1 | Practical Philosophy » Positive economics and normative political economy » 3/26/2018 2:39 pm |
- Karl3125
- Replies: 49
-
Re: publication in mainstream journals
[url=,5]This article by William Barnett[/url] is very telling. Barnett highlighted basic problems in neoclassical methodology, and he was rejected because the editors of a mainstream journal just did not care.
| Practical Philosophy » Positive economics and normative political economy » 3/26/2018 2:34 pm |
- Karl3125
- Replies: 49
-
UGADawg wrote:I mean, I'm just telling you he's something of a laughingstock in the profession and nobody takes him seriously, and that there's a reason for that, which largely explains his inability to be published in high level journals. His butchering of undergrad level economics is just a particularly egregious illustration. Other examples might be his neo-chartalism, his belief that mark-up pricing is evidence against competition's equilibriating tendencies, etc.
Hayek was ignored by the majority of the profession.
Mises was ignored by the majority of the profession.
Wicksteed was welcomed by most of the profession.
All three were Austrian/causal-realist economists. What does Keen's being ignored by the majority of the profession have to do with anything?
| Practical Philosophy » Positive economics and normative political economy » 3/26/2018 2:32 pm |
- Karl3125
- Replies: 49
-
Jeremy Taylor wrote:
Still, I don't agree with those critics of mainstream economics who reject mathematical economics entirely. The truth is that mainstream economists, despite their pride in being mathematically minded, are using long out of date static analysis and linear functions, whereas they should be using dynamic analysis and nonlinear differential equations. It has long been known, in all sorts of scientific disciplines, that such techniques are far better for better for modelling any type of complex system. The problem is that such analysis been shown a market is extremely unlikely to be in equilibrium. Indeed, there can be multiple equilibria, and a slight deviation from any can cause the market to move further from the equilibrium, sometimes greatly (one of the problems with the Austrians is that, although they reject equilibrium analysis, they imply the market will tend to stay close to equilibrium, but this is not necessarily the case).
Not all Austrians reject mathematical modeling. In their review of Keen's Debunking Economics, Gene Callahan and Robert Murphy expressed agreement with Keen's support for dynamic modeling.
My problem with the "mathematization" of economics is that it teaches students to ignore endogenous factors (technonlogy, demand, income, etc.), which heterodox theories of the business cycle (both Keynesian and Austrian) highlight.
| Practical Philosophy » Positive economics and normative political economy » 3/25/2018 2:39 pm |
- Karl3125
- Replies: 49
-
UGADawg wrote:
No, rational choice theory doesn't assume people have perfect information. So much to the contrary, informational limitations are easily incorporated into the model as information costs, which just alters the choice constraint. Mutatis mutandis for preference rankings.
Don't Austrian/market process critiques often begin with the critique of mainstream formalism (e.g. perfect information, transitivity)?
UGADawg wrote:It's important to keep in mind the meaning of "rational" in "rational choice theory" is very thin, being nothing more than an instrumental rationality (perhaps a helpful analogy would be to compare this with Aquinas's very thin notion of goodness when he says individuals always pursue what they take to be good in some way or another). This kind of choice theory is the basis of all economics, not just modern neoclassical economics that is (perhaps) overly concerned with mathematical tractability. In fact you can't do any economics at all without rational choice theory; it is, quite literally, impossible (laughable attempts from left-heterodox economists to model economic phenomena along fundamentally different lines notwithstanding).
True. However, there is a world of difference between the minimalist definition of rationality one finds in the Austrians and the technocratic definitions that is often the target of behavioral/experimental economists.
UGADawg wrote:Nor is this some curious invention modern economists are reading back into previous generations of economists. Go back to Adam Smith. What does his analysis and explanation of the economic coordination he was concerned with (the "invisible hand") look like? Well, he starts with the rational choice postulate and traces out the implications of that assumption in a market institutional context (see e.g. "...it is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner..."). Much of TWoN is very simila
…
| Practical Philosophy » Positive economics and normative political economy » 3/25/2018 2:26 pm |
- Karl3125
- Replies: 49
-
Jeremy Taylor wrote:
My understanding is that rational choice theory generally assumes an individual has perfect information and the unlimited ability to rank one's preferences, not to mention that it is possible to aggregate individual choices to derive a smooth, downward sloping demamd curve that intersects the supply curve once.
