How do you gain knowledge of other people’s terminal values, or even your own?
Be in an extreme situation that involves a devastating turn of events like a serious illness or losing everything in a disaster. As examples, Victor Frankl had some great insights into his own and other’s terminal values after experiencing a concentration camp (that people seek meaning and get meaning from ideals, not power or survival or pleasure) and Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi had a deep insight into what makes people happy (flow state).
In my case, I have experienced a devastating turn of events, so I am pretty sure of what my terminal values are: closeness, and changing the world to make it more ideal.
I am not sure why I want them, but they are what I live for—I’m completely sure of that.
Your instrumental values changed dramatically and very visibly, so you confused them for your terminal values.
Your terminal values changed, and you didn’t gain any insight to what they were before.
Your terminal values didn’t change, but are weighed differently now.
Your terminal values didn’t change, you’re still optimizing for the same things you did before, and are just using different kind of language.
As an exercise, what kinds of smaller parts can the terminal values you mentioned be chopped into?
Anyways, I’m pretty reluctant to use “instrumental” and “terminal” for humans anymore. People’s values seem so volatile and thickly veiled that it’s not a useful distinction.
Be in an extreme situation that involves a devastating turn of events like a serious illness or losing everything in a disaster. As examples, Victor Frankl had some great insights into his own and other’s terminal values after experiencing a concentration camp (that people seek meaning and get meaning from ideals, not power or survival or pleasure) and Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi had a deep insight into what makes people happy (flow state).
In my case, I have experienced a devastating turn of events, so I am pretty sure of what my terminal values are: closeness, and changing the world to make it more ideal.
I am not sure why I want them, but they are what I live for—I’m completely sure of that.
Alternatives:
Your instrumental values changed dramatically and very visibly, so you confused them for your terminal values. Your terminal values changed, and you didn’t gain any insight to what they were before. Your terminal values didn’t change, but are weighed differently now. Your terminal values didn’t change, you’re still optimizing for the same things you did before, and are just using different kind of language.
As an exercise, what kinds of smaller parts can the terminal values you mentioned be chopped into?
Anyways, I’m pretty reluctant to use “instrumental” and “terminal” for humans anymore. People’s values seem so volatile and thickly veiled that it’s not a useful distinction.