> Date sent: Fri, 11 Oct 1996 10:41:40 -0700 (PDT) > Send reply to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > From: Michael Perelman <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Subject: [PEN-L:6619] a nobel puzzle > Suppose you won the Nobel prize and wanted to put it to use to make the > society you live in improve as much as possible. Where would you spend > the $? Supporting labor? Radical education? Organize a vanguard movement? > -- > Michael Perelman > Economics Department > California State University > Chico, CA 95929 > > Tel. 916-898-5321 > E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED] If you had won the Nobel Prize, what would be the chances that you would give a damn about society? What would be the chances that you would be other than an ultra-individualistic, materialistic, acquisitive, coldly "rational and calculating", egoistic, ultra- competitive, selfish, atomistic anti-social petit bourgeois neoclassical apologist utilizing not-so-elegantly quantified theoretical mystifications of a fantasy of capitalism built on contrived assumptions and syllogisms, meaningless tautologies, linear unidirectional chains of causality and simultaneous equations portraying perfectly--or somewhat perfectly--mobile, informed, rational and calculating economic actors whose mutually cancelling interactions lead to movement toward a singular general equilibrium solution and Pareto Optimality in an non-historical or anti- historical and anti-institutional vacuum. Jim Craven *------------------------------------------------------------------* * James Craven * "The envelope is only defined--and * * Dept of Economics * expanded--by the test pilot who dares* * Clark College * to push it." * * 1800 E. McLoughlin Blvd. * (H.H. Craven Jr.(a gifted pilot) * * Vancouver, Wa. 98663 * * * (360) 992-2283 * "For those who have fought for it, * * [EMAIL PROTECTED] * freedom has a taste the protected * * * will never know." (Otto Von Bismark) * * * * * MY EMPLOYER HAS NO ASSOCIATION WITH MY PRIVATE/PROTECTED OPINION *