Defining "Formal Axiology"

Formal axiology focuses initially upon the most formal features of human values, then upon applications of these formalities to the concrete details of what we value (values) and how we value (valuations). Robert S. Hartman searched for and began to find the most logically abstract (he would say “synthetic”) features of all human values and valuations.


 

This excerpt from the 2008 debut issue of the Journal of Formal Axiology has been published with the consent of the Editor and Author. 

 

Formal axiology is a branch of axiology in general. Axiology in general or “as such” is value theory in all its ramifications, ranging from meta-theory to ethics, aesthetics, logic, and any other dimension of human interest that involves questions of good and evil, right and wrong, correctness or incorrectness, beauty and ugliness, truth and falsity, and every other conceivable value issue, dimension, or interest.

Formal axiology, to which this Journal of Formal Axiology: Theory and Practice is devoted, was created by Robert S. Hartman (1910-1973) who spent his final years before his premature death teaching in the Philosophy Departments of The University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN and The National University of Mexico, Mexico City, MX.

Formal axiology focuses initially upon the most formal features of human values, then upon applications of these formalities to the concrete details of what we value (values) and how we value (valuations). Robert S. Hartman searched for and began to find the most logically abstract (he would say “synthetic”) features of all human values and valuations.

His most important contributions were

(1) the formal definition of “good” or “value,” which he regarded as the “axiom” of formal axiology — Good is concept (or standard) fulfilment,

(2) the three basic kinds of value, intrinsic, extrinsic, and systemic,

(3) the hierarchy of value, where the three basic kinds of value are themselves ranked with respect to their relative worth,

(4) an association of the three basic kinds of value with set theory and transfinite mathematics, (which has proved both enlightening and highly controversial),

(5) preliminary work on a formal calculus of value, further advanced by Frank. G. Forrest and challenged by Mark A. Moore, who provides a finitistic alternative,

(6) the creation of the “Hartman Value Profile,” based upon all of the above, which is a powerful personality profile which assumes that our values are the keys to our personalities,

(7) the prediction that formal axiology would eventually embrace, apply to, and bring rational order to all the humanities and social sciences, and

(8) the expectation that formal axiology would be or become a “science,” a formal not an empirical science, but further advanced more recently as an empirical science by Leon Pomeroy.

Instead of explaining each of the above in more detail, let me just say that [the Journal of Formal Axiology: Theory and Practice] will be devoted to such topics as these. Also, let me invite you and interested others to read and write for this journal on such topics.

Robert S. Hartman made a great beginning, but he left us with many unsolved problems and puzzles and with a vast amount of work still to be done. Members of the Robert S. Hartman Institute, organized in 1976, have attempted to carry on and further develop Hartman’s insights into the formal features of human values and to apply them to many value domains such as business consulting, psychology, spirituality, etc.  

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