The purpose of this discussion is to supply the main outlines of a
theory of value based upon analysis of the valuation-process from the
logical point of view. The general principle which we shall seek to
establish is that judgments of value, whether passed upon things or upon
modes of conduct, are essentially objective in import, and that they are
reached through a process of valuation which is essentially of the same
logical character as the judgment-process whereby conclusions of
physical fact are established--in a word, that the valuation-process,
issuing in the finished judgment of value expressive of the judging
person's definitive attitude toward the thing in question, is
constructive of an order of reality in the same sense as, in current
theories of knowledge, is the judgment of sense-perception and science.
Our method of procedure to this end will be that of assuming, and
adhering to as consistently as possible, the standpoint of the
individual in the process of deliberating upon an ethical or economic
problem (for, as we shall hold, all values properly so called are either
ethical or economic), and of ascertaining, as accurately as may be, the
meaning of the deliberative or evaluating process and of the various
factors in it as these are presented in the individual's apprehension.
It is in this sense that our procedure will be logical rather than
psychological. We shall be concerned to determine the _meaning_ of the
object of valuation as object, of the standard of value as standard, and
of the valued object as valued, in terms of the individual's own
apprehension of these, rather than to ascertain the nature and
conditions of his apprehensions of these considered as psychical
events. Our attention will throughout be directed to these factors or
phases of the valuation-process in their functional aspect of
determinants of the valuing agent's practical attitude, and never,
excepting for purposes of incidental illustration and in a very general
and tentative way, as events in consciousness mediated by more
"elementary" psychical processes. The results which we shall gain by
adhering to this method will enable us to see not merely that our
judgments of value are in function and meaning objective, but also that
our judgments of sense-perception and science are, as such, capable of
satisfactory interpretation only as being incidental to the attainment
and progressive reconstruction of judgments of value.
The first three main divisions will be given over to establishing the
objectivity of content and function of judgments of value. The fourth
division will present a detailed analysis of the two types of judgment
of value, the ethical and economic, defining them and relating them to
each other, and correlating them in the manner just suggested with
judgment of the physical type. After considering, in the fifth part,
certain general objections to the positions thus stated, we shall
proceed in the sixth and concluding division to define the function of
the consciousness of value in the economy of life.[107]
I
The system of judgments which defines what one calls the objective order
of things is inevitably unique for each particular individual. No two
men can view the world from the standpoint of the same theoretical and
practical interests, nor can any two proceed in the work of gaining for
themselves knowledge of the world with precisely equal degrees of skill
and accuracy. Each must be prompted and guided, in the construction of
his knowledge of single things and of the system in which they have
their being, by his own particular interests and aims; and even when one
person in a measure shares in the interests and aims of another, the
rate and manner of procedure will not be the same for both, nor will the
knowledge gained be for both equally systematic in arrangement or in
interrelation of its parts. Each man lives in a world of his own--a
world, indeed, identical in certain fundamental respects with the worlds
which his fellow-men have constructed for themselves, but one
nevertheless necessarily unique through and through because each man is
a unique individual. There is, doubtless, a "social currency" of objects
which implies a certain identity of meaning in objects as experienced by
different individuals. The existence of society presupposes, and its
evolution in turn develops and extends, a system of generally accepted
objects and relations. Nevertheless, the "socially current object" is,
as such, an abstraction just as the uniform social individual is
likewise an abstraction. The only concrete object ever actually known or
in any wise experienced by any person is the object as constructed by
that person in accordance with his own aims and purposes, and in which
there is, therefore, a large and important share of meaning which is
significant to no one else.
It is needless in this discussion to dwell at length upon the general
principle of recent "functional" psychology, that practical ends are the
controlling factors in the acquisition of our knowledge of objective
things. We shall take for granted the truth of the general proposition
that cognition, in whatever sphere of science or of practical life, is
essentially teleological in the sense of being incidental always, more
or less directly, to the attainment of ends. Cognition, as the
apperceptive or attentive process, is essentially the process of
scrutinizing a situation (whether theoretical or practical) with a view
to determining the availability for one's intended purpose of such
objects and conditions as the situation may present. The objects and
conditions thus determined will be made use of or ignored, counted upon
as advantageous or guarded against as unfavorable--in a word, responded
to--in ways suggested by their character as ascertained through
reference to the interest in question. In this sense, then, objective
things as known by individual persons are essentially complex stimuli
whose proper function and reason for being it is to elicit useful
responses in the way of conduct--responses conducive to the realization
of ends.
