT. An object can exist without any minds or will, and does by definition if reality is objective. But value cannot exist objectively, because it is the product of subjectivity – assignment by the mind or will. The error being identified in this thread is the idea that “meaning” or “value” can obtain objectively like existence can. It can’t, by definition.

Now, what is funny is that pragmatists, existentialists, materialists, etc. are up in arms against religious people since they believe in a “fairy tale” or an “illusion.” Religious people, on pragmatic etc. grounds can claims all that the pragmatists claim concerning the “meaning of life” (i.e. “it is true because I will to believe it to be true”), without violating the pragmatic philosophy. Where I’m from they call that the pot calling the kettle black.

Could be. But that wouldn’t begin to save the idea of “objective value” or “intrinsic meaning”.

William James was a great American scholar, but he was simply an extension of Kantian epistemology, which is doomed to absurdity, since it traps us within our own being and is unable to account for objective reality. James tried vainly to place some foundation in the human mind for meaning as “what works” or “what I will to believe”, but he failed to offer any sound basis for meaning.

That sounds simply dogmatic. If one declares that meaning is not meaning or value is not value if not’s not from God, or not objective (!) somehow, then of course. But you’re just helping yourself to an ad-hoc rendering of “sound basis for meaning” in that case. In practical terms, you can see meaning at work, subjectively constructed, and empirically effective in human communication.

My use of “real” is due to your lack of a fundamental distinction in epistemology: that between the subject and object, or that between the knower and the thing known. You want to say that the subject determines the object, or, at any rate, that the subject can determine itself (which really just takes us back to the subject determining the object).

The subject has a mind, which even on a determinist model, makes valuation and meaning subjective – “mind based”. Existence is not the same concept as “value”, and has no dependency on the mind, if that existence obtains objectively (that’s just the definition of 'objective). On a godless, mindless world, objects would exist objectively. Values wouldn’t, and couldn’t. “Value” is incoherent without a “valuer” mind.

If the former, I will simply say it is ridiculous to hold that you can determine objective reality simply by thinking so, and will provide you examples ad infinitum of how this is false.

We don’t and can’t determine it, especially if you man that in a prescriptive, normative sense. We suppose, as a metaphysical intuition, that reality obtains objectively, and we build models based on that to see what comes of the idea. In many important and practical ways, the model is highly effective for our goals. So we embrace it, and extend it.

We neither need nor can use such an “objective reason”. We predicate our model on the intuition that the extramental world is real and intelligible. It’s not deductive, it’s just natural. And it works.

The subject is “spontaneously” free. This is the whole point of existentialism (which, if you follow your pragmatism far enough, you’ll understand.) There is no reason for “meaning”.

Let’s be clear. There’s no basis for objective meaning. Subjective meaning, the formation of relationships conceptually between subjects and objects is crucially useful. This is the basis for all communication between and within humans.

There is no reason for the term whatsoever, besides your necessarily

arbitrary criteria. Necessarily, I say, since there is no objective ground you are referring to in order to validate or substantiate your views, since you claim the subjective determines the object, instead of being determined by it.It is necessarily arbitrary in the sense that meaning is mind-based, subjective. But that doesn’t diminish it’s utility or effectiveness. Again, look at money, this is strong pedagogy. It’s “necessarily arbitrary”, but all that’s needed is a collective agreement that X has value and – mirabile dictu! – it has value.

-TS

 

[Touchstone]

Christ Himself was given the gift of gold at birth. Certainly it has value.

Agreed. Gold was valued, then, as it is now, and a gift of gold meant the offering something of value.

Take a $1 bill and compare the two. Same amount of paper, same weight, same amount of ink. Why is one worth 20 times more than the other? Trust, that’s what gives any value at all.

Exactly. We agree, collectively, on the value of a currency, and it becomes valuable virtue of our agreement.

Your paper US bills have the words “Federal Reserve Notes” on them. What are notes? They are I.O.U.s. I could simply give you a piece of paper saying I.O.U. $20 and if you accept it, even until I pay you otherwise, we’ve just expanded the money supply.

Right! Perfect exemplification of the principle I am presenting here.

But the note says it’s legal tender, which means that you MUST accept it as payment of a debt. And the Federal Reserve, courtesy of Ben Bernanke, seems to be willing to give you as much as you want.

Heh. Yes. For “legal tender”, the decision about value carries additional weight, the force of law.

