Thanks for this John,

We agree on this - but I'd like to know what others think.  It seems to me
that there is a real issue about whether intrinsic "value" (requiring a
valuer) is a more desirable term than intrinsic (or inherent) "worth".  I
happen to accept that environmental solutions must take account of all the
functions and "parts" of an ecosystem (its qualities), which - I think -
requires some measure of ecocentrism (at least in a Leopoldian "Think like a
Mountain" sense where human perspectives are orientated some way away from
the purely anthropocentric view).  Where many people baulk at this idea of
intrinsic "value" is the lack of a "valuer" to prescribe "value" from
anything other than an anthropocentric perspective.  Why don't we just use
worth as John suggests?  It appears to be a clearer and perhaps less
problematic.  And do we need "value"?  The idea of value implies that we
think it more important to put a $(or something) "value" on something than
to recognise either that the *qualities exist* or that *they have worth in
themselves* and in relation to the ecosystem of which they are associated.

I also think that "value" is often confused with reference to "human values"
which are entirely different beasties.

Cannot think of any more arguments to get some rationalisation of
nomenclature, but others may.

Chris Perley

> -----Original Message-----
> From: john foster [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
> Sent: Monday, 10 July 2000 04:31
> To: [log in to unmask]; [log in to unmask]
> Subject: RE: Minteer on Callicott and intellectual slipperiness
>
>
> At 09:34 PM 7/9/00 +1200, Chris Perley wrote:
> >Some questions for clarification.
> >
> >Is there a difference between "quality", "value" and "worth"?
>
> Value requires a 'evaluator' I believe. So if one finds a 'quality within'
> then it is a predicate of the value that one finds. One could find a
> 'quantity within' and this would still denote some value.
>
> Value requires enactment of valorization.
>
> Since worth may be hypothetical and unknown for instance in the idea of
> 'self worth' or 'intrinsic' worth, there is no evaluation by an evaluator.
> Worth that is proposed may always have some residue within.
> Perhaps the term
> 'inner grandeur' denotes the predicate more accurately. So an
> item may have
> an 'intrinsic worth' but it is not known or has not been evaluated.
>
> Do you have a sense of self-worth, are you worthy? In this sense the term
> 'inherent worth' denotes something futural. The item is a 'sortal' form of
> the term value which is an artifact rather - in emphasizing - an enactment
> of 'entrenched values'.
>
> Paul Taylor's idea on organisms as 'centers of teleological *activity*'
> indicates that organism have 'inherent worth' which is a better term than
> intrinsic value since worth extends beyond and before any value. Inherent
> also means that the worth is 'to come to pass' and 'it's time is
> yet to come'.
>
> I like inherent worth because it has a psychic or metaphysical
> sense to it.
> And when value or worth is discussed the domain of knowledge lies in the
> beholding. Worthiness means more than simply value I think. Inherent worth
> thus may signify something of worth yet to come. But how is this 'sortal
> form' to be known in advance?
>
> best regards,
>
> john foster
>
> *sortal I guess refers to forms that are 'sort of like' or emulate or are
> copies of their originals, hence 'sortals' objects sort-of-like
> this or that
> ideal form. [cf. Platon]
>
>
>
>
>
> If so, what
> >are they and are they relevant to the discussion of intrinsic value? Are
> >there any other terms that need to be defined?
> >
> >For what it is worth (ha, little pun I didn't even intend - this is a
> >quality debate of some potential value) I think that they are often
> >confused.  Many refer to intrinsic "value" while perhaps meaning
> intrinsic
> >"qualities".  Others refer to "value" as "worth" perhaps.
> >
> >Only stumbling around in the dark  here.  My views are not
> formed.  Comments
> >please.
> >
> >Chris Perley
> >
> >> -----Original Message-----
> >> From: [log in to unmask]
> >> [mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of john foster
> >> Sent: Saturday, 8 July 2000 04:14
> >> To: [log in to unmask]
> >> Subject: Re: Minteer on Callicott and intellectual slipperiness
> >>
> >>
> >>  Paul Kirby wrote:
> >>
> >> >response to John
> >>
> >> >Moths and bats have an intimate relationship. Bats which could
> >> locate moths
> >> >by sonar ate well and survived. Moths which had a fluffy outer surface
> >> >which reduced sound reflection had a better chance of not
> being eaten and
> >> >survived enough to reproduce. Moths with an erratic flight
> path, making
> >> >prediction of position difficult, also had a marginally
> improved rate of
> >> >survival. Hence we have fluffy moths with erratic flight. Mothood is
> >> >therefore linked to the existence of bats. There is a
> reciprocity between
> >> >bathood and mothood, in that they have moulded their identities in
> >> >relationship to each other. However this reciprocity is not
> symmetrical.
> >> >The bats need moths to eat but the moths do not need to be
