Abstract

The axiological receptivity view (AR) is critically assessed in some detail. I start by laying out the phenomenological motivation for the view. As proponents of the view tend to suppose, ordinary experience supports AR in that emotional feelings are commonly experienced as a type of impression or presentation of value. I show that AR is wrong about ordinary experience. An adequate view of emotional phenomenology does not represent them as presentations or impressions, but as ‘feelings towards’. As I argue, feeling towards fundamentally differs from presentation in respect of its intentional features. I further explicate the relevant difference by noting that feeling towards is a response to certain aspects of its object. Expanding on this criticism, I show that emotional feelings are necessarily responsive to a specific value (their formal object) and can therefore not apprehend it since they already presuppose awareness of it. The chapter concludes by rejecting AR.