Curt Doolittle

Theme: Science

  • GENETICS

    http://www.nature.com/news/ethics-taboo-genetics-1.13858TABOO GENETICS

    Source date (UTC): 2014-05-12 14:04:00 UTC

  • Untitled

    http://blog.23andme.com/23andme-research/genes-and-geography/

    Source date (UTC): 2014-05-11 06:57:00 UTC

  • AUSTRIAN ECONOMICS. Richard Ebeling has been posting old photos of Austrians we

    AUSTRIAN ECONOMICS.

    Richard Ebeling has been posting old photos of Austrians we admire. Today we see Roger Garrison. (I have a long standing man crush on Roger Garrison’s brain, and am profoundly envious of his lecturing skills.)

    The post reminds me that my criticism of Austrian Economics is limited to the positioning by Mises and then Rothbard of Praxeology as a deductive a priori ‘science’ rather than an empirical science like any other. And that they confuse introspective observation and conclusions from introspection as somehow different from external observation, instrumentation, and the reduction of complexity to analogies to perception, which are then subject to introspective analysis. In other words, this whole kantian nonsense is an erroneous edifice upon which to build the mythology that economics does not require instrumentalism for the purpose of observing emergent phenomenon. Just because we can never predict those phenomenon, does not mean we cannot learn the nature of man and cooperation from them. And as such we are open to terrible criticism for anti-empiricism which is merely an error in the fundamental understanding of the human cognitive process.

    As I’ve stated, praxeology is not so much ‘true’ as it is ethical. Because by reducing economic statements to operational langage, subject to individual perception as a series of actions, it becomes possible to test wether or not any action is moral – ie: a change in state of property is rationally voluntary. So the value in praxeology is not in its ability to assist us in deducing economic rules, but it is in ensuring that economic statements adhere to moral realism, by requiring moral operationalism. That this is the same requirement we hold scientists to in the presentation of their theories might be lost on people. But it is precisely for this moral constraint that we hold scientists accountable for their statements. The same is true for economic statements. They are as immoral as unscientific statements in the physical sciences, whenever those statements are not reducible to a sequence of operations, each of which we can sympathize with and test for the rationality of the incentives, as to whether the change in state of property would be rationally voluntary or not. That we have been on a century long dead end because of Jewish Cosmopolitan logic compounded by German Continental logic (if you want to take the great leap of calling either of them logical) is unfortunate but a common mistake in philosophy readily solved yet again by science – this time cognitive science.

    However, other than this argumentative fallacy, the basic insight that (a) political intervention is immoral and unethical (b) that it exacerbates booms and busts (c) that it may in the long term distort an economy, a state, a culture, and even a civilization to the point of collapse is something I see no way of contradicting. And the only reason it is a problem is because we are victims of well meaning fools, rather than a set of small states all experimenting so that we ‘fail small’ even if we wish to experiment with economic immorality.

    Source date (UTC): 2014-05-07 10:36:00 UTC

  • Juan Sebastian Ortiz: —“Britain´s approach to evolution has not been the selfi

    Juan Sebastian Ortiz:

    —“Britain´s approach to evolution has not been the selfish gene one but a value loaded social darwinistic one which raises an eyebrow of suspicion as it developed in the imperialistic era of agricultural-industrial domination over hunter gatherers throughout the world. If the data about the Ashkenazi jewish IQ is correct and the argument proposed by Gregory Clark in his Farewell to Alms is correct. There´s no reason to disbelieve that: given an unhampered market, sovereign private property society without a state and the consequent welfare programs that follow from it(military overproduction, affirmative action, minimum wage, etc included) the intergenerational tendency would be eugenic. EVEN controlling for higher availability of medical facilities, pharmaceuticals, etc. After all many of the genes responsible for immune processes are fairly recent….The [active] social darwinism of the 19th century is antiquated and unnecessary given the fundamental institutions of a free society. Having said that here are some Hegelian thoughts on anarcho-libertarianism as the millennial crusade for the Spirit of the world emanating the ultimate and final ethic.”—

