[I]nnovations are good. Better innovations are better. And, yes, Mises made an innovation, but the expository and explanatory power of the deductive and axiomatic method is LESS than the expository and explanatory power of the ratio-empirical method – not more. Congratulating Mises on improving Kant, who was probably the single greatest contributor to philosophical obscurantism and the destruction of reason in human history, is hardly a compliment. Its an accusation of conspiracy. (See Rand on Kant. Kantian pseudoscience is part of the reason the libertarian project from the continent has failed.) Hoppe’s argument is stated within the context of economic action. He is arguing that economics is purely deductive rather than like all other ‘sciences’ a mixture of: (a) the limits of our biological ability to perceive in real time, (b) a theory describing a general rule, (c) the use of logic to test the internal consistence of the theory, (d) and instrumental tests that replicate and falsify the theory But he misunderstands (or intentionally mischaracterizes) the development of theories. There is no point in retesting them if they’ve been sufficiently tested and criteria for falsification defined. We can develop economic laws just like we can develop physical laws. But we cannot develop economic axioms because axioms are not required to be correspondent with reality, while theories are – and human action exists in reality. [P]hilosophy itself, when expressed operationally, as action (realism), rather than as analogy (platonism etc), or as experience (phenomenalism etc), results in a statement of the ratio-empirical method. The philosophy of action is science, not rationalism, precisely because only science requires demonstration of action. Reason does not. Reason is a continental attempt to conflate authority, morality and reason as a reaction to ratio-empircal science, and commercial morality which would upset the hierarchy as it has in the anglo countries. It’s nonsense though. Economics, and human action, are empirical sciences that may, for the purposes of convenience be reduced to laws that are expressible in axiomatic terms. But axiomatic systems are not dependent upon external correspondence, and as such economics cannot under any circumstances be reduced to a logic. It is a science. It is the most challenging science because it lacks causal relations but it is a science born of observation, reducible to theories, we can use as laws, but these laws are not equivalent to axioms because axioms are not bounded by reality. Period.
Source: Original Site Post
-
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.
-
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.
-
Profound Propertarian Insight
[E]nlightenment Political and economic ethics, whether under classical liberal, libertarian, socialist and ‘dishonest socialist (keynesian)’ theory are predicated on the two assumptions (a)that moral and ethical behavior are ‘givens’ that we must agree upon, and that (b) our labors in the act of production are the means by which we earn rewards. This logic assumes that entry into, and participation in the market (society, the order in which cooperation is possible), is all that one obtains for one’s constant payment of the costs of respecting property and other norms. However, norms that permit property rights, and norms that permit trust (low transaction costs), and norms that prohibit conspiracy, are as equal in value in creating a polity in which the voluntary organization of production (capitalism) is possible. Respect for property rights, eschewing corruption and conspiracy, and demonstrating honestly, are all costs that the individual must bear. And he must bear them prior to any participation in production. But if it is not possible for the individual to participate in the market (and it demonstrably is not), then entry into the market is not POSSIBLE, and as such it is non-rational for that individual to pay the very high costs of entry into that market. And therefore demands that they respect for property, honesty, and combat against conspiracy and corruption are simply attempts at theft of their opportunity, time and effort, without compensation. As such, the alternative is to pay people to respect property rights, demonstrate honesty, eschew corruption and conspiracy, so that they work to enable the voluntary organization of production (capitalism), and function as consumers – to pay people to construct a society, polity, and economy, wherein the dynamic voluntary organization of production is possible. [P]eople who enforce and respect property rights, manners, ethics, morals and norms, do so at a cost. The benefit of capitalism for everyone, is that production can be cheaply (low transaction costs) organized dynamically and voluntarily. However, if we cannot equally participate in the market (as we did under labor and farming) then the only alternative is to pay people for the work of facilitating the dynamic and voluntary organization of production. Those people, paid as such, will have the same interests as producers: to minimize state consumption of the fruits of productivity. That logic can be attacked from any number of angles but in the end, the result will be the same. You cannot make an operational argument in favor of property rights and at the same time defeat this argument. (Or you can try a lot, but it won’t work.) Conversely, telling people that they must pay high costs for rights that they cannot make use of is merely theft by capitalist means.
-
Profound Propertarian Insight
[E]nlightenment Political and economic ethics, whether under classical liberal, libertarian, socialist and ‘dishonest socialist (keynesian)’ theory are predicated on the two assumptions (a)that moral and ethical behavior are ‘givens’ that we must agree upon, and that (b) our labors in the act of production are the means by which we earn rewards. This logic assumes that entry into, and participation in the market (society, the order in which cooperation is possible), is all that one obtains for one’s constant payment of the costs of respecting property and other norms. However, norms that permit property rights, and norms that permit trust (low transaction costs), and norms that prohibit conspiracy, are as equal in value in creating a polity in which the voluntary organization of production (capitalism) is possible. Respect for property rights, eschewing corruption and conspiracy, and demonstrating honestly, are all costs that the individual must bear. And he must bear them prior to any participation in production. But if it is not possible for the individual to participate in the market (and it demonstrably is not), then entry into the market is not POSSIBLE, and as such it is non-rational for that individual to pay the very high costs of entry into that market. And therefore demands that they respect for property, honesty, and combat against conspiracy and corruption are simply attempts at theft of their opportunity, time and effort, without compensation. As such, the alternative is to pay people to respect property rights, demonstrate honesty, eschew corruption and conspiracy, so that they work to enable the voluntary organization of production (capitalism), and function as consumers – to pay people to construct a society, polity, and economy, wherein the dynamic voluntary organization of production is possible. [P]eople who enforce and respect property rights, manners, ethics, morals and norms, do so at a cost. The benefit of capitalism for everyone, is that production can be cheaply (low transaction costs) organized dynamically and voluntarily. However, if we cannot equally participate in the market (as we did under labor and farming) then the only alternative is to pay people for the work of facilitating the dynamic and voluntary organization of production. Those people, paid as such, will have the same interests as producers: to minimize state consumption of the fruits of productivity. That logic can be attacked from any number of angles but in the end, the result will be the same. You cannot make an operational argument in favor of property rights and at the same time defeat this argument. (Or you can try a lot, but it won’t work.) Conversely, telling people that they must pay high costs for rights that they cannot make use of is merely theft by capitalist means.
