Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics
Mike, At no time have I said what a person's desires are. I don't know - though I did say that I thought that a primary desire would be survival. Seems reasonable doesn't it? Without survival, there are no more desires. I think some people are more skilled than others at deducing from his actions what a person desires, but that is outside the scope of the both assumption. Which is that Man's desires are unlimited. So, your first two paragraphs may be interesting, but they do not affect the first Assumption. And you have in no way shown a need to abandon the first Assumption as an axiom and treat it as a corollary to the second. In fact, the second is a way better to achieve the first. If you satisfy your desires with less exertion, you will be able to satisfy more of them - which is what you want. Your next paragraph indicates you and your neighbor have different desires. Nothing wrong with that. However, I would suggest that each of you, no matter what course you may take will seek to satisfy your desires with the least exertion. You will not blunt your axe so it will be harder to cut the wood. On the contrary, you will probably sharpen it to save yourself exertion. As for your neighbor, he has taken a different turn. He is watching TV. If you want to watch TV rather than split wood, I suppose you will follow a path similar to your neighbors'. Or, perhaps your desire is not o split wood - even though you are doing it. Maybe you want big muscles and this is the easiest path to get them. If it isn't the easiest path and you find one which will get you the muscles with less exertion - you'll take it. The operating word of the second Assumption is seek. You may not yet have found the best way - but you will seek it. If someone says do it this way and it will be completed in 2 days rather than 3 - would you change your method to save a day? Would you change? I would expect you to change to save yourself exertion. But, you may have desires I don't know. A problem arises when we know what we would do and therefore expect others to do they same as us. That doesn't happen. You attacked me at the end of your note. Perhaps you shouldn't have. I fear you still are wounded from when I suggested you don't know what ad hoc meant. Well I was kidding. I should actually have looked around for some umbrage to take. For you took the careful work of a century or two and dismissed it as ad hoc generalizations of the emergent properties of the aggregate. In other words, you dismissed a great deal of thoughtful work as improvised or impromptu. So, I suggested you didn't know the meaning of ad hoc. You didn't like that, and grabbed the umbrage I missed. You also suggested I am scornful, which indicates extreme contempt. Would I spend hours of writing if I was contemptuous of the Future Workers. They are a great lot and I think we all enjoy the thrust and parry of debate and discussion. Brian said 'This is fun. It is! Harry __ Mike wrote: Harry expostulated: Why is desire ambiguous? The word was chosen carefully and it isn't difficult to check out. I like The feeling that accompanies an unsatisfied state. Desire is stronger than want, which is often used by economists. I'll repeat. Why is desire ambiguous? Desire is an internal state of mind. It is purely cognitive and private. Your mindfulness of your unsatisfied states is itself a state of the same kind. You have no way to know mine or confirm its existence save by projection, the same kind of projection that we all use when we surmise in others conscious states similar to those we experience ourselves. Our desires are not accessible to external observation, to scientific scrutiny. How shall we treat any statement as an hypothesis subject to proof or disproof or even to scrutiny, if it is about a thing -- a state or phenomenon -- that is not subject to observation? Well, perhaps we may say that we can infer desires from the behavior of those subsequently alleged to have experienced them. In that case we will have to abandon your first Assumption as an axiom and treat it as a corollary to the second. I desire to have a warm house and so does my neighbor. But I'm out splitting wood while he has finished up the wage work needed to pay for his oil and has his feet up, watching television. I'm willingly expending rather more effort to heat my house than he is. How do we get out of this? Only by inferring that it must be the case, our protestations to the contrary notwithstanding, that my desire is different from his, that his is to heat his house plus X while mine is to heat my house plus Y, for there is in fact nothing to prevent me from installing oil or gas heat. But if we use this behavioral methodology to infer desires, the second Assumption can never be evaluated. We have no way to evaluate whether or not a subject is seeking to satisfy a desire with the least effort because we can only infer his desire from efforts
Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics
At 10:14 PM -0500 2002/02/03, Brad McCormick, Ed.D. wrote: I [think I...] can see the point of this. (Dickensin poem) Brad, We both seem to have taken the edge (nasty?) off our responses. A good sign. I try not to play chess and old habits die hard. 'Seeing the point' of Dickinson's poem is different from 'being in the world' as Emily is in the world. It is a kind of continually being 'born again'. I know how loaded that expression is. If we learn from all experience intellectually, emotionally and spiritually then we are newer each moment of our lives. Take care, Brian -- ** * Brian McAndrews, Practicum Coordinator* * Faculty of Education, Queen's University * * Kingston, Ontario K7L 3N6 * * FAX:(613) 533-6596 Phone (613) 533-6000x74937* * e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]* * Education is not the filling of a pail, * * but the lighting of a fire. * * W.B.Yeats * ** **
Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics
Title: Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics Hi Ray, I can't tell you how much I appreciate your very thoughtful response to my very brief attempt to hint at a few of Wittgentein's insights into language.He truly believed that ethics and aesthetics are one in the same.An attempt to create a 'theory' of ethics/aesthetics indicated to him a profound confusion brought on by the worship of science in the 20th century. Our appreciation of the Good/Beautiful shows itself in how we live our lives and there as many ways to show our appreciation as there are people. I could go on Ray, but my duties need attending. Here is a website which will give you more carefully crafted glimpses: http://radicalpedagogy.icaap.org/content/issue3_3/4-peters.html Take care, Brian
Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics
Brian, Yes, it is fun. You said: 'I've got to prepare for 6 hours of classes tomorrow but I can use a lot of this exchange because we are exploring 'interpretation' of text in The Incredible Lightness of Being.' And I have to make a postscript file of the first Cycle of my high school economics course. That will be compressed into an executable rar file to send by E-Mail to a young lady who will begin teaching 4 classes of senior economics tomorrow and will need the stuff printed on Monday, so she can start the Cycle Tuesday. Thus does reality intrude into our lofty thoughts. But, back to business. You added a reference to disciple in your note. I'll add this to religious, ad hoc and dogma. Incidentally, many of your posts contain bits of Wittgenstein, or comments on Wittgenstein, or glowing appraisals of Wittgenstein. I don't recall any criticism of Wittgenstein. Does this make you a disciple? (Someone who believes and helps to spread the doctrine of another.) If you have a critique of Wittgenstein, I would love to see it. Now, the only time I mentioned George was in a little potted biography I did of myself back in January - where I detailed how I came across him and found him extremely useful, but nevertheless fought him all the way - and lost. The two Assumptions appear in Progress and Poverty some 165 pages apart as odd