The Orientation of Human Beings Toward Value

Abstract

Scheler’s philosophical anthropology is introduced and applied to an exploration of how humans are oriented towards value and experience them on several levels, each of which is made a theme of analysis. The highest level, that is, the one in which values of all kinds are primordially and universally given to human emotions is love and hate. The next level is that of the fundamental moral tenor; then sympathy; then milieu and the moral milieu. These condition our receptivity to values, but they do not determine their content. The question then arises as to whether human being can escape this structural openness to value and achieve moral autonomy. Hartmann’s and Scheler’s contributions to the question of freedom and determinism are discussed and criticized, but no resolution of the problem is obtained here. The uncertain question of human autonomy and moral responsibility will be pursued throughout this work.