 If we accept this possibility, a number of questions arise. One question is what a ranking of realizations of values means if a gain in one value does not cancel the loss in the other. A second question is whether the first and second conceptions of value incommensurability each admit of two versions: one version in which the gain in one value cancels the loss of the other and one version in which it does not. A third question concerns the relation between value incommensurability and tragedy. It may be thought that what makes a choice tragic is that, no matter which alternative is chosen, the gain in value cannot cancel the loss in the other value. Not all authors, however, regard all value conflicts involving incommensurable values as tragic (Richardson 1994, 117). Wiggins, for example, reserves the second conception of value incommensurability for what he calls “common or garden variety incommensurable” choices and the third conception for what he calls “circumstantially cum tragically incommensurable” choices (1997, 64).