From this point of view, then, the difference between one person's
knowledge of a particular object and another's signifies (1) a
difference between these persons' original purposes in setting out to
gain knowledge of the object, and (2) consequently a difference between
their present ways of acting with reference to the object. The bare
object as socially current is, at best, for each individual simply a
ground upon which subsequent construction may be made; and the
subsequent construction which each individual is prompted by his
circumstances and is able to work out in judgment first makes the
object, for this individual, real and for his purposes complete.
Now, it is our primary intention to show that objects are, in cases of a
certain important class, not yet ready to serve the person who knows
them in their proper character of stimuli, when they have been, even
exhaustively, defined in merely physical terms. It is very often not
enough that the dimensions of an object and its physical properties,
even the more recondite ones as well as those more commonly
understood--it is often not enough for the purposes of an agent that
these characters should make up the whole sum of his knowledge of the
object in question. A measure of knowledge in terms of physical
categories is often only a beginning--the result of a preliminary stage
of the entire process of teleological determination, which must be
carried through before the object of attention can be satisfactorily
known. In the present study of the logic of valuation we shall be
occupied exclusively with the discussion of cases of this kind. In our
judgments of sense-perception and physical science we have presented to
us material objects in their physical aspect. When these latter are
inadequate to suggest or warrant overt conduct, our knowledge of them
must be supplemented and reconstructed in ways presently to be
specified. It is in the outcome of judgment-processes in which this work
of supplementing and reconstructing is carried through that the
consciousness of value, in the proper sense, arises, and these
processes, then, are those which we shall here consider under the name
of "processes of valuation." They will therefore best be approached
through specification of the ways in which our physical judgments may be
inadequate.
Let us, then, assume, as has been indicated, that the process of
acquiring knowledge--that is to say, the process of judgment or
attention--is in every case of its occurrence incidental to the
attainment of an end. We must make this assumption without attempting
formally to justify it--though in the course of our discussion it will
be abundantly illustrated. Let us, in accordance with this view, think
of the typical judgment-process as proceeding, in the main, as follows:
First of all must come a sense of need or deficiency, which may, on
occasion, be preceded by a more or less violent and sudden shock to the
senses, forcibly turning one's attention to the need of immediate
action. By degrees this sense of need will grow more definite and come
to express itself in a more or less "clear and distinct" image of an
end, toward which end the agent is drawn by desire and to which he looks
with much or little of emotion. The emergence of the end into
consciousness immediately makes possible and occasions definite analysis
of the situation in which the end must be worked out. Salient features
of the situation forthwith are noticed--whether useful things or
favoring conditions, or, on the other hand, the absence of any such.
Thus predicates and then subjects for many subsidiary judgments in the
comprehensive judgment-process emerge together in action and interaction
upon each other. The predicates, developed out of the general end toward
which the agent strives, afford successive points of view for
fresh analyses of the situation. The logical subjects thus
discovered--_objects_ of attention and knowledge--require, on
the other hand, as they are scrutinized and judged, modification and
re-examination of the end. The end grows clearer and fuller of detail
as the predicates or implied ("constituent") ideas which are developed
out of it are distinguished from each other and used in making one's
inventory of the objective situation. Conversely, the situation loses
its first aspect of confusion and takes on more and more the aspect of
an orderly assemblage of objects and conditions, useful, indifferent,
and adverse, by means of which the end may in greater or less measure be
attained or must, in however greatly modified a form, be defeated. Now,
in this development of the judgment-process, it must be observed, the
end must be more or less clearly and consistently conceived throughout
as an _activity_, if the objective means of action which have been
determined in the process are not to be, at the last, separate and
unrelated data still requiring co-ordination. If the end has been so
conceived, the means will inevitably be known as members of a mechanical
_system_, since the predicates by which they have been determined have
at every point involved this factor of amenability to co-ordination.
The judgment-process, if properly conducted and brought to a conclusion,
must issue at the end in the functional unity of a finished plan of
conduct with a perfected mechanical co-ordination of the available
means.
We have now to see that much more may be involved in such a process as
this than has been explicitly stated in our brief analysis. For the end
itself may be a matter of deliberation, just as must be the physical
means of accomplishing it; and, again, the means may call for scrutiny
and determination from other points of view than the physical and
mechanical. The final action taken at the end may express the outcome of
deliberate ethical and economic judgment as well as of judgments in the
sphere of sense-perception and physical science. Let us consider, for
example, that one's end is the construction of a house upon a certain
plot of ground. This end expresses the felt need of a more comfortable
or more reputable abode, and has so much of general presumption in its
favor. There may, however, be many reasons for hesitation. The cost in
time or money or materials on hand may tax one's resources and
injuriously curtail one's activities along other lines. And there may be
ethical reasons why the plan should not be carried out. The house may
shut off a pleasing prospect from the view of the entire neighborhood
and serve no better end than the gratification of its owner's selfish
vanity. It will cost a sum of money which might be used in paying just,
though outlawed, debts.
