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Emotional Reason
How to Deliberate about Value
Bennett W. Helm
July 5, 2002
Abstract
Deliberation about personal, non-moral values involves elements
ofboth invention and discovery. Thus, we invent our values by
freely choos-ing them, where such distinctively human freedom is
essential to our defin-ing and taking responsibility for the kinds
of persons we are; nonetheless,we also discover our values insofar
as we can deliberate about them ratio-nally and arrive at
non-arbitrary decisions about what has value in ourlives. Yet these
notions of invention and discovery seem inconsistent witheach
other, and the possibility of deliberation about value therefore
seemsparadoxical. My aim is to argue that this apparent paradox is
no paradoxat all. I offer an account of what it is to value
something largely in terms ofemotions and desires. By examining the
rational interconnections amongemotions and evaluative judgments, I
argue for an account both of howjudgments can shape our emotions,
thereby shaping our values in a waythat makes intelligible the
possibility of inventing our values, and of howour emotions can
simultaneously rationally constrain correct deliberation,thereby
making intelligible the possibility of discovering our values.
Theresult is a rejection of both cognitivist and non-cognitivist
accounts ofvalue and deliberation about value.
Personal values are those values that enter into an
understanding of whatmakes life worth living, values that, because
of they way the help define thekind of person one is, are to a
large extent relative to the individual. How isdeliberation about
personal values possible?
What makes this issue difficult is that our concept of personal
value, or ofimport more generally,1 is pulled in seemingly opposed
directions of objectivity
American Philosophical Quarterly, 37, 122.1I shall use import to
cover two distinct ways in which something might matter to a
person, ways that are distinguished by their depth. Thus, one
might care about doing wellin a sporting event, and be motivated on
this ground, say, to train hard for it in advance.Yet such a care
is not for most of us a central part of our lives such that our
very selveswould be wounded if we failed. On the other hand, a
professional athlete might well valueparticipating in a sport in
the sense that she makes who she is depend on it, and to someextent
organizes her understanding of herself around it. Thus, she may
undergo an identitycrisis after a career-ending injury. I will have
more to say about this distinction betweencaring and valuing below,
though I shall throughout use import neutrally with respect
tothem.
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and subjectivity. Thus, what is meaningful in my life is at
least in part up tome and is in this sense subjective: I can have a
say in creating or inventingthe kind of person it is worth my
being. To be able to invent ourselves inthis way is to have a kind
of freedom that is distinctly human: a freedom notmerely to control
our actions but more fundamentally to govern ourselves; callthis
freedom autonomy . Yet there seems also to be an element of
objectivityin what is meaningful in our lives in that we can reason
about it correctly orincorrectly: insofar as it is not
intellectually arbitrary which values we choose,we must be able to
think critically about the different paths we might take inlife and
articulate why one path is better than another. Consequently,
whenwe get this reasoning right, we come to discover what makes our
lives valuableand worth living, potentially overcoming delusions or
misunderstandings aboutourselves. The problem is that such talk of
discovery seems to leave no room forinvention, and vice versa. How
can we make sense of the possibility of gettingour values
(objectively) right or wrong when we are the ones
(subjectively)determining the standards of correctness? This
difficulty, which I shall call theapparent paradox of simultaneous
invention and discovery, seems to undermineour best attempts at
getting clearer on the kind of reasoning at issue here. Myaim in
this paper will be to show how we can make sense of deliberation
aboutpersonal values as involving both aspects of autonomous
invention and rationaldiscovery.
To say that import is simultaneously both invented and
discovered is to rejectboth cognitivist and non-cognitivist
theories of import. According to a cogni-tivist conception, the
import things have is something to be discovered, thereindependent
of our attitudes towards it; such attitudes are therefore
understoodcognitively, as responsive to such independent import.
Non-cognitivists, by con-trast, understand import as existing in
the world only as projected there byour attitudes, where we can
have a complete understanding of those attitudeswithout appealing
to import to explain or justify them. The difference
betweencognitivism and non-cognitivism therefore consists in their
conceptions of therelative conceptual priority of import and the
corresponding attitude. My aimin articulating a conception of
import that embodies both elements of rationaldiscovery and
autonomous invention is in effect to reject any claim of
conceptualpriority of the import or the attitude.
I shall argue that the kind of attitudes that are most relevant
for understand-ing import is emotional. Consequently, it will be
important to understand theemotions and their connections to
deliberation and evaluative judgment. Myargument will proceed in 1
by considering an earlier attempt by Charles Taylorto provide the
sort of account I will be advocating and arguing that his accountas
it stands is inadequate in large part because it is not well
grounded on a the-ory of the rational interconnections between
emotion and judgment. In 23I provide this theory by arguing that
emotions and judgments are two aspectsof a single perspective
constitutive of import, each of which has the potentialto correct
the other. In 4 I provide a clearer account than Taylor of
how,through self-interpretation, we can exercise judgment to shape
our emotionalattitudes, although only in ways that are constrained
in turn by those emotions
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themselves, thus making room for the possibility of the
simultaneous inventionand discovery. Finally, in 5 I extend this
account to deliberation about im-port, arguing for a way of making
sense of how a change in ones emotional andjudgmental perspective
on import can constitute an improvement.
1 Taylor on Radical Reevaluation
Consider Charles Taylors account of radical reevaluation as a
way of takingresponsibility for the kind of person one is.2
According to Taylor, persons areessentially strong
evaluatorscreatures that can concern themselves with thequalitative
worth of different desires (p. 16), thereby aspiring to be a
cer-tain kind of person (p. 19). As such, Taylor thinks, there is
the possibilityof our taking responsibility for these aspirations
by rethinking our values; thisre-thinking he calls radical
reevaluation. The question of how such radical reeval-uation is
possible is, of course, precisely the question I have been asking
abouthow reasoning about personal values can be a matter of both
invention anddiscovery, and Taylors outline of a solution provides
clear direction for how togo on.
Taylor claims that the task of radical re-evaluation is largely
a task of self-interpretation in which one tries to articulate more
clearly ones deepest un-structured [or largely inarticulatecf. p.
38] sense of what is important, whichis as yet inchoate and which I
am trying to bring to definition (p. 41). Sucha sense is initially
(more or less) inarticulate in that one has not yet spelled itout
in judgment; as a result, it is somehow implicit in the kind of
experiencesand reactions one has, in particular in ones emotions.
In part because thisunstructured sense of import is deeply a part
of our identities, Taylor thinks,it can help us determine what our
personal values should be. Thus, by engag-ing in
self-interpretation, one can come to articulate more fully not only
ourexperiences of value themselves but also, digging deeper, the
relevant sense ofpersonal values that underlies those
experiences.
Taylor claims that by interpreting our experiences of import we
can changehow we feel and consequently change our sense of import.
This phenomenon isfamiliar from such contexts as when we feel
vaguely hungry and run throughseveral options for what we might eat
until something strikes us as what wewanted, or when we try to
figure out where to go for a vacation, trying toarticulate the kind
of trip we desire more fully, and eventually settling on some-thing
that strikes us as right. In each case, the articulation of what we
wantchanges our desire by making it more determinate. However,
since there mayhave been many different things that might have
satisfied these desires, such anarticulation is in part a matter of
shaping and inventing those desires, possiblyin the light of
deliberation. Thus, you might reason that since you have just a
2See, for example, his What Is Human Agency? in Human Agency and
Language:Philosophical Papers 1 (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1985), pp. 1544; and hisSources of the Self: The Making of
the Modern Identity (Cambridge: Harvard UniversityPress, 1989),
especially Part I.
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couple hours ago stuffed yourself with a large meal, eating
something light isnow appropriate, and so start looking for fruit
that will satisfy your craving. Ofcourse, you cant just shape your
desire any old way you want: eating a lemonprobably wont satisfy
the desire (a fact you can test by eating it and seeingif the
craving remains unfulfilled). In this way, your vague hunger
constrainshow you interpret and so articulate it, thereby making
possible a discovery ofwhat you wanted all along. Consequently, in
the process of settling on an ap-ple as what you want, there are
elements of both discovery (insofar as you areconstrained) and
invention (insofar as you nonetheless shape the desire).
