Seeing red

[Angrboda]

My views are similar to Rhythm's, but I feel perhaps I've done a disservice to them.  Chad originally claimed that objects cannot have intentionality — that they do not refer in the way thoughts do in a human mind.

Well, I'm kind of in the middle on the semantics in this case.  I think you've made a pretty good case for your definition of intentionality; I can definitely see someone saying, "Look!  That Google car plans to turn left, but it's stopped at the stop light."  However, I also agree with Chad that intentionality is usually a word related to the agency of a conscious organism.

It is, but it's also true that such observations seldom go beyond the intuition that "ideas refer" to an actual attempt to understand what that may mean when we say that our ideas refer; in the intuitional phase, it's just an empty concept. I am attempting to offer an explanation that makes sense of both human referring and machine referring. The best that seems to be offered up in reply is, "No, it's different; that doesn't fit my intuition." Seldom do people tackle the meaning of 'meaning' or what it means when we say that our idea refers.

My problem with your definition is that it represents a slippery slope: specifically that if I accept your (and Rhythm's) definitions of words that have traditionally referred to the human experience (what it's like to be a human) rather than to the function of the human organism (the behaviors that are "output"), then what words will I use when I want to express MY views of how things work?

I think that maintaining multiple provisional definitions is preferred to inventing a bunch of neologisms. "Traditionally referred" to human experience is folk psychology; it presents an interpretation of experience that is every bit as theory laden and arbitrary as my interpretation of the experience. That isn't arguing to preserve something free of baggage; that wanting to stick to traditionally referring is simply preferring one set of baggage over another. We have minds that are capable of keeping each person's baggage separate. The only danger, I think, comes when someone concludes that a specific view is baggage free and therefore preferred. I think it's good to acknowledge that I am adding my own set of baggage to the question. We must attach the baggage to the same words or we won't know what we are discussing. These are alternate theories* about the phenomena; they're going to use the same words, at least as a starting point. The function is what those words refer to. (For example, my definition of value in the "What is 'objective' value?" thread. I redefine value in order to provide an explanation in terms of function. [see below])

Valuing something is placing it within the context of a plan or purpose. Things are always valuable to be used toward some goal. This is the province of intention. Without some form of goal directing the valuation of the thing, the thing is without value. So no, a thing can't be inherently valuable as value implies the designs of an intentioning agent.