Now, from the standpoint of such problems as these the fullest possible
preliminary knowledge of the physical and mechanical fitness of our
means must still be very abstract and general. It would be of use in any
undertaking like the one we have supposed, but it is not sufficient in
so far as the problem is one's own problem, concrete, particular, and
so unique. One may, of course, proceed to the stage of physical
judgment without having settled the ethical problems which may have
presented themselves at the outset. The end may be entertained
tentatively as a hypothesis until certain mechanical problems have been
dealt with. But manifestly this is only postponement of the issue. The
agent is still quite unprepared, even after the means have been so far
determined, to take the first step in the execution of the plan; indeed,
his uncertainty is probably only the more harassing than before.
Moreover, the economic problems in the case are now more sharply
defined, and these for the time being still further darken counsel.
Manifestly the need for deliberation is at this point quite as urgent as
the need for physical determination can ever be, and the need is
evidenced in the same way by the actual arrest and postponement of overt
conduct. The agent, despite his physical knowledge, is not yet free to
embrace the end and, having done so, use thereto the means at his
disposal. It is plainly impossible to use the physical means until one
knows in terms of Substance and Attribute or Cause and Effect, or
whatever other physical categories one may please, what manner of
behavior may be expected of them. So likewise is it as truly impossible,
for one intellectually and morally capable of appreciating problems of a
more advanced and complex sort, to exploit the physical properties thus
discovered until ethical determination of the end and economic
determination of the means have been completed.[108]
There are, then, we conclude, cases in which physical determination of
the means is by itself not a sufficient preparation for conduct--in
which there are ethical and economic problems which delay the
application of the physical means to the end to which they may be
physically adapted. Indeed, so much as this may well appear as
sufficiently obvious without extended illustration. Everyone knows that
it is nearly always necessary, in undertaking any work in which material
things are used as means, to count the cost; and everyone knows likewise
that not every end that is in any way attractive and within one's reach
may without more ado be taken as an object of settled desire and effort.
It is indeed needless to elaborate these commonplaces in the sense in
which they are commonly understood. However, such is not our present
purpose. Our purpose is the more specific one of showing that the
meaning of Objectivity must be widened so as to include (1) the
"universe" of ends in their ethical aspect and (2) the economic aspect
of the means of action, as well as (3) the physical aspect to which the
character of Objectivity is commonly restricted. We shall maintain that
these are parts or phases of a complete conception of Reality, and that
of them, consequently, Objectivity must be predicated for every
essential reason connoted by such characterization of the world of
things "external" to the senses. It has been with this conclusion in
mind, then, that we have sought to emphasize the frequent serious
inadequacy, for practical purposes, of the merely physical determination
of the means in one's environment.
The principle thus suggested would imply that the ethical and economic
stages in the one inclusive process of reflective attention should be
regarded as involving, when they occur, the same logical function of
judgment as is operative in the sphere of sense-perception and the
sciences generally. Ethical and economic factors must on occasion be
present at the final choice and shaping of one's course of conduct,
along with the physical determinations of environing means and
conditions which one has made in sense-perception. There is, then, it
would appear, at least a fair presumption, though not indeed an _a
priori_ certainty, that these ethical and economic factors or conditions
have, like the physical, taken form in a _judgment-process_ which will
admit of profitable analysis in accordance with whatever general theory
of judgment one may hold as valid elsewhere in the field of knowledge.
This presumption we shall seek to verify. Now, our interest in thus
determining, first of all, the logical character of these processes will
readily be understood from this, that, in the present view, these are
the processes, and the only ones in our experience, which are properly
to be regarded as processes of Valuation. We shall hold that Valuation,
and so all consciousness of Value, properly so called, must be either
ethical or economic; that the only conscious processes in which Values
can come to definition are these processes of ethical and economic
judgment. The present theory of Value is, then, essentially a logical
one, in the sense of holding that Values are determined in and by a
logical--that is, a judgmental--valuation-process and in its details is
closely dependent upon the general conception of judgment of which the
outlines have been sketched above. Accordingly, the exposition must
proceed in the following general order: Assuming the conception of
judgment which has been presented (which our discussion will in several
ways further illustrate and so tend to confirm), we shall seek to show
that the determinations made in ethical and economic judgment are in the
proper sense objective. This will involve, first of all, a statement of
the conditions under which the ethical and economic judgments
respectively arise--which statement will serve to distinguish the two
types of judgment from each other. We shall then proceed to the special
analysis of the ethical and economic forms from the standpoint of our
general theory of judgment, thereby establishing in detail the
judgmental character of these parts of the reflective process. This
analysis will serve to introduce our interpretation of the consciousness
of Value as a factor in the conduct and economy of life.