Objective and Subjective Values

The objective values they are those that reside in the thing or in the person, and not in the appreciation of each one. The subjective values are those that depend on the personal considerations of each person, according to the cultural context and person of it.

Differences between objective and subjective values

The differences between objective values ​​and subjective values ​​can be summarized as follows:

What are values?

A value is a quality that we attribute to an object or a subject, based on its perceivable physical or psychological traits. Value is an interpretation that we make of the characteristics that things and people present, based on our moral, social and cultural context, to estimate them as positive (desirable) or negative characteristics (reprehensible).

Thus, for example, in the vast majority of human societies, aggressiveness and the ability to violence are considered as negative traits in a person, since they are contrary to coexistence peaceful; but if that same person were on a battlefield, it is likely that those same traits would be praised and rewarded by his military commanders. So, depending on the context, the valuation of the same characteristic can vary drastically.

Something similar occurs with the economic value of objects, which is usually largely determined by their usability (the higher the utility, the higher the value) or because of its availability or scarcity (scarce goods always have More value). But these conditions are always determined by the context and by human needs and appreciations.

Value, in any case, constitutes a whole field of study for philosophy (called Value Theory or also Axiology), within which different ways of thinking about this concept are proposed. And, in the same way, several ways of classifying value are distinguished: universal values ​​(shared by everyone), personal values ​​(of each individual), family values ​​(specific to the family as a social institution), religious values ​​(specific to a religious doctrine), among others.

Among these classifications is the one that opposes objective values ​​and subjective values, a distinction very important because the distinction between two opposing axiological schools depends on it: objectivism and subjectivism.

What are objective values?

When we speak of objective values, we refer to those that can be appreciated by any person, regardless of their cultural background and their way of thinking or feeling. The objective values ​​are those that reside in the thing or in the person, and not in the appreciation of everyone, so that they are absolute, universal and quantifiable, that is, expressible in amounts.

According to the current of objectivism, value is something that resides in things and people, and not in the minds or points of view of the people who value them. In that sense, what the latter do is discover their value, just as it happens with colors: blue has objective and measurable physical characteristics of wavelength, for example, and even if we take a blue object and paint it red, the blue never stopped being blue, we just put red above. The same would happen with the objective values ​​of things.

One of the great theoreticians of this axiological current was the German philosopher Max Scheler (1847-1928), who insisted that the perception of value is objective, that is, reason does not intervene in it, but rather instinct, the immediate perception of value. world. According to this view, value is a trait a priori of things, that is, part of their essence. Other names associated with this current are those of the Greeks Plato and Aristotle.

What are subjective values?

Subjective values ​​are those that depend on the considerations of each person, their cultural and personal context, their way of thinking and their interests. These values ​​are established between human beings and things based on the attention and interest that the former suppose for them.

According to the current of subjectivism, the value does not reside in things but in our look at them. The value is assigned at the moment of observing and appreciating them, that is, when things are valued.

One of the great names of philosophical subjectivism was the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900), who stated that "truth will always be relative and individual". Other names that make up this tradition are those of the Greeks Protagoras and Gorgias.

References:

• "Objectivity" in Wikipedia.
• "Subjectivity" in Wikipedia.
• "Value (axiology)"in Wikipedia.
• “Values, subjective or objective?” on the Extremadura joint (Spain).
• "Values, subjective or objective?" on the Xarxa Telematica Educativa de Catalunya (Spain).

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