WHICH IS MORE CRANKISH? SIMPLE SCIENCE AND LOGIC, OR RATIONALIST PSEUDOSCIENCE? I am pretty confident that the praxeological line of reasoning, as currently constructed, is a dead end, as I’ve argued elsewhere. In no small part because it cannot compete with the universality of the language and processes of the ratio-scientific method. But while an inferior method, it’s still a useful method. And if it helps people understand micro and ethics then that’s good enough. The challenge at this inflection point in intellectual history, is that Hoppe has created the formal language of political ethics and political economy, and taught most of us to argue politics ethics and morality in economic terms. Yet that language is unnecessarily dependent upon Argumentation, Continental Rationalism, and a misguided attempt to conflate logic and science, in order to defend against a positivism that is not present in the philosophy or practice of science – if it ever was. Logic is axiomatic, and therefore both prescriptive and deductive. Science is theoretic, and therefore descriptive and deductive. But we can make statements in logic that are internally consistent yet not externally correspondent, yet we cannot make theories that fail external correspondence, whether or not our language is internally consistent. But the empirical test is obvious: if praxeology and rothbardian ethics are correct, then why are they both rejected almost universally? If these things are true, then why do we fail? Comparative ethics, empirically studied, yields a universal descriptive ethics that is theoretically rigid and more sustainable from criticism than rothbardian ethics. —“in all cultures and all civilizations, manners, ethics and morals reflect the necessary rules for organizing reproduction (the family) and the polity of families, such that they may cooperate in whatever structure of production is available to them. The content of those rules, under analysis, can be represented as property rights, each of which is distributed between the individual to the commons. Demand for third party authority as a means of resolving differences (the state) is determined by the degree of suppression of free riding (parasitism), and the number of competing sets of rules (family structures and classes) within any given structure of production. These sets of rules can be expressed as a simple formal grammar, which allows us to render all moral and ethical systems commensurable.”— Macro economics, experimental psychology, and cognitive science have contributed all economic insights over the past three decades, and none of these insights were deducible (cognitive biases in particular), or were emergent effects of economic cooperation (stickiness of prices, the time delay until money achieves neutrality, and the quantitative impact on interest and production in the interim, within each sustainable pattern of specialization and trade.) So, WHICH IS MORE PARSIMONIOUS A THEORY? Which theory is easier to understand? Which theory is more obscurant? Which more accurately reflects reality? I can explain and demonstrate this theory to anyone with a ratio-scientific background. I know this because it is simply an advancement to Ostrom’s work on institutions and she was able to do so. Cheers.
Category: Epistemology and Method
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CRANKISH? Rationalist Pseudoscience Like Praxeology is Crankish. Science and Logic are Parsimonious.
WHICH IS MORE CRANKISH? SIMPLE SCIENCE AND LOGIC, OR RATIONALIST PSEUDOSCIENCE? I am pretty confident that the praxeological line of reasoning, as currently constructed, is a dead end, as I’ve argued elsewhere. In no small part because it cannot compete with the universality of the language and processes of the ratio-scientific method. But while an inferior method, it’s still a useful method. And if it helps people understand micro and ethics then that’s good enough. The challenge at this inflection point in intellectual history, is that Hoppe has created the formal language of political ethics and political economy, and taught most of us to argue politics ethics and morality in economic terms. Yet that language is unnecessarily dependent upon Argumentation, Continental Rationalism, and a misguided attempt to conflate logic and science, in order to defend against a positivism that is not present in the philosophy or practice of science – if it ever was. Logic is axiomatic, and therefore both prescriptive and deductive. Science is theoretic, and therefore descriptive and deductive. But we can make statements in logic that are internally consistent yet not externally correspondent, yet we cannot make theories that fail external correspondence, whether or not our language is internally consistent. But the empirical test is obvious: if praxeology and rothbardian ethics are correct, then why are they both rejected almost universally? If these things are true, then why do we fail? Comparative ethics, empirically studied, yields a universal descriptive ethics that is theoretically rigid and more sustainable from criticism than rothbardian ethics. —“in all cultures and all civilizations, manners, ethics and morals reflect the necessary rules for organizing reproduction (the family) and the polity of families, such that they may cooperate in whatever structure of production is available to them. The content of those rules, under analysis, can be represented as property rights, each of which is distributed between the individual to the commons. Demand for third party authority as a means of resolving differences (the state) is determined by the degree of suppression of free riding (parasitism), and the number of competing sets of rules (family structures and classes) within any given structure of production. These sets of rules can be expressed as a simple formal grammar, which allows us to render all moral and ethical systems commensurable.”