-
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.
-
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.
-
Adding Kant To History's Most Destructive Minds
[I]‘m going to add Kant (obscurant anti-realism), to the ranks of history’s most destructive minds: Cantor(obscurant Pseudoscience), Freud(obscurant pseudoscience), Marx(pseudoscience), Napoleon (total war), Constantine(christianization of Europe), Plato (the Republic), Abraham(monotheism), Zoroaster (divine scripture).
Intellectual Sainthood
– Aristotle
– Machiavelli
– Bacon, Newton and Leibniz
– Smith, Hume and Jefferson
– Jevons, Menger, Walras, Marshall, Böhm-Bawerk, Wieser;
– Pareto, Durkheim, Weber and Hayek.
– Poincaré, Mandelbrot, Brouwer, Bishop, Taleb[N]ow, if I could get Hoppe off his Continental and Kantian platonism, then he would have be the first person to succeed in reducing all rights to property rights. Even if his definition of property is incomplete he would have done it. He managed to articulate the morality of states, but not the morality of polities necessary for the voluntary organization of production. And possibly, that was his only goal. Whereas with propertarianism, I’ve illustrated the definition of property necessary for the formation of a polity capable of voluntary organization of production in the absence of a state. But he isn’t a candidate for intellectual sainthood if he’s stuck in Kantian nonsense.
Failing that I’m stuck with doing it myself. And while I feel I have mastered ethics better than anyone else, I do not feel the same for philosophy proper. And while I’m getting there, I’m not there yet. I’m getting there. But the standard of measure is not my own comprehension, but the structure of my arguments. And I am just getting, after a year of solid hard work, to where I feel I can construct those arguments.
Einstein was right (even if a plagiarist) that most of doing something innovative is just working at it longer than anyone else.
-
Adding Kant To History’s Most Destructive Minds
[I]‘m going to add Kant (obscurant anti-realism), to the ranks of history’s most destructive minds: Cantor(obscurant Pseudoscience), Freud(obscurant pseudoscience), Marx(pseudoscience), Napoleon (total war), Constantine(christianization of Europe), Plato (the Republic), Abraham(monotheism), Zoroaster (divine scripture).
Intellectual Sainthood
– Aristotle
– Machiavelli
– Bacon, Newton and Leibniz
– Smith, Hume and Jefferson
– Jevons, Menger, Walras, Marshall, Böhm-Bawerk, Wieser;
– Pareto, Durkheim, Weber and Hayek.
– Poincaré, Mandelbrot, Brouwer, Bishop, Taleb[N]ow, if I could get Hoppe off his Continental and Kantian platonism, then he would have be the first person to succeed in reducing all rights to property rights. Even if his definition of property is incomplete he would have done it. He managed to articulate the morality of states, but not the morality of polities necessary for the voluntary organization of production. And possibly, that was his only goal. Whereas with propertarianism, I’ve illustrated the definition of property necessary for the formation of a polity capable of voluntary organization of production in the absence of a state. But he isn’t a candidate for intellectual sainthood if he’s stuck in Kantian nonsense.
Failing that I’m stuck with doing it myself. And while I feel I have mastered ethics better than anyone else, I do not feel the same for philosophy proper. And while I’m getting there, I’m not there yet. I’m getting there. But the standard of measure is not my own comprehension, but the structure of my arguments. And I am just getting, after a year of solid hard work, to where I feel I can construct those arguments.
Einstein was right (even if a plagiarist) that most of doing something innovative is just working at it longer than anyone else.
-
Adding Kant To History's Most Destructive Minds
[I]‘m going to add Kant (obscurant anti-realism), to the ranks of history’s most destructive minds: Cantor(obscurant Pseudoscience), Freud(obscurant pseudoscience), Marx(pseudoscience), Napoleon (total war), Constantine(christianization of Europe), Plato (the Republic), Abraham(monotheism), Zoroaster (divine scripture).
Intellectual Sainthood
– Aristotle
– Machiavelli
– Bacon, Newton and Leibniz
– Smith, Hume and Jefferson
– Jevons, Menger, Walras, Marshall, Böhm-Bawerk, Wieser;
– Pareto, Durkheim, Weber and Hayek.
– Poincaré, Mandelbrot, Brouwer, Bishop, Taleb[N]ow, if I could get Hoppe off his Continental and Kantian platonism, then he would have be the first person to succeed in reducing all rights to property rights. Even if his definition of property is incomplete he would have done it. He managed to articulate the morality of states, but not the morality of polities necessary for the voluntary organization of production. And possibly, that was his only goal. Whereas with propertarianism, I’ve illustrated the definition of property necessary for the formation of a polity capable of voluntary organization of production in the absence of a state. But he isn’t a candidate for intellectual sainthood if he’s stuck in Kantian nonsense.
Failing that I’m stuck with doing it myself. And while I feel I have mastered ethics better than anyone else, I do not feel the same for philosophy proper. And while I’m getting there, I’m not there yet. I’m getting there. But the standard of measure is not my own comprehension, but the structure of my arguments. And I am just getting, after a year of solid hard work, to where I feel I can construct those arguments.
Einstein was right (even if a plagiarist) that most of doing something innovative is just working at it longer than anyone else.