C. S. Lewis on the Objectivity of Value

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C. S. Lewis on the Objectivity of Value

• I. What is the Tao?
• II. Critique of the Subjective Theory of Value
• III. Implications of the Subjective/Objective
  Issue for Education
• IV. Critique of Ethical Innovation

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I. What is the Tao?

• Associated with the idea of objective values.
• Sentiments, affections, value judgments can be
  true/false, correct/incorrect, correspond or fail
  to correspond with reality.
• No fact/value distinction. There are evaluative
  facts.

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Lewiss Examples

• The waterfall is sublime/pretty.
• It is sweet/bitter to die for one's country.

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4 senses of "the Tao" in AM

• 1. The cosmic, metaphysical basis of all
  objective value.
• 2.Human nature, as having a final cause, built-in
  purpose. This purpose involves in some way
  imitating or reflecting the Tao in sense 1.
• 3. Our present state of knowledge or opinion of
  the Tao (in 1 2) or the belief in the reality
  of the Tao (in 1 2).

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• 4. The progressive development or growth of our
  knowledge of the Tao (in 1 2) the dynamic
  unfolding of the truth about the Tao in human
  consciousness through history.

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Unanswered question

• This raises the question is it necessary to
  accept the reality of the Tao in sense 1?
• Would it be sufficient to accept the Tao in sense
  2 only, positing objective but anthropocentric
  values?

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II. Lewis's Critique of Subjectivism

• Lewis's target in chapter 1 the emotive theory
  of value.
• Values are merely projections of our feelings
  upon external things.
• Contrasting objective view attitudes and
  sentiments can be just, appropriate, fitting,
  ordinate to their objects, or fail to be so.

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The Tao as Objective Value

• There are qualities that demand certain responses
  from us, given the kind of thing we are.
• Implication our own human essence is fulfilled
  only when we adopt these objectively demanded
  attitudes toward their respective objects.

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The Tao as Reason

• Lewis also describes emotions as being in
  accordance, or in conflict, with Reason.
• Emotions can be rational or irrational, just as
  beliefs can be.

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Lewiss Main Argument

• subjectivism cannot explain the phenomenon of
  disagreements over value judgments.
• "That is pretty." "No, it is not."
• "I feel sick." "No, I feel quite well."
• If value judgments are merely projections of
  one's feelings, what are we disagreeing about?

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Men without Chests

• The subjectivists that Lewis considers
  (represented by "Gaius and Titius") believe that
  we should learn to see through appeals to emotion
  that masquerade as appeals to objective fact.
• Propaganda will then lose its power.

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• Lewis argues that this approach will produce "men
  without chests" humans with overdeveloped
  intellects and powerful appetites/drives, but no
  strong passions, sentiments.
• It is impossible to achieve moral virtue under
  such conditions. The intellect requires
  well-trained sentiments as its ally.

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Combating Propaganda

• The task of the modern educator is not to cut
  down jungles but to irrigate deserts.
• The right defense against false sentiments is to
  inculcate just sentiments.
• By starving the sensibility of our pupils, we
  only make them easier prey to the propagandist
  when he comes. (p. 24)

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Consequences of Neglecting the Education of the
Sentiments

• And all the time - such is the tragicomedy of
  our situation - we continue to clamour for those
  very qualities we are rendering impossible.
• We make men without chests and expect of them
  virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honour and are
  shocked to find traitors in our midst. We
  castrate and bid the geldings be fruitful. (p.
  35)

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III. Implications for Education

• On the objectivist view, education is a matter of
  initiation.
• Analogy adult bird teaching the young bird to
  fly.
• Helping the young to develop into the form of
  common human nature. A process of humanization.

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On the Subjectivist View

• On the subjectivist view, education is a matter
  of conditioning.
• Analogy poultry keeper training the young bird
  to be manageable for the sake of productivity.
• Distinction propagation and propaganda.

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The Acid Test

• Crucial case teaching the child to be willing to
  sacrifice himself/herself for the sake of the
  community.
• Is this a matter of shared submission to an
  objective order of value, or a matter of
  exploiting the child to serve the values of
  others?