>Hmmm.  Good post Jimbo you old geaser.  I agree with much of it, but would
>like to take up the cudduls (sp?) on some points some time - for instance
>whether ecosystem "integrity" is a tertiary (i.e. entirely subjective)
>quality (or its related "ecosystem health" for that matter).  Don't have
>time for the details of an argument.  I note you transpose qualities and
>properties.  Do they mean the same thing? 
> 
>I do agree that our "ideas" of nature are a social construct (your
>tertiary qualities perhaps touches on this), though I am a realist who
>believes there is a "nature" out there with certain qualities/properties
>that are objective - and perhaps much of the debate in environmental
>ethics comes from the old realist/anti-realist schism).  But that is a
>bridge further on.  At the moment, I want to get my head around some of
>the metaphysics of the nomenclature.  I confess to not having heard of
>tertiary qualities - aesthetics I suppose, which I have never studied
>(though related to some Kuhnian processes of social construction in
>science - [aside: so is Kuhnian normal science a form of aesthetics? -
>certainly it is donkey-deep in social construction]).  The concept (tert.
>qualities) is very useful to environmental ethics I think - and perhaps we
>have underplayed the primary/secondary properties (qualities) potential
>for contribution as well.  Have to go re-read Locke (a boring old fart).
> 
>I don't have time for more - unless you REALLY rile me. 
> 
Chris Perley

Hi Chris,

Chris, of course you know I would never actually *intend* to rile anybody.
. . . :-)   But your comment above ("I note you transpose qualities and
properties. Do they mean the same thing?") got me to thinking once again.

Allow me to cite an example from personal experence.  For some time now in
my teaching I have employed a chocolate taste test in classes (usually
seminar settings, but once in a big lecture) where we've discussed the
nature and ontology of value.  This may test my abilities to describe
things a bit, but bear with me and let me see if I can explain what we do
in those classes.

Prior to the class meeting, I cut up a bunch of "bad" chocolate (or more
precisely, "less good" chocolate <grin>) and another bunch of "good"
chocolate, into bite-sized pieces.  (The modifiers "good" and "bad" don't
need to be in scare quotes, actually--those evaluations of chocolate are
certainly real, objective, and "scientifically" verifiable to anyone with
an open mind and a cleansed palate . . . as I *clearly* demonstrate below
and also in class to my students! <g>)

In class, I hand out to each student a sample of the good chocolate (I call
it chocolate "A") and a piece of the less good chocolate (chocolate "B").
Now, to make explaining this a bit easier, I'll give away some of my
secrets (such as they are) right here.  "A" is usually something like
Lindt's or Tobler or some really good Swiss chocolate (doesn't have to be
Swiss, mind you--there ARE decent American chocolates out there, I suppose.
I just haven't found them yet <s>).  I should add that these are MILK
chocolates we're talking about.  Sample "B" is usually and pretty reliably
Hershey's milk chocolate.  Ideally the students wouldn't be able to tell
simply by looking at the sample what kind of chocolate it is, but they
usually figure it out anyway, and we end up talking about the value
significance (none) of things like brand names, monetary cost, etc.  (more
on that perhaps in a moment).

I first have them taste one sample, reflect on it (that's important), and
then taste the other one, and reflect upon it.  If I were really being
scientific here, I'd have them eat a cracker or drink water in between
tastings. (Some students do actually do this and go out into the hallway to
get a drink of water in between).

After they get done tasting the two samples, we then list what they
experienced or "sensed" on the chalkboard.  Usually students will comment
on things like texture (A is smooth, B a bit grainy); subtlety  of flavor
(for lack of a better term): A is more subtle, B is a bit more harsh.
Associated qualities: presence or absence of a slight caramel flavor (A has
it, B doesn't have it).  And a number of other things like that. . . .

Now the fun starts.  We start trying to discuss what properties of the
chocolate are objectively "better" than others.  Some students at first may
balk at the very idea of "better" chocolate; others will staunchly try to
defend "B" as the better chocolate; etc.  But usually the class discussion
eventually gets around to the idea that people tend to share some values in
chocolate in common: smoothness, for example.  Most students--even those
who will stubbornly try to defend sample "B" (let's call them, chocolate
relativists <s>)--will come around to the idea that smoothness is a
generally desireable quality in chocolate, *regardless* of one's initial
preference for either A or B.

This latter point is significant because it helps lead us into a discussion
of how one student might actually *prefer* B to A (i.e. the Hershey's to
the good chocolate) for whatever reason, but still rationally agree that
smoothness, subtlety of  flavor, etc. make for a *BETTER* chocolate,
objectively speaking, and thus A is the better chocolate.  Perhaps the
taste of "B" (Hershey's) in a particular student's mouth (and mind) brings
back "warm and fuzzy" associations from childhood . . .  e.g. perhaps the
student's grandmother boiled up a pot of Hershey's hot cocoa everyday after
that student got home from school.  Perhaps that student is simply
*accustomed* to the taste of the Hershey's and has never really experienced
what "good" chocolate is.

