Ontology of Values (2) Values as Expressions of Contradiction

I would like to return briefly to my previous discussion of Adam Smith’s free market economy to focus on its population aspects. The market is comprised of sellers and buyers. Smith is actually interested in the decisions of these persons, rather than the persons themselves; but I will continue to refer to persons. There are two different subpopulations of persons contained together within the single market population. When consumers buy products and sellers sell them, the subpopulations are interacting. Price regulates their economic interactions, as well as back-stream economic activities of production and preparation for consumption. The market itself is defined as the number of persons (and often geography) whose buying and selling decisions are set by knowledge of the same price. Would it be possible by analogy to see social and moral values as price regulators in interacting social populations?

Let us imagine two religious populations, Roman Catholic and Protestant. In the history of the United States, these two groups have often encountered each other in different situations. Here are three hypothetical scenarios of their relationships.

Suppose, in scenario A, Catholic Irish immigrants do not interact with New England English-heritage Protestants. They are so separated, that they do not know of each other’s existence. Protestants in New England’s rural villages go about their lives with no contact with Catholics living in Boston. Catholics do not marry Protestants. Protestant sports teams do not play against Catholic sports teams. Catholic and Protestant children attend separate schools. In the case of complete separation of these two groups, we (observers studying the groups) would have no reason to talk about Catholic or Protestant values. We would explain their social behavior, rituals, and community organizations, by other values, but not by Catholic or Protestant as values of primary identity.

Now imagine a different situation, scenario B. The Catholics and Protestants are completely socially integrated. They intermarry freely. They attend the same schools and the same classes. Their sports teams compete against one another in the same leagues. As far as we can tell, there are no differences between Catholics and Protestants. If we did a study of social characteristics, Catholic and Protestant identity would not differ from random as explanatory factors. In such a case of complete integration, we would have no reason, either, to talk about Catholic or Protestant values.

In the two preceding scenarios, the concept, “values”, explains nothing. When Catholics and Protestants are completely separated and without knowledge of each other, scenario A, their behavior and thoughts could not have reference to each other. They would not think about or verbalize being Catholic or Protestant as a value of religious identity. We (again as social scientist observers) could not even directly observe their values of religious identity.

Alternatively, when Catholics and Protestants are so completely integrated that there are no differences between them, scenario B, the notion they have different values is superfluous. In these two instances, there are no different behaviors to require us to appeal to different values to explain them.

What would happen, scenario C, if we would mix the Catholic and Protestant populations unequally? Take the example of intermarriage. Suppose that wealthy Catholics and wealthy Protestants intermarry frequently and freely, but do not marry poor Catholics or Protestants. Further, poor Catholics and poor Protestants do not intermarry at all. Poor Catholics marry other poor Catholics. Poor Protestants marry other poor Protestants. How do we explain the difference in marriage patterns?

Looking at example C, most persons would probably say, for wealthy Catholics and wealthy Protestants, wealth is a more important consideration in marriage than religion. For poor Catholics and Protestants, wealth values are less important than religious values in deciding upon marriage.

The concept of value is useful in case C, because there are differences between the social behavior of the groups of wealthy and poor religious persons with regard to marriage. Values are about differences. They signify difference. They sort out differences. For social scientists, values help explain differences observed by the scientists in behavior of populations.

In the previous post, I discussed contradiction. I want to bring back this term here. When we are aware of difference, difference is contradiction. Contradiction states that one thing is not another, different thing; for instance, if you are Catholic, then you are not Protestant. Values express contradiction, because values—religious values in this instance—signify that each value expresses in practical terms that it is not some other value (this is not a tautology).

In the theory I am exploring, values simultaneously create social relations and are products of social relations between interacting populations, when those relations involve contradiction. When persons in populations interact in a way based on their differences, values spring into existence, regulate behavior, and are experienced.

Values have objective existence as defining features of interaction of populations, just as prices have objective existence as defining features of free markets. In an established market, buyers and sellers do not create prices; rather prices regulate buying and selling. The prices exist independently of particular individual persons and personalities. They are simultaneously the result of economic interaction and creator of economic interaction. I suggest that social and moral values are like prices in this regard (I am not saying that social and moral values are economic values).

If we would define values as purely subjective, or psychological, phenomena, it would be difficult to explain social behavior. Consider scenario C. Suppose there are 500,000 Protestants distributed in 500 New England villages and 100,000 Catholics in Boston. Further imagine that over ten years, 5,000 wealthy Protestants and wealthy Catholics meet, fall in love, and marry each other. As in scenario C, no wealthy Protestants or wealthy Catholics marry anyone who is poor. Surely, we would not ascribe this pattern to coincidence or random chance.

Could any purely subjective mental state, such as ideas, motives, drives, or values-as-purely-subjective, explain the pattern as its ultimate cause? I don’t see how. How would all those persons get the same idea at the same time, that they should marry only other wealthy persons? Motivation must be connected to each person’s knowledge of the social world. Each person sees wealthy persons marrying each other and accepts such behavior as a model he or she should repeat. Such knowledge implies that social signaling, regulation, and prescription are occurring; i.e., that values exist and are creating behavior patterns.

To put the matter differently, a social value (“wealth is more important than religion in arranging affairs of the heart”) exists in the social realm. This value differentiates between wealth and religion. Wealthy people perceive this value as prescriptive. Subjectivity conforms to the objective value.

Contents

1. Ontological Status
2. Values as Expressions of Contradiction
3. New Categorization of Values
4. Perception of Values
5. How Fundamental Values Arise

(Revised. December 2, 2005.)

Comments

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