remarks - about obvious human behavior, but otherwise not particularly significant. You asked me if I had read George Orwell's essays at that time. The answer is probably yes, but I cannot remember them - which probably means that I agreed with them (or thought them too lightweight to bother with). I did find George worth bothering with. I was a free trader. George wrote what is probably the best book ever written on free trade, then showed that the benefits of free trade do not find their way into the hands of marginal workers at the bottom of the heap - except in transitory fashion. He also said things so well. It is certain that Progress and Poverty has been used in many literature classes in University - but very few economics classes. You would find him interesting and a fine writer, even if you disagreed with everything he said. I did enjoy Burke Marilyn Waring merely reiterated the same old stuff. Russell Banks' was OK. Schiller again is saying the same things I enjoyed the piece from Mary Rose O'Reilley's book The Peaceable Classroom but she was describing chaos rather than order. It is dangerous to stand in a classroom with literature in our hands. What do we do with those awful moments in Virginia Woolf when her meaning becomes unmistakable: there is no possibility of human beings understanding each other, no hope at all. Grossman was good. I thought that Wittgenstein's remark about the Oracle was fun, but not particularly wise. Science tests its hypotheses. When the Oracle appears to be wrong, we seek reasons for our failure to understand. When physics appears to be wrong, we test it. If physics says there is gravity and the Oracle says there isn't, one simply tests it by stepping off a cliff. It's not an experiment you can repeat but it probably provides a clear answer. So we come to: We turn not older with years; but newer every day I suppose that the TV commercial I'm not growing older, I'm growing better isn't in the same class. Now, I know I'm a Philistine, but while I like her poem, I am unwilling to place a deep significance on it. But, I also know you may. So be it. I don't have a lot of old left, which may affect my viewpoint. As I read your various excerpts, I experienced deja vu. It seemed to me I had read these things before. That's a problem with being around a long while. As to being a disciple (because I work for one of the many schools all around the world named after Henry George) I must say I think the man was great. But, I brought his remarks about exertion to the front of my economics course and called them Basic Assumptions. He had them both in the text far apart from each other and treated them as self evident truths, not worth spending many words on. I changed his basic concepts, the very essence of his arguments - while keeping the same names (which I might also change). I changed a number of conclusions, because I thought they were inadequate. I'm not much of a disciple. What have you denied in Wittgenstein? Now to the less consequential. You told me that I said: There is an order in the universe. I said: I didn't say there was an order in the universe. Oh yes you did Harry, I pasted it into the very beginning of the thread that prompted this response. Check your sources Harry. You think you actually pasted your own paste. It's often useful to excerpt - but a careful cut and past can change the meaning. I don't think that I ever said There was an order in the universe. I said that two Basic Assumptions precede every science. - and I quoted them. You took one line of the quote and gave it to me, . You also suggested that I claim to discover
Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics
Harry, I pointed out many exceptions which you
ignored. Just say that Man's desire for eternal pain is
infinite. Man's desire for death is infinite.
Liebestod?JohnWaters and his movies?
Sounds pretty kinky to me this aphorism of yours.Those who
believed that Man's desires were infinite and that it was OK went on the largest
sexual binge in historyin the baths of New York and the
world. Should man's desires be infinite?
Their binge ended in a plague.
Or maybe we could say that the desires of a child
seem infinite but are limited by their experience to food clothing
andshelter. And thenthey go passive and want
it with the least effort. The language of a child is
concrete while the language of the adult is abstract. You must prove
which stance you are speaking from in order to make your meaning
clear. But I must say, dealing with the whole list seems like
you are Bruce Lee and the rest of us are the villains. You have a
lot of guts inside your simplicity. But you don't convince me in
spite of your tenacity. The most common state of humanity is
boredom. I have no doubt that some of the systems that you mentioned
worked and I will give you that George made it work, although I have to take
your word for it. But why did it change? No system
works that doesn't cover all of the bases and lasts more than a few years before
it is thrown out.
REH
- Original Message -
From:
Harry Pollard
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ; [EMAIL PROTECTED] ; [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: Saturday, February 02, 2002 11:36
PM
Subject: RE: FWk: Re: Double-stranded
Economics
Arthur,Jolly good, Arthur!They are
axioms - self evident truths. That's why no-one can find an
exception.You don't have to prove a self-evident truth. After all -
it's self-evident.More seriously, it is almost vital to have
self-evident truths as assumptions, then as Russel said, use as few as
possible ("Two are better than sixteen.") At least, I suppose you should with
something incontrovertible (perhaps the same thing).After all, you
intend to build a network of reasonable logic on this base.It had
better be right.I fear the Neos replaced the careful thinking of the
Classicals with an edifice resting on air. As one looks through what is
considered important in a current textbook, one must be struck by
inconsequentiality of it all. We must start thinking of economics as a
real science and I can't see much hope of that unless we look back to before
the rot began.Now this a hard thing to say to a professional
economist, who has learned all kinds of useful skills (even though Ed never
did get to try out his indifference curves). Also, economists seem to be
the best of the crop. Maybe they have to be to draw out the worthwhile from
the complications."Publish or Perish" ensures that a veritable
blizzard of paper sweeps through academia - much of it exposing such important
things as imperfect competition (who said it was perfect?) Joan Robinson made
a career out of this nonsense.But, what about the perpetual poor who
grace our society?And a bit above the polloi are a middle class
desperately trying to keep the perks of the somewhat well-paid professionals -
and they do so by working umpteen hours to say ahead of the
mortgage.And the rich? Henry George suggested that when poverty exists
in a society, riches are not enough. You keep struggling to get more because
over your shoulder you can see the leering face of poverty - a poverty that
may catch you. Economists don't really appear to do a very good job,
do
they?Harry___Arthur
wrote:
HARRY: You mean the two Assumptions are wrong. Well, you are a
scientist. Show it. All you need is one exception. that shouldn't be hard to
find.A religious dogma is something that is proclaimed as true
without proof.So, disprove it. Show everyone on Future Works that
the two Assumptions are not true of human behavior.ACNow that
we have moved to proof, Harry, how about some proof that your two
assumptions, the pillars of your system, are true.Proof please.
arthur
---
Mike,
Your analysis is wrong.
Though everything you say can be applied to the Neo-Classical stuff.
They are the people who decided about 100 years ago to make economics
mathematical, and therefore a science.
The problem with people sciences is you can't put people in test
tubes, so you have to use the tool of imagination (a tool not unknown in
the physical sciences).
"What if?" is the question in the social sciences - also not unknown
in other sciences.