— Macro economics, experimental psychology, and cognitive science have contributed all economic insights over the past three decades, and none of these insights were deducible (cognitive biases in particular), or were emergent effects of economic cooperation (stickiness of prices, the time delay until money achieves neutrality, and the quantitative impact on interest and production in the interim, within each sustainable pattern of specialization and trade.) So, WHICH IS MORE PARSIMONIOUS A THEORY? Which theory is easier to understand? Which theory is more obscurant? Which more accurately reflects reality? I can explain and demonstrate this theory to anyone with a ratio-scientific background. I know this because it is simply an advancement to Ostrom’s work on institutions and she was able to do so. Cheers.
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More On The Axiomatic (consistent) Vs Theoretic (correspondent)
[A]xiomatic vs Theoretic 1 – axiomatic (independent of action and observation) versus theoretic (action and observation) a) Axiomatic systems allow us to make statements independent of any correspondence with reality. b) Theoretical systems require us to make statements dependent upon correspondence with reality. c) It is universally possible to create axiomatic systems by copying theoretical statements. d) But it is not universally possible to create theoretical statements by copying axiomatic statements. 2 – Testing against our perception in an empirical test. Not a logical one. If economic statements are reduced to human actions which we can observe, then we are not in fact making a logical test, but an empirical one. 3 – What separates economics from the other sciences, (where science means observation) is that we can sense and perceive changes in state without the use of instrumentation. That does not mean that because we do not require instrumentation, we are not making observations. Introspection is still observation. Our statements are not logical, they are empirical because they are based upon that form of observation we call introspection. 4 – Praxeology, if it’s a science, cannot depend on axiomatic statements since sciences are not axiomatically based, but theoretically based. But if we claim it is axiomatic then it does not require observation and if it does not require observation than must include a prohibition on introspection as a means of testing, and that all such tests are truth or false independent of our sense perception. 5 – metaphysics states that reality is deterministic or knowledge of the universe is impossible. This stipulation required prior theory or axiom. Reason is impossible without it. We must assume regularity of the universe, even if we tend to construct history in retrospect for our ease of use. BACKWARDS [M]ises got it backwards. Economics is an observational science which we have the power of introspection to test. We can, from those observations both introspective and external, We can test the rationality of any statement (it’s truth content) but we cannot deduce much of anything from it. Because complex properties of action are emergent and impossible to forecast. Kant was an intellectual criminal, and the continental and cosmopolitan schools have done nothing to help us eliminate obscurantism and pseudoscience favored by the left. In fact, All the triumvirate have seemed to want to do is create yet another pseudoscience. I can’t save Hoppe unless I can fix this problem. Otherwise our movement is done when he is. Either we reform this nonsense, or libertarianism dies as a continental and cosmopolitan pseudosciences like the rest of the 20th century pseudosciences, or we convert libertarian language from the pseudoscientific to the scientific. Science won. Cognitive science, experimental psychology, and empirical economics have provided all the insights. Meanwhile we’ve spent thirty to forty years now masturbating with a pseudoscience only an autistic moron could possibly fall for. Time for libertarians to grow up. If you can’t answer my objections above, with statements of human action you’re just a sucker for pseudoscience. Because that’s what Praxeology is. It doesn’t have to be. But that’s what it is. LIBERTARIANS OUGHT TO STUDY MORE THAN “SCRIPTURE”. Because while knowledgable about economics, libertarians tend to be absolutely ignorant of anything outside the approved canon. I gain more understanding of the autistic nature of libertarians every day. Even though I’m one of them. I see that the lack of empathic comprehension applies to all disciplines. Time to grow up kiddies.
