Note * — Chapter VI · Value as an Ultimate Idea

It has always been found far more easy to divide experiences* into good and bad, valuable and the reverse, than to discover what we are doing when we make the division. The history of opinions as to what constitutes value, as to why and when anything is rightly called good, shows a bewildering variety. But in modern times the controversy narrows itself down to two questions. The first of these is whether the difference between experiences which are valuable and those which are not can be fully described in psychological terms; whether some additional distinctive ‘ethical’ or ‘moral’ idea of a non-psychological nature is or is not required. The second question concerns the exact psychological analysis needed in order to explain value if no further ‘ethical’ idea is shown to be necessary.