I am not sure what good such an approach would do to examining any social phenomena (unfortunately, mainstream macroeconomics now incorporates rational choice theory, as well as rational expectations).Your definition of rational choice theory is correct. My problems with RCT are twofold:
(1) The aggregation feature of RCT was questioned in the 1930's by John Hicks and Nicholas Kaldor in their works on welfare economics. To put the problem simply, how can economics propose scientifically proven policies if they cannot scientifically aggregate subjective preference scales?
(2) There are cases in which transitivity does not hold true. The Condorcet paradox comes to mind as a colorful example.
| Practical Philosophy » Positive economics and normative political economy » 3/21/2018 6:47 pm |
- Karl3125
- Replies: 49
-
Jeremy Taylor wrote:
I suppose it depends if one is using the term descriptive economics in a general sense, or one means specifically what is current economic orthodoxy (i.e., more or less neoclassical economics). It doesn't seem to me that the latter should be treated without caution. Otherwise, I would say that descriptive economics, so far as it is purely descriptive and can be trusted as accurate, should be treated like any other technical or scientific knowledge is treated. Any normative or prescriptive platform has to take onboard relevant technical or scientific knowledge: if true, these scientific fact are just how the world works.
That said, it is important to discern what are normative elements being sold as descriptive ones, just as it is important to make sure the latter are an entirely accurate picture of reality.
This is a solid piece of advice. For example, consider the article published by the Freakonomics authors that claims abortion reduces crime. It seems completely descriptive until you learn that they made an arbitrary assumption in their argument:
Mueller wrote:It is impossible using the data alone to distinguish the impact or 1970’s abortions on current crime rates from the impact of 1990’s abortions on current crime rates. Put another way, we obtain similar results regardless of whether we include 1970’s abortion rates or 1990s abortion rates, but when both are included multicollinearity leads to enormous standard errors. Consequently, it must be recognized that our interpretation of the results relies on the assumption that there will be a 15–20 year lag before abortion materially affects crime. (Donohue and Levitt, “Legalized Abortion and Crime,” unpublished paper, p. 22)
This is one of many cases in which a normative/philosophic assumption (e.g. time doesn't matter, murdering innocents is not immoral) is being sold as a description of economic reality.
…
John Mueller's critique of the "aborti
| Practical Philosophy » Resources on Political, Economical and Ethical philosophy » 3/04/2018 10:03 pm |
- Karl3125
- Replies: 30
-
Thomas C. Behr's book on the social and political thought of Luigi Taparelli should be published some time this year by CUA Press.
| Chit-Chat » Lawrence Krauss Faces Allegations Of Sexual Harassment » 2/23/2018 10:19 pm |
- Karl3125
- Replies: 3
-
When is the court date?
Dry and Uninspired wrote:Arizona State University, where he is a tenured professor
Well, expect Kraus to be fired within the upcoming month.
| Practical Philosophy » Resources on Political, Economical and Ethical philosophy » 2/15/2018 2:46 pm |
- Karl3125
- Replies: 30
-
seigneur wrote:
On any complex topic, it's best to start reading a careful selection ancients. My recommended text for beginners is Athenian Constitution, attributed to Aristotle.
Why not The Nicomachean Ethics or The Politics?
| Practical Philosophy » Resources on Political, Economical and Ethical philosophy » 2/15/2018 2:45 pm |
- Karl3125
- Replies: 30
-
seigneur wrote:UGADawg wrote:
Yes, I guess to be fair, if that's how inept your understanding of the point here is, then it's no wonder you find him ridiculous.
Well done for not beginning to defend the indefensible, but you have done nothing to explain how my understanding is inept and yours isn't.
Hayek is most obviously indefensible. In the passage quoted (and that would really apply to everything in the book cited), he is not doing economics or any sort of social science. He is doing ideological rhetoric with a clearly un-Christian attitude. Apart from his moral failure, his scientific failure is equally serious. He is not empirically relevant to anything, so he is safely dismissed or at least postponed.You quoted The Road to Serfdom, which was a political work. Hayek did not intend it as a scientific treatise.
Why don't you quote a passage from The Pure Theory of Capital or Prices and Production, and explain to us how class analysis could improve Hayek's insights?