Likewise, Taylor claims, an interpretation of our sense of
import involveselements of both discovery and invention. In
deciding whether to make a careerchange, for example, it is common
to lay out the pros and cons on each side, andthen use ones sense
of what is more important to guide ones choice. Insofar asthis is
deliberation and not guesswork, however, it must involve having
some-thing to say about why one made the choice this way: why, to
oversimplify, aprofession that involves helping the underprivileged
has more going for it thanone that merely pays a lot of money. One
can articulate this by saying that it isa nobler life, and in this
way, Taylor thinks, one is articulating more fully onesdeepest
sense of what is important. To do this is to provide some shape to
onesunderstanding of value and so is in part a matter of autonomous
choice: inven-tion. Nonetheless, not just any choice is possible
here, and mistaken choicesmay leave one feeling unfulfilled: maybe
that to which one aspires is instead akind of high culture only the
high paying job will enable one to afford. Conse-quently, ones
unstructured sense of import can impose constraints on choice ina
way that enables one to discover what one really values: it is that
to whichour judgments must strive to be faithful (p. 38). Invention
and discoveryare simultaneously possible because of the role
self-interpretation plays in thisspecial kind of deliberation.
Although there is much that is right about this outline of how
we can rea-son about lifes meaning, Taylors account as it stands is
incompletemore agesture in the direction of a solution than the
solution itself. Many questions re-main. First, exactly what is
this deepest unstructured sense of things (p. 42)?Taylor suggests
that ones emotions are somehow central, but exactly how is
leftunclear.3
Are emotions merely reliable indicators of what has import to
us, or do theysomehow (partly?) constitute it? To make sense of the
way Taylor wants tounderstand deliberation about import as
involving aspects of both inventionand discovery by interpreting
ones emotions, it seems that he must have thelatter in mind. But
exactly how do emotions constitute a sense of import, andwhat
provides the kind of depth Taylors account needs? Second, it is
unclearexactly how we could go about interpreting this sense of
import. After all, if it isunstructured as Taylor says, what
purchase does it provide for interpretation?4
3For a little more detail, however, see Taylors
Self-Interpreting Animals, in HumanAgency and Language, pp.
4576.
4It is this idea that our sense of import is unstructured that
makes appropriate the analogyto a vague hunger I gave above. Yet it
is surely a strain to talk of interpreting ones hunger
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Finally, how exactly are we to understand the relation between
our senseof import and our evaluative judgments in a way that
allows for simultaneousinvention and discovery? On the one hand, if
we are to make sense of oursense of import as constraining judgment
in a way that underwrites claims ofdiscovery, that constraint must
be not merely causal but rational, providingreasons for judging one
way rather than another. We can make sense of such arational
constraint if we understand our sense of import to be an experience
ofsome already existing item, akin to sense perception, so that
judgment has therole of discerning such import more clearly in the
face of sometimes conflictingexperiences. This is, of course, a
cognitivist conception of import, and as suchit seems to undermine
the idea that we simultaneously invent import. On theother hand, we
might relax this emphasis on the objectivity of import and socome
to see our experiences as constitutive of import, as on a
non-cognitivistconception. In such a case, it might seem, we can
make sense of judgment asboth interpreting our experiences, thereby
articulating what has import to us(as constituted in those
experiences), and identifying inconsistencies in thoseexperiences
in a way that enables us subsequently to alter our experience.
Herewe might understand the result as a kind of discovery that is
consistent withthe idea that the import is invented by us. However,
the resulting conceptionof the objectivity of import seems to be
insufficient, for mere internal coherenceof experience is
compatible with the discovery that our evaluative
experiencesdistort their objects and so get import wrong. The
problem is that makingsense of this stronger notion of discovery
seems to force us back to a cognitivistconception of import and so
to an unsatisfactory account of invention. How,then, can this
oscillation between cognitivist and non-cognitivist conceptions
ofimport be avoided?
The solution to these difficulties with Taylors account can be
found in amore detailed account of emotions, as a fundamental kind
of experience of im-port, and their rational interconnections with
judgment. Traditionally, however,our intellectual capacities for
deliberation, interpretation, and judgment havebeen understood as
always more rational than our (subjective and therefore
lessrational) capacities for emotions. Consequently, any other
mental state (suchas the emotions) that conflicts with the outcomes
of deliberation and judg-ment must ipso facto be irrational.
However, I shall argue, this understandingpresents us with a
distorted view of what reasoning involves, a conception thatblinds
us to the contributions emotions can make to rational
deliberation.
2 Emotions and Rational Patterns
What is it for something to have import to a subject? Although
it is beyondthe scope of this paper to present detailed arguments
for the particular accountof import I advocate and so to defend it
against the alternatives, my aim here is
and so of coming to a better understanding of it. As I shall
argue in 4, these analogiesultimately fail because our sense of
import must itself have structure that rationally constrainsones
interpretation of it.
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to provide enough detail to ground my subsequent claims. In the
end, perhaps,the best argument for this conception of import is the
light it sheds on how wecan deliberate about it.5 Intuitively, at
least part of what it is to have importis to be worthy of attention
and action. That something is worthy of attentionmeans not merely
that it is permissible or a good thing to pay attention toit;
rather, it means that paying attention to it is, by and large,
required onpain of giving up or at least undermining the idea that
it really has import toone. After all, it is hard (though, perhaps,
not impossible) to credit someonewith caring about, say, having a
clean house even though he never or rarelynotices when it gets
dirty. This is not to deny that someone who genuinelycares may in
some cases be distracted by other things that are more importantand
so not occasionally notice that it is getting dirty. What is
required, however,is a consistent pattern of attending to the
relevant object: in short, a kind ofvigilance for what happens or
might well happen to it. Similarly, that somethingis worthy of
action means that acting on its behalf is, other things being
equal,required if its continued import is to be intelligible: to
care about a clean houserequires not only vigilance for cleanliness
but also a preparedness to act so asto maintain it.
The relevant modes of vigilance and preparedness for
understanding importare primarily emotional, desiderative, and
judgmental, and I shall argue that wecan understand the sense in
which objects of import are worthy of attention andaction in terms
of the rational interconnections among these modes. Of partic-ular
importance are the emotions, which just are feelings of imports of
variouskinds; consequently, being vigilant for import means feeling
emotions when ap-propriate and not otherwise. To understand this
more fully it is necessary firstto establish some vocabulary.
The formal object of an emotion is the kind of import definitive
of that emo-tion as the kind of emotion it is. Thus, fear of
something is to be distinguishedfrom anger at the same thing
insofar as in fear you feel it to be dangerous,whereas in anger you
feel it to be offensive; these implicit evaluations of some-thing
as dangerous or offensive are what make fear be fear and anger be
angerand so are their respective formal objects. The target of an
emotion is intu-itively that at which the emotion is directedthat
which gets presented in theemotion as having the evaluative
property defined by the formal object. In thisway, emotions involve
implicit evaluations of their targets as having a kind ofimport.
The focus of an emotion is the background object having import
towhich the target is related in such a way as to make intelligible
the targetshaving the property defined by the formal object. For
example, I might beafraid as the neighbor kid throws a ball that
comes perilously close to smashinga vase. Here the target of my
fear is the ball, which the emotion presents ashaving the formal
objectas being dangerous; the focus of my fear is the vase,for it
is in virtue of both the import the vase has for me and the
relation theball has to it (as potentially smashing it) that the
ball is intelligible as a danger.
5For more detailed arguments, see my The Significance of
Emotions, American Philo-sophical Quarterly, 31 (1994), pp.
31931.
