Well, only one week has passed since my last post, so I guess that’s progress! Previously, I’ve waited until a subject came to me before I sat down to type. This time, I’m going to give it a few minutes and see where my mind takes me…
Maybe this will be the first time my blog actually lives up to its title. In one of my previous posts, I mentioned the idea that what is fundamentally valuable will vary from person to person. When I say “fundamentally,” I mean something that is valued for its own sake rather than as a means to some other end. I value money for the flexibility it gives me, not because my ultimate goal is to see how much I can accumulate over the years.
The most fundamental goal is a life worth living, but that is too vague to act as a guide. What I mean by “fundamental” in this context is the list of a life’s characteristics that make it worth living without being subordinate to other characteristics/goals, which brings me (in the third paragraph, finally) to the question I can’t answer with a degree of justification that I find satisfactory: How should I identify those fundamental goals? Put another way, what kind of explanation for their existence should I find acceptable?
To some extent, for example, the explanation is certainly evolutionary in nature. I want X because my ancestors wouldn’t have survived and reproduced if they hadn’t wanted it. In a similar vein, I might want X because I found it pleasurable in the past or because I was socialized to want it. In each case, we are back to the is-ought gap. How can my neurological wiring justify a particular choice? If the goal is simply to avoid pain, why should that take precedence?
The only explanation that I can generate at the moment is that our emotions are the fundamental building blocks of the system. Beyond a certain point, if someone asks why they should want X, the only answer seems to be that I want it because I want it. That doesn’t sound like a very good response to me, but I don’t see a way around it at this point.
Inner Questions 