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More On The Axiomatic (consistent) Vs Theoretic (correspondent)
[A]xiomatic vs Theoretic 1 – axiomatic (independent of action and observation) versus theoretic (action and observation) a) Axiomatic systems allow us to make statements independent of any correspondence with reality. b) Theoretical systems require us to make statements dependent upon correspondence with reality. c) It is universally possible to create axiomatic systems by copying theoretical statements. d) But it is not universally possible to create theoretical statements by copying axiomatic statements. 2 – Testing against our perception in an empirical test. Not a logical one. If economic statements are reduced to human actions which we can observe, then we are not in fact making a logical test, but an empirical one. 3 – What separates economics from the other sciences, (where science means observation) is that we can sense and perceive changes in state without the use of instrumentation. That does not mean that because we do not require instrumentation, we are not making observations. Introspection is still observation. Our statements are not logical, they are empirical because they are based upon that form of observation we call introspection. 4 – Praxeology, if it’s a science, cannot depend on axiomatic statements since sciences are not axiomatically based, but theoretically based. But if we claim it is axiomatic then it does not require observation and if it does not require observation than must include a prohibition on introspection as a means of testing, and that all such tests are truth or false independent of our sense perception. 5 – metaphysics states that reality is deterministic or knowledge of the universe is impossible. This stipulation required prior theory or axiom. Reason is impossible without it. We must assume regularity of the universe, even if we tend to construct history in retrospect for our ease of use. BACKWARDS [M]ises got it backwards. Economics is an observational science which we have the power of introspection to test. We can, from those observations both introspective and external, We can test the rationality of any statement (it’s truth content) but we cannot deduce much of anything from it. Because complex properties of action are emergent and impossible to forecast. Kant was an intellectual criminal, and the continental and cosmopolitan schools have done nothing to help us eliminate obscurantism and pseudoscience favored by the left. In fact, All the triumvirate have seemed to want to do is create yet another pseudoscience. I can’t save Hoppe unless I can fix this problem. Otherwise our movement is done when he is. Either we reform this nonsense, or libertarianism dies as a continental and cosmopolitan pseudosciences like the rest of the 20th century pseudosciences, or we convert libertarian language from the pseudoscientific to the scientific. Science won. Cognitive science, experimental psychology, and empirical economics have provided all the insights. Meanwhile we’ve spent thirty to forty years now masturbating with a pseudoscience only an autistic moron could possibly fall for. Time for libertarians to grow up. If you can’t answer my objections above, with statements of human action you’re just a sucker for pseudoscience. Because that’s what Praxeology is. It doesn’t have to be. But that’s what it is. LIBERTARIANS OUGHT TO STUDY MORE THAN “SCRIPTURE”. Because while knowledgable about economics, libertarians tend to be absolutely ignorant of anything outside the approved canon. I gain more understanding of the autistic nature of libertarians every day. Even though I’m one of them. I see that the lack of empathic comprehension applies to all disciplines. Time to grow up kiddies.
