Aesthetic values as a typical case of bidirectional relational values

Relational Values have been proposed in the discourse of biodiversity conservation as a third category of environmental value alongside intrinsic and instrumental values. This presentation connects a philosophical account of relational values with insight from environmental aesthetics arguing that aesthetic values– especially as discussed in non-cognitive theories of environmental aesthetics– are typical cases of bidirectional relational values.

On the account adopted here, relational values arise from bidirectional human-nature relationships (Deplazes-Zemp and Chapman, 2021). One direction refers to the contribution of these values to a flourishing human life. The other direction concerns what the valuer gives back to nature. This can take the form of support or care for nature, or a cognitive, emotional, and motivational orientation towards nature, for instance, as attention, interest, wonder, and respect.

While the character of this bidirectional involvement of the valuer and valued object remains under-theorised in the context of relational values, it has been a recurring theme in environmental aesthetics. Arnold Berleant, for instance, describes a “sensory immersion in the natural world” (2004) and Ronald W. Hepburn refers to the role of attentive perception (1997). However, it is Emily Brady’s theory of integrated aesthetics that comes closest to the notion of the bidirectionality of relational values. She characterises the aesthetic experience as a relationship between the appreciator and nature, one which involves a recognition of nature in its ‘otherness’ (2003).

This presentation builds on the understanding of the aesthetic experience as a bidirectional relationship to explore how aesthetic values are a type of relational values and what we can learn about relational values more generally from environmental aesthetics.

Berleant A (1993) The Aesthetics of Art and Nature.

Brady E (2003) Aesthetics of the Natural Environment. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.

Deplazes-Zemp A and Chapman M (2021) The ABCs of Relational Values: Environmental Values That Include Aspects of Both Intrinsic and Instrumental Valuing.

Hepburn RW (1997) Trivial and serious in aesthetic appreciation of nature