So basically we have no real money of significance anymore. Just debt. If in doubt, substitute the word “debt” anytime you read the word “money” in the Bible as see if it makes sense.

When I go to the gas station, and give the attendant a $20 bill, he sets the pump to dispense a few gallons of gas for my car. That’s value, practical, effective value, as I’ve exchanged the piece of paper for something I value and need (gas for my car), and the gas station has exchanged something it values (gas which it had to buy wholesale) for my $20 bill. That’s value in practice, bits of paper exchanged for real goods. Doesn’t matter what the Fed policy is or what the national debt is, that $20 has currency, and it’s valuable simply by virtue of the gas station attendant giving me gas in exchange for it.

-TS

 

[Touchstone]

Do you regard animals as subjects? Were animals’ lives valueless before human beings existed?

Sure. A deer values its own life. Try to approach one, sometime, it will run away in fear, nervous that you are threat to its well being.

False! God does not create life and assign value to it. He creates life because existence is valuable. He doesn’t assign value to His own existence; it is intrinsically valuable. God is goodness just as God is love. Catholics believe life is valuable even if no one recognises its value.

Here’s the test. If there was no God or gods, would life be valuable objectively? On your paragraph here, it must be. You’ve proposed a truth (er, value) that even God cannot control. God is subordinate to the ‘value of existence’. In that case, yes, existence would have ultimate value, having primacy even over God, but we would still need a “valuer” to make “value” coherent. God would create life, in subordination to the higher truth he serves, but that value would still be subjective, even if ultimate, because it obtains in the valuing.

Clarity on this will come from telling me if godless, impersonal universe which exists, but has no minds, will or persons anywhere has “intrinsic” value.

And I note, interestingly, that you now have forfeited a continuing claim you have against materialism – that life cannot have meaning or value without God. You’ve just shown that God isn’t needed for value – existence is valuable prior to any notion of God. So a materialist can now just assert, like you, that “life is intrinsically valuable”, and you’d be obligated to accept that, for he is simply appealing to the ultimacy of value that you are.

To favour is a matter of preference whereas to recognise value is not.

That’s an equivocation on ‘recognize’, I suggest. When another nation ‘recognizes’ another nation’s diplomatic status, it is not seeing something more clearly through the fog. It is asserting its decision, its preference for such a valuation for the other nation. That sense of recognition fits with “favor” as preference. But “recognizing value” in an object combines the subjective valuation assigned to the object with the recognition of the object. I recognize my daughter, and by production, since I value my daughter, when I look at her, I see a person I value. But I don’t “see the value” – that’s just a façon de parler. I see something that I happen to value, and so I combine them by saying I “see my beloved daughter”. There’s no “belovedness” in my visual stimuli. “Belovedness” is something I overlay on top of that stimuli, cognitively.

Like Schopenhauer you may prefer life never to have existed on this planet but you are not justified in doing so. Or do you agree with him?

No, I’m happy to be here, and am enjoying the experience on the whole.

For one thing you don’t believe in God. For another I have already pointed out that God does not assign value as if value is distinct from life. He wouldn’t have created life if it were not valuable. Everything is good because He created it knowing that it is good to exist.

It’s good to exist on his say so, though, which supports my point. You even allowed as much there, by saying “Everything is good because He created it”. If you are suggesting, per above, that God is subordinate to some superior notion of goodness or value, then you are right, God would not be the assigner of value. He would just be one of us, with mad skillz. “Goodness of existence” would be the ultimate God, over Yahweh or anything else then, and something that we ought to worship just as Yahweh worships it.

I think you will find that a confused rendering of Catholic theology, that God’s nature defines goodness, and doesn’t merely submit to superior and prior virtues apart from him. Much of Catholic theology is hellenized, but I think this part of Aristotle, that the gods are subservient to cosmic ideas – the meta-gods! – that the Church did not embrace. God on Catholicism is a plenopentiary and ultimate in the final sense. On you claim here, he is neither. But you can believe as you like – not trying to box you in. Now the materialist can appeal to an “ultimate value” along with you. You’re not able to discount such a notion on materialism, for you subscribe to such a notion prior to and superior to any God yourself.

The basic problem running through your arguments here is that you are unwittingly contradicting yourself! Do your valid arguments cease to be valuable if you think - or aren’t sure whether - they are valid?

What do you identify as the contradiction here?

You are confusing value with the recognition of value. Life is valuable because it is a source of opportunities for development, fulfilment and enjoyment. Animals are unaware of its value but their lives do not thereby cease to be valuable.