The clincher is usually the presence or absence of the slight caramel
flavor.  Many (American) students who have never tasted a really good milk
chocolate might not (usually they don't) at first even sense the caramel
flavor in sample A.  Some who do but don't yet understand the significance
of the flavor will actually sometimes initially report this as a bad or
unpleasant sensation, i.e. as some kind of "off" flavor in the chocolate.
In our discussions following the taste test, I try to get around explaining
the caramel flavor, which is a sign of truly *good* milk chocolate.  I try
to explain the (empirical) reason behind the caramel flavor, which has to
do at the temperature at which the milk and sugar carmelizes during the
chocolate making process.  Now, the subtle caramel flavor is a fairly
difficult thing to manage on an industrial chocolate-making scale, and so
lots of (inferior) chocolate makers don't even attempt to make their
chocolate with such a subtle and delicate characteristic as their goal.
(And at the risk of offending anyone here who is hopelessly addicted to
Hershey's chocolate . . .  sorry, Hershey's doesn't have it <smile>.)

The upshot of the classroom experiment is as follows.  *Usually*, once (a)
the caramel flavor is first brought to the attention (either by me or, even
better, by other students in the class) of those who don't initially focus
in on that sensation, and after (b) these initially uninformed students
have been "educated" about the meaning, significance, origin, and
interpretation of that caramel flavor, then most (MOST, not all) students
will (c) come around to the idea that the caramel flavor in a milk
chocolate signifies a "property" or "quality" in milk chocolate that (d) is
in fact and is in reality *objectively* there, in the "realist" sense of
the term, and that (e) the caramel flavor constitutes a highly desirable
aesthetic/value/tertiary quality, etc. characteristic of good quality milk
chocolate.

Its absence indicates a lack of value/quality.

I labor over this one particular issue (the caramel flavor) because it
helps me explain a key goal of my conducting the taste test in a classroom
setting.  In other words, the caramel flavor's presence/absence and the
subsequent interpretation of this property in chocolate helps me get the
students to discuss the difference between their subjective *preferences in
chocolate* and real properties of the chocolate that "inhere" in the
choclate itself, regardless of whether the individual student finds that
property pleasant or desireable.  (For example, when all is said and done,
some students may still doggedly defend Hershey's to the bitter end--which
is a pun, come to think of it . . . For the chocolate uneducated among you:
if anyone here has ever attempted to eat a WHOLE lot of Hershey's milk
chocolate, you'll know what I mean.  Your taste buds tend to go numb after
a while, whereas with a really GOOD milk chocolate, you can actually eat a
larger quantity of it and still enjoy the experience at the end of
consuming a large amount of it as at the beginning . . . .  I actually try
to bring this quality up in discussion as well, among other things--bitter
aftertaste, chalky surface ("bloom"--definitely NOT a desireable
characteristic of good milk chocolate), etc. etc. etc.

Anyway . . . .  Anyone who has ever reflected upon making quality judgments
about ANYTHING, about wine, let's say--or about cars, or about beer, or
about food will understand the point behind the lesson.  For example,
NOBODY goes to the store with the intention of buying the mealiest,
softest, mushiest, most rotten apples in the fruit section--no, we make
quality judgments all the time, and these are NOT just a matter of our
individual preferences or taste.  Some apples are objectively better than
others.  Now, to be sure . . . in an ethics class, I have to be sure that
the students understand at some point in our discussion that aesthetic
value bears only a superficial (to be more precise, bears only an
"analogous") relation to the idea of *moral* value.  As we've noted here on
the list many times, the two are quite distinct, even if (still) distinctly
connected, in some sense.  But the *analogy* of objective value in
chocolate and objective value in ethics is something that most students
take home with them . . . albeit sometimes it takes a long while to sink
in, sometimes the entire semester.

But the discussion of "quality" and "value" in something like chocolate,
say, helps me begin to break down the skeptical and relativistic barriers
that exist in most students' minds when we try to teach "ethics" as an
academic subject.  I realize, however, that this is a TERRIBLY roundabout
and long-winded discussion in reponse to Chris's question about whether
quality and property refer to the same thing . . .  so now let me try a
quick synopsis in response to his, and use the chocolate example to
illustrate the point.

The caramel flavor in the milk chocolate is objectively present in the
chocolate, independent of human valuer (the students intersubjectively
experience that objective characteristic of the chocolate together, even if
some students are not aware of that flavor characteristic at the
beginning).  By that I mean to say that whatever factors or "primary
qualities" cause the caramel flavor to be experienceable by human tasters,
such primary qualities are objectively there in the chocolate--it is "in"
the chocolate (not in the taste buds), i.e. in some sense the chocolate
"possesses" the caramel characteristic or property/quality.  Here it is
important to note that "quality" is necessarily ambiguous when considered
as synonymous with "value"--as a community of intersubjectively agreeing
chocolate connoisseurs, we *value* the "quality" of caramel flavor in the
milk chocolate.  But as a property of milk chocolate, that "quality" of
caramel is objectively there, i.e. is inherent in the chocolate.

Hmmmm. . . . does that make sense?  Whatever causes the caramel
flavor--chemically-speaking, ingredients-wise (i.e. the interaction between
heat, milk, and sugar)--is the primary quality/property of milk chocolate.
The presence or absence of that caramel flavor is a secondary quality of
the chocolate.  The registering of that caramel flavor on the human (or
nonhuman) palate and the subsequent human response to it, i.e. the
interpretation/evaluation of that flavor, is the tertiary quality.

Wow.  Not even sure that makes sense to ME anymore, in rereading it.
<grin>  Better go get me a strong cup of GOOD coffee . . .  you know the
kind: full-bodied, smooth, lots of flavor; not the watered down,  day old,
highly acidic, thinly disguised excuse for brake fluid that they serve in
some second rate beaneries.  :-)  I want a GOOD cup of coffee.

Allright, let's send this one out in the world and see what kinds of
confusion and dissent I can reap.  :-)

later,
Jim