Detaching Betterness From Value

This paper discusses whether, as a matter of logic, better-than relations require value-bearing relata. Must an x that is better than y be in any sense good (or, where x is less disvaluable than y, bad?) Examples I provide suggest the contrary—that it is possible for something to be better than something else without having any sort of value (other than betterness). Several reasons for being suspicious of this notion of better-than are considered and questioned.