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Consequently, we can make sense of emotions as being appropriate
or not interms of whether the implicit evaluation of its target is
warranted. The condi-tions of appropriateness of emotions therefore
have two parts. First, the focusmust really have import to the
subject: my fear would be inappropriate if thevase is not something
I care about. Second, the target must be, or intelligiblyseem to
be, appropriately related to the focus: my fear would be
inappropriateif the ball had no real potential to damage the vase
(because, say, it is made oflight-weight foam rubber). Given these
conditions of appropriateness, we canunderstand emotions to be a
kind of sensitivity or responsiveness to the importof ones
situation: emotions are essentially intentional feelings of
import.
Emotions are often treated as if they were isolated states of
feeling, but it isimportant not to overlook the complex rational
connections they have to othermental states. In part, these
connections are among the emotions themselves:to experience one
emotion is in effect to commit oneself to feeling other
emotionswith the same focus in the relevant actual and
counterfactual situations becauseof the import of that focus. Thus,
if you are hopeful that some end can beachieved, then you normally6
ought also to be afraid when its accomplishmentis threatened,
relieved when the threat does not materialize, angry at thosewho
intentionally obstruct progress towards it, and satisfied when you
finallyachieve it (or disappointed when you fail); moreover it
would be inconsistentwith these emotions to be afraid of achieving
the goal, grateful towards thosewho sabotage it, etc.7 In this way,
emotions normally come in broader patternsof other emotions sharing
a common focus.
This talk of emotional commitments needs further explanation in
terms ofthe kinds of patterns they normally involve, patterns that
I shall now argue areboth rational and projectible. Such a pattern
is rational in that belonging to itis partly constitutive of the
appropriateness of particular emotions. Thus, myfeeling of fear
focussed on the vase as the baseball hurls towards it would
beinappropriate unless I would also feel relief if the vase were to
emerge unscathed,disappointment, sadness, or grief if it were
destroyed, anger at the neighbor kidfor his casual disregard of it,
etc. (Precisely why this is so will be discussedshortly.)
In saying that the patterns are rational, I am not claiming that
emotionsbelonging to the pattern are merely permitted by the import
of their common fo-cus. Rather, other things being equal, the
failure to experience emotions that fitinto the pattern when
otherwise appropriate is a rational failure. Consequently,being
such as to have these emotions in the relevant actual and
counterfactualsituations is rationally required, and the resulting
pattern of emotions mustbe projectible. This is not to say that one
must feel emotions every time they
6I shall throughout carefully distinguish normal, which I use in
its normative sense, fromusual, which I use merely to indicate a
statistical regularity.
7Notice that such inconsistency is a kind of ambivalence that is
particularly unstable pre-cisely because it involves an implicit
evaluation of the same focus as both good and bad.Another type of
ambivalence involves feeling both good and bad in the same
situation, butwhere ones feelings have different foci. Ambivalence
of this type need not involve any rationalconflict and indeed might
be precisely what is called for by the situation.
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are appropriate in order for their focus to have import;
isolated failures to feelparticular emotions, though rationally
inappropriate, do not undermine the ra-tional coherence of the
broader pattern so long as these failures remain
isolated.Nonetheless, particular emotions are beholden to the
broader patterns of whichthey are a part in the sense that, by
virtue of the projectibility and rationalityof these patterns,
there is a rational requirement to feel these emotions in
therelevant circumstances and not otherwise.
At this point we can see that there is a two-way conceptual
connection be-tween somethings having import and its being the
focus of such a projectible,rational pattern of emotions. First,
these patterns of emotions depend on im-port. As argued above, it
is a necessary condition of the appropriateness ofparticular
emotions, as intentional feelings of import, that their focus have
im-port. This means in part that the commitment implicit in these
emotions isintelligible as rational only in terms of that import:
by feeling the focus to haveimport, I am in essence feeling it to
be worthy of attention and so as calling forother emotions in the
relevant actual and counterfactual situations. Particularemotions,
therefore, presuppose import as their proper object.
It may now seem that import is conceptually prior to the
projectible, ra-tional patterns of emotions, but that would be to
ignore the second conceptualconnection between them. Insofar as
something is the focus of such a patternof emotions, the
projectibility of that pattern ensures that one will
typicallyrespond with the relevant emotions whenever that focus is
affected favorably oradversely. In effect, the projectibility of
the pattern of emotions is an attune-ment of ones sensibilities to
that focus, and this just is the sort of vigilancenormally required
for import. Yet these patterns of emotions make intelligiblenot
only that one has a disposition to respond to the focus of the
pattern; insofaras the pattern itself is rational, one ought to
have these subsequent emotions,and so one ought to pay attention to
the focus of the pattern, precisely becausethe past pattern of ones
emotions rationally commits one to feel these subse-quent emotions
when otherwise appropriate. Consequently, the rationality ofthe
pattern makes intelligible the idea that the focus of that pattern
is worthyof attention. In this way, such a pattern of emotions is
presupposed by import,at least insofar as to have import is to be
worthy of attention: it is hard to makesense of someone as caring
about something if he does not respond emotionallyno matter what
when it is affected favorably or adversely.8
Of course, to have import is to be worthy of action as well.
This is intelligibleonce again in terms of projectible, rational
patterns, though we must extendour conception of these patterns in
light of the rational interconnections amongemotions and desires.
On the one hand, if something is the focus of a projectible,
8I say that it is hard to make sense of import in such a case
because there are otherelements that go into constituting import,
such as ones desires and judgment, and these mayenable us to make
sense of import even in the face of a failure of emotional
response. Doingso, however, requires a special story about why the
pattern of emotions is absent so as toexplain away that absence
(and its irrationality) while preserving the coherence of the
overallpattern. (I have discussed such a case, in which the import
defined largely by ones emotionsand that defined largely by ones
judgments pull apart, in my Integration and Fragmentationof the
Self, Southern Journal of Philosophy, 34 (1996), pp. 4363.)
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rational pattern of emotions, it rationally ought to be a focus
of desire as well,both as something one is motivated to pursue or
maintain and as the sourceof instrumental reasons for ones pursuit
of means to such an end. This isbecause to display a projectible,
rational pattern of emotions focussed on avase, for example, is to
be committed to the import of that vase. Insofar asto have import
is to be worthy of action, such a commitment must thereforebe to
have the relevant desires and so act on its behalfsuch as for a
displaycase to protect it from dust and errant baseballs.
Consequently, a failure tohave the relevant desires focussed on the
vase and so be motivated by thesedesires when otherwise appropriate
would be a rational failure. Moreover, aconsistent failure to have
these desires would mean that one is not prepared toact on its
behalf, thereby undermining its import and so the rationality of
thepattern of emotions. On the other hand, desire also involves a
commitment tofeel the relevant emotions. For to desire something is
not merely to be disposedto pursue it as an end; it rather involves
the sense that this end is worthy ofpursuit: that it has import.
Consequently, if one did not in general feel fearwhen a desired end
is threatened, relief when the threat does not pan out, etc.,it
would be hard to make sense of that end as having import and so as
beingan appropriate object of desire. The upshot of these
interconnections betweendesires and emotions is that the
projectible, rational pattern in ones emotionsmust include ones
desires as well. The projectibility of this pattern,
therefore,makes possible not only ones vigilance for import but
also ones preparednessto act on its behalf, and the rationality of
this pattern makes intelligible itsfocus being not only worthy of
attention but also worthy of action.
Nonetheless, different kinds of import demand different kinds of
patternsof emotional and desiderative response. Thus, we can
distinguish caring fromvaluing in terms of distinctions between
reflexive and non-reflexive emotions andbetween second-order and
first-order desires.9 Reflexive emotions, althoughtheir targets and
foci are typically things in the world, nonetheless involve asense
of their foci as a part of the kind of person it is worth being; in
this way,the kind of evaluation implicit in their formal objects is
not only of their targetsbut also of oneself. Thus, pride, shame,
remorse, self-approbation, and somekinds of self-confidence and
anxiety are all reflexive emotions because of theirconcern with the
kind of person it is worth being. Likewise, second-order
desiresinvolve finding the desire for some end to be itself a part
of the kind of person it isworth being. For this reason, rational
patterns of reflexive emotions and second-order desires involve the
kind of depth we associate with valuing. In contrast,caring, which
lacks that depth, is partially constituted by rational patterns
offirst-order desires and non-reflexive emotions: emotions whose
formal objectsinvolve implicit evaluations only of their targets
and not of the kind of personone is. These are emotions such as
fear, hope, satisfaction, and anger.10
9For a more complete account of the distinction between first-
and second-order desires, seeHarry Frankfurts Freedom of the Will
and the Concept of a Person in his The Importanceof What We Care
About (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988), pp. 1125.
