Aphoresis (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)

Marxism is a doctrine about revolution, Conservatism by definition is the antithesis of that. End of discussion.

jake fisher (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)

G.A. Cohen is a conservative in the literal sense of the word. CleanTownUSA appears not to have understood the lecture at all, or maybe like a Thatcher or Reagan follower he is only conservative about injustice.

CleanTownUSA (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)

Since when was G.A. Cohen a conservative? He's always been a political and cultural Marxist.

Flame230 (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)

Yeap, and to think that I thought I knew English...

Eric White (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)

Right, so then it's seems entirely unfeasable (or moot) to mount a general defense of intrinsic value as against instrumental value in general. You can clearly do this on a case by case basis, but that will ultimately depend on a community of co-believers in the intrinsic value of the object in question, in which case the argument is already half-won by the given circumstances. Not to mention that it's hard to ignore the instrumental value of doing so (i.e. conservation as such).

Ben Nolan (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)

The instrumental value has no intrinsic value. It's only comparable in terms of other things' instrumental values that serve the same goal. Things' intrinsic values are richly qualitative and particular to a specific perspective in place and time. They can only be compared imperfectly. Preferable / unpreferable depends entirely on one's perspective.

Eric White (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)

Not to equivocate, but how can something ultimately unpreferable be in any meaningful sense "better"? Isn't he just placing "sentimental value" (intrinsically valuing the familiar) higher than "instrumental value"? Thus everything familiar by that measure actually *is* better, unless I decide a thing's instrumental value outweighs its sentimental value; but this seems very difficult to enact at the social level...

tomitstube (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)

@agorlewski ~ lol, what do you mean by "rigorous"?

tomitstube (November 30, 1999 at 12:00 am)

~ and that is the fundamental error of the so-called "free" market. deals that are between people always affect someone else. it's a rock in pond, there are ripple effects to every transaction. that's what a cowboy conservatist free market completely misses. it claims to be a fairness doctrine by some invisible equaling. nothing is further from the truth. how can anyone think a deal between bp and conservative politicians won't possibly have colossal collateral damage?