Rod Hay wrote:
>
> The problem is that the reasoning is circular. It is a tautology. The problem
> has been given a name, but no demonstration, either logical or empirical, has
> been given. It sounds nice, "Oh yeah, transactions costs, that makes sense." But
> it means nothing.
The classic description of this process (substituting a name for an
explanation) is Marx's comment on Providence in *Poverty of
Philosophy*. Over on LBO I've been trying to convince people that
psychology (of any kind, but particularly psychoanalysis) operates
by the same schtick: It proliferates a number of names (take a
noun that describes one event well enough, give it a capital letter,
and you are off) and pretends it has explained human thought
and feeling.
Carrol