10For a more careful distinction along these lines between
caring and valuing, and its rel-evance for understanding what it is
to be a person, see my Freedom of the Heart, Pacific
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Emotions11 are not alone in constituting import, for
deliberation and judg-ment must also be central. This is because we
can, for example, deliberate aboutwhat constitutes such vaguely
specified ends as a good vacation or a good life,and arrive at
judgments that shape the imports things have for us, where
suchdeliberation must be intelligible as a matter of simultaneous
discovery and in-vention. To decide that one values something is to
confer on its object the statusof having import, which means that
it ought also to be the focus of a projectible,rational pattern of
emotions. The failure to exhibit at least large parts of
thesepatterns of emotions therefore undermines the idea that the
object really hasimport, thereby undermining ones judgment of its
worth. Consequently, delib-eration succeeds only if it is able to
bring ones emotions along with it, and soones emotions impose a
kind of constraint on correct deliberation.
This, of course, is much too quick. If emotion is to impose
constraintson correct deliberation, these constraints must be
imposed rationally and notarbitrarily. At this point one might
object that evaluative judgments are theprimary way in which we
make evaluations, for it is by making judgments that wearticulate
evaluations and so make them explicit to ourselves in a way that
allowsus to think self-consciously about their justification. So,
the objection concludes,the evaluations made explicit in judgment
are intrinsically more rational or morefundamental than those
implicit in emotion, and the considerations I have justoffered are
simply irrelevant to understanding how we can deliberate
aboutvalue.
Although deliberative judgments surely have a central role in
constitutingimport, we might think the objection overstates that
role by assuming thatevaluative judgments are always rationally
prior to emotions insofar as in anycase of conflict between them it
is the emotion that ought to be brought in line.This assumption
needs careful reexamination in light of a careful articulationof
the rational connections among emotions and evaluative judgments.
It is tothis that I turn in 3.
3 Single Perspective on Import
When emotion and judgment coincide, a subject will have a
single, unifiedperspective on the world. Thus, at dusk you may see
a large brown dog chargingthrough the trees directly at you and
respond simultaneously with the thoughtthat it is a vicious
Rottweiler and with fear of it, and it is this joint responsethat
constitutes your overall perspective on your circumstances. Of
course, thisperspective might be mistaken, and we can rationally
assess both the judgment(as right or wrong) and the emotion (as
appropriate or not) in terms of whetherthe perspective they afford
reveals the world as it is. Consequently, to reviseyour judgment so
as to arrive at a clearer perspective on the world will
normally
Philosophical Quarterly, 77 (1996), pp. 7187.11Because my
concern in the rest of this paper is with import rather than
motivation, for
simplicity of expression I shall for the most part speak merely
of emotions, thereby intendingboth emotions and desires.
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involve corresponding changes in your emotion. Thus, as the dog
rushes at you,you hear the owner, whom you had met earlier, of the
friendly, toothless Bernesemountain dog yelling, Stay! In hearing
this sound, you make the inference andcome to perceive the brown
blur more accurately, a more accurate perceptionthat simultaneously
undermines both your former belief and your fear. Toachieve the
clarity of perspective the inference makes possible is to rule
outalternative inconsistent perspectives, such as that provided by
ones fear. Hence,to make the inference in this case just is to
change your emotion as well as yourbelief.
Ones emotions and judgments can, of course, come apart and so
present onewith inconsistent perspectives on the world. In such
cases, we ordinarily thinkof the emotion as being at fault. Thus,
if, upon realizing that the dog mustbe the friendly Bernese, your
emotion does not change, then it would seem theemotion is
inappropriate because it conflicts with your considered
judgment.Judgment in this case has a kind of rational priority in
part because of itsstability and coherence with other things you
believe, a coherence that enablesyou to perceive the situation
differently and in a way that achieves a measureof confirmation in
a more careful scrutiny of your circumstances.
Not all cases of rational conflict between emotions and beliefs
need to be likethis, however. When an inexperienced camper camps
alone for the first time, therustling noises coming from the nearby
undergrowth may cause him to be afraid.Although he may try to calm
himself by telling himself that it is probably justa harmless
rabbit bedding down for the night, his fear may persist: the
noisescontinue, and he continues to feel them as vaguely
threatening, a threat thatis ultimately confirmed by a loud noise
followed by the high-pitched squealof a small animal in pain.
Because of this rational conflict with a persistentemotion, it may
well look like this belief, isolated as it is from other
judgments,is much more akin to wishful thinking than a considered
judgment. It seemsplausible, therefore, that the best way to
resolve this conflict, even before thefinal confirmation, is to
give up (at least by withholding) on the belief. In sucha case, the
emotion may well turn out to be more rationally appropriate and
soto correct the belief in the minimal sense that it provides a
reason to reconsiderthat belief in order to achieve a new clarity
of perspective.12 In the examplesjust provided, the conflicts
between emotions and judgments concern largelynon-evaluative facts,
namely whether some animal may well intend to injureme; it is not
in dispute that such injury would be bad. As I shall now argue,
asimilar moral applies when we turn to conflicts over the imports
things have forus: emotion and judgment are each rationally
responsive to the same thing, and
12One might object that in this example the wishful thinking is
not a genuine belief insofaras it can be quickly doubted and shown
up as irrational by the emotion, so that the case isnot one of the
emotion correcting a belief. There is some truth to this, though it
only servesto reinforce my point. First, just because it is wishful
thinking does not mean it does notfunction as a belief in the
relevant ways: as a cause of behavior, as a premise in an
inference,etc. Second, doubt that one has the belief here must be
based on ones having the emotionadoubt that is well grounded only
in light of the rationality of the emotion, thus confirmingmy claim
in the text.
11
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each can correct the other in cases of rational conflict. This
understanding ofemotion and judgment is possible only because
import is an object about whichwe can be right or wrong in a sense
that makes the possibility of discoveryintelligible. This is clear
in the case of emotions, as already argued in 2:particular emotions
might be rationally inappropriate insofar as they respond tothings
which, by failing to be the focus of a broader pattern of emotions,
do notreally have import to us. The same is true of evaluative
judgments: merely tojudgeeven sincerelythat something is important
does not mean that it reallyis so. In such cases, ones evaluative
judgments may misrepresent the importsthings have for one.
Nonetheless, the moral in the case of evaluative conflicts isnot
exactly the same as that for non-evaluative conflicts. The two
kinds of casediffer in that import is itself constituted in part by
ones projectible, rationalpatterns of emotions and desires. Because
these patterns are subject to rationalcriticism by evaluative
judgment, to investigate the rational interconnectionsamong
emotions and evaluative judgments is in part to articulate more
fullyrational patterns constitutive of the imports things have for
one.
Consider the following example. Cassie pays much attention to
her personalappearance. Thus, she keeps up with the latest trends,
eagerly buying currentfashions and scorning those who are out of
style, and she is fastidious about thecondition of her clothes,
often getting upset when the dry cleaner does not cleanor press
them just so. In short, she invests considerable time and
emotionalenergy in her appearancea pattern of emotions and desires
that constitutethe import it has for her. Eventually, however,
Cassie begins to think and readsystematically about ethics, becomes
a confirmed utilitarian, and is articulateabout the reasons why.
Moreover, she realizes that the money, time, and energyshe has been
spending on fashion is excessive and ought to be used insteadto
promote worthy causes, such as helping the needy. She therefore
resolvesto eliminate or at least to reduce these excesses by, for
example, buying newclothes only when the old ones are genuinely
worn out: fashion and appearance,she judges, are not very important
in the larger scheme of things. In spite of thisresolve, however,
Cassie continues to feel emotions consistent with her
earlierpattern of concern, and becomes increasingly dissatisfied
with her appearanceand even annoyed at her newfound principles,
even as she intellectually rejectsthese emotions as groundless.
