Introduction
The word axiology was introduced into philosophy by urban in 1906 in
his heavily excellent book valuation: its nature and laws: it was used
to translate the werttheorie which the Austrian economist von Neumann
had introduced into economics, and which the Austrian philosophers had
adapted .'Axiology' meant the study of the ultimately worthwhile
things as well as the analysis of worthwhileness in general. Axiology
or value theory began as a tail piece to ethics, bit it arguably ought
to end as the tail which wags the dog, which by illuminating the end
of practice itself a practicable undertaking. Axiological ethics
concerned with morals, values i.e. positive and negative.
J N Findlay's axiological ethics help t study a strand of ethical
enquiry which has been present throughout the history of ethical
thought, but which has in fairly recent time been given an independent
development and has thereby illuminated the whole field of ethical
questions. Here the author considers the writings of some of the most
important exponents of axiological ethics, namely G.E Moore, Rashdall,
Scheler, Ross and Hartmann. He expounds their views clearly and
sympathetically but not uncritically and adds his own opinion about
value theory.
We could observe how scheler anticipated and criticized the emotivist.
Again this study makes unpopular claims and argues for them cogently
;is it the case for example, that too much attention has been lavished
on the early chapters of Moore's principia ethics, which discuss the
naturalistic fallacy, and too little on the later chapters, which make
Moore's one of the prime founders of axiology. In the last part
Findlay makes his own suggestion towards a theory of values with a
reflection that is there any gap in modern moral philosophy which
these suggestion help to fill.
He quotes "there really is, it would seem, an organized frame work of
values and disvalues within which our practical decisions must be
made, and philosophy must give some account of the structure of this
framework and of the principles guiding its construction." He attempts
to meet the philosophical need referred to in two ways. The view of
some of the most important axiological thinkers is clearly and
critically expounded. To this exposition the author add his own
opinions about value theory
Findlay was Clark professor of moral philosophy and metaphysics at
yale university. He for many years held the chair of philosophy at
King's college in the university of London's Gifford lecturer and a
fellow of the British academy and has written books on Meinong, Hegel,
the theory of Mind, the theory of value, and other topics.
Here I tried to summaries these giant ideas into two pages. Though it
didn't give any complete sense I could assure you that it may help to
give an outline to value theory which is discussed by some prominent
philosophers
Brentano, with whom we shall first deal was of course primarily a
philosophical psychologist, the developer of a psyhognosy, an analysis
of mentality as such and its basic differentiation, whose empirical
connections he has concerned to stress. he of course concerned to use
his notion of self transcendence in order to demarcate the realm of
psychic or mental phenomena from those that are physical and it is
perhaps doubtful whether he achieved this. But whether or not there
non-intentional states of mind or cases of intentionality which are
not mental, the notion remains of supreme importance in illuminating
the higher levels of mental life, on which such performances as
valuation can take place. The relevance of Brentano's doctrine to
value theory lies however not in his general demarcation of the mental
but in his peculiar classification of mental phenomena. He believes
that the experiences of belief or judgment , in which the reality of
what we believe have a limiting form in which it no longer makes sense
to question the authenticity of what one judges to be there
If we now turn to Meinong we have what is probably the most
brilliantly elaborated of all theories of the possibilities of what
may be called emotional knowledge and an interesting application of
all theories. He build his value theory on the internationalist
doctrine of Brentano: that it is of the essence of mental life to live
outside of itself, to point beyond itself and to concern itself with
objects that need not be part of it and which need not have being
anywhere, though of course that may be essential elements of reality
and known as such.
Moore begin his study of the good as is well known with a long defense
of the wholly analyzable character of the notion of goodness as such
as opposed to being this or that sort of good thing. Another
axiological contribution of Moore is his doctrine of organic wholes.
while objects considered as what they are in themselves always and
necessarily have the same value or disvalue, the wholes that they form
may have values and disvalues, which are in no sense the sum of, and
not even plainly proportionate to, the values that enter to them.
The rightness of acts Rashdall explains like Moore in terms
productivity of a maximal amount of good, though he avoids the pitfall
of saying that this is what rightness means or of giving any bad
reason to show that this is what rightness means or of giving any bad
reason to show that this is what the content of duty must be. The
whole view that the rightness of acts, Rashdall gives the excellent
name of 'ideal utilitarianism'
The doctrine with which the name of Ross is mainly associated is that
of prima facie duty. On that view, what we ought to do on a given
occasion is always the outcome of a number of distinct 'claims' in the
field. Ross stresses the non-deducible character of the accommodation
of the various duty-claims upon us
Max Scheler's work on ethics is only one of his immensely original,
penetrating studies of the human person in relation to the world, to
other human person, to other human person. Scheler like Hartmann is
concerned to put emotion, rather than cold intellectual grasp, at the
centre of value experience. From the doctrine of a priori emotionally,
Scheler goes on to make many points in opposition to Kant. He devotes
a great deal of space to the values of social as opposed to individual
person.
Hartmann believes, like Scheler that some values are given to
axiological feeling as unquestionably higher than others. Thus moral
values, the values of voluntary acts and dispositions, are
unquestionably higher than goods-values. he holds there is a
dimension of strength of value concerned not so much with the
actualization of positive values as with avoidance of disvalues, and
that this dimension is to a large extent independent of the dimension
of height ,though in general it operates inversely. Hartmann believes
further, that though they ought to beness of values is in no sense
subjective it is only through subjects, and in fact only through the
special subjects called 'person' that it gain any purchase on the
world.
Conclusion
It is not illuminating to treat the ordering of values like the
topography of the moon which can be established by simply training a
telescope on one's object, or, more satisfactorily, by going there.
The sort of values that one is concerned to establish in a systematic
axiology are ineluctable, framework values, things presupposed in all
rational choice, and indispensable to a complete account of anything
whatsoever. We are not free to determine the points of the compass in
the realm of values, but remain free, within wide limits, to steer a
course among them Obviously the beings who often perform whatever may
be meant by putting themselves into other people's shoes, and who have
acquired some skill and zest in this performance, must in the end tend
to move to a new, higher level of interest where what they concern
themselves with is not what this one or that one likes or is
interested in, but only with what survives all such laborious
translation of oneself into everyone else's shoes, so that one then,
at that level, only desires and likes what everyone must desire and
like, and desire and like for everyone, and desire and like everyone
to desire and like for everyone, and so on in unending complication
After giving a sketch of some eminent philosophers in axiological
ethics, now it seems to pictures better view on values, good and bad
and morals. The author is successful in giving sum up of all
axiological philosophers. We should never look for a theoretical study
rather, a better understanding of morality by which building a better
personality. He is not merely summing up all philosophies, but at the
end of the book he present his critical evaluation on their
philosophies. It gives a better perspective on value ethics. I wish
let it be impetus to go through this book.
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