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Logic vs Science
(on praxeology) (getting closer) (attestation theory of truth) [S]o, if the defining property of the discipline of science is observation, and praxeology is purely deductive independent of observation, then how can praxeology honestly be termed a science? It cannot. Praxeology can be defined as a logic, but not a science. Formal Logic and mathematics are branches of logic that produce proofs, but not truths. Truth, to have any universal meaning at all must mean correspondence to reality with increasingly weaker definitions in niche application as we move into various branches of logic. Yet while truth is constrained by reality, axiomatic systems are not constrained by reality. We may produce theories, and rigid theories at that, but correspondence with reality is never axiomatic – axioms are limited to internal consistency. We are certainly missing a logic of cooperation with which to repair ethics. (I think I have articulated the criterion for that logic as voluntary transfer, symmetrically informed, warrantied, and free of externality.) But, I do not yet understand why we require a logic of action – or if there is any value in such a thing. But regardless of that question, logics are not identical to sciences and sciences not identical to logics, any more than proofs are identical to truths, or axioms identical to theories. We may pretend for amusement purposes that human actions are, by analogy, functionally axiomatic rather than functionally theories in a given context, but this is a mere pretense. Theoretic systems must retain correspondence with reality, while axiomatic systems are not bound by correspondence with reality. Human actions occur within reality and are bounded by reality. Axiomatic systems are imaginary and are only bounded by imagination. For this reason human actions can only be theoretically constructed as correspondent with reality, just as logical systems can only be axiomatically constructed. As such axiomatic systems tell us only about the internal consistency of our statements, and theoretical systems tell us only about the external correspondence of our theories – but not the internal consistency of our descriptions of those theories. If we use both tests of internal consistency and tests of external correspondence, and our statements are demonstrably valid proofs, and our theories are demonstrably valid tests, and both proofs and theories are stated operationally, then we can attest to the truth of our theories. And the only means by which we can subjectively test either axiomatic or theoretic statements is to reduce them to analogies to experience, by stating them in operational sequence – which we call “Constructionism”. If we cannot test the internal consistency or our arguments and external correspondence of our actions, then we cannot EVER honestly attest that our theories are true to our knowledge and understanding. [T]his is the only standard of truth for any theory that I know of: attestation. If a theory is both externally correspondent, internally consistent, operationally stated, and falsifiable, then to our current knowledge that theory as stated is true – one can attest to its truth, and not commit unethical attestation. This does not mean that the theory cannot be improved upon. But it means one’s attestation about it is true. And that is the best that we can ever hope for. There is a great difference between a true theory and a complete theory. At some point any theory must evolve into a tautology, at which point one cannot attest to one’s hypothesis (theory, conjecture). Than is non-sensical. So a theory free of attestation is merely complete – tautological. Identical. Not correspondent dependent upon attestation ‘true’, nor imaginary and proven ‘proof’.) Getting closer. It should be possible, if difficult, to follow that argument. I bet within six months I can get lightbulbs to come on. Not quite there yet. But very close. This approach reduces all statements to human actions and truth to attestation rather than the platonic.
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Logic vs Science
(on praxeology) (getting closer) (attestation theory of truth) [S]o, if the defining property of the discipline of science is observation, and praxeology is purely deductive independent of observation, then how can praxeology honestly be termed a science? It cannot. Praxeology can be defined as a logic, but not a science. Formal Logic and mathematics are branches of logic that produce proofs, but not truths. Truth, to have any universal meaning at all must mean correspondence to reality with increasingly weaker definitions in niche application as we move into various branches of logic. Yet while truth is constrained by reality, axiomatic systems are not constrained by reality. We may produce theories, and rigid theories at that, but correspondence with reality is never axiomatic – axioms are limited to internal consistency. We are certainly missing a logic of cooperation with which to repair ethics. (I think I have articulated the criterion for that logic as voluntary transfer, symmetrically informed, warrantied, and free of externality.) But, I do not yet understand why we require a logic of action – or if there is any value in such a thing. But regardless of that question, logics are not identical to sciences and sciences not identical to logics, any more than proofs are identical to truths, or axioms identical to theories. We may pretend for amusement purposes that human actions are, by analogy, functionally axiomatic rather than functionally theories in a given context, but this is a mere pretense. Theoretic systems must retain correspondence with reality, while axiomatic systems are not bound by correspondence with reality. Human actions occur within reality and are bounded by reality. Axiomatic systems are imaginary