You said:
MIKE: "It is, I think, even worse to start with ad hoc generalizations
of the
e
Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics
Ray answered my: For that matter where is this dog-eat-dog fantasy world. Enron. Ray You've pinned it down! Harry ** Harry Pollard Henry George School of LA Box 655 Tujunga CA 91042 Tel: (818) 352-4141 Fax: (818) 353-2242 ***
Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics
At 02:38 AM 2/3/2002 -0400, Mike Spencer wrote: Harry quoted me: me It is, I think, even worse to start with ad hoc generalizations of the me emergent properties of the aggregate and then employ them as me hypotheses from which, with the application of scientific reasoning, me we hope to deduce a science of the good society. And opined: hp Maybe you don't know what ad hoc means. C'mon Harry. Lay off the condescension. To this, to the purpose at hand. In this case, to the purpose of creating suitable slogans for an ideology. No condescension, Mike. I was lightly kidding you. However, you did take the work of a century or two and call it ad hoc. Meantime: ad hoc: Often improvised or impromptu I guess the condescension came from your court. hp I am also not sure how emergent properties of the aggregate applies hp to an Assumption about individual action. Your Assumptions are not about individual action. They are about Man in the 19th century sense of generalizing to all of man- or human-kind, as I think you were at pains to explain in an earlier post. Many of the things we may say about Mankind allude to emergent properties of complex interactions between multitudinous individuals, no one of which alone *neccessarily* exhibits the properties to which we allude. When one uses Man one is referring to the species homo - not some of them, or most of them, but every single one of them. But if that is confusing. Let me say it. The two Assumptions apply to every single person. The Classical Analysis seemed to be prejudice-free. Much more important than our differences are our similarities. But, we know that. me Harry has, IIRC, repeated several times his premises: hp I don't know what IIRC ... If I recall correctly. You are quite correct. As I've put it elsewhere, I've trailed my coat in your paths. me I don't see this as any less a religious dogma than All have sinned me and come short of the glory of God. ' hp You mean the two Assumptions are wrong. Well, you are a scientist. hp Show it. All you need is one exception. that shouldn't be hard to find. hp zhp A religious dogma is something that is proclaimed as true without proof. hp hp So, disprove it. Show everyone on Future Works that the two hp Assumptions are not true of human behavior. No, I didn't *mean* they are wrong, although I think they're bogus -- generalities of the same quality as Everybody loves a parade or There's nothing like a good cigar I don't like parades and I don't smoke. Try another. and constructed or chosen for their propaganda value (ad hoc). Propaganda for what? I *meant* that they were offered as zdogma and seemed to me to qualify as such. Not at all. They were offered as scientific assumptions to precede a science. If they are true they jump start our economic thinking. Instead of assuming that people are simply too unpredictable to deal with, they offer an opportunity to think about people as predictable beings. They describe why people work and how people work. And they are self-evident truths. Doesn't that make them useful? Unfortunately we have rather forgotten rigor in our thinking processes. Look at Ray's contribution to this discussion. He's the best yet, yet he offered alternatives to the Basic Assumptions that softened them - made them easier to accept. That's fine but I will argue with him that the two Assumptions don't need to be softened. If you accept them, you are not somehow weakened. Indeed, you are strengthened. (Of course, once past the self-evident truths, the Classicals immediately took us into the seven terms hat effectively cover everything on earth. Yet again the Classicals were rigorous in their thinking and they came up with seven terms that named tightly defined concepts that were mutually exclusive.) Would that modern economists were as rigorous. I remember 30-40 years ago Economics text-book writer George Leland Bach finishing his chapter on profit with for what profit is paid, and to whom, is very difficult to determine. I doubt that modern text-book writers are as candid as Bach. But then, profit isn't an economic term. What the Neo-Classicals seem to do when they have a word hanging around doing nothing, is to attach a meaning to it. It makes modern economics a butt for jokes, saved perhaps only by the quality of the people who get trapped in it. No, I'm not a scientist, although I've studied a bit of science and make some effort to continue in that avocation. No, a religious dogma, at least as I construe the word, is proclaimed authoritatively as subject neither to proof nor disproof. It is the nature of good propaganda technique to construct slogans that repel and evade critique. A subsequent invitation to disprove the slogan is part of the propaganda. Prove to me that there *is* somthing like a good cigar! There is no point to proclaiming with authority (whose authority?) something in a science because the proclamation will be torn to pieces. So, tear it to pieces. hp Then start thinking again
Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: What we need to understand may only be expressible in a language that we do not know [snip] I am rather more optimistic on the potential of language, although if you mean by a language that we do not know, the results of childrearing and schooling in terms of individuals' language skills, then I would agree. One of the genuine advances of the personal computer is that it removes a great disincentive to getting one's words exactly right: the drudgery of recopying words one does not intend to change. Uniform printed editions removed the disincentive to correcting text that, under manuscript conditions, correcting a manuscript by writing a new one would likely introduce new errors in the copying process. Word processing software eliminates the tedium of recopying everything to change anything in one's text. -- If persons were educated to the expressive possibilities of the English language, instead of dulling their minds on Dickens, perhaps the postmodern conceit that communication is impossible would appeal less to the PhD products of our Prestige Universities who don't really have any idea of what it would be like to have something to say (or even to think). After graduating from Yale in the same class (although, obviously not in the same class!!!) as George W Bush, it was several years later when, in reading Hermann Broch's _The Sleepwalkers_ (not to be confused with Arthur Kroestler's book by the same title!!!), that I saw why words might deserve to exist, and I found my own voice. Oh *This* is what language can be about and what it can do So my expectation that language's gross under market valuation will rise any time soon is not much. Invest your semiotic capital in the postmodernist linguistic bubble. Get a big enough semiotic credit line (AKA PhD w/tenure) that you too can explain to fawning graduate students how communication is impossible (even while you blithely deploy the denotation of your American Express card to pay for (if there is such a thing as paying for...) dinner at a 5-star restaurant (if there is such a thing as dinner...). What a person cannot say, they can, at best, see through a glass darkly -- although they can even see vaguely only because they can at least put *that* into words. So vast is the extent of the Logos, that no matter how far you search, you will not find its limit anywhere. (Heraclitus) The herd of mankind is two-headed, thinking what is is-not, and what is-not is, together. (Parmenides) If you want to read something that trumps Richard Nixon's I am not a crook, read Deconstruction in a Nutshell, where you will find Jacques Derrida explaining that he honors the Immortals of the Western Canon whom he Honors like every other Normal University Professor who defends with his life the academic establishment, so he finds it difficult to understand why people think he says things like that meaning is impossible. It's a shame George W Bush is a Republican, since Derrida could be his speech writer -- a post Derrida would probably enjoy as much as Robert Bork would have enjoyed the intellectual feast of being on the Supreme Court. \brad mccormick -- Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works (Matt 5:16) Prove all things; hold fast that which is good. (1 Thes 5:21) ![%THINK;[SGML+APL]] Brad McCormick, Ed.D. / [EMAIL PROTECTED] - Visit my website == http://www.users.cloud9.net/~bradmcc/
Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics
Brian McAndrews wrote: Brad, Have you read Ray Monk's biography of Wittgenstein? I have not. (So many books, so little time) What does he say about LW's mental breakdown before WWI and how LW related to students when he was a school teacher? I did read a fascinating book about LW's single venture as an architect -- Aspergers' probably; genius probably too. LW spent 2 years finding a foundery to cast the heating radiators for the house I do now recall that the other Asperger's candidate was Bela Bartok. Ref. lost, sorry, so you don't have to give it any credence. Stephen Toulmin gave it rave reviews. He was a student of Wittgenstein and I think I recall you mentioning his 'Cosmopolis' on this list. I have no idea where you came up with the Asperger's syndrome stuff. (I have no idols, if that's the question) I am still trying to improve my audit trail skills, but having been childreared not to notice what's happening to me, often I remember something was interesting after where I found it is gone, and I fail to find it again. But I do think my oral and my written discourse are at least not altogether shameful in their bibliographical underpinnings, andf I promise to redouble my efforts over the redoubling I was already intending anyway Scientists do play their own language games, so do all the disciplines. Isn't that what first year 101 courses are all about? Learning the languages (superstars)of economics, poli sc, psych, physics... I would have had no problem had LW talked about quote-language games-unquote, like Erving Goffman might have done. Goffman was a student of the way the surface semiotic moves and counters in social life covertly deploy all manner of unacknowledged hidden agenda. Did LW deal with the hidden agenda behind the words? He did not explore the hidden curriculum (Lawrence Kohlberg), or did he? *Please* give me the references where Wittgenstein explored both the Freudian unconscious of repression and the poisitive social unconscious of permissions described in Alain Resians' film Mon Oncle d'Ameriqua, and Edward Hall's The Silent Language? We can imagine a language simpler than ours, in which there are words for the various materials on a construction site, and words for telling a person what to do with these materials. Bring brick. All language can be understood as being elaborated on this base (presumably like all mathematics can be constructed from the null set). That is my understanding of LW's philosophy in a nutshell. And it certainly beats looking for sense data or atomic facts! How about, instead, starting off with the Winnicottean notion that the infant's first word expresses the whole world [as the infant understand it...]? Of course, we, like LW's building construction site crew, quickly train the infant to use words denotatively (or rather: we truncdate the infant's world to various materials on a construction site and words for telling the person what to do with them. We call this education, although a real construction worker might call it schlepping. Hammurabi's children made their house of slavery's bricks imprimatured by some mad priest's imagined good. The good is gone, the priest stamps on (George Delury) \brad mccormick Brian At 08:08 PM 2/2/2002 -0500, Brad wrote: Sorry, I didn't see this last point. Wittgenstein seems likely to have had Asperger's(sp?) syndrome [mild autism]. Did he love anybody? Who but an autistic could come up with the conceptualization that the forms of social life are: language games ? Wouldn't a person who was dissociated but also a genius be likely to think about whether a person could be meaning blind? Sounds like autism to me -- but then I am making interpretations beyond the basic rule (ref. Freud), so they are merely speculative. \brad mccormick -- Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works (Matt 5:16) Prove all things; hold fast that which is good. (1 Thes 5:21) ![%THINK;[SGML+APL]] Brad McCormick, Ed.D. / [EMAIL PROTECTED] - Visit my website == http://www.users.cloud9.net/~bradmcc/ -- Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works (Matt 5:16) Prove all things; hold fast that which is good. (1 Thes 5:21) ![%THINK;[SGML+APL]] Brad McCormick, Ed.D. / [EMAIL PROTECTED] - Visit my website == http://www.users.cloud9.net/~bradmcc/
Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics
At 09:42 AM 2/3/2002 -0500, Brad wrote: I'll leave whitman aside, since I am poetry blind Thanks for this honesty Brad. It saves both of us a lot of time because; as the Perloff article I sent explores, I see Wittgenstein as a poetic philosopher.. I am an amateur self taught student of philosophy. My background is in child development - Piaget et al. I developed an interest in the history and philosophy of science which led me to make sense of the concept 'paridigm shift' and that took me to Ludwig Fleck and Wittgenstein who both used this language early in the 20th century. Wittgenstein wrote the way he did precisely because of how he understood language (meaning and understanding). Some people hate poetry because of 'hidden meaning' . The Emily Dickinson poem I sent has no hidden meaning, it shows us a profoundly different way of experiencing the world. Some of us might embrace this way of being. And because of this new way of being so many of the old philosophical problems aren't solved; they disappear. That is the ladder metaphor that Wittgenstein uses. This is what Russell came to see but couldn't bring himself to embrace. Take care, Brian
Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics
Brian, I didn't say there was an order in the universe. I suggested that scientists are obliged to assume there is. Also, that they must assume that they can find it. What else is there? And what if it is a musical order? What a delightful thought. I bet Ray would like that. But what if it is cacophony? Then we are done. We cannot find an order where there is no order. But your imagery is delightful. But, you bring in Emily Dickenson. (I think you may be confusing the message with the messenger.) If I were Emily Dickenson, I would experience the world as EmilyDickenson. How I experience the world is nothing to do with the subject, but I am ever willing to discuss anything. What mythology of the creation of the universe do I find most attractive? You are asking me what fairy story I like most. Perhaps Alice in Wonderland fits the bill best. I know nothing about the creation of the universe and neither does anyone else. Maybe you want me to tell you which guess I prefer. Is this a game? Perhaps not. Maybe it's an exercise in curiosity, which is fine. People are curious. (Could that be an Assumption of psychology?) I don't agree with Einstein on this point. I recall the past, It happened to me. In expect to be in the future tomorrow. But perhaps he meant we can only live in the now, which is correct. We only have now. Lots of good questions, Brian. But don't direct them at me as if I am claiming responsibility for the order in the universe. Harry _ Brian wrote: Harry wrote: There is an order in the universe. Perhaps, and it may be musical. C. S. Lewis in his Narnia series has Aslan sing the universe into being. Think of the 'order' Emily Dickinson shared with us : We turn not older with years; but newer every day Do you experience living as Emily does Harry? If you did would it change your ways of experiencing the world? Einstein said that the past ,the present, and the future are illusions; albeit stubborn ones. Why did Einstein never accept the 'order' that quantum mechanics suggests? Perhaps he was uneasy leaving things to 'chance'. Which mythology of the creation of the world (universe) do you find most attractive, Harry? Even within the myths of science, the big bang theory (hunch) is only one of several that hold the interest of the 'movers and shakers'. How come many chemo-therapy researchers don;t opt for chemo when they find themselves with cancer? A lack of Faith? Or do they know too much? Ezra Pound said: Poetry is news that stays news. Perhaps Art (music, dance, visual art, poetry, literature,) is the 'language' Arthur Cordell is looking for. Take care, Brian McAndrews ** Harry Pollard Henry George School of LA Box 655 Tujunga CA 91042 Tel: (818) 352-4141 Fax: (818) 353-2242 ***
Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics
Hi Brian et al, At 09:32 AM 2/3/2002 Sunday , you wrote: Brian, I didn't say there was an order in the universe. I suggested that scientists are obliged to assume there is. Also, that they must assume that they can find it. What else is there? And what if it is a musical order? What a delightful thought. I bet Ray would like that. But what if it is cacophony? Then we are done. We cannot find an order where there is no order. [snip] There is more than one kind of order. Even chaotic systems display order. Statistically, certain types of physical events can occur with greater frequency than others. Almost any very complex system appears chaotic at first and may be chaotic at the micro level even when well understood at the macro level. So looking for simple rules for complex beings like humans may be a fools errand. Humans exhibit all kinds of irrational behaviors when viewed from any one viewpoint. So trying to predict human behavior in an economic sense while ignoring humanitarian or sexual drives is almost sure to fare poorly. I fail to see any axioms proclaimed in this discussion that are sufficiently obvious to me to claim such a title. I think we will need to go much deeper into the human mind before we succeed. Scientists themselves have many motivations. Some do it for the wages they earn. Some for the intellectual pleasure. Some to remove themselves from the popular culture. Some are responding to compulsive drives. The same can be said for climbing mountains. Or chatting on email lists for that matter. Dennis Paull Half Moon Bay, California
Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics
At 09:32 AM 2/3/2002 -0800, Harry wrote: But what if it is cacophony Harry, Isn't this fun? You well know one person's cacophony is another person's Mozart. It is a matter of taste. Wittgenstein spends a lot of time dissolving this confusion. Think of how silly it would be to argue over which coffee tastes best. If we can't agree on our taste preferences then shouldn't the same hold true for sound preferences? Same goes for the rest of the 5 senses. (or is their only five?) What about intuition; is it a sense? I didn't say there was an order in the universe. Oh yes you did Harry, I pasted it into the very beginning of the thread that prompted this response. Check your sources Harry. What else is there? Faith in something else Harry. Why not ask Ray about his beliefs given that he is a priest within his culture. Actually Ray generously shares his beliefs on this list all the time. His poem response to Dan George's beliefs could be read as a credo. If I were Emily Dickenson, I would experience the world as EmilyDickenson. How I experience the world is nothing to do with the subject You can be 'in-formed' by her though; right Harry? You seem to have been deeply 'in-formed by Henry George .You even work at his school. Does that makes you a disciple? What mythology of the creation of the universe do I find most attractive? You are asking me what fairy story I like most. Perhaps Alice in Wonderland fits the bill best. YES I AGREE!! Alice is perfect because as you recall the rich and powerful get to decide what language means and they get to change that meaning when it serves their purposes!! Now that is infinitely better than privilege. Enough for now Harry,. I've got to prepare for 6 hours of classes tomorrow but I can use a lot of this exchange because we are exploring 'interpretation' of text in The Incredible Lightness of Being. Take care, Brian
Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics
At 11:55 AM 2/3/2002 -0500,Brad wrote: Do philosophical problems of dying, suffering, anomie, making choices, etc. dissolve? Or do they get called something else and live on under some less disturbing rubric? I missed the Emily Dickinsoon poem -- can you resend and I'll see what I make of it? Brad, Dickinson's poem: We turn not older with years, but newer each day. As to your other questions about dying etc.I can only say that Monk, using eye witness accounts shows us how Wittgenstein dealt with his own suffering and dying. Wittgenstein once wrote that instead of: In the beginning was the word he would prefer: In the beginning was the deed. Take care, Brian
Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics
Hello Brad, Brian, I am enjoying your conversation immensely as I always do. I have great respect for your minds. That being said I would like to contribute a little point or to. Wittgenstein believed that ethics and aesthetics can not be spoken or written about; they must be shown. I think this probably came from a time when too much was being said about ethics and aesthetics and too little done, so out of frustration heresorted to dramatic statements much as Kierkegaard insisted that nobody had the courage to have a real war when in fact they had been in a real war for quite some time. Other than that the statement is not true. It is not either/or but both.e.g. Words can never describe a sound but they are necessary to point out things in the sound that those who are experiencing it for the first time, either as performer or audience, would miss. Words, like teaching, are meant to draw attention to and focus upon the comprehension of technique, but they are not a substitute for the orginial symbol unless they are the orginal art work. In the way that Whitman's poem shows us the ineffable. I read the poem andI don't perform it that way. In fact, quiet rightly, you needed the bold mark to point out what your reading was.Even then I still might not have believed that it only showed the ineffablealthough one of the things that it showed could have been that. IfI examine the poem's key wordsI get the absurdity of a scientific human trying to comprehend a universe (the oneWhitman knows in his head) that cannot be comprehended in the modality the scientist has chosen. It is not about ineffibility but the arrogance of the scientist claiming and being acclaimed for describing the "real" Universe with his simple tools. If I may analyse a bit: Poem Keywords for meaning stress, i.e. semantics (nouns + modifiers and process verbs + modifiers = meaning stress) heard learned astronomer,proofs,figures, were ranged columns,shown charts diagrams, add, divide, measure,sitting heardastronomerlectured much applauselecture-room,soon unaccountable became tired sick,rising gliding out wandered off mystical moist night-air timetime,Looked upperfect silencestars. Walt Whitman REH Interpretive stress, i.e. contextual semantics When I heard the learned astronomer,When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me,When I was shown the charts and diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them,WhenI sitting heard the astronomer where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room,How soon unaccountable I became tired and sick,Till rising... andgliding out... I wandered off by myself, (pause)In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time, (pause)Looked up in perfect silence at the stars. Walt Whitman (character analysis for above performance interpretation) WW Job: Work is poetry withlittle financial recompense while job is as an opera critic for a Brooklyn Newspaper. WW Emotion: anger/irritation WW Question: why am I being asked to endure this bore who makes a living doing such inadaquate things? WW Main Point: This scientist, this tone deaf baby has no knowledge whatsoever of what he speaks when compared to the possibilities of the real thing. WW