Then why does the deer run, when you approach? Do you suppose it doesn’t value it’s life? Have you ever interacted with wild animals? Why run away if you don’t value your life?

-TS

 

[The_Exodus]

But value cannot exist objectively, because it is the product of subjectivity – assignment by the mind or will. The error being identified in this thread is the idea that “meaning” or “value” can obtain objectively like existence can. It can’t, by definition.

This is absolutely true – on atheism. All value is relative, since it’s differentiated from existence proper by the human mind. The consequences of this are not strictly irrational in and of themselves. They just often lead to inconsistencies when the one who holds such a view begins to speak, particularly about “oughts.” I.e. one “ought” not to believe in God; one “ought” to believe what science shows to be true; one “ought” to listen to me; etc.

Even if one doesn’t implicitly say the word “ought,” such a sentiment is betrayed in the very fact he is speaking to a point. At least he is implicitly saying “one ought to listen to me” (especially in the case of one in a philosophy forum.) But in truth, if you do hold all value is relative, you’ve effectively just told everyone on the forum that they have no reason to listen to anything you say, since all your statements are stripped of “ought” value, except by your mind. But again, why ought we to value what comes from the mind of “Touchstone”?

You’ve sawed off the branch you were sitting on. If you were consistent in this, you would concede every point made against you in any argument you’ve ever had, since you readily admit that value cannot obtain outside *your *mind. Further, it is impossible then for you to point to some common “objective” reason which would actually justify a claim of yours that “everyone ought to value this,” since there is no value referent outside *your own * mind that you could possibly be speaking about.

It’s as if I said “Value doesn’t obtain outside my mind.” And another said, “why should I care what you are saying then? I obviously have a different mind than you.” And I said, “well look at our biology, nervous system, etc. These things work!” But all this is built on a foundation of relativism, built on your sheerly relative conception of “work”. It doesn’t matter what you say afterwards or how you substantiate your claim, if you’ve already conceded the fact that all value is subjective.

You’ve effectively said that, outside your own mind, there is no reason to listen to you. Unfortunately for the rest of us, we are deprived of such a privilege, and since you’ve cut any possible common ground for us to share, we are (again, unfortunately) doomed never to be able to have any meaningful exchange.

But anyway, none of this follows on theism. Since God grounds existence, he can objectify value just as effectively; i.e. his will makes things “be” in the same sense that his will makes human life “valuable” in and of itself, regardless of what you, or Nietszche, or Hitler think.

 

[Touchstone]

This is absolutely true – on atheism. All value is relative, since it’s differentiated from existence proper by the human mind. The consequences of this are not strictly irrational in and of themselves. They just often lead to inconsistencies when the one who holds such a view begins to speak, particularly about “oughts.” I.e. one “ought” not to believe in God; one “ought” to believe what science shows to be true; one “ought” to listen to me; etc.

You seem to be thinking that a subjective value somehow translates to “no value”, “no effect”, or “unreal”. The value assignment is subjective, but because all values are subjective, and our minds can change those assignments, I don’t have to superimpose any deontology here; I just argue from my values, and the reasoning that accompanies them, and people make of it what they will. If they find the arguments interesting, maybe they are valuable just as interesting, even if they are not persuasive at all. Maybe they valuable because they are ediucational, again, without having to be persuasive. Maybe they are persuasive in part, and that’s valuable as well, as persuasive arguments are an opportunity for those who value better models and more robust arguments for their beliefs to “upgrade”.

Even if one doesn’t implicitly say the word “ought,” such a sentiment is betrayed in the very fact he is speaking to a point. At least he is implicitly saying “one ought to listen to me” (especially in the case of one in a philosophy forum.) But in truth, if you do hold all value is relative, you’ve effectively just told everyone on the forum that they have no reason to listen to anything you say, since all your statements are stripped of “ought” value, except by your mind. But again, why ought we to value what comes from the mind of “Touchstone”?

The value obtains in the valuer. Some people, most, in fact, never read a post I’ve put here. I imagine some who do read here just skip over my posts, and that’s their prerogative. No one is obligated to listen to me at all, this is an “at will” environment, and to read me is again not at matter of deontology, but some (implicit) commitment that there is value or potential value in reading my words, or yours.

The words may not be valuable, after the fact, or have any redeeming qualities in the mind of the reader. But the dynamics work themselves out in the mind of each reader. There’s no “ought” that is intrinsic to my posts. Whatever value they have obtains from the priority and importance assigned them by any who read (or don’t!).