Here Cassie faces a conflict between her emotions (and the
coherent, pro-jectible pattern they form) and her judgments (and
the pattern of inferencesshe has come to endorse). In the face of
this conflict, what can we say about theimport her appearance now
has for her? If we focus narrowly on this patternof emotions, it
seems clear that she still does care about her appearance, yetif we
focus narrowly on her judgments and patterns of inference, it seems
clearthat she does not (at least to the same extent). Nonetheless,
her judgments alsoseem to have rational priority: her considered
view is that fashion should notmatter to her, that it does not have
import to her. Insofar as this is her con-sidered view, it seems
that her judgments have corrected her emotions, whichnow ought to
fall in line; their failure to do so merely exhibits the
irrationalityof these emotions.
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Part of what makes these judgments intelligible as articulating
her consideredview is her ability to justify them in light of a
broader evaluative framework.Equally important, however, is the way
in which this evaluative framework asa whole generally resonates
with her emotions insofar as it provides her withan evaluative
perspective on the world that both is consistent with, and is
thatin terms of which she can make sense of, those emotions,
perhaps with theexception of a few isolated domains such as
fashion. To see this, assume theopposite: that Cassies intellectual
assent to utilitarianism does not generallyresonate with her
emotions, as when she is forced to make choices betweenloyalty and
devotion to her loved ones and helping others selflessly. For
herassent to utilitarianism to represent her considered judgment,
the perspective itprovides must be able in general to rule out
alternative, inconsistent evaluativeperspectives and so make the
best sense of her overall sensitivity to import. Yetthe conflict
with her emotions, given their consistency and breadth, is
precisely aconflict with an inconsistent evaluative perspective,
thus bringing into questionthe idea that her judgments represent
her considered view and so the idea thatthere is a clear fact of
the matter about what she really values. In such acase, judgment is
not rationally prior to emotion and, we might say, Cassiesemotions
have corrected her judgment in the minimal sense that, so long
asthe alternative evaluative perspective they provide persists, she
has reason toreconsider.13 This example of emotions in this sense
correcting judgments isnot isolated. Our value judgments can be
distorted by peer or other societalpressures, as was the case for
Huck Finn judging that he ought to turn Jimin. In such cases one is
blind in judgment to the imports ones emotions bothconstitute and
reveal. Moreover, the conflicts between emotions and judgmentscan
occur not merely over whether something has value or not but also
over howto balance ones various values against each other in
particular cases. In short,judgments (whether evaluative or not)
and emotions are tightly interconnectedinsofar as they are located
within, and assessable in terms of, the same rationalframework such
that each can correct the other. This means that, when thingsgo
right, it is not that two separate faculties of judgment and
emotion merelyhappen to converge on a single object; rather,
judgments and emotions provideus with a single, unified perspective
on the world. Because of these rationalinterconnections, changes in
ones perspective as the result of changes in eitherones emotions or
judgments ought to bring the other along with it; If this doesnot
happen, the idea that ones perspective really has changed is
undermined,and ones perspective may be fragmented as a result.
This means that evaluative judgments and emotions that share a
commonfocus are a part of the same projectible, rational pattern
that simultaneouslyboth is defined by their mutual commitment to
the import of their commonfocus and constitutes that import. The
projectibility of this pattern, as definedby these mutual
commitments, means that emotions and evaluative judgmentsmust
normally be rationally responsive to each other on pain of
undermining
13For further examples of evaluative conflicts between patterns
of emotions and judgments,see my Integration and Fragmentation of
the Self.
13
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the coherence of the pattern, thereby fragmenting ones
evaluative perspective.By undermining this pattern, such
fragmentation therefore undermines the ideathat there is a clear
fact of the matter about what has import to one. Con-sequently, as
we have just seen, deliberation and judgment on their own donot
guarantee success in achieving a new clarity of evaluative
perspective andso changing that import. Ones emotions may be
resistant to new evaluativeperspectives one may try to achieve
through deliberation, and such resistance,so long as it is
systematic and provides one with an inconsistent
evaluativeperspective, provides one with reason to reconsider.
4 Self-Interpretation and Change of Import
My claim in 2 was that to have import is to be worthy of
attention and actionin the sense of both warranting and calling for
ones attention and action, and Ithere cashed this out in terms of
emotion and desire: to have import is in partto be a suitable focus
of emotions and desires generally. Rational patterns ofemotion and
desire, therefore, provide one with part of an evaluative
perspectiveon the world constitutive of import. We have just seen
in 3 that this perspectivemust include ones evaluative judgments as
well insofar as it is by articulating,criticizing, and revising
that perspective that one can achieve clarity in whathas import to
one. Import, then, is constituted by these projectible,
rationalpatterns in ones emotions, desires, and evaluative
judgments. For what makessomething be worthy of attention and
action is nothing other than the wayin which these various mental
states hang together in rational patterns. Thatis precisely what is
meant in calling these patterns rational: it is in part thepatterns
themselves that determine the appropriateness of the various
elementsof that pattern by constituting import.
This background theory of the rational structure of emotions and
evalua-tive judgments enables us to make sense of how
self-interpretation is possibleand so of Taylors appeal to it in
order to resolve the apparent paradox of si-multaneous invention
and discovery. For when there is some lack of clarity inthe
patterns of ones emotions, whether in the precise target or focus
of onesemotions or in emotional depth, we can as Taylor suggests
articulate throughself-interpretation more precisely what we are
feeling, thereby delineating moreclearly the pattern as a whole and
so shaping what has import to us; here thereis a kind of autonomous
invention. Yet we cannot articulate these emotions anyway we
please, for our articulations are rationally constrained by the
emotionswe come to have and so by the broader rational structure of
this pattern ofemotions; here there is a kind of discovery.
Consequently, successful interpreta-tion not merely changes what we
feel but does so in a way that amounts to adiscovery of what we
were feeling all along.14 This needs further explanation.
14It is this broader rational structure of emotions that makes
intelligible the idea of self-interpretation in a way that does not
apply to the apparently analogous phenomenon describedin 1 of
articulating a vague hunger. For in the case of hunger the notion
of self-interpretationdoes not get a grip precisely because the
hunger is just a vague, unstructured sense of wanting
14
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4.1 Indeterminacy in Focus
Consider first an example of unclarity in the focus of emotion.
Ed finds himselfincreasingly interested in and excited about going
to volunteer every weekendat a local homeless shelter, but is
puzzled as to the source of his excitementfor this: is it a
newfound concern for helping others, or is it a growing love
forLisa, one of the other volunteers? The question here is about
the focus of hisemotion: what is the background object the import
of which makes volunteeringintelligible as something to get excited
about? Insofar as rationality is a canon ofinterpretation for the
mental, the answer must identify the projectible, rationalpattern
of other emotions with the same focus, a pattern to which his
excitementis beholden as a necessary condition of its
appropriateness.
Determining the focus of his excitement depends in part on what
emotionsEd has felt in the past. On the one hand, has his past
excitement been a kind ofhopefulness that has become disappointment
when Lisa has not shown up? If hedid feel bad in these cases, that
would suggest that the focus is Lisa. (It mightbe, however, that he
felt bad for other reasons, and it was just coincidence thatthose
were the times she didnt show up; that would undermine this
suggestion.)On the other hand, has he felt excited about similar
opportunities to help othersin contexts in which Lisa is not
present? This might indicate that the focus ofhis excitement is
helping others. (Again, however, we can ask about whether
thepresence or absence of excitement in these other cases can be
explained away byother factors.) These are further questions for
interpretation, and in each casethey are questions of exactly what
the relevant patterns in his past emotionsare and how these
patterns are connected to his present excitement.
