"Monism and Pluralism in Axiology and the Semantics of Evaluative Language"
There’s an under-explored problem of "dimensional variability" at the intersection of first-order value theory and the semantics of evaluative language. Value monists and value pluralists disagree about how many genuine, distinct dimensions of value (moral or otherwise) there fundamentally are: exactly one or more than one. A semantics for evaluative language should be able to explain our use of terms like ‘good’ and ‘bad’ to state monist and pluralist positions and debate their truth. But it’s far from clear just what kind of semantics may best achieve this. For example, how can ‘good’ be used to state monist positions about value if it’s semantically associated with a multidimensional scale or to state pluralist positions about value if it’s semantically associated with a unidimensional scale? My aims in this talk are to articulate the problem more fully, describe two solutions, and offer a partial defense of one of these solutions.