> eaten by bats.
> >>
> >> I quess it is a trade off. The bats though are not conscious
> of the method
> >> of genetic selection for fuzziness. In the absence of bats
> thus the moth
> >> through genetic drift loses the attribute of fuzziness unless
> they endure
> >> into winter and need some fleece.
> >>
> >> My explanation regarding 'intrinsic value' could be further
> >> elaborated on by
> >> simply discussing the term value. To have value means that
> there must be a
> >> relationship: intrinsic or extrinsic. For instance, valorization is an
> >> activity of the consciousness, whether in the bat or in the
> moth regarding
> >> the attribute of flavour, a sensory datum that influences the pleasure
> >> response (or principle) that leads to the selection and
> pursuit of prey in
> >> the moth/bat interaction. The moth is not conscious of it's own flavour
> >> presumably so the bat is the indicator/register of that attribute
> >> of value,
> >> right.
> >>
> >> Now what about cow birds? The cow bird can lay eggs in the
> nest of another
> >> bird species, even remove the eggs of that bird. The parasitized bird
> >> species cannot tell the difference between the hatchlings, and
> >> the cow bird
> >> young eats more, is larger, etc. The parasitized bird receives no
> >> benefits,
> >> no value from the interaction and as far as ornithologists are
> >> concerned the
> >> species that are parasitized may become endangered in temperate
> >> and tropical
> >> environs.
> >>
> >> So the term 'value' thus relates to the interaction (or
> relationship) but
> >> there is no apparent value to the parasitized bird except that
> it believes
> >> it is reproducing it's own. The bird may 'feel' good that it is
> >> raising it's
> >> own young. We may call this a pure antinomy since there is actually a
> >> 'disvaluation' but it is concealed except to man (the rational
> species may
> >> only be conscious of this dis-value).
> >>
> >> So the value which is intrinsically occurring for the cow bird, is a
> >> disvalue for the parasitized bird. But it is man that is
> conscious of the
> >> disvalue, and the cow bird and the parasitized bird really
> only 'perceive'
> >> value, not disvalue or the cow birds would not be able to
> parasitize. Both
> >> birds must be content (bird contentment in the form of song, preening,
> >> stretching of wings, etc.) for the interaction to occur successfully.
> >>
> >> Cow birds can change the color of their eggs to suit the color of the
> >> parasitized eggs. So the parasitized bird thus cannot recognize
> >> that another
> >> species eggs are in the nest.
> >>
> >> Ah ha! Eureka. There must be some unconcealed value then that
> operates in
> >> the parasitism of the cow bird that confers some benefit to the
> >> parasitized
> >> bird, otherwise the cow birds would have to raise their own
> offspring. So
> >> this concealed value is intrinsic in an instrumental way.
> >>
> >> But value is an activity since to value is to find meaning
> intended in the
> >> relationship between the interactions. Thus what is of value
> >> depends on the
> >> relationship of the two.
> >>
> >> There are two functional forms of interaction operating here: one is
> >> behavioural and the other is morphological. The cow bird has
> developed egg
> >> color alteration, and the cow bird has learned to find nests
> of a suitable
> >> host or surrogate parents. But what then does the cow birds do in the
> >> meantime. Do they check out the nest once and a while? Do the
> large young
> >> protect the other nestlings? Not likely.  These are unanswered
> >> questions in
> >> part because we know that in the normal course of biological events,
> >> parasitism rarely is successful in nature if the host species
> dies off. So
> >> what may be operative here in the explosion of cow birds in the
> >> Americas is
> >> an imbalance brought on by fragmentation of forests caused by
> >> roads, farms,
> >> cities and clearcut forestry to create vastly more edge habitat
> >> that the cow
> >> bird can exploit than is normal in primary forests of the
> >> Americas, right?
> >>
> >> So now parasitism becomes more or less lethal to the host
> because of human
> >> encroachment, and indirectly to the parasitic bird. Like the
> >> example of the
> >> moth there is a disvalue operating here for the moment. Eg.
> while the moth
> >> is fooled by lights in cities, near homes, the bats begin to feed near
> >> street lights and freeways at night. Many bats on the highways
> >> are killed as
> >> are moths, and the moths near homes get preyed on by the bats with
> >> increasing frequency. People become concerned about bats not
> knowing that
> >> bats also prey on mosquitoes. So in fact what was in homeostatic
> >> relationship (what was the meaning intended in the stable
> relationship) of
> >> the bat and the moth is now altered significantly since moths
> >> only feed and
> >> fly at night, butterflies feed and fly during the day (basic
> lepidopteran
> >> biology) the bats are now assisted by lights which attract the
> moths, etc.
> >> Now if we were to bring up genetically altered corn and migratory
