Science Forums 2

[maikeru]

Originally Posted by lemit

I have to confess I couldn't get past DiLorenzo's first line:



That's an interesting interpretation of the social contract. It's not just a little overreaching, it kind of reaches back to the origins of all civilization and says they are all corrupt, every single one of them, and the fact that he is able to put anything in print is just a sign of how we've given up our individuality.

No, it's more than that. He's saying that the fact he exists is a denial of his premise and that he as the author of that line is therefore an idiot.

I've seen him on CSPAN. He makes a little more sense than that, although that's not difficult to imagine, but he doesn't make enough sense to be taken seriously.

But who cares? Anybody who has that as his thesis is still an idiot. The rest doesn't matter. If you are in a bookstore, pick up a book, and read that as a first line, you should put down the book and find somewhere to wash your hands.

--lemit

Hi Lemit,

Excellent observation. Too bad I've missed this thread. I wish I'd joined the conversation earlier.

Mainstream economists consider the Austrians idiots, but they are a favorite of Libertarians and other independents. Increasingly people have become wary of Keynesian and other schools of economic thought and have turned to outliers like the Austrians. I agree on some points with the Austrian School of Economics, with their observations on how a "free market" ought to work, *ought to* being the key words here, but I've found out that much like Libertarians, etc. they tend to be too extreme and too myopic in their total belief in "free markets," "natural" regulation through capitalism, etc. that it's become something short of an alternative economic mantra and unjustifiable, unprovable religious belief system. I don't believe in "free markets," but I believe we can have "freer markets," and I don't believe we can approach and reach the ideal in the real world, with people, resources, and the limitations of human thought and action.

Likewise, beliefs in people being wholly rational or irrational are unfounded as well, so economic models and theories based on rational or irrational agents are flawed. We know from common and personal experience, psychology, and increasingly backed by neuroscience that people and their decisions are both rational and irrational, and more rational or irrational depending on situations, beliefs, education, etc. If they cannot account for such basic unpredictability in models and theories, basically we need to keep in mind they're working with "best case" scenarios but not necessarily realistic or wholly predictable ones. In short, it boils down to economics often being perceived as but not really being a science. The scientific method has no place in it, nor does validation by testing and experimentation and refinement of theories. (Indeed, how can one do it in many cases with economic theories and models? It is often impractical or impossible.) It's more akin to a mishmash of mathematics, psychology, philosophy, and history, IMO. And it appears very logical and good, and several of the fundamentals have a strong basis in our perception and experience of reality, but not really of reality or the natural world out there.

For example, several economists often are strong adherents in the growth of populations and consumption to boost GDP but do not factor in that population growth can lead to unsustainable crowding, resource depletion, lowered quality or standard of living, or even population collapse due to resource depletion, food scarcity/famine, untenable living standards or living costs, disease, war, etc. Many ignore, deride, or mock Malthus. I've also run across a lot of scientific ignorance or mocking or derision of global warming on Austrian economist websites and blogs. If they cannot even understand basic science and common sense, I am not inclined to trust all their predictions, theories, and analyses. Many of them just might be idiots. Very smart, very well educated idiots, but idiots nonetheless because they ignore even basic tenets and observations of reality. I look at it this way: science lets reality (the natural world) be teacher, when others would simply like to "teach" or remake reality. Which one is more realistic? Which one is doable?

As LaurieAG suggested earlier in the thread, I suspect that all our man-made systems are more like "shadows" that mimic natural systems, but have less of the stability, full utilization and capacity, efficiency, natural design, or grace that natural ones do. We must make do with imitations. We can always more closely approach, but never realize the ideal. Realizing this, I believe boom, bust, collapse, and failures as well as successes will be more frequent and, indeed, are inevitable, due to our shortcomings.

Seriously, several things I'd really be interested in knowing is if the 'free market' is just another flawed human construct, is it really a 'natural' system because it shadows mainstream cosmological constructs, and accordingly, are mainstream cosmological constructs 'natural' systems or flawed human constructs based on the global financial system?

As Shakespeare put it, "Lord, what fools these mortals be!"