What is the difference between a value judgment and a fact (description vs prescription)
Immortalista
fact or just a value free description. How can one tell when someone
is explaining some facts or just trying you to get interested in what
he or she likes? You know, how some people insist that it is factual
that certain kinds of music is better than others.
Value judgements include
statements about what is
good and what people
ought to do.
They contrast with statements
of fact, whose acceptance
does not (necessarily)
entail action.
'It is raining' is merely factual. 'You ought not to hit that child'
implies a value judgement. One way of putting this is that value
statements are prescriptive, not purely descriptive (Hare 1963).
Another terminology is that;
value statements are practical,
while purely factual statements
are theoretical (Quinton 1973).
Programs of the brain.
J. Z. Young 1978
http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0198575459/
bigfl...@gmail.com
Great questions and even greater answers (he said humbly).
If you consider the idea of the laws of synchronicity (whereby people
show up in your life for mutual benefit)then the question becomes
'does what they say reverberate with me, either confirming positively
or negatively my pov?
In that case it matters not if they are trying to convince you or not.
(In that situation, they are only trying to convince them self).
An example would be the music scenario.
It is observable how different music effects the brain. Soothing music
'lights up' the deeper reflective states, where some music whips up
the adrenal glands reaction !!!War drums being a good example (Our
ancestors knew a thing of two without the help of 'brain lighting
systems' :-)
That is not arguable, but what is also not arguable is the fact that a
person chooses either for their own subjective reasons (which is never
constructively arguable)
BOfL
Zerkon
> I see many people try and disguise a value judgment as some sort of fact
> ...
>
> Programs of the brain.
LOL!!
Daniel T.
What about "that smells nice" and "that smells bad"?
It turns out that these are not value judgments at all, they are
statements of fact. (http://www.pnas.org/content/97/20/10712.full)
Who's to say how many more of these so-called value judgements will fall
to science?
Zinnic
>
> - Show quoted text -
Many will judge that molecular conformation of receptor sites have no
philosopical value and that's a fact. They dismiss 'hard' science and
prefer self-serving 'easy' speculation. :-)
jigo
Smelling nice or bad are questions of fact depending on the
characteristics of the smeller. That is subjective but still has a
factual answer; it's different in kind from questions of "should."
Daniel T.
"Should" assumes a goal, given a particular goal, it is generally quite
objective as to what actions will further that goal and what actions
will not.
Immortalist
Well, it is an old old book, but I read it two times the first feww
days after it was released in 1978. At the time some anthropology
books were becoming like the religion of nature and humanity, and this
was one of the first brain books that followed suite. Then E.O. Wilson
came out with the end all of anthro religions; On Human Nature
http://www.amazon.com/Human-Nature-Edward-O-Wilson/dp/067463442X
Then Harris ended the very idea with this one which no one could beat
from then on as a religion of nature and human.
http://www.amazon.com/Our-Kind-Where-Came-Going/dp/0060919906/
Most important books but now they are disappearing from public
libraries, time goes on and humans suffer cultural amnesia..
Immortalist
Pretty good. I would normally paste something like this to make a
similar point;
...we are endowed with a moral faculty that delivers judgments of
right and wrong based on unconsciously operative and inaccessible
principles of action. The theory posits a universal moral grammar,
built into the brains of all humans. The grammar is a set of
principles that operate on the basis of the causes and consequences of
action. Thus, in the same way that we are endowed with a language
faculty that consists of a universal toolkit for building possible
languages, we are also endowed with a moral faculty that consists of a
universal toolkit for building possible moral systems.
http://www.pandasthumb.org/archives/2006/11/marc-hauser-mor.html
Moral Minds: How Nature Designed Our Universal
Sense of Right and Wrong - by Marc Hauser
http://www.amazon.com/Moral-Minds-Nature-Designed-Universal/dp/0060780703
Immortalist
What if it is an inborn "drive" or "instinct" of course adjusted in
strength by the environment, but the should would be identical to -it
feels better to consider smells this way- -it is "easier" to consider
smells this way-.
dorayme
<daniel_t-2BD514...@70-3-168-216.pools.spcsdns.net>,
"Daniel T." <dani...@earthlink.net> wrote:
> What about "that smells nice" and "that smells bad"?
>
> It turns out that these are not value judgments at all, they are
> statements of fact. (http://www.pnas.org/content/97/20/10712.full)
>
It hardly needs the heavy guns of science to support *these*
cases as people stating facts. If you are going to go this way,
we know people differ in their impressions and that this is
likely to be due to all sorts of memory associations and hard
wired chemistry.
But note that it is a bit more complicated: the truth of such
claims seem to depend not just on how it seems to the sayer but
often there is an implied "and it will seem nice to others".
> Who's to say how many more of these so-called value judgements will fall
> to science?
Science might persuade philosophers to abandon their fixed
analyses but these would be merely psychological persausions, not
logical argument.
--
dorayme
jigo
True, but choosing a goal involves a value judgment--why *should* that
particular goal be chosen. Now there are a lot of reasonable goals (like
trying to preserve one's life), but they still can't be established in
the same way that we verify facts.
dorayme
jigo <ret...@home.com> wrote:
> choosing a goal involves a value judgment--why *should* that
> particular goal be chosen. Now there are a lot of reasonable goals (like
> trying to preserve one's life), but they still can't be established in
> the same way that we verify facts.
Consider also that some goals are simply not *chosen*, they are
just there, they just arise out of instinct or by causes other
than reasons.
--
dorayme
BOfL
>
> - Show quoted text -
For a brief time in the 90's I was involved with a perfume cloning
business based in the US where the combination of scientific
understanding of the molecular structure, and gas chromatography
allowed 'identical' outcomes (to within the human olfactory
sensitivity).
Based on the science, a clear road into the $6bill annual market in
the US (plus superb presentation and marketing.)
What wasnt taken into account was the 'philosphical factor' regarding
the attitude and mentality of the potential customer, and as a
consequence (in the world of crossover realities),many lost their
shirts.
BOfL
BOfL
>
> - Show quoted text -
Yes, but the value outcome of such goals can never be anticipated
accurately.
BOfL
BOfL
Not amnesia, but an increaed requirement for selective
recall,otherwise we would all be savants.
BOfL
BOfL
>
> - Show quoted text -
Scince can identify a reaction, but never a subjective
interpretation...ie 'nice'. Animals use their sense of smell for
survival moment to moment. They dont consider 'nice' , they just eat
it or leave it instinctively.
BOfL
Zinnic
"nice! What next?
Obviously, you have observed and long studied how, given a choice,
foraging animals do not show preference for the "nicer" tender shoots
and predatory animals do not show preference for the "nicer" soft
tissues of their prey! Aargh!
Daniel T.
> interpretation... ie 'nice'.
You mean reactions such as the subject saying, "that smells nice"?
Daniel T.
Your just adding a level of indirection to the goal seeking. The goal of
determining which goal should be chosen is also a goal, and as I said it
is generally quite objective as to what actions will further that goal
and what actions will not. Of course, because of the extra level of
indirection, the objectiveness will be correspondingly less direct.
jigo
The point is that choosing a goal inherently involves a value
judgment--a "should." If you're claiming that it does not, show how you
could verify the choice of goal as true or false in the way we verify facts.
Daniel T.
Choosing requires a goal. The "choice of a goal" cannot be made unless
you have a goal (a "meta-goal") in mind. It's goals all the way up, so
to speak.