> >> lepidopteran species, and we were to bring up the role and
> importance of
> >> lepidopteran species in pollination say of one genus, the
> Salix spp., then
> >> the threads, webs, and tangles of relationships become impossible to
> >> untangle and actually become indescribable. Some species of plants are
> >> totally reliant on lepidopteran species for reproduction.
> >> Certainly that is
> >> the case, so as we continue our investigation on value we end
> up thinking
> >> like a mountain whose enemy is erosion. But in the strict
> >> analogical case of
> >> the bat and moth, the cow bird and the neotropical songbird
> (eight hundred
> >> species of birds alone in Costa Rica which is only 3.5 million
> hectares in
> >> size) we can now begin to see what is at risk here on earth. Only
> >> about 21 %
> >> of the remaining primary ecosystems are protected in Costa Rica for
> >> instance, and of the remainder we have lots of pineapple
> >> monocultures which
> >> are completely sterilized of bird life, oil palms, etc.
> >>
> >> Birds and moths and butteflies depend on each other since the
> >> birds control
> >> insect outbreaks in the temperate forests to a certain extent. The
> >> insectivorous birds conserve the trees from epidemics of defoliating
> >> insects, leaving the trees for the moths, budworms, etc., when
> >> the birds are
> >> not too numerous. In fact the evening grosbeak can cause (along with
> >> parasitic dipteran flies) the collapse of an epidemic of the
> >> western spruce
> >> budworm (C.occidentalis). I have seen this happen and it was like an
> >> 'epiphany' to me since the budworm had defoliated entire forests for
> >> thousands of hectares here. After three years the forests were
> >> looking like
> >> they were going to die. The bugs had begun eating the pines,
> hemlocks, and
> >> true pines. Then one day we woke up and the forest was alive with
> >> bird song
> >> and seemed to be moving but it was the evening grosbeaks. They
> >> were having a
> >> feast. So the next year the budworm almost dissappeared and the
> >> trees survived.
> >>
> >> "You never know where fish will go" is one saying, but much of
> >> the food for
> >> fish, the salmonids, for instance is in the form of flies,
> right. And the
> >> salmonid is a visual feeder and thus the protection of forests
> >> along streams
> >> is absolutely critical to their existence, as well as moderating stream
> >> temperatures. So as we begin to discuss valorization from an ecological
> >> perspective it looks like it is a vast tangle.
> >>
> >> The premiss of Leopold is correct in all instantiations because
> >> the land is
> >> as important as each species; taken together life begets life,
> >> progressus ad
> >> infinitum.
> >>
> >> So life as a class act is really an activity each organism
> >> participates at;
> >> the consciousness of which is a sustaining or guiding activity-notion.
> >>
> >> I checked numerous tree rings with an increment borer and I
> could find no
> >> growth declines in the previous hundred years in the trees
> here, but the
> >> radial growth decline from the budworm was significant. Many
> >> trees produced
> >> minute annual rings of mere millimeters. This was amazing, and
> >> there was no
> >> spraying here to stop the worms. I think if the spraying had
> >> occurred, then
> >> the epidemic would have remained endemically a problem, and that
> >> would have
> >> impacted many other species of dipterans and lepidopterans,
> because they
> >> would have sprayed Bt and then may have resorted to malathion and other
> >> organo phosphates.
> >>
> >> They used to spray DDT here over our homes to kill mosquitoes
> >> when I was a lad.
> >>
> >> chao,
> >>
> >> John
> >>
> >> PSS The idea of intrinsic value will blow out into a view of
> >> extra-intrinsic
> >> value ultimately if we take a strictly ecological perspective on value
> >> confusing and conflating intrinsicality with extrinsicality or
> >> instrumentality.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> >
> >> >This, example illustrates my problem with intrinsic value (as far as I
> >> >understand it). That humankind has its identity formed by its
> >> relationship
> >> >to the natural environment I have no doubt. I could agree
> with an idea of
> >> >"oneness", we are all stardust etc. However Invoking intrinsic
> >> value seems
> >> >to me like bats, faced with a catastrophic decline in the moth
> >> population,
> >> >developing a theory of "intrinsic flavour" on behalf of the
> moth. Such a
> >> >moth-centric theory may engender a useful moderation in moth
> consumption,
> >> >if bats wish to preserve the opportunity to enjoy moth flavoured
> >> meals, but
> >> >it does not alter the fact that the flavour does not exist
> except on the
> >> >palate of the bat. Moths have intrinsic qualities from which the
> >> flavour is
> >> >derived but they do not own the flavour. Bats developed
> flavour to reward
> >> >them for doing (eating) the right things.
> >> >
> >> >I do not see any difference between intrinsic flavour and
> >> intrinsic value.
> >> >
> >> >Regards Paul k
> >> >
> >> >
> >> >
> >>
> >>
> >
> >
>
>



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