I agree, Yes, it could be discussed instead of abdicated. The Invisible Hand sounds too much like the "wisdom of Darwinian nature." Personally I believe that we can all arrive at something that works better than sheer accident or a society that resembles a garden gone to seed.
Good start Brad, Arthur, you are the virtuoso here and so is Sally. Why not give it a shot? Harry could do it too if he promised to avoid everything that Henry George said or thought and Keith could stir up that wild imagination while he taboos Comparitive Advantage. I'll give up the Trail of Tears and the miserable history thus far and just talk as well. Karen can forget about her fears and Selma can taboo all of those underlying sub-texts that make her see how vulnerable we all are when we try to just be true, open and at the core with each other. I would also suggest abandoning Math since you all generally hide in it as badly as I have hidden recently in music theory and history. Sally's idea about research into insecurity would be a good place to start since we generally resent the way that salaried folks used their security as a way to beat up on us. REH ----- Original Message ----- From: "Brad McCormick, Ed.D." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Cc: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Thursday, October 03, 2002 6:28 PM Subject: Re: FW: To survive or not to survive. > [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > > > > Economics is about the allocation of scarce resources among competing uses. > [snip] > > This sounds to me like it could be the subject of > serious fully linguistic conversation among the citizens of the polis, > to decide among themselves the shape of their shared social life, > rather than the content of an impoverished less-than-conversation > between "buyers" and "sellers", with only one word in its > language: "$", where the shape of shared social > life is formed by the "cunning of the price mechanism which > takes place behind the persons' backs" likw qw have in > our "formal democracy" where the most important issues are > excluded from political discussion and relegated to > the hidden machanations of CxOs and Directors of > corporate boards (as has been pointed out many times, > some large "private" corporations are bigger than > many "sovereign nations"). > > So "economics" could be a discipline which studied in a > disciplined way the ways persons decide how to > shape their shared social world, e.g., how and why some of > them abnegate genuine responsibility and let > the quasi-natural force of "The Invisible Hand" > made the decisions instead. > > A secondary part of economics, of course, would be > calculating the various alternatives that are available > for the citizens of the polis to choosae among. For instance, > the economists might determine that the citizens of > the polid afford both an Anti Ballistic Missile shield and > also have resources left over to preserve the > books in their libraries, or even to protect themselves from > terrorists in dinghies loaded with fertilizer-based > explosives. > > \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/