Postlude:That scientist thinks he's a star but stars are found only in heaven. For further reading, reference my old teacher Dorothy Uris' book, "To Sing In English" as well as my French coach Pierre Bernac's "The Interpretation of French Song." Dorothy's book speaks for the semantic and syntactical elements of performance diction that she recieved in the old Hollywood Studio Star System. She was a young actress at the feet of the coaches for the system that created great technical actors from people who they "discovered" with a "look" at lunch counters. Maestro Bernac wasjust as tough but without Ms. Uris's niceness. The Performance of poetry is everythingbecause it ishighly specific in its use ofpoetic diction. On the "other hand" itopen's up into the "Universal" in as many ways as its reader'stechnical knowledge, imagination anddesire will pursue. Therecan never be one interpretation unless the poem is overly obvious and not very good poetry. Brian, I accept that your interpretation is both a goodand valid one.One can never draw, however, scientific conclusions from such a thing since science struggles tolower complexity througha generalover-simplified projection to practical ends, poetry struggles to express the whole of the Universe through a blossoming specificity that reaches to the ends of the possibilities of meaning in its interaction with the reader/performer and if there is one, the external audience. The point of art is that all things are expressible at least as metaphor but not quantifiable or maybe that quantifying it is a useless activity in the long run. As the Psycho-linguist Robert Brown points out in "How Shall a
Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics
Brian, I've been discussing the two Assumptions that precede all human sciences - but particularly the Science of Political Economy. There are two assumptions that precede all Science. That there is an order in the universe. and That the mind of man can find that order. Why two? - Well as Bertrand Russell said Better two assumptions than sixteen. Actually, better two assumptions than three. The more you make the more chance of error - so you keep them few. We don't impose a system on nature. We look for the order in Nature that exists. We simply have to find it. That is, if we make the two primary general assumptions. Which we must. The last sentence of the piece is appropriate. Harry _ Brian wrote: Hi Pete, Along with Whitman, I think this has relevance too: Brian McAndrews The Way We Are (Taken from J. Burke, The Day the Universe Changed. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1985). Somebody once observed to the eminent philosopher Wittgenstein how stupid medieval Europeans living before the time of Copernicus must have been that they could have looked at the sky and thought that the sun was circling the earth. Surely a modicum of astronomical good sense would have told them that reverse was true. Wittgenstein is said to have replied: 'I agree. But I wonder what it would have looked like if the sun had been circling the earth? The point is that it would look exactly the same. When we observe nature we see what we want to see, according to what we believe we know about it at the time. Nature is disordered, powerful and chaotic, and through fear of the chaos we impose a system on itwe classify nature into a coherent system which appears to do what we say it does. This view of the universe permeates all aspects of our life. All communities in all places and at all times reveal their own view of reality in what they do. The entire culture reflects the contemporary model of reality. We are what we know. And when the body of knowledge changes, so do we. Each change brings with it new entities and institutions created by new knowledge. These novel systems then either oust or coexist with the structures and attitudes held prior to the change. Our modern view is thus a mixture of present knowledge and past view points which have stood the test of time and, for one reason or another, remain valuable in the new circumstances. (p. 11) ** Harry Pollard Henry George School of LA Box 655 Tujunga CA 91042 Tel: (818) 352-4141 Fax: (818) 353-2242 ***
Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics
Mike, Your analysis is wrong. Though everything you say can be applied to the Neo-Classical stuff. They are the people who decided about 100 years ago to make economics mathematical, and therefore a science. The problem with people sciences is you can't put people in test tubes, so you have to use the tool of imagination (a tool not unknown in the physical sciences). What if? is the question in the social sciences - also not unknown in other sciences. You said: MIKE: It is, I think, even worse to start with ad hoc generalizations of the emergent properties of the aggregate and then employ them as hypotheses from which, with the application of scientific reasoning, we hope to deduce a science of the good society. Maybe you don't know what ad hoc means. The work of at least a century or two of thought doesn't seem to fit your use of the phrase. On the other hand it allows you to move along quickly, so maybe it's justified. I am also not sure how emergent properties of the aggregate applies to an Assumption about individual action. Also, whatever you do, don't use an hypothesis as an Assumption. Try to get an axiom, a self-evident truth, if possible a Law, to use as an assumption. You continued: MIKE: Harry has, IIRC, repeated several times his premises: I don't know what IIRC means but you should know they are not my premises. I would love them to be mine, but they are not. They are a century or two old and I use them because they seem good to me - and are particularly appropriate to the subject of human behavior - and therefore Political Economy. You went on to quote the two Assumptions: MIKE: ' 1. Man's desires are unlimited. 2. Man seeks to satisfy his desires with the least exertion. I don't see this as any less a religious dogma that All have sinned and come short of the glory of God. ' HARRY: You mean the two Assumptions are wrong. Well, you are a scientist. Show it. All you need is one exception. that shouldn't be hard to find. A religious dogma is something that is proclaimed as true without proof. So, disprove it. Show everyone on Future Works that the two Assumptions are not true of human behavior. Then start thinking again about your statement that: Hard science is essentially statistical in nature. How do you know what to measure? Maybe soft science tells you. Do you march into the lab and say Hey! What shall we measure today? You should understand that there are two kinds of knowledge. The knowledge of truths and the knowledge of things. I fear that in the schools they spend much of their time on the knowledge of things. Learn this and repeat it back tomorrow. They should be learning truths. The knowledge of truths is the knowledge THAT things are so. While you must know things, they aren't much use without a knowledge of truths. A truth can be used across the gamut of the subject. A thing isn't transferable to another thing - except perhaps with a truth. The two Assumptions are truths. They say THAT people's desires are unlimited and THAT they will seek to satisfy them with the least exertion. This can probably be used across the gamut of the social sciences - and certainly across the subject of economics. These Assumptions apply to every person and people is what Classical Political Economy is all about. The rest of what you wrote was interesting, but had nothing to do with our subject. Harry -- Mike wrote: Pete Vincent wrote: When mathematics is applied to the problem of the nature of the physical world, it's called physics, and it works pretty well, within its domain. When mathematics and sometimes, by extension, physics, are brought to bear on problems in the real world, where dirt and warm bodies and other inconvenient things get in the way of purely analytic solutions, it's called engineering, and that is where economics rightly belongs. I have a slightly different take on why science, as typified by physics, doesn't work well when we move it to economics (or the other so-called social sciences.) Hard science is essentially statistical in nature. Thermodynamics is well described by statitical mechanics and math that applies to large ensembles of indistinguishable particles of ideal gas. Polymer and Protein chemistry is really about properties of statistical ensembles of possible molecular spatial conformations or charge distributions of a single molecule that appear when large numbers of molecules are put together. As for solid state physics, it depends on quantum physics and in QP, *everything* exists smeared out in a haze of ontic probability. The problem with applying science to society is that we profess to care about the individuals of which it is composed. I don't want to be sacrificed to the equivalent of the heat sink in order that the steam engine economy may have the emergent property of producing usable work. Nor, presumably, does anyone. Our notions of civilized society suggest
Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics
When I heard the learned astronomer, When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me, When I was shown the charts and diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them, When I sitting heard the astronomer where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room, How soon unaccountable I became tired and sick, Till rising and gliding out I wandered off by myself, In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time, Looked up in perfect silence at the stars. Walt Whitman Brad, I gave this poem to the list as art. Not as evidence of anything. The words I bolded intrigue me. Un -account- able suggests to me the absence of reason. Gliding out suggests to me his spirit leaving the lecture Mystical speaks for itself if you have had that kind of experience Perfect silence reminds me of the last statement in Wittgenstein's Tractatus: What we cannot speak about we must pass over in silence Wittgenstein believed that ethics and aesthetics can not be spoken or written about; they must be shown. In the way that Whitman's poem shows us the ineffable. When the Vienna Circle (Carnap and friends) believed that his Tractatus was the perfect book to launch the Logical Positivist movement, Wittgenstein went to a meeting with them and read passages from Rilke's poetry. They did not invite him back. Wittgenstein reminds us that if science was able to answer all of its questions we would still be left with our most fundamental concerns: are we loved and how well are we able to love. Brian McAndrews
Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics
Brad, Have you read Ray Monk's biography of Wittgenstein? Stephen Toulmin gave it rave reviews. He was a student of Wittgenstein and I think I recall you mentioning his 'Cosmopolis' on this list. I have no idea where you came up with the Asperger's syndrome stuff. Scientists do play their own language games, so do all the disciplines. Isn't that what first year 101 courses are all about? Learning the languages (superstars)of economics, poli sc, psych, physics... Brian At 08:08 PM 2/2/2002 -0500, Brad wrote: Sorry, I didn't see this last point. Wittgenstein seems likely to have had Asperger's(sp?) syndrome [mild autism]. Did he love anybody? Who but an autistic could come up with the conceptualization that the forms of social life are: language games ? Wouldn't a person who was dissociated but also a genius be likely to think about whether a person could be meaning blind? Sounds like autism to me -- but then I am making interpretations beyond the basic rule (ref. Freud), so they are merely speculative. \brad mccormick -- Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works (Matt 5:16) Prove all things; hold fast that which is good. (1 Thes 5:21) ![%THINK;[SGML+APL]] Brad McCormick, Ed.D. / [EMAIL PROTECTED] - Visit my website == http://www.users.cloud9.net/~bradmcc/
RE: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics
What we need to understand may only be expressible in a language that we do not know (Anthony Judge) -Original Message-From: Brian McAndrews [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]Sent: Saturday, February 02, 2002 7:41 PMTo: Brad McCormick, Ed.D.Cc: futurework-scribe.uwaterloo.caSubject: Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded EconomicsWhen I heard the learned astronomer,When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me,When I was shown the charts and diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them,When I sitting heard the astronomer where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room,How soon unaccountable I became tired and sick,Till rising and gliding out I wandered off by myself,In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time,Looked up in perfect silence at the stars.Walt WhitmanBrad,I gave this poem to the list as art. Not as evidence of anything. The words I bolded intrigue me. Un -account- able suggests to me the absence of reason. Gliding out suggests to me his spirit leaving the lectureMystical speaks for itself if you have had that kind of experiencePerfect silence reminds me of the last statement in Wittgenstein's Tractatus: "What we cannot speak about we must pass over in silence" Wittgenstein believed that ethics and aesthetics can not be spoken or written about; they must be shown. In the way that Whitman's poem shows us the ineffable. When the Vienna Circle (Carnap and friends) believed that his Tractatus was the perfect book to launch the Logical Positivist movement, Wittgenstein went to a meeting with them and read passages from Rilke's poetry. They did not invite him back.Wittgenstein reminds us that if science was able to answer all of its questions we would still be left with our most fundamental concerns: are we loved and how well are we able to love.Brian McAndrews
Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics
Brian, We must clear up the meaning and use of Assumptions. (I'm making then official with a capital - but they are rarely expressed, I would think, by scientists. This because they have already accepted them - because they must. Let's assume the opposite. There is chaos in the universe. Then all science stops, for nothing they do is likely to be repeatable. A science will last for a moment - unless it lasts for ever. A scientist may become a baby, unable to speak and write. Earth will burn up tomorrow or the deserts will be replaced by jungle. If there is an earth tomorrow. We cannot assume chaos, so we are forced to assume order, or (as an old Polish Kriegspiel player friend used to say looking at his position) Nothing is any good any more. If we try to see an order (system?) in nature that's the way sciences are born. Scientists try to bring together apparently disparate characteristics and look for their similarities. But we do nothing without the unspoken assumption There is an order in the universe. And the second, of course, that we can do something about it. I haven't read Wittgenstein's Ladder yet, but will do so. Harry ___ Brian wrote: Harry, I disagree, I believe we do impose a system on nature and any first year course in cultural anthropology will show you that. Mythology also shows us that. The 'order' that you claim we discoverwhich already exists in nature is based on certain notions of what counts as evidence and proof. The logical positivists that I mentioned in a recent posting to FW believed that the logic underlying mathematics is the rock solid foundation of empirical science. Bertrand Russell admitted that Wittgenstein had shown this to be false in his Tractatus.. The logic of western science is not universal; it is part of a belief system . It requires faith on the part of its followers. Ray Monk documents this very well in his biographies of Wittgenstein and Russell. He uses Russell's own letters to say this. Amazon.com has excerpts from Monks work on Russell that includes these pages. Harry you should read the last writings of Wittgenstein: On Certainty. He wrote these ideas as he awaited his death from colon cancer. My very favourite passage was written 3 days before he died: (On Certainty, 609-12): Supposing we met people who did not regard [the propositions of physics] as a telling reason [for action]. Now, how do we imagine this? Instead of the physicist, they consult an oracle. (And for that we consider them primitive.) Is it wrong for them to consult an oracle and be guided by it?