4/ Conclusion: The Notion of Value as Irreducible to All Others
Our reflection leads to this conclusion: the concept of value has been confused with related but distinct concepts, such as 'good' and 'end'. Consequently, the problem of values has been mistaken for the problem of the supreme good or supreme end, even though these are fundamentally different issues. By substituting one problem for another, we have effectively caused the problem of values to disappear, as it could never be properly posed due to this incorrect formulation.
Other formulations can be identified, but I will only mention them briefly. For instance, the notion of 'value' has often been confused with 'meaning,' leading to conflating the problem of values with questions like 'Is there a meaning to life?' or 'Is there a meaning to history?'. Similarly, 'value' has often been wrongly equated with 'right' and 'reality' with 'nature,' leading to confusing the axiological question 'Is there anything that truly has value?' with the political question 'Is there a natural right?' (in the sense of a right that is legitimate, i.e. that has a value).
However, the difference between these questions is clear: history could have a meaning (e.g., the progress of the human species), yet an axiological position could still affirm that neither humanity, art, nor technology has any value and that therefore human progress (whether artistic, technical, etc.) has no value. Likewise, finding meaning in my life (e.g., an activity that brings fulfillment) does not imply that the value of my life has been in any way founded. We can also imagine an axiological position that maintains that what has value is meaninglessness, chaos, and thus praises a life or history with no fixed direction.
Similarly, if we were able to answer the question of whether there is such a thing as natural law, and even to identify each of the laws it prescribes, it does not seem to me that we would have made one iota of progress in resolving the problem of values. This view of nature as the foundation of values lacks factual basis, and it is conceivable to adopt an axiological position asserting that what truly has value transcends nature, contradicts it, surpasses it (an idea which is, moreover, perhaps at the foundation of science, as well as of the ideas of progress and culture), whether or not it is possible to go beyond it. There would then be no point in showing that a behaviour violates natural law, precisely to someone who maintains that what is of value is to detach oneself from nature.
Thus, even if we had somehow resolved the question of the meaning of life, history, or the existence of natural law, we would still not have approached the core issue of what truly has value. It would have been interesting, however, to explore the notion of natural law or the meaning of history or life, to examine how the axiological question might have been transformed in this way, and thus lost; but such an investigation cannot be undertaken here.
We can therefore conclude that the notion of value is irreducible to any other concept, and the confusions with related concepts are indeed illegitimate.
The fact that these are moral concepts, or stem from the field of ethics (good, end, etc.) has meant that axiology has been confused with morality, and that the problem of values has been thought to be an ethical concept.
What are the consequences of this absorption of axiology by ethics? This is the question I propose to explore next.