    Well said. Elegantly. My question is whether the NAP/IVP is a sufficient basis for that order anarchic order. Propertarianism would suggest that high performing groups adhere to much, much, higher standards, and then subjugate their masses by using lower standards, and trade with other states on even lower standards. I think that the NAP/IVP is too low a standard if we ask people to voluntarily join an anarchic polity. And we only think it’s OK because as libertarians we have a cognitive bias (moral blindness) that discounts the cost of OBJECTIVELY unethical and immoral actions as described by Propertarianism’s spectrum that prohibits free riding.

    Free Riding is the negative claim and property the positive claim, but the two claims are identical under propertarianism. Where under NAP/IVP prevention of free riding stops at physical aggression. However, people with higher moral thresholds (and who are stronger) see actions such as blackmail, and ‘cheating’, as well as immoral behavior, as violations of the contract for cooperation which puts in place the prohibition on free riding.

    I would never join a low trust polity, because it would be poorer than a higher trust polity, since trust determines the velocity of innovation, production and trade.

    So I agree with your argument that all we need is an anarchic polity. I disagree that the NAP/IVP is sufficient for the formation of it. And while I haven’t done surveys yet to prove it (I will) science, logic and history, are pretty clearly on my side.

    Anarchy is right. Sure. But the NAP/IVP is insufficient. I do not have the empirical evidence to demonstrate what level of suppression of free riding in the unethical and immoral range would be required for the formation of a voluntary polity, but I suggest that it will be far closer to the very limit of Propertarianism’s spectrum of prohibitions, than it is to rothbard’s NAP/IVP.

    Hopefully within a year or two I will have that evidence.

    But I’ll put money on the fact that only indoctrinated rothbardians choose the NAP/IVP level of suppression. That’s because it’s pretty clear that human beings prefer (logically) seller beware, rather than buyer beware. And propertarianism ensconces that in the legal code.

    Thanks for great (rare) dialog.

    Curt

    Source date (UTC): 2014-05-05 01:48:00 UTC

  • AUSTRIAN ECONOMICS: THE PROBLEM IS NOT ONE OF MATHEMATICS, BUT OF MORALITY 1) If

    AUSTRIAN ECONOMICS: THE PROBLEM IS NOT ONE OF MATHEMATICS, BUT OF MORALITY

    1) If you look at mainstream economics as the study of human behavior demonstrated by the record of human actions, then I think it’s an excellent means of conducting research in social science. And, by and large, that is what the economic community engages in, and how most of them describe their work. Because the canons of science suggest that such a claim is all that they can make.

    2) If you look at mainstream economics as the source of government policy which can be used to maximize all available opportunity for consumption, then some economists might argue that is true although a lot might also argue that their work is used for that purpose but should not be, since their science is too young to be used for that purpose.

    3) if you look at mainstream economics as a means by which to justify ‘dishonest socialism’ under the Keynesian model of forcible redistribution without control of the means of production, and a tool by which to undermine western exceptionalism, then it’s really not hard to make that argument.

    4) If you look at economics as the study of moral human cooperation, then austrian economics (or at least, praxeological analysis) exposes the immorality of political intervention in the economy and the consequences of that intervention over the long term. Unfortunately the progressive argument – which can only be settled empirically if and when we demonstrate that they are wrong by catastrophic failure – is that the short term good accomplished (the acceleration of the reproductive rates of the lower classes) compensates for any harm in the long term, and in the long term technology (and our supposed infinite wisdom) will solve that problem in the long run for us.

    CLOSING

    The problem is that under majority rule and monopoly government, we cannot allow the dishonest socialists, and moral and honest austrians to conduct their experiments in parallel. Were we able to divide our polity either internally (by class) or externally (by separate states) we could run this empirical test. I would assume that under that test the keynesian group would reproduce and generate consumption through reproduction that could not be matched by the innovation of the austrian group – since generating demand through innovation is more expensive a research program than generating demand through malthusian reproduction.