---If we call this wrong aren't we using our language-game as a base from which to *combat* theirs?.. And are we right to combat it? Of course there are all sorts of slogans which will be used to support our proceedings. Where two principles really do meet which cannot be reconciled with one another, then each man declares the other a fool and heretic. .. I said I would combat the other man,---but wouldn't I give him *reasons*? Certainly; but how far do they go? At the end of reasons comes *persuasion*. (Think what happens when missionaries convert natives.) Brian McAndrews At 10:07 AM 2/2/2002 -0800, you wrote: Brian, I've been discussing the two Assumptions that precede all human sciences - but particularly the Science of Political Economy. There are two assumptions that precede all Science. That there is an order in the universe. and That the mind of man can find that order. Why two? - Well as Bertrand Russell said Better two assumptions than sixteen. Actually, better two assumptions than three. The more you make the more chance of error - so you keep them few. We don't impose a system on nature. We look for the order in Nature that exists. We simply have to find it. That is, if we make the two primary general assumptions. Which we must. The last sentence of the piece is appropriate. Harry _ Brian wrote: Hi Pete, Along with Whitman, I think this has relevance too: Brian McAndrews The Way We Are (Taken from J. Burke, The Day the Universe Changed. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1985). Somebody once observed to the eminent philosopher Wittgenstein how stupid medieval Europeans living before the time of Copernicus must have been that they could have looked at the sky and thought that the sun was circling the earth. Surely a modicum of astronomical good sense would have told them that reverse was true. Wittgenstein is said to have replied: 'I agree. But I wonder what it would have looked like if the sun had been circling the earth? The point is that it would look exactly the same. When we observe nature we see what we want to see, according to what we believe we know about it at the time. Nature is disordered, powerful and chaotic, and through fear of the chaos we impose a system on itwe classify nature into a coherent system which appears to do what we say it does. This view of the universe
Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics
- Original Message - From: Harry Pollard To: pete ; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, February 01, 2002 2:00 PM Subject: Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics For that matter where is this "dog-eat-dog fantasy world". Enron. Ray
Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics
At 5:38 PM -0800 2002/01/31, pete wrote: Some decades ago, I took a course in celestial mechanics, which used the beautifully elegant Newtonian formulations to develop a framework for computing the positions and movements of bodies under gravity, Pete, Your ideas reminded me of this: When I heard the learned astronomer, When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me, When I was shown the charts and diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them, When I sitting heard the astronomer where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room, How soon unaccountable I became tired and sick, Till rising and gliding out I wandered off by myself, In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time, Looked up in perfect silence at the stars. Walt Whitman -- ** * Brian McAndrews, Practicum Coordinator* * Faculty of Education, Queen's University * * Kingston, Ontario K7L 3N6 * * FAX:(613) 533-6596 Phone (613) 533-6000x74937* * e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]* * Education is not the filling of a pail, * * but the lighting of a fire. * * W.B.Yeats * ** **
Re: FWk: Re: Double-stranded Economics
Pete wrote: HARRY (replying to Keith): However, the Classical Political Economists didn't hide behind mathematical jargon. They looked at people and particularly at persons. And they hypothesized the rules that would apply to all the different drives, instincts, genetic propensities. And as you know they came up with the two Basic Assumptions of human nature that described the behavior of everyone - every single person. You must know them by heart, now. Man's desires are unlimited. Man seeks to satisfy his desires with the least exertion. Which will make their computations as useless as any others which are not based in systems engineering principles of what is actually happening feeding back into the model to improve the accuracy of its parameters. You see, as any sociological study of economists will tell you, and has been discussed here before (where were you?) economists more than any other group of people sorted by any measure, regard people as venal, greedy, contemptible, robots, Homo economicus I can't help what economists say, Pete. Now explain why the two Basic Assumptions relate in any way to venal, greedy, contemptible, robots. You continued: I think Ray suggested for these imaginary creatures, who defy all human virtues in order to act according to the arbitrary dictates of the economists' dog-eat-dog fantasy world. What imaginary creatures are you referring to? For that matter where is this dog-eat-dog fantasy world. I don't recall it anywhere in what I said. But perhaps you are more perceptive than I. Or, more imaginative. Real people, by contrast, sometimes actually treasure concepts like fairness, compassion, and non-material goals. Where is this denied? I don't understand you. And each culture possesses such individuals in different numbers, and values them to differing degrees. Only a robust engineering structure can hope to keep up with the vagueries of human nature well enough to make a functioning economic model which takes this sort of variable into account. Sounds like the typical failure of a command economy, no matter how robust its engineering structure. I think you should make a model (if the real thing isn't good enough for you) based on some premise. What is your premise? Or do you have one? Of course that's what neo-classical economists do all the time - make models. There again, you'll recall that the single complicated human being is not analyzed in Classical Political Economy. Rather we look at his connection with the economic world, which is the way he exerts. The manifest indication of the person (no matter how complex) is found in the way he exerts. What other evidence have you? Once we have people somewhat pinned down, we have to look at the equally complicated world - so complicated that it is impossible to think about, which doesn't stop people trying. You won't get people somewhat pinned down with any a priori assumptions. To unpin them, perhaps you had better come up with a couple of exceptions to the Assumptions. Otherwise, regard them as pinned. You build your engineering structure to be able to turn on a dime, and reflect the nature of people as you find them. If the top-down (theory-first) economists had it right, economics wouldn't be as lame as it is. I wish you wouldn't keep mixing in the neo-Classicals, the criticism of whom I could probably do better than you (I've perhaps had more practice). I would think that the two Assumptions are not top-down theory. Rather, they are bottom up fact - perhaps, as you say, reflecting the nature of people as you find them. That will continue to be the case, as I've said often before, until economics is absorbed under systems engineering, at which point the improvement in effectiveness will develop so fast it'll make your head spin. Also, perhaps, economics should become a science before being swallowed by systems engineering. However, I fear you are suggesting exactly what you deplored - that is regarding people as robots, susceptible to systems engineering. Of course that's what many, or most, modern economists practice anyway - system engineering. Harry ** Harry Pollard Henry George School of LA Box 655 Tujunga CA 91042 Tel: (818) 352-4141 Fax: (818) 353-2242 ***
