An Outline for Ambivalence of Value Judgment

Experiencing the Conflict: The Rationality of Ambivalence

“…In contrast, a subject will feel ambivalence toward an object or a situation if she is aware that the two opposite evaluations are irreducibly opposed, i.e., the subject will be conscious that the two evaluations favor two mutually exclusive actions or attitudes. As has been argued (Razinsky 2014), the characteristic of ambivalent objects is one of "mutual undermining" between conflicting evaluative properties. For example, in the case of Sachertorte, the same features that make it so tasty and pleasant (chocolate, sugar, butter, etc.)…”

“…For instance, as some authors (Greenspan 1980;Koch 1987) have argued, ambivalence can be generated by two opposite emotions (e.g., amusement and sadness). However, ambivalence might also be derived from two conflicting value judgments (Razinsky 2014) or a combination of emotion and judgment. Some authors (Frankfurt 1999;Swindell 2010) suggest that attitudinal ambivalence is fundamentally a conflict between desires.…”

“…Frankfurt's (1999) and Frankfurtian (Swindell 2010) accounts understand ambivalence as a conflict between desires. It is also argued that ambivalence can be generated by conflicting emotions (Greenspan 1980;Koch 1987) or value judgments (Razinsky 2014). However, these philosophical theories of ambivalence have not sufficiently highlighted that ambivalence is more than the mere co-occurrence of two opposite attitudes.…”

Values, decision-making and empirical bioethics: a conceptual model for empirically identifying and analyzing value judgements

“…Presuppositions based on an understanding of the term 'value judgment' contribute to what is 'seen' and analyzed in texts; differences in the meanings of this term are not merely meta-ethically relevant. It thus matters whether value judgments are, for example, understood as the "preferences of persons or groups" that "complement data from observation" [15, p. 521] as an action-guiding instrument to steer behavior toward the best solution to the person's problem which is empirically justified [16], or as kinds of beliefs that "are directed to objectivity" [17], p. 471]. Finally, one also needs to understand what exact partor implication-of a text passage is evaluated ethically in the end.…”

“…Since only few of the empirical data that would be relevant from an ethical point of view are generated by other disciplines (sociologists or psychologists have often other, discipline-driven interests), it is necessary for bioethics itself to collect and analyze this data 2. This is not true for literature on, for example, 'value' or on the discussion of whether value judgements can be understood in an objectivist manner[17,23], whether value is a mere expression of emotions[24] or whether an expression of attitudes is a necessary or sufficient condition for a value judgement[25] 3. The R2N-E1 project was part of the R2N consortium ("R2N -'Replace' and 'Reduce' from Niedersachsen (Lower Saxony)," https:// r2n.…”