Goodness and value theory

Theories of Value investigate how people positively and negatively value things and concepts, the reasons they use in making their evaluations, and the scope of a legitimate evaluation across the social world. As a related issue, theories of goodness inquire into what sorts of things are good, and what the word "good" really means in the abstract.

Skeptical worries

The entire project of investigating the good is, to some skeptics, worrisome.

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For many skeptics, the investigation into the good is not a fruitful quest. The prospect of the investigation being successful, with goodness finally analysed, satisfactorily defined, and universally agreed is unsettling for some people. They assert that perhaps the definition could be used in a totalitarian way, or perhaps the world would lose some of its ambiguity, or there may be a loss of diversity in society and in ways of life. So the fact that some existing choices may be threatened, produces the paradoxical situation that ultimate, incontrovertible knowledge of what is good may to some people not seem good or desirable.

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Some skeptics question the rise of literature about the description of ecology as good or bad. Some green ethicists ask what the role of the ecosystem is in terms of values and the good. It seems that goodness, or value, exists within an ecosystem. In that case, values and the people that hold them, seem subordinate to the ecosystem. If this is so, then what kind of being could validly apply the word to an ecosystem as a whole? Who would have the power to assess and judge an ecosystem as good or bad, and by what criteria?

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Similar questions can (and have) been made concerning evaluations of deities by theists.

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See also: Meta-ethics, Descriptive ethics, Inductive reasoning, Common good, Supreme good

Related Topics:
Meta-ethics - Descriptive ethics - Inductive reasoning - Common good - Supreme good

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