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    There exists a genuine fourth value relation — 'on a par'... — Carmelics
    Home/Aesthetics
    HistoryEditSee Inverse

    There exists a genuine fourth value relation — 'on a par' — distinct from 'better than', 'worse than', and 'equally good'.

    Aesthetics
    ?Rate how convincing each reason is below to see the overall strength.
    1 reason for
    2 reasons against

    Reasons For

    1 perspective
    Reason for
    ?
    • 1.Some pairs of items are comparable even though neither is better than the other.
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    • 2.Some comparable pairs cannot be judged equally good because they differ in the respects they display.
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    • 3.The existing trichotomy of 'better than', 'worse than', and 'equally good' cannot account for comparability between items that differ across incommensurable dimensions.
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    Reasons Against

    2 perspectives
    Reason against 1 of 2
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    • 1.Ruth Chang's 'on a par' relation presupposes that small improvements to one item would not make it better than the other, but this 'bi-directionality' condition can be accommodated by a vague or indeterminate equality relation without positing a fourth value relation.
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    • 2.Epistemic indeterminacy about where items fall on a single value scale fully explains our inability to rank them, rendering 'on a par' an unnecessary ontological posit rather than a genuine evaluative category.
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    Reason against 2 of 2
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    • 1.Derek Parfit and others in the fitting-attitudes tradition hold that all genuine value comparisons reduce to rankings of reasons, and any apparent 'on a par' cases reflect agent-relative permissibility rather than an objective fourth value relation.
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    • 2.If 'on a par' is defined by the resistance to improvement tests, it faces the 'chaining argument': a series of pairwise 'on a par' judgments can transitively generate absurd outcomes, suggesting the relation lacks the formal properties required of a genuine value relation.
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    AestheticsModality & Possibility

    Related

    'On a par' is needed to allow for comparability between alternatives that are di...Derek Parfit and others in the fitting-attitudes tradition hold that all genuine...Epistemic indeterminacy about where items fall on a single value scale fully exp...If 'on a par' is defined by the resistance to improvement tests, it faces the 'c...
    +4 moreShow less
    Ruth Chang's 'on a par' relation presupposes that small improvements to one item...Some comparable pairs cannot be judged equally good because they differ in the r...Some pairs of items are comparable even though neither is better than the other.The existing trichotomy of 'better than', 'worse than', and 'equally good' canno...

    Similar

    There exists a fourth value relation, parity, distinct from the standa...83%Two items are 'on a par' when neither is better than the other, their ...77%The existing trichotomy of 'better than', 'worse than', and 'equally g...75%When A and B are 'on a par,' they are comparable but none of the three...75%

    Source

    AI-extracted1/3 agreementValid
    SEP: value-incommensurable
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    A separate proposal for a genuine fourth relationship is Ruth Chang’s argument for “on a par” (Chang 1997; Chang 2002b). Two items are said to be on a par if neither is better than the other, their differences preclude their being equally good, and yet they are comparable. Whereas “roughly equal” is invoked to allow for comparability among alternatives that display the same respects (e.g., literary merit), “on a par” is invoked to allow for comparability between alternatives that are different i
    Extraction notes

    Validity: Extracted via Max plan + API grounding/validity checks

    Details

    Type
    claim
    Perspectives
    3 (1 for, 2 against)
    Edits
    1 edit