Practice Axiology And Transformation Of Philosophy Of Value

The epistemological research pattern is the key reason that causes the development of philosophy of value to fall into the difficult .Thus, breaking away from the bondage of this pattern, combining the value and the practice truly has become the main theoretical duty which the practice axiology faces.This paper mainly consists of three parts:In the chapter one, it mainly focuses on the problem of Value and the Subject-object relations. Subject-object relations as the basic framework to determine the concept of value in practice axiology are different from that in the epistemological philosophy of value. It goes beyond abstract and entitative understanding of subject-object relations in the epistemological philosophy, thus the concept of value has a whole new meaning. The subject and the object of practice axiology are set up on the basis of practice. That is to say, the meaning of the subject and the object is determined by its corresponding practice. They are significant only when used as elements of practice activity. The content of subject and object is decided by the structure of practice or different effect which they make in practice activity or different roles which they occupy. In detail, the subject is in a dominant, active position in practice, the object is in a dominated, passive position in practice. As a whole, the subject and object in practice axiology is a pair of concept of relationship, but not substantial concept. The character of relationship is their fundamental property. This situation determines that the value which is set up on the basis of the subject-object relations must be a concept of relationship, rather than a substantial concept.Practice axiology believes that valve exists in the accordant and consistent relations between the existence, property, change of object and the desire, need of subject. So, to establish the concept of the value integrally, we must clarify the specific expressional way of the accordant and consistent state further. In a word, with the same as treating meaning of the concepts of subject and object, the practice axiology still carries out the opinion of practice or the way of thinking. That is to say, whether the object will meet or comply with the subject is not an epistemological problem which can be resolved in static intuition or reflection, but a practical problem which can be resolved in the interaction and communication of subject and object. Speaking concretely, in practice axiology, the interaction of subject and object can be divided into two processes, the objectization of the subject and the subjectization of the object. The former is a process which the subject carries out and realizes his purpose and intention by the object, the latter is the process which the object shows or expresses their own laws or nature through the subject. Even though these two processes as integral parts of practice activity, they depend on each other indivisibly in the content. However, their respective action for the formation of the meaning of value is entirely different. The value appears and is formed mainly in the process of the subjectization of the object. It depends on the subject-object interaction, which further deepens the beginning location of the concept of value in practice axiology. That is to say, value is not only a concept of relationship, but also a concept in dynamic relationship. This is also the first step of practical concept of value to break away from the ready and fixed way of epistemological concept of value.In the chapter two, we mainly talk about the relationship of value and needs. As a kind of subjectivity description about subject-object relations and the process of its interaction, the contents of value is depended on the subjectivity factors radically, which are finally determined by the needs basically. So we can say that the content of value is determined by the factor of needs finally. Practice axiology claims that the needs is set up on the basis of practice activity. The practice not only decides the content of the needs, but also decides its achieving way . So the quality of needs can not be really understood until comprehending the properties of practice distinctly. But, in the view of the practice materialism, the practice is a social activity in its essence. Though the adjustment of relationship between human and nature holds an important position, by contrast, the essence of practice is the adjustment and alteration of the relationship between people and people, and as well as the relationship between human and society, which not only decides the development of human and nature, but also decides the quality and direction of the relationship between human and nature. The practice is also a kind of historical activity due to its Sociality, which is not only embodied by the development of activity from low level to high grade or from simple to complex, but also exhibited by the degree of dependence of its subject-object factors on the aspect of specific social and historical conditions and circumstances. Only completely based on the real social and historical conditions, the activity can be called the human practice in true sense.The social and historical connotation of practice determines the sociality and historical property of needs, thus it also decides the objectivity of needs. Though due to the function of the natural attribute of human, the needs of human shows inevitably the dependence among natural beings, fundamentally, it's social. The content and level of the needs in the real life do not depend on the natural physical condition, but on the level of development of society and the role which people acts in it. The sociality of the needs determines its historical property. The needs of human not only change with the development of society and history, but only under its changed and developed condition and situation, people can really understand and realize their own needs. The main content of objectivity of needs is sociality and historical property of needs, and because the needs is the core of the subjectivity factors during the process of subject-object interaction, therefore, the content of subjectivity factors is inevitably objective.In the chapter three, it mainly focuses on the objectivity of value. The deciding function of subjectivity factors to objectivity of value differentiates the practice axiology from the former theories of objective value. The latter mainly can be divided into three types: Axiology of intuitionism taking Moore as representative, phenomenological axiology taking Scheler as representative, and cognitive axiology of naturalism taking Dewey as representative. Through analyzing the actual content of these theories of objectivity, we may draw the conclusion that they have the serious problem and flaw on understanding of the meaning of objectivity of value. No matter had Moore understood value as some kind of pure, unanalyzed and non-defined character, Scheler understood value as some kind of transcendent character or Dewey understood value as the result of wisdom activity, in a word, their common shortcoming was that they had not realized the combination of value and human practice activity. The reason of their falling into this condition was that they only understood so-called content of objectivity in the way of epistemology, that was to say, those theories excluded the subjectivity factors from the forming process of value thoroughly. So they resulted in that the value which was stipulated by objectivity had been separated from the relationship with subjectivity. Being different from these theories, in the view of the practice axiology, the key of understanding the objectivity of value is the action of subjectivity factors, because the value is eventually relative to human's existence, therefore, its objectivity must be established on the function of subjective factors. In detail, practice axiology insists that the objective value's meaning mainly includes two aspects: firstly, it is the sociality of value, namely, the content of value isn't the expression of wish or emotion of individual, but is decided by the content of social relations which occupies dominant position in concrete social and historical condition; secondly, it is the historical property of value, that is to say, the content of value not only varies with social development, but also this kind of change follows certain rule. Because this kind of rule is based on the process of historical evolvement about human development in the practical materialism, therefore, it is objective, can not be transferred by the people's subjective will. The value which is stipulated by the sociality and the historical property is not only one kind of objective value, but also an active value which can make self-criticism and transcend itself, therefore is also a kind of value which can combine with people's realistic activity of survival, which is the goal of practice axiology. Therefore, we may say that practice axiology has gotten rid of or transcended the epistemological research pattern thoroughly which has fettered the concept of value.