    Cheers.

    Source date (UTC): 2014-05-04 12:22:00 UTC

  • TAKEN A WHILE. BUT SCIENCE HAS DONE THE WORK

    http://www.amazon.com/The-Essential-Difference-Female-Brains/dp/046500556X/IT’S TAKEN A WHILE. BUT SCIENCE HAS DONE THE WORK.

    Source date (UTC): 2014-05-04 11:59:00 UTC

  • WE CAN NOW OBJECTIVELY AND SCIENTIFICALLY JUDGE GOOD PHILOSOPHERS AND BAD PHILOS

    WE CAN NOW OBJECTIVELY AND SCIENTIFICALLY JUDGE GOOD PHILOSOPHERS AND BAD PHILOSOPHERS

    (suggestions wanted)

    If we acknowledge that democracy is a failure, and all philosophers who attempted to justify democracy failures, and all philosophers who attempted to expand democracy into socialism and postmodernism failures, we are left with instrumentalists (empiricists) and reactionaries of various fields.

    Philosophy as a discipline, must face the uncomfortable fact, that (a) the metaphysical program failed and was solved by cognitive science, and (b) the democratic program failed and was solved by economists (c) therefore the political program failed, and was solved by heterodox philosophers (d) the ethical problem failed and was solved by economists and heterodox philosophers. The reason for this is obvious: the incentives in Academia to attempt to replace the church’s mysticism with some sort of collectivist democratic rationalism, had it’s predictable influence.

    Philosophers can produce good neutral and bad influences. Unfortunately, the greater body of philosophers that have been influential since the american revolution, have been more destructive than beneficial. We can never forgive Marx and Freud, any more than we can forgive Kant and Rousseau.

    “Thou Shalt Not Harm” not only applies to doctors, but to philosophers, and to all of us.

    I give great weight to computer science because unlike the logic of language and unlike abstract and mathematical logic, computer science does not drop the property of operationalism in real time from its reasoning. As such it has higher correspondence with actionable reality than mathematics, and farm more so than formal logic. And if we seek to make informal logic of any value we must learn from computer science and return the property of operationalism to philosophical discourse. Because without it, it certainly appears to consist almost entirely of nonsense built upon linguistic deception.

    ==

    99. Aristotle

    99. Niccolo Machiavelli

    99. Adam Smith

    99. Max Weber

    99. Emile Durkheim

    99. David Hume

    99. John Locke

    99. G.W.F. Hegel

    99. Friedrich Nietzsche

    (lesser candidates)

    99. Robert Michels

    99. Steven Pinker

    99. Jonathan Haidt

    ==

    99. Rene Descartes

    99. Alan Turing

    99. Karl Popper

    99. Gottlob Frege

    99. W.V.O. Quine

    99. Saul Kripke

    THE BAD PHILOSOPHERS

    99. Immanuel Kant

    99. Ludwig Wittgenstein

    99. Karl Marx

    99. Soren Kierkegaard

    99. Jean-Jacques Rousseau

    20. John Rawls

    99. Martin Heidegger

    99. Jacques Derrida

    99. Michelle Foucault

    99. Jean-François Lyotard

    99. Jean Baudrillard

    99. Murray Rothbard

    THE FRANKFURT SCHOOL’S BAD PHILOSOPHERS

    Max Horkheimer

    Theodor W. Adorno

    Herbert Marcuse

    Friedrich Pollock

    Erich Fromm

    Otto Kirchheimer

    Leo Löwenthal

    Franz Leopold Neumann

    Siegfried Kracauer

    Alfred Sohn-Rethel

    Walter Benjamin

    Jürgen Habermas

    Claus Offe

    Axel Honneth

    Oskar Negt

    Alfred Schmidt

    Albrecht Wellmer

    Source date (UTC): 2014-04-30 05:06:00 UTC

  • “Why the great accomplishments of humanity in the sciences and arts have been ov