and are only bounded by imagination. For this reason human actions can only be theoretically constructed as correspondent with reality, just as logical systems can only be axiomatically constructed. As such axiomatic systems tell us only about the internal consistency of our statements, and theoretical systems tell us only about the external correspondence of our theories – but not the internal consistency of our descriptions of those theories. If we use both tests of internal consistency and tests of external correspondence, and our statements are demonstrably valid proofs, and our theories are demonstrably valid tests, and both proofs and theories are stated operationally, then we can attest to the truth of our theories. And the only means by which we can subjectively test either axiomatic or theoretic statements is to reduce them to analogies to experience, by stating them in operational sequence – which we call “Constructionism”. If we cannot test the internal consistency or our arguments and external correspondence of our actions, then we cannot EVER honestly attest that our theories are true to our knowledge and understanding. [T]his is the only standard of truth for any theory that I know of: attestation. If a theory is both externally correspondent, internally consistent, operationally stated, and falsifiable, then to our current knowledge that theory as stated is true – one can attest to its truth, and not commit unethical attestation. This does not mean that the theory cannot be improved upon. But it means one’s attestation about it is true. And that is the best that we can ever hope for. There is a great difference between a true theory and a complete theory. At some point any theory must evolve into a tautology, at which point one cannot attest to one’s hypothesis (theory, conjecture). Than is non-sensical. So a theory free of attestation is merely complete – tautological. Identical. Not correspondent dependent upon attestation ‘true’, nor imaginary and proven ‘proof’.) Getting closer. It should be possible, if difficult, to follow that argument. I bet within six months I can get lightbulbs to come on. Not quite there yet. But very close. This approach reduces all statements to human actions and truth to attestation rather than the platonic.
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Constructive Logic: A Sequence Of Human Actions : The Only Moral Logic
[T]his is where I’ve ended up thanks to Constructive Mathematics (Intuitionism, Intuitional Mathematics, Neointuitionism). Logic: I apply the same requirement of operational language (strict construction) to logic – the logic of language. Of all the logics, the logic of language is the most misleading. I have the most work to do here. Much to the disappointment of practitioners of formal logic. Most of the mistakes I have come across (particularly in critical rationalism) are caused by erroneous elimination of action from that which depends upon action. Math: In mathematics – the logic of names, numbers and relations. This work has been done by the generations before me. They just have not had the moral criticism I have given them as an argumentative weapon before in their attack on ‘magical’ mathematics. Physics: It’s already present in the canons of science, and is already universally applied in physics – the logic of causality. There is very little work to be done here other than to cast some branches of physics as non-logical as currently stated. Cooperation: I apply the same argument to the logic of cooperation (ethics). Ethics was the easiest problem to solve by the requirement for operational language (strict constructionism).
Knowledge of use is not equal to knowledge of construction. MOTIVATIONS: ELIMINATION OF LOADING, FRAMING, DECEPTION, OBSCURANTISM, AND PSEUDOSCIENCE FROM POLITICAL DISCOURSE. [L]aw is but another logic. Politics is discourse on law. There is no logical specialization to citizenship save the logic of cooperation and even that specialization will forever be above the masses. If we are to eliminate deception from political discourse, we must eliminate it in all the logics. I was not correct that immorality in language originated with mathematics. Only that mathematical legitimacy was used as a means for expanding pseudoscience. Just because something is convenient, if it is immoral, it remains immoral. Obscurantism, platonism, and use without comprehension of construction, are all forms of deception that insert magic and religion into the world. Most of these conveniences are easy means of compensating for the problem of reducing any ‘computation’ into the two or three second window of human cognitive ability. However, as long as we can construct from operations, any entity, we can forever use the name of that construction as a function – giving us a shorthand for it that fits within our cognitive window. I am sorry for labeling conveniences and contrivances as immoral, despite the cherished mythos that philosophers, logicians and mathematicians have warmed themselves in against the cold of realism. But no one else has yet attacked platonism as immoral. And I’ve done it I think pretty conclusively. If you can purvey platonism, then others can equally claim to purvey mysticism, obscurantism, pseudoscience, loading and framing. Because if utility is the only tests, then religion is clearly superior to rational politics, and pseudoscience an effective means of governing (keynesianism), and the mind finds greater comfort in loading, framing, conflation and justifying, than it does in grasping objective reality. Sorry, but if you can’t construct it, you don’t understand it. And the reason you don’t understand it is probably a cover for a lie. Certainly that’s what’s happened in math and logic. Most of philosophy, continental in particular is deception. Justification. Lie. The only moral statements are those under strict construction.