In this case, however, Eds interest, whether it is in Lisa or in
volunteering,is only recently beginning to grow, and there may be
indeterminacy in how tounderstand the relevant patterns of
emotions; hence multiple interpretationsmay be possible. In trying
to answer these questions, Ed himself is able to acertain extent to
invent himself through self -interpretation. For to arrive at
asingle understanding of himself and what has import for him
requires makinginterpretive decisions whose effect is to delineate
patterns of emotions whereantecedently there were no clear lines to
be drawn, thereby changing his under-standing not only of his
current excitement but also of his past emotions. Thisis important
because these patterns commit him to feel other emotions withthe
same focus, thereby imposing rational pressure to sustain the
projectibilityof the patterns. By making these interpretive
decisions and delineating thesepatterns more precisely, Ed is not
only making the pattern in his past emotionsmore determinate; he is
undertaking commitments that shape the future courseof his
emotions, thus providing a new direction to his sensitivity to
import as awhole.
Of course, Ed cannot just make any old decision about what he
cares about.
something to eat, so that although an articulation here can help
make determinate the objectof ones hunger, it does not really make
sense to say that this is a matter of discoveringwhat one wanted
all along. For this reason, Taylors description of emotions as
similarlyunstructured must be false if this sort of interpretation
of emotions is to be possible.
15
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Self-interpretation like any interpretation must be constrained
by its object; asTaylor says, the articulation of import must be
faithful to something, andwe can now understand this something to
be in part the rational patternsin ones emotions generally. By
being held accountable to these patterns, sucharticulation of
import runs the risk of getting it wrong. It may be that the
sub-sequent emotions one feels are not consistent with the patterns
of emotions onehas delineated in self-interpretation, and this
failure of the pattern to projectinto the future indicates that
ones interpretation is inadequate. Thus we canunderstand successful
interpretation as a kind of discovery of what has importto one.15
Nonetheless, it is not true, in cases in which ones subsequent
emotionsare consistent with the pattern as one interprets it to be,
that one has merelydiscovered the pattern that was there all along,
for that would be to ignorethe rational interconnections among
emotions and judgments and so the waysin which self-interpretation
can shape ones subsequent emotions. We shouldnot conceive the role
of judgment as that of offering up an interpretation assomething
like a prediction that can be shown to be right or wrong as
onessubsequent emotions take their course. Having decided to
interpret oneself oneway, there may be considerable work both in
casting about to reinterpret sub-sequent apparently anomalous
emotions in a way that is consistent with theinterpretation, and in
exerting effort on behalf of ones judgment so as to getones
emotions to conform.16 To interpret the pattern of emotions in this
way isto arrive at an understanding of ones perspective on import,
and because thisunderstanding is (barring self-deception) to some
degree well-grounded in onesemotions themselves, it exerts rational
pressure on ones subsequent emotionsto conform, albeit rational
pressure that is defeasible. When this pressure issuccessful, it
institutes a new evaluative perspective that can properly be
un-derstood as a kind of invention, for antecedent to the
interpretive judgment,there was no clear fact of the matter about
what the focus of ones emotionswas.
Consequently, invention and discovery are both possible here
because of themutual readjustments emotion and judgment each must
make as responsive torational pressure from the other.
15One might object that because such discovery is merely a
matter of coherence, it isnot a very interesting notion of
discovery and therefore cannot be that which underlies
ourdeliberation about import. This is right: we need to be able to
articulate a conception ofhow a change in import can be an
improvement even when it results in no net increase incoherence.
This issue will be addressed in 5 by arguing that the articulation
of import must beaccountable not only to the rational patterns in
ones emotions but also to a correct elucidationof the relevant
evaluative concepts in terms of which such improvement is
intelligible.
16For more on how one can exert this kind of effort, see my
Freedom of the Heart.Moreover, as I shall argue in 5, the mere
identification of the unclarity in ones emotions canitself
irrevocably change ones subsequent emotions.
16
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4.2 Indeterminacy in Depth
Consider now another example, in which the indeterminacy
involved lies withthe depth of ones emotions. Fran, a mother who,
having decided that shewants to resume her career now that her
children are in secondary school, hasrecently gone back to work
full time and is now faced with a readjustment of herrelationships
with her husband and children. As her commitments at work beginto
encroach on her previous commitments to her family, she begins to
feel badabout missing important events in their lives. In part the
question she facesin feeling this way concerns whether the relevant
emotions are non-reflexiveemotions like frustration or
disappointment, or reflexive emotions like shameor guilt: is her
absence at these events merely an unfortunate consequence
ofconflicting cares and concerns, or is it, more deeply, a failure
to be the kind ofperson to which she aspires? In this case neither
the target of her emotions (hermissing important events in the
lives of her family) nor their foci (her familyand her work) are in
question; rather it is the depth of the emotions themselvesand so
whether the relevant import is that of caring or valuing.
As before, this question must be answered in terms of the
broader, rationalpattern of other emotions into which this negative
emotion fits. Does Fran feelmere satisfaction or a deeper
self-approbation when she is there for her family?If she has to
leave work and rush to get to her sons school play in time, doesshe
feel fear or hope turning into relief or satisfaction? or does she
feel anxietyor self-assurance turning into self-affirming relief or
self-approbation? Thesequestions may not yet have determinate
answers insofar as there may not yetbe a clear pattern of
rationally connected emotions to resolve the matter oneway or the
other, and hence no antecedent fact of the matter about the depthof
import here. Given this indeterminacy, Fran may decide to delineate
therelevant patterns in terms of non-reflexive emotions: although
she cares aboutmissing these important events in her childrens
lives, her bad feelings are merelycaused by a regrettable conflict
given her circumstances rather than a failing ofherself as a
person.
Once again, this decision is a matter of simultaneous invention
and discov-ery. It is a discovery insofar as the evaluative
judgment it involves must be heldaccountable to the subsequent
emotions Fran comes to feel and the resultingrational patterns that
constitute the import things really have for her. It is aninvention
insofar as by making this judgment Fran is coming to articulate
moreclearly the kind of import at issue in her feelings, thus
making determinate thebroader rational patterns of emotions she has
felt, thereby committing herself to,and exerting rational pressure
on, her subsequent emotions, which are beholdento these patterns.
It is only out of these mutual readjustments of emotion
andevaluative judgment, each rationally accountable to the other,
that a single eval-uative perspective and the import it constitutes
can be simultaneously inventedand discovered.
Consequently, an articulation of import by self-interpretation
can be faith-ful to the patterns in ones emotions only because
these patterns are rationallystructured; insofar as interpretation
is to be possible at all, its object cannot
17
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be what Taylor calls ones unstructured sense of import.
Moreover, it is alsoonly because of this structure of rationality
in emotion that self-interpretivejudgments are intelligible as
shaping the subsequent course of emotion: by ar-ticulating in
judgment the patterns in ones emotions, one thereby delineatesmore
precisely what those patterns actually are; since ones emotions are
be-holden to these patterns, this delineation of past patterns ipso
facto imposesrational pressure on ones subsequent emotions to
conform.
5 Deliberation and Rational Improvement of Im-port
This account of the way in which self-interpretation can affect
patterns of emo-tions and so what has import to us is not by itself
an account of how we canreason about what is meaningful or valuable
in our lives. For according to theaccount so far,
self-interpretation enables us to identify and resolve
indetermina-cies in what has import simply by achieving increased
coherence in the rationalpatterns of emotions, desires, and
judgments. Yet there may be multiple waysto do this, and only some
or one of these ways may count as an improvement.The problem is
that nothing has been said about the standards according towhich
improvement is intelligible, and so the account of the discovery of
importis inadequate as it stands. Moreover, the discussion so far
can seem quite limitedby focussing merely on how to resolve
antecedent indeterminacy in the importthings have to us, whereas
deliberation about import can obviously proceed evenwhen there is
no current indeterminacy. This section aims to overcome
theselimitations by expanding the account of simultaneous invention
and discoveryfrom 4 to include deliberation proper so as to achieve
an account that under-writes a conception of ourselves as able
autonomously but nonetheless rationallyand non-arbitrarily to
decide what shape our lives should take.