    —“Why the great accomplishments of humanity in the sciences and arts have been overwhelmingly European? My first task is to show that Europe was in fact the most creative culture of the world. My second, and main task, is to start explaining why this was the case, in comparative contrast to the

    more serene and deferential Eastern spirit.”—

    –“human accomplishment is determined by the degree to which cultures promote or discourage autonomy and purpose. Accomplishments have been “more common and more extensive in cultures where doing new things and acting autonomously [were] encouraged than in cultures [where they were] disapprove[d]” (395). Human beings have also been “most magnifi cently productive and reached their highest cultural peaks in the times and places where humans have thought most deeply about their place in the universe

    and been most convinced they have one.” —

    –“Both Buddhism and Daoism taught that purposeful action on this earth was a delusion; they encouraged the virtues of serene acceptance, gentleness, and passivity as a way of comprehending the universe and one’s role in it. The progress achieved in China and Japan was made consensually and hierarchically by individuals motivated to become a valued part of a tradition by imitating their past masters.

    Islam gave its believers a sense of purpose and energy that helped foster the achievements of its golden age. But Islam saw God as a deity who is not bound by immutable laws, and which emphasized obedience to God’s rules and submission to his will against any presumption that humans could comprehend his works or glorify God with their understanding of nature.

    Islamic, Chinese, Japanese, and Indian cultures

    were all highly familistic, hierarchical, and consensual cultures

    (400–01). Europe was different in the way it was able to integrate

    purpose with autonomy. This integration produced “the defining cultural

    characteristic of European civilization, individualism” (401).

    The Greeks laid the foundations of human rational autonomy but their

    culture was still not individualistic, insomuch as it did not conceive

    the individual apart from his public role as a member of the polis.

    It was Christianity that “differentiated European accomplishment

    from that of all other cultures around the world” (402). This did not

    happen immediately, but with the consolidation of Roman Catholicism

    and the development of a philosophical outlook, notably by Thomas

    Aquinas (1226–1274) who stressed that “that human intelligence is a

    gift of God, and that to apply human intelligence to understanding the

    world is not an aff ront to God but is pleasing to him”.

    This outlook, adopted by the Church, also taught “that human autonomy is a gift of God, and that the only way in which humans can realize the relationship with God that God intends is by exercising that autonomy” (403). However, the full development of individualism came with Protestantism and its encouragement of industriousness, persistent action,

    and empirical utilitarianism.”—

    Source date (UTC): 2014-04-28 13:31:00 UTC

  • THE SIMPLICITY OF THIS ARGUMENT

    http://www.soest.hawaii.edu/oceanography/researchers/francois/RESEARCH/RESEARCH_NOTES/SCIENTIFIC_NOTES/Popper-as-an-exception-to-Bayes.htmlLOVE THE SIMPLICITY OF THIS ARGUMENT

    Source date (UTC): 2014-04-28 06:30:00 UTC

  • Curing Libertarian Illiteracy

    [T]he cure to libertarian illiteracy is to keep up on research, rely on science, and not empty verbalism of continental and cosmopolitan rationalism. (See Axelrod – Cooperation. See Fukuyama – Trust. See Todd ‘Explanation of Ideology; The Invention of Europe. See Hannan – The Invention of Liberty. See Kahnemann. See RIdley. See Pinker. See Haidt: Moral Foundations; The Righteous Mind. Here is the bibliography that points to the relevant research. http://www.propertarianism.com/jonathan-haidts-bibliography/ The libertarian spectrum is less ignorant of economics, but libertarian scientific illiteracy, moral blindness, and ideological zeal is nearly universal. Human moral instincts are objective and universal if we account for differences in reproductive strategies: they are prohibitions on free riding. Cultures may randomly invent different moral CODES that incorporate more or less prohibition on free riding, and accommodate the use of property in relation to family size. But the cause of moral instinct is universal: the prohibition on free riding and the requirement for contribution to production. That’s just science. Deal with it.