You’ve sawed off the branch you were sitting on. If you were consistent in this, you would concede every point made against you in any argument you’ve ever had, since you readily admit that value cannot obtain outside *your *mind.

It can, and often does obtain outside my mind. Value doesn’t obtain outside of any minds at all. As a Christian, in part due to talking to atheists and understanding their values and reasoning, I was on many points persuaded of the poverty of my own values and reasoning as a Christian, and on some of those points inclined to adopt or move toward those values, and that reasoning. I wasn’t forced to do so, I simply valued arguments and reasoning that provided more coherence, performance and economy than those with less of each of those qualities.

So those ideas and values were effective, at length, persuasive. They became, in part, my values.

Even apart from that, for all the items that I didn’t find persuasive, I still found (and find) value in the educational value of exposure to them. I’m better off being more familiar with the texture and structure of various paradigms and value frameworks. Even if I don’t adopt them, other ideas are educationally valuable to me. Here, I think materialism in particular is badly misunderstood, and represented in caricatures. So while no one is obligated to read or take anything away from my posts, I understand there is potential for readers to apprehend a more cogent rendering of materialist thinking than the straw man commonly erected and burnt down around here.

Further, it is impossible then for you to point to some common “objective” reason which would actually justify a claim of yours that “everyone ought to value this,” since there is no value referent outside *your own * mind that you could possibly be speaking about.

The map is not the territory. The referent is not the symbol. When I say “everyone ought to value this”, it’s necessarily implied that this is a subjective statement – it’s positing a square circle, otherwise. But such a statement advocates for the value judgment, and rests on the supporting reasoning and evidence that it relies on for its formation. This does assume that readers value their beliefs as a matter of considerating the values and reasoning and evidence that underlie them. If not, nothing I can do, correct. But the values in my mind might also become values in your mind, or vice versa, and that gives all of this the basis for meaning and value; they are meaningful and value as potentially educational, entertaining, or even persuasive.

-TS

 

[Touchstone]

The Exodus:

It’s as if I said “Value doesn’t obtain outside my mind.” And another said, “why should I care what you are saying then? I obviously have a different mind than you.” And I said, “well look at our biology, nervous system, etc. These things work!” But all this is built on a foundation of relativism, built on your sheerly relative conception of “work”. It doesn’t matter what you say afterwards or how you substantiate your claim, if you’ve already conceded the fact that all value is subjective.

What do you mean by “matter”? Look at the valuation of money. Valuation doesn’t exist just in my mind for the $20 bill. In fact, in that case, the “currency” of that bill obtains from the broad, collective embrace of that commitment (enforced by statute, in this case). But there’s no ultimate gounds for value outside the mind. Does money still ‘matter’, then? I’d say it does for the same reason our other valuations matter, because they have practical impacts on how we live our lives and interact with others.

You’ve effectively said that, outside your own mind, there is no reason to listen to you.

No, haven’t said that at all. My estimation is that other minds, being of a similar physiology, are likely to have a basic value commitment to reasoning and evidence as the basis for belief formation and value judgments. If this is the case, and those similarities obtain, then other minds out there reading right now value the same discursive benefits I do. They may not be persuaded, but I can value in reading your posts even if I’m not persuaded. I can be informed, entertained, or maybe just enabled with a context for exposition of views I think are valuable in response. These are practically valuable reasons for one person to listen to another.

Unfortunately for the rest of us, we are deprived of such a privilege, and since you’ve cut any possible common ground for us to share, we are (again, unfortunately) doomed never to be able to have any meaningful exchange.

No, not hardly. We can, and sometimes do, share these values. Values and meaning can flourish in consensus, obtaining in many minds, not just mine, or yours, or in any one individual. And because of that potential, communication and discourse is valuable, effective. Values and meaning can propagate, but the propagate in minds, in “valuers”. They are not “intrinsic” to an object. The $20 bill’s value obtains from the minds that agree it has value. It is just a small piece of paper absent that, on its own intrinsic properties.

But anyway, none of this follows on theism. Since God grounds existence, he can objectify value just as effectively; i.e. his will makes things “be” in the same sense that his will makes human life “valuable” in and of itself, regardless of what you, or Nietszche, or Hitler think.