Deliberation about import requires the use of a distinctive
vocabulary ofworth, for it is only in terms of such a vocabulary
that we can articulate thereasons justifying our having (or
changing) certain values. Part of the questionfor deliberation,
however, concerns what vocabulary it is most appropriate touse, for
uncertainty about what to value is in part uncertainty about
whatevaluative vocabulary is relevant and how to apply it. Indeed,
this is preciselythe question when we consider our fundamental
values and try to justify themin the face of alternatives.
We can justify the application of a certain vocabulary by
elucidating itbyarticulating its rational, inferential connections
with a broader vocabulary soas to make good sense of its subject
matter.17 Such an elucidation need notinvolve an analysisan
articulation in other vocabulary of precisely the role aparticular
concept has in our inferential economy; nonetheless, it does
require
17Cf. John McDowells Projection and Truth in Ethics, in Stephen
Darwall, Allan Gib-bard, and Peter Railton (eds.),Moral Discourse
and Practice: Some Philosophical Approaches(Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 1997), pp. 21525, at p. 220; and David Wiggins A
Sen-sible Subjectivism, also in Darwall, et al., pp. 22744.
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being able to say in particular cases both why the concept
applies (in light ofour experiences and, perhaps, other bits of
reasoning) and what inferences itlicenses. Doing so may reveal
inconsistencies or confusions in our understandingof particular
concepts, and part of the task of elucidating concepts is to
refinethis understanding or even, in extreme cases, to come to see
a concept as un-tenable and so one we should reject. In the case at
hand, such a refinement willbe both a refinement in our
understanding of import and, because the perspec-tive such an
understanding provides is constitutive of what has import to us,
arefinement of import itself. The question is: how in detail does
this elucidationwork, and what is the source of the standards of
refinement at issue?18 To an-swer this question, consider the
following example. George has been brought upin a culture in which
men are expected to be strong and dominant, especiallyin their
relationships with women. As a result, he comes to identify
himselfwith, and so value, a certain machismo by virtue of the
patterns he displaysin his reflexive emotions and judgments. Thus,
he is shamed by any display ofweakness of his own or even of his
friends, proud of himself for standing up toothers and not taking
any shit, and he frequently makes judgments like: onlya wimp would
do that! However, as he tries to convince his younger brotherto be
a man, he is forced to justify the value of machismo and finds
himselfwith astonishingly little to say. Although he may have the
sense that its valuelies in a certain kind of strength and
self-confidence, grounded in courage andvirility, exactly what kind
of strength, self-confidence, courage, and virility areat issue
here, and how do these justify the value of machismo? At this
pointthe elucidation of concepts is a necessary part of
articulating its import.
The elucidation of machismo and related concepts must involve in
part anexamination of particular cases and an articulation of what
it is about thesecases that give them import. In this context,
where it is the value of machismothat is in question, the answer
cannot simply be that something has importbecause it is macho;
rather, the answer must partially elucidate the concept ofmachismo
by identifying in other language what makes a particular case be
aninstance of machismo in a way that manifests its value: as, for
example, properself-respect and courage in the face of harassment
or as self-confident virilityand social ease that enable him to use
women for his own ends. (Of course, itmay be a non-trivial
accomplishment to do this, one that may be possible onlythrough
conversations with others he loves and respects.) Although, it
need
18McDowell and Wiggins, of course, are concerned to provide an
alternative to cognitivistand non-cognitivist accounts of values by
showing how an elucidation of concepts that resultsin an
improvement of ones evaluative perspective can take place at least
partially internal tothe perceptions of its participants (Wiggins,
p. 232; cf. McDowell, p. 220). By doing so, theyhope to dispel the
idea that there is a vicious circularity in such elucidationin
essence, thecircularity identified above as the apparent paradox of
simultaneous invention and discovery.Their tack is largely to argue
for the intelligibility of a middle path between cognitivismand
non-cognitivism. However, this can seem merely to amount to an
unmotivated denial of avicious circle unless it is supported by a
clear account of the rational interconnections betweenan
elucidation of concepts and ones evaluative sensibilities that
makes such a middle pathwork. This is what the present section aims
to do.
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not be that the result of such an examination of many different
cases will bean analysis of the concept of machismo, we can
nonetheless gain some clarityon that concept by roughly locating
its place simultaneously in a rationally in-terconnected scheme of
concepts and as the focus of other patterns of emotionsthat
partially overlap with that of machismo by virtue of these rational
inter-connections. Moreover, such a reidentification of the
machismo in a particularcase enables us, through
self-interpretation, to see this instance of machismo asthe object
of emotions that belong as well to other patterns focussed on
courageand self-respect more generally.
Part of the point of elucidating these concepts is that it can
reveal hithertounnoticed complexity in concepts that previously
were run together, complex-ity that might prove important for the
purpose of understanding the value ofmachismo. Thus, having
identified a case of machismo as, say, self-confidentvirility in
using women for ones own ends, it becomes possible to ask how
muchof it can be understood as worthy of admiration, as the focus
of broader patternsof emotions.
Here again, self-interpretation is required to answer this
question. However,the interpretation in this case may not be
straightforward insofar as the distinc-tion between virility and
the use of women may simply be blurred in his conceptof machismo.
Before he articulated the case in this way, the focus of his
admi-ration was simply machismo; insofar as George would not then
have understoodthere to be any difference between virility and the
use of women, it would nothave made sense to him for someone to
press the question of whether what isworthy of admiration in this
case is the virility rather than the use of women. Sothere was
antecedently no indeterminacy in the focus of his emotion. Now,
how-ever, having begun to elucidate the concept of machismo and so
having at leastbegun in his own mind to make the distinction
between virility and the use ofwomen, the question can be pressed.
By making this distinction, George has ineffect made possible a
kind of indeterminacy in his emotions that was not therebefore: the
past pattern in his emotions underdetermines whether he shouldnow
interpret them as focussed on the self-confident virility and
social ease oron the use of women, or both. He is now faced with an
interpretive decisionthat might enable him to refine his emotional
sensitivity in new ways; in effect,this is also to make possible a
refinement in his understanding of machismo and,consequently, its
import.
How is he to decide among these possibilities for the focus of
his admirationand so for how to elucidate the concept of machismo?
Assume George concludesthat the use of women for ones own ends is a
matter of exploitation and sorecasts the matter as one of virility
versus exploitation. (The grounds for thisconclusion will be
discussed below.) His decision is now easy: there is
nothingadmirable in exploiting women, for exploitation is an
improper or unjust use ofsomething. Consequently, George attempts
to refine his conception of machismoand what is admirable about it
in a way that enables him to interpret hisemotions, and here he may
end up attributing a degree of confusion to his pastemotions. Thus,
he may conclude that, although he didnt realize it at thetime, his
emotions focussed on machismo were in some cases confused
responses
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to a kind of virility now manifest as exploitation. As such,
these emotionswere inappropriate because they were not properly
responsive to the importexploitation has, even though they seemed
at the time to fit into a pattern ofemotions partially constitutive
of the import of machismo. Moreover, he cannow understand his
current admiration simultaneously as focussed on virility(but
dissociated from exploitation) and as an improved continuation of
thepattern of emotions he felt all along. As such, he has
apparently achieved anew perspective on import that commits him to
feel subsequent emotions inaccordance with this refined pattern,
thereby imposing rational pressure onthese emotions to fall in line
(cf. 3).
Whether this is the correct way to refine his understanding of
machismodepends in part on whether the concept of exploitation is
properly deployed inboth denotation and inference. This is not
something George can just decidefor himself, since concepts must be
intelligible to others and capable of with-standing criticism from
them.19 In addition, because this revised conceptual un-derstanding
makes possible new evaluative judgments and
self-interpretations,its adequacy depends as well on whether those
judgments present him with animproved perspective on import. As was
argued in 3, such a perspective isin part an emotional perspective,
and the rationality of these judgments is un-dermined by a
consistent failure to feel the required emotions precisely
becausethese conflicting emotions constitute a continuing
evaluative perspective incon-sistent with that provided by his
judgments. Given such a persistent conflictwith his emotions,
George has reason to reconsider not only the content of
thesejudgments but also the conception of machismo they involve,
potentially forcingfurther revision of his elucidation of machismo.