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Constructive Logic: A Sequence Of Human Actions : The Only Moral Logic
[T]his is where I’ve ended up thanks to Constructive Mathematics (Intuitionism, Intuitional Mathematics, Neointuitionism). Logic: I apply the same requirement of operational language (strict construction) to logic – the logic of language. Of all the logics, the logic of language is the most misleading. I have the most work to do here. Much to the disappointment of practitioners of formal logic. Most of the mistakes I have come across (particularly in critical rationalism) are caused by erroneous elimination of action from that which depends upon action. Math: In mathematics – the logic of names, numbers and relations. This work has been done by the generations before me. They just have not had the moral criticism I have given them as an argumentative weapon before in their attack on ‘magical’ mathematics. Physics: It’s already present in the canons of science, and is already universally applied in physics – the logic of causality. There is very little work to be done here other than to cast some branches of physics as non-logical as currently stated. Cooperation: I apply the same argument to the logic of cooperation (ethics). Ethics was the easiest problem to solve by the requirement for operational language (strict constructionism).
Knowledge of use is not equal to knowledge of construction. MOTIVATIONS: ELIMINATION OF LOADING, FRAMING, DECEPTION, OBSCURANTISM, AND PSEUDOSCIENCE FROM POLITICAL DISCOURSE. [L]aw is but another logic. Politics is discourse on law. There is no logical specialization to citizenship save the logic of cooperation and even that specialization will forever be above the masses. If we are to eliminate deception from political discourse, we must eliminate it in all the logics. I was not correct that immorality in language originated with mathematics. Only that mathematical legitimacy was used as a means for expanding pseudoscience. Just because something is convenient, if it is immoral, it remains immoral. Obscurantism, platonism, and use without comprehension of construction, are all forms of deception that insert magic and religion into the world. Most of these conveniences are easy means of compensating for the problem of reducing any ‘computation’ into the two or three second window of human cognitive ability. However, as long as we can construct from operations, any entity, we can forever use the name of that construction as a function – giving us a shorthand for it that fits within our cognitive window. I am sorry for labeling conveniences and contrivances as immoral, despite the cherished mythos that philosophers, logicians and mathematicians have warmed themselves in against the cold of realism. But no one else has yet attacked platonism as immoral. And I’ve done it I think pretty conclusively. If you can purvey platonism, then others can equally claim to purvey mysticism, obscurantism, pseudoscience, loading and framing. Because if utility is the only tests, then religion is clearly superior to rational politics, and pseudoscience an effective means of governing (keynesianism), and the mind finds greater comfort in loading, framing, conflation and justifying, than it does in grasping objective reality. Sorry, but if you can’t construct it, you don’t understand it. And the reason you don’t understand it is probably a cover for a lie. Certainly that’s what’s happened in math and logic. Most of philosophy, continental in particular is deception. Justification. Lie. The only moral statements are those under strict construction.
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Philosophical Matchsticks
[P]hilosophy is too much like giving children matches to play with. And as Durant said, there are really no answers there. History is the only evidence of the nature of man, and the answers to our political nature are there. Philosophy is, at best, just a tool that helps us reduce our ever-present tendency to err. It is more often a tool by which we increase our errors. At its worst, it is a tool for self deception, or the deception of others. BUT If I succeed with a logic of cooperation, and the morality of stating philosophy operationally, I think that I will have ‘cured’ discourse.
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Philosophical Matchsticks
[P]hilosophy is too much like giving children matches to play with. And as Durant said, there are really no answers there. History is the only evidence of the nature of man, and the answers to our political nature are there. Philosophy is, at best, just a tool that helps us reduce our ever-present tendency to err. It is more often a tool by which we increase our errors. At its worst, it is a tool for self deception, or the deception of others. BUT If I succeed with a logic of cooperation, and the morality of stating philosophy operationally, I think that I will have ‘cured’ discourse.