[MD] Food for Thought

[David M]

> DM:
>> I accept your behaviour as evidence of your subjectivity
>> and values, so am I making a mistake?
>
> You mistake objective behavior for a response to value.  A mechanical doll
> or robot can exhibit the behavior of walking, even talking.  A flag 
> hanging
> from a pole points in the direction of the wind.  Bowling pins fall down
> when struck  by the ball.  Are these responses to value?

DM: Have you answered my question?

>
> DM:
>> Do you not express values by your behaviour?
>
> Rarely.

DM: That's yes then.

 I'm more apt to express values in my preferences and decisions.

DM: Aren't those behaviours?

> Human behavior doesn't directly tell us what an individual thinks or 
> feels.

DM: Yet we cannot avoid attributing these. Unless we are some nutso skeptic.

> Behavior can be feigned.  Thus, a criminal who protests his innocence may 
> be
> given a lie detector test, but the U.S. justice system does not even 
> accept
> this as evidence of guilt.  If I cry "Ouch!", you may assume that I sense
> pain; but, in general, how one behaves is an unreliable indicator of his
> values.

DM: Unreliable means it is generally valid, as I am suggesting.

>
> I have problems interpreting Heidegger.  But here is how Cynthia Nielsen
> explains Heidegger's concept of value:

DM: You, me and everyone. There are some terrible books on Heidegger
out there. Heidegger is a beast, but also magnificent. One good book is 
called
Between Good and Evil, Expressing the World by Anthony Rudd, and the
Cambridge Companion to Heidegger is good.

>
> "Heidegger interprets Nietzsche as saying that nihilism is a 'devaluation 
> of
> all values.' So Heidegger asks, 'What is a value?' Heidegger (interpreting
> Nietzsche) says, 'the essence of a value lies in its being a
> point-of-view. . Through the characterization of value as a point-of-view
> there results one consideration that for Nietzsche's concept of value is
> essential: as a point of view, value is posited at any given time by a
> seeing and _for_ a seeing.  This seeing is of such a kind that it sees
> inasmuch as it has seen, and that it has seen inasmuch as it has set 
> before
> itself and thus posited what is sighted as a particular something.'
> Heidegger goes on to say that value 'counts inasmuch as it posited as that
> which matters.  It is so posited through an aiming at and a looking toward
> that which has to be reckoned upon.'  Aim, view, etc., have a meaning that
> come out of the Greek tradition, viz., a seeing and that which is seen, 
> but
> the meaning has been transformed from idea (eidos) to perceptio. 'All 
> being
> whatever is a putting forth . The essence of everything that is - an 
> essence
> thus possessed of nisus [the impetus to come forward] lays hold of itself 
> in
> this way and posits for itself an aim in view. That aim provides the
> perspective that is to be conformed to.  The aim in view is value.'
> Moreover, a value is not a phenomenon that arose in the 19th century.
> Understanding reality in terms of value is a much broader phenomenon.  To
> approach reality from the point of view of value makes reality 
> manipulable.
> In other words, the world is seen in terms of enhancing our existence.
> Instead of unleashing Being as being, this approach reduces Being."    -- 
> [http://percaritatem.blogspot.com/]

DM: I don't know what the context of the above was, but that looks like
dreadful writing to me.

>
> HP, previously:
>> Please explain what you mean by "inter-subjectivity".
>> To me it suggests the relationship between subjects.
>> Is this your intent?
>
>> DM:
>> That is my intent.
>
> Then, you are interpreting behavior as a valuistic response.  By engaging 
> in
> conversation, we communicate our ideas and experiences in an indirect,
> objective context.  But, because value is subjective, there is no
> "inter-subjective" value experience.  No other person can sense my values.

DM: Disagree.

>
> HP, previously:
>> The essence of Value is in the aggregate: the Absolute Source.
>
> DM:
>> Fine, but I have no time for the word absolute as it
>> implies something finished and what is existence if it
>> is not an exploration of what is possible and of value?
>> Why would any absolute require the journey of
>> discovery that we know as the actual.
>
> Why, indeed?  Your leading question is so well stated that the answer is
> virtually self-evident.  I'll use your words.
>
> BECAUSE the Absolute is finished and complete in itself, to be 
> "perfected",
> it extends its sensibility to an actualized (provisional) otherness in 
> order
> that its value may be realized autonomously.  Hence, "the journey of
> discovery that we know as actual."  Negation creates Difference, dividing
> sensibility and otherness which are held together by the Value of the
> source.  Proprietary awareness (the not-other or "negate") realizes value 
> by
> negating otherness (the essent) and creating its own Being-in-the-world, 
> to
> use Heidegger's metaphor.  Each cognizant being becomes aware of 
> (acquires)
> value as its object.  Existentially, this creates the objective world.
> Metaphysically, it enables the value of otherness to become realizable by
> the subjective "not-other".
>
> What don't you like about this scenario?
>

DM: I don't like: "the Absolute is finished and complete" , because
it seems at odds with the work in progress, struggling to evolve,
that this cosmos seems to be. In the beginning was some 'lack'.