Argh. If his will is effective, reality is by definition subjective. Subjective isn’t a curse word, it’s just not good for clear thinking and reasoning to confuse it with “objective”. Catholics can say “life is valuable because God wills it thus”, and there you go. On that view, you value the authority of God’s assessment and make it your own value judgment. But it’s still “valuers establishing value”, where nothing obtains intrinsically for value outside of any valuer.

-TS

 

[Betterave]

Originally Posted by Betterave
This is an embarrassingly naive view. Do you really think that you have proven that a valuation is merely subjective by pointing out that it is subjectively apprehended? “If an object is apprehended by a subject, then that object is merely subjective” is the nonsense non sequitur you ground your thinking in here, isn’t it? And what do you think ‘objective’ means? Not apprehended by any subject? That’s nonsense, bud.

TS’s response:

Apprehension or observation don’t matter. If something obtains objectively, it obtains independently of mind or will. The reality exists without any dependency on a subject, on the will, choice or mind of anything.

When a subject observes an object, and supposes it obtains objectively (i.e. reality is real), it’s not the observation of the object that gives it reality. The subject is incidental, irrelevant. It is what it is whether a mind wills it, wishes it, wants it, observes it, understands it, likes it, hates it or wants to date it or not. All of that has perfectly no bearing on the object if, the object is objectively real.

I’ve not said anywhere that the object itself is subjective. If reality is reality, and it is a real object, the subject doesn’t matter to the reality of the object. The choices a mind or will makes ABOUT an object are necessarily subjective, though. Valuation is an volitional activity of the subject. The valuation of the object is subjective, then, even as the reality of object is objective. The valuation is dependent on the mind/will of the subject (even if its God), and the reality of the object does NOT depend on any mind or will if its reality is objective.

So let’s see how you answered my questions: Do you really think that you have proven that a valuation is merely subjective by pointing out that it is subjectively apprehended? No, you think that you have proven that a valuation is merely subjective by claiming that it is subjectively chosen (‘subjectively’ being redundant here).

So fine. Let’s modify the question: Do you really think that you have proven that a valuation is merely subjective by claiming that it is (subjectively) chosen?
“If an object is (voluntarily) chosen by a subject, then it follows that that object is merely subjective” is the nonsense non sequitur you ground your thinking in here, isn’t it? And what do you think ‘objective’ means? Not chosen by any subject? That’s nonsense, bud. Or not constituted in being by the choice of any subject? Again, that’s nonsense. Your asserting the contrary does not ‘demonstrate’ anything, please stop pretending that it does.

See, it’s good to have read all that, but embracing that in a way where you would recommend that here is precisely how one gets so thoroughly confused about subject-object relationships. It’s not that I’m not aware of the concept of, say “human flourishing” as something intrinsic or fundamental from Aristotle; the whole point of this thread is to demonstrate that the concept is itself incoherent, and at odds, demonstrably with the way humans actually assign and process meaning and value.

The intended point of the thread and the actual content of the thread are very different matters. So far you have only demonstrated that you are very confused about the concepts that you are attempting to refute, that you don’t understand the position you are trying to attack.

 

[Betterave]

This kind of post is really depressing, TS.

Do you suppose pointing to “intrinsic value” or “objective value”, meaningless, incoherent concepts, literally as self-contradictory as “circular squares” is the “rational” choice?

Really?

Did you read what I wrote? What do you think, smart guy? Did you really need to ask that question?

I don’t support the notion that such a conflict, or the values driving it, more precisely, are arational in some essential sense. A disposition for, or against slavery is a value commitment, and hence a subjective one, but the reasoning that informs and commends those value choices can be more or less rational, depending on the thinker. One can come to different value judgments (or the same ones) based on different levels of rigour and discipline in reasoning. That doesn’t mean the value judgment itself is rational (it may be, subjective does not negate rational!), but we can’t class value judgments up front as “arational”, if we are considering what contributed to those judgments.

-TS

So you want to assert a real difference between “a disposition for or against slavery” (a value commitment) and “the reasoning that informs and commends those value choices.” But you have arbitrarily equated “disposition” with “choice” here, and a choice, as such, is already based on reasons (unlike a disposition - which doesn’t prevent dispositions from being objective), so the reasoning that informs a value commitment is prior to and constitutive of that value commitment. In other words, you are again being very sloppy and talking nonsense from the perspective of the view that you’re attempting to critique.

“Subjective does not negate rational” is correct in one sense, because voluntarily chosen does not negate rationally chosen. But rational does negate “*merely *subjective”; rational implies that there is an objective foundation which can be examined and objectively assessed.

