The "Unique" Quality Goodness -- A Myth

Abstract

W T HE PROPOSE to show that the evidence for the view that there is a "unique" quality goodness is overwhelmingly negative. Before this is done it is best to sketch the generic types of meanings of goodness that are possible. The meanings of goodness can be divided into two main classes: goodness has either a unique meaning or a "nonunique" meaning. If goodness has a unique meaning, then goodness is simply goodness, and it cannot be described in non-value terms. The meaning could be simple or complex, i.e., its content could be either unanalyzable or analyzable. Adherents of the unique views of goodness have usually maintained that goodness is unanalyzable. If goodness has a non-unique meaning, then goodness is describable in non-value terms. Again goodness could be either simple or complex. If goodness is simple it could mean pleasantness (assuming that pleasantness is an unanalyzable quality); or if goodness is complex, it could mean positive-interest-in-objects, etc. The meanings of goodness can again be divided into two classes: goodness has either an absolute or a relative meaning. If goodness is absolute, then there is one and only one valid meaning of goodness; but if goodness is relative, then there is one meaning of generic goodness and n specific meanings of goodness. (As in geometry, we have a generic meaning of geometry but many specific geometries.) Where goodness is relative, generic goodness is the determinable, it acts as a variable; the specific meanings of goodness are the determinates of the variable. The determinable, generic goodness, has a significant range of determinates and each determinate generates a specific value-system.