synthetic in that it represents a measuring and valuing of
ends--instinctive and imagined, individual and social--against each
other and as part of a whole to which a growing self corresponds. It is
synthetic in that it represents not merely a process of evaluating ends
which match actually defined desires, but also a process in which the
growing self, dissatisfied with any ends already in view, gropes for
some new definition of ends that shall better respond to its living,
creative capacity, its active synthetic character. Good is the concept
for just this valuing process as carried on by a conscious being that is
not content to take its desire as ready made by its present
construction, but is reaching out for ends that shall respond to a
growing, expanding, inclusive, social, self. It expresses value _as_
value.

Value _as value!_ not as being; nor as independent essence; nor as
anything static and fixed. For a synthetic self, a living personality,
could find no supreme value in the complete absence of valuing, in the
cessation of life, in the negation of that very activity of projection,
adventure, construction, and synthesis in which it has struck out the
concept good. A theory of ethics which upholds the synthetic character
of the good may be criticized as being not synthetic enough if it fails
to see that on the basis of the mutual determination of percepts and
concepts, of self and objects, the synthetic character of the process
must be reflected in the ultimate meaning of the category which
symbolizes and incorporates the process.

(2) We may find some light upon the question how moral value gets its
distinctive and unique character, and how it comes to be more
"objective" than economic value if we consider some of the social
factors in the moral judgment. For although the concept good is rooted
in the life process with its selective activity and attending emotions
it involves a subtle social element, as well as the more commonly
recognized factors of intelligence.

Within the fundamental selective process two types of behavior tend to
differentiate in response to two general sorts of stimulation. One sort
is simpler, more monotonous, more easily analyzable. Response to such
stimulation, or treatment of objects which may be described under these
terms of simple, analyzable, etc., is easily organized into a habit. It
calls for no great shifts in attention, no sudden readjustments. There
is nothing mysterious a