 

[Touchstone]

“Subjective does not negate rational” is correct in one sense, because voluntarily chosen does not negate rationally chosen. But rational does negate “merely subjective”; rational implies that there is an objective foundation which can be examined and objectively assessed.

Sorry, having to do very short posts as I’m way behind on the real-world stuff today, but…

“Rational” does not not imply an objective foundation. “Rational” just means “the use of reasoning”. Reasoning (and thus rational thought) can be subjective, and often is. Where the main (name removed by moderator)uts to reason about are subjective – an emotional reaction, qualia via the senses, judging the relative important tradeoffs of competing personal values and priorities, you have subjective reasoning.

-TS

 

[tonyrey]

A deer values its own life. Try to approach one, sometime, it will run away in fear, nervous that you are threat to its well being.

Instinct not evaluation.

If there was no God or gods, would life be valuable objectively? You’ve proposed a truth (er, value) that even God cannot control. God is subordinate to the ‘value of existence’.

God is not subordinate to the value of existence because God is existence! That was the great insight of the Hebrews: “He Who Is”.

In that case, yes, existence would have ultimate value, having primacy even over God, but we would still need a “valuer” to make “value” coherent.

The Ultimate Value does not require prevaluation. God does not confer value on His existence.

God would create life, in subordination to the higher truth he serves, but that value would still be subjective, even if ultimate, because it obtains in the valuing.

Since God is the Supreme Being He would not be God if He were subordinated! He cannot serve a higher truth because He is Truth!

Clarity on this will come from telling me if godless, impersonal universe which exists, but has no minds, will or persons anywhere has “intrinsic” value.

A godless, impersonal universe cannot have any value because it cannot exist.

A materialist can now just assert, like you, that “life is intrinsically valuable”, and you’d be obligated to accept that, for he is simply appealing to the ultimacy of value that you are.

Life cannot have meaning or value without God because neither life nor anything else can exist without God! So your question does not arise… Life is valuable because of the opportunities it offers but opportunities presuppose a Source of opportunities.

I recognize my daughter, and by production, since I value my daughter, when I look at her, I see a person I value. But I don’t “see the value” – that’s just a façon de parler. I see something that I happen to value, and so I combine them by saying I “see my beloved daughter”. There’s no “belovedness” in my visual stimuli. “Belovedness” is something I overlay on top of that stimuli, cognitively.

You value your daughter not because her value exists in your mind but because she is valuable. Try telling her she is valuable only because you think she is valuable! See what her reaction will be… And if her mother tells you you’re only valuable because she thinks you’re valuable you wouldn’t be very impressed! Wouldn’t you say “Is that the only reason?” ?

I’m happy to be here, and am enjoying the experience on the whole.

In other words you believe life is valuable because it is a source of enjoyment.

It’s good to exist on his say so, though, which supports my point. You even allowed as much there, by saying “Everything is good because He created it”.
I did not say everything is good because He created it. I said He created life knowing it is good to exist, i.e. He knows it is good to exist and shared existence with others.

“Goodness of existence” would be the ultimate God, over Yahweh or anything else then, and something that we ought to worship just as Yahweh worships it.
I think you will find that a confused rendering of Catholic theology, that God’s nature defines goodness, and doesn’t merely submit to superior and prior virtues apart from him.

God’s nature does not define goodness. God is goodness! Jesus said “I am the Way, the Truth and the Life”.

Now the materialist can appeal to an “ultimate value” along with you. You’re not able to discount such a notion on materialism, for you subscribe to such a notion prior to and superior to any God yourself.

Again you are making an artificial distinction between God, existence and goodness. Truth, goodness, justice, freedom, beauty and love converge in the Ultimate Source of everything…

What do you identify as the contradiction here?

That your argument is valuable only because you think it is valuable! Is it valueless - regardless of its merit - if you think it is valueless?

Then why does the deer run, when you approach? Do you suppose it doesn’t value its life? Have you ever interacted with wild animals? Why run away if you don’t value your life?

Having lived in Africa for fifteen years I’m well aware that animals run away from predators not because they consciously value their lives but because they associate predators with danger. Fight and flight are physical defence mechanisms, not rationally motivated actions. They don’t have the abstract thought “It is necessary for me to run away because that predator will kill me if I stay here”! Some animals brought up in captivity don’t run away from predators but that doesn’t mean they don’t value their lives. It simply means they are creatures of habit. They don’t even know what “value” means…