"Instrumental" and "value rationality" are terms scholars use to identify two ways humans reason when correlating group behaviour to maintain social life. Instrumental rationality recognizes means that "work" efficiently to achieve ends. Value rationality recognizes ends that are "right," legitimate in themselves. These two ways of reasoning seem to operate separately. Efficient means are recognized inductively in heads or brains or minds. Legitimate ends are felt deductively in hearts or guts or souls. Instrumental rationality provides intellectual tools—scientific and technological facts and theories—that appear to be impersonal, value-free means. Value rationality provides legitimate rules—moral valuations—that appear to be emotionally satisfying, fact-free ends. Every society maintains itself by correlating instrumental means with value rational ends. Together they make humans rational. Sociologist Max Weber observed people exercising these capacities and gave them these labels that have stuck, despite scholars constantly coining new labels. Here are his original definitions, followed by a comment showing his doubt that humans are rational to believe that unconditionally right ends can be correlated with conditionally efficient means. Principles "work" by coordinating actions that become legitimate as their success becomes recognized. Individuals are free to apply principles they find work for them, and to behave accordingly. Chapter 1 explained four ways that individuals use principles to correlate group behavior instrumentally. Dewey's “general ideas” were not pre-known legitimate ends actors intended to achieve. They were hypothetical visions of ways of acting that might solve existing problems developmentally, restoring correlated behavior in conditions that obstruct it. They visualize where a situation should go; what “from here to there” looks like. In Rationality and Freedom, Sen defined rationality as a discipline "subjecting one's choicesof [instrumental] actions as well as of [value rational] objectives, values and prioritiesto reasoned scrutiny". More forcefully than Weber, he questioned the rationality of believing that unconditionally legitimate ends can be correlated with conditionally efficient means. He essentially made both instrumental and value rationality conditional, eliminating the paradox of reason contaminating reason. To scrutinize choices seems to mean treating them as hypotheses to be tested, not as knowledge already acquired. All knowledge is conditional, subject to revision. He proposed new terms for Weber's two kinds of rationality, relating them to specific flaws he found in the reasoning of Rawls and Nozick. He labeled their instrumental rationality "transcendental institutionalism" and "arrangement-focused" analysis, prescribing fact-free patterns of correlated behavior assumed to be instrumentally efficient without conditions.
"Instrumental" and "value rationality" are terms scholars use to identify two ways humans reason when coordinating group behaviour to maintain social life. Instrumental rationality recognizes means that "work" efficiently to achieve ends. Value rationality recognizes ends that are "right," legitimate in themselves. These two ways of reasoning seem to operate separately. Efficient means are recognized inductively in heads or brains or minds. Legitimate ends are felt deductively in hearts or guts or souls. Instrumental rationality provides intellectual tools—scientific and technological facts and theories—that appear to be impersonal, value-free means. Value rationality provides legitimate rules—moral valuations—that appear to be emotionally satisfying, fact-free ends. Every society maintains itself by coordinating instrumental means with value rational ends. Together they make humans rational. Sociologist Max Weber observed people exercising these capacities and gave them these labels that have stuck, despite scholars constantly coining new labels. Here are his original definitions, followed by a comment showing his doubt that humans are rational to believe that unconditionally right ends can be coordinated with conditionally efficient means. Principles "work" by coordinating actions that become legitimate as their success becomes recognized. Individuals are free to apply principles they find work for them, and to behave accordingly. Chapter 1 explained four ways that individuals use principles to coordinate group behavior instrumentally. Dewey's “general ideas” were not pre-known legitimate ends actors intended to achieve. They were hypothetical visions of ways of acting that might solve existing problems developmentally, restoring coordinated behavior in conditions that obstruct it. They visualize where a situation should go; what “from here to there” looks like. In Rationality and Freedom, Sen defined rationality as a discipline "subjecting one's choicesof [instrumental] actions as well as of [value rational] objectives, values and prioritiesto reasoned scrutiny". More forcefully than Weber, he questioned the rationality of believing that unconditionally legitimate ends can be coordinated with conditionally efficient means. He essentially made both instrumental and value rationality conditional, eliminating the paradox of reason contaminating reason. To scrutinize choices seems to mean treating them as hypotheses to be tested, not as knowledge already acquired. All knowledge is conditional, subject to revision. He proposed new terms for Weber's two kinds of rationality, relating them to specific flaws he found in the reasoning of Rawls and Nozick. He labeled their instrumental rationality "transcendental institutionalism" and "arrangement-focused" analysis, prescribing fact-free patterns of coordinated behavior assumed to be instrumentally efficient without conditions.
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