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Parity and Comparability—a Concern Regarding Chang’s Chaining Argument

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Author

Summary, in English

According to Ruth Chang the three standard positive value relations: “better than”, “worse than” and “equally good” do not fully exhaust the conceptual space for positive value relations. According to her, there is room for a fourth positive value relation, which she calls “parity”. Her argument for parity comes in three parts. First, she argues that there are items that are not related by the standard three value relations. Second, that these items are not incomparable, and third, that the phenomena she has focused on are not due to the vagueness of the comparative predicates (i.e., that it is indeterminate which of the standard value relations that holds). This paper focuses on the second part of the argument and an objection is presented. By assuming the Small Unidimensional Difference Principle, which is a key premise for the second part of the argument, Chang’s argument could be accused of begging the question. More so, by assuming this principle, the space for incomparability gets severely limited. If these worries are justified, then Chang’s argument for parity as a fourth form of comparability is unsuccessful.

Publishing year

2016-02-01

Language

English

Pages

245-253

Publication/Series

Ethical Theory and Moral Practice

Volume

19

Issue

1

Document type

Journal article

Publisher

Springer

Topic

  • Philosophy

Keywords

  • Begging the question
  • Chang
  • Comparability
  • Comparisons
  • Parity
  • Trichotomy
  • Vagueness
  • Value relations

Status

Published

ISBN/ISSN/Other

  • ISSN: 1386-2820