In this way, his conception ofmachismo and its import is subject to
rational constraint not only from thecriticisms of others but also
from his own emotional experiences.
As before, however, we should not understand such a failure of
emotionalresponse (or criticism from others) to leave him with
nothing to say on behalf ofhis judgments and his changed
understanding of the relevant concepts. Recal-citrance in his
emotions may simply be the result of habits of feeling
ingrainedalong with his earlier misunderstanding, and often
considerable effort and perse-verance is required to overcome this
source of irrationality. Through judgment,George can bring these
conceptual resources to bear on his evaluative perspec-tive so as
to articulate his reasons for a refinement of that perspective. As
heself-consciously forces himself to see particular situations in
line with these rea-sons, he thereby imposes rational pressure on
his emotions to conform preciselybecause the evaluative perspective
at issue is simultaneously both judgmental
19There is, however, some room for disagreement even among
reasonable people about howto elucidate the concept of exploitation
and apply it to particular cases: just which uses ofsomething are
improper or unjust? Here we might say that such uses involve a kind
of insen-sitivity to the object by way of failing to show it proper
respect given the kind of thing it is.Such respect and the
correlative insensitivity, however, involve a kind of evaluative
perspectivethat cannot be understood apart from ones emotions.
Exactly how the emotions are involvedin this elucidation, and so
exactly how we can reason about the value of exploitation, are
thesort of questions addressed with reference to machismo.
Obviously, these questions can ramifywidely throughout ones
understanding of the relevant concepts.
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and emotional. As in the case of Cassie (cf. 3), whether this is
so depends onwhether his judgments can be understood as
articulating his considered view.That in turn depends on whether
those judgments and the broader pattern ofjudgment and inference of
which they are a part, resonate with his emotions gen-erally,
including the broader patterns of emotions (patterns focussed on
objects,like courage, honor, and exploitation) that partially
overlap with the pattern ofemotions focussed on machismo.20 As a
result, a persons evaluative judgmentsrationally constrain his
emotions and are simultaneously rationally constrainedby those
emotions and by the criticisms of others. The result of mutual
read-justments of his conceptual understanding, his judgments, and
his emotions,may be a change in his evaluative perspective
constitutive of import, and sucha change can properly be understood
as an improvement because of the reasonshe is able to articulate.
Thus, in light of the elucidation of concepts, he can nowexplain
why his previous understanding of machismo was confused insofar as
itfailed to distinguish a sensitive and self-confident virility and
social ease from ex-ploitation; he can therefore explain why, in
light of that confusion, his previousperspective on import was
inferior. As such, the mutual rational constraintsamong emotions
and evaluative judgments make intelligible the possibility
ofrational discoverya more robust kind of discovery than that
articulated in4. For it is a discovery not only of what really has
import to him but alsoof the concepts in terms of which that
reality is more properly described.21
Consequently, the appeal to machismo as the object of his
understanding (andprevious misunderstanding) is an appeal to an
evaluatively thick property: anevaluative property that both is
intelligible as an object of discovery and is thatby virtue of
which he can regulate his evaluative sensibilities.
Nonetheless, such discovery is intelligible only as internal to
an evaluativeperspective, for the evaluatively thick properties
thus discovered are themselvesconstituted by the projectible,
rational pattern of emotions, desires, and judg-ments.
Consequently, although an evaluatively thick property is
ontologicallyand rationally prior to particular exercises of our
evaluative sensibilities andso is that in terms of which we can
assess those exercises for correctness andthereby regulate them, it
is not ontologically prior to that sensibility in general.Insofar
as the concepts in terms of which the discovery of import is made
arenot fixed, George can refine them through the process of
elucidation just de-scribed so as to reveal and overcome a
misunderstanding that was not merely aresult of failing to grasp a
concept everyone else understood all along.22 Such
20Notice that this can be Georges considered view and so form an
evaluative perspectiveconstitutive of import even if he finds
himself consistently needing to fight against a deeplyingrained
sexism, and so even if the result is an increase, perhaps even for
the long term, inthe conflicts among his evaluative judgments and
his emotions (and so a decrease in his overallrational
coherence).
21I say more properly described to indicate that what one has
discovered is an improve-ment of ones concepts, thus leaving open
the possibility (or even inevitability) of furtherrefinement and
improvement.
22Indeed, such a refinement can result in further changes in his
conceptual understanding ofmachismo, separating off, for example,
self-serving puffery and bluster from genuine courage;
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refinement may require all of Georges creativity and originality
as he confrontsand tries to resolve the resulting indeterminacies
in his overall evaluative per-spective, through attempts to shape
his emotions. In this way, we can makesense of these evaluatively
thick properties as autonomously invented as well.
Neither import as an evaluatively thick property nor our
evaluative sensibil-ities is rationally prior to the other, even
though each rationally constrains theother. This means that
although our deliberation about import must be circular,it is not
viciously circular, thus avoiding the apparent paradox of
simultaneousinvention and discovery.
6 Conclusion
In summary, deliberation can have two kinds of effects on our
patterns of emo-tions and on import. First, by elucidating concepts
so as to understand whathas import and why, we can reveal relevant
complexities in them to which wewere not previously attuned. Such
complexities may well give rise to an inde-terminacy in the focus
of the relevant patterns of emotions, an indeterminacythat was not
antecedently there and that makes possible a refinement in
thesepatterns of emotion and so in what has import. Second, we can
deploy thesenewly elucidated concepts in deciding how to resolve
the resulting indetermi-nacy. Such a decision in turn institutes a
new pattern of commitments thatrationally constrains our future
emotions. It is in part because of the elucida-tion and deployment
of concepts that this process of shaping our emotions isproperly
understood as deliberation.
Nonetheless, in each of these stages, we are involved in part in
self-interpretationin an attempt to understand ourselves and what
has import. The way in whichwe elucidate our concepts and deploy
them, in creating indeterminacy and ar-riving at decisions about
how to resolve it, must ultimately be answerable tohow much sense
it is able to make of import and our emotional responses to
it.Insofar as our emotions do not cohere with the pattern of
commitments as wehave understood it, we have reason to rethink
these conclusions of deliberation.Such deliberation takes place,
therefore, partially from within our emotionalsensibilities.
The resulting picture of deliberation about import understands
it as a mat-ter of simultaneous autonomous invention and rational
discovery in a way thatcannot happily fit into either a cognitivist
or a non-cognitivist understandingof import. It is not
non-cognitivist insofar as there are substantive
rationalconstraints on correct deliberation about importconstraints
that go beyondconstraints of coherence. For through deliberation we
can come to discoverevaluatively thick properties and so reject the
idea that our emotional sensi-bilities merely project the import
things have for us; this central insight ofcognitivism is something
a non-cognitivist cannot understand. Nonetheless, the
as this process continues it might no longer be clear what is
left of the original concept ofmachismo, and the result may be a
new concept.
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account is not cognitivist insofar as import does not have a
status as ontologi-cally prior to our evaluative responses to it.
Instead, our evaluative perspectiveon the worldboth emotional and
judgmentalis constitutive of import, andby changing this
perspective we thereby change what has import for us. This isa kind
of autonomous invention, and it is this central insight of
non-cognitivismthat a cognitivist cannot understand. By virtue of
this simultaneous inventionand discovery inherent in our
deliberations about import, we can make non-arbitrary decisions
about (and so discover) who we are, and do so in a way thatis
consistent with our having a kind of freedom to shape (or invent)
our valuesand so have a say in what makes life worth living.23
23Thanks to Leon Galis, Michael Murray, and participants in
Simon Blackburns 1997 NEHSummer Seminar, Objectivity and Emotion in
Practical Reasoning, for helpful discussionof earlier drafts of
this article, as well as to the National Endowment for the
Humanities,the Franklin & Marshall College Hackman Scholars
Program, and the American Council ofLearned Societies for their
generous support.
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