So, you’re saying that since self-destruction is effortless, it has no meaning, and since self-preservation has effort, it has meaning.
In a wholly abstract setting, yes. Read up on Aristotle. I don’t know that he addresses this particular issue, but he will get you in the mood to think of just how much nothing nothing actually is when dealing with abstract concepts. Or am I thinking of Plato? Eh, they’re both good.
You cannot have context and objectivity, not when you’re dealing with abstracts. The context is undefined, so purple cow if you want to have it, you’re going to have to generate it. Generation – even observation in the day to day – is going to insert subjectivity.
In context, however, we might have the scenario from my very first post:self-destruction to ensure the preservation of others. In Spock’s case, not entering the heavily irradiated room would have resulted in everybody on the ship – including himself – dying. Had he done nothing, his death would, from the audience’s POV, have been meaningless, a mere trick by the wacky arts crowd to make the viewers feel hollow. But instead, his death meant the lives of hundreds of other people, and a satisfied (though saddened) audience.