Austrian economics on RTE!

[20000miles]

Insofar as I believe that pens don't act, I do so because I have a concept of 'act' that requires consciousness or intention (leaving aside the sense in which, for example, gravity acts on things), and in my experience, pens are not the kinds of entity that possess consciousness or intention.

See above. It is evident to me that pens do not act. The evidence for that evidence, however, seems to be a posteriori.

Can we quit with the irrelevant philosophical musings. We are after all discussing human action.

Stringy, Misesian economics is a synthetic a-priori science. Formal logic is not sufficient, (but nonetheless necessary), while obseravtions remain unnecessary.

Hoppe goes through Mises' Kantian-ness in Part I of Economic Science and the Austrian Method.

[Christel]

Perhaps using a few examples to determnine whether there is acting on behalf of a subject would be good to come to terms what acting means:

- the leaves of the ash tree are moved by the strong wind.
Do the leaves act?
- the sheep graze.
Do the sheep act?
- The sheep watch and think about what to do in answer to the stranger. Then they decide to stay.
Do the sheep act?
- The stone that was dug up from the garden bed is moved.
Did the stone act?
- The dog barks. Someone was nearing the house.
Did the dog act?
- The strawberries have grown new little plant, still attached to the old ones, which have rooted further away.
Did the strawberries act?
- The old trousers I never wore and found in a corner of the wardrobe after some years was put into the bin. Did the trousers act?
- I had forgotten about the trosers above. Did I act?
- I put the same trousers above into the bin yesterday. Did I act?

[Christel]

Hi Christel,

Excellent post (if not an obvious one but tell that to stringjack ) - (ps im playin with you stringjack , it is an intriguing back and forth mate)

You can read more on the Austrian (or Vienna) School here: Austrian School - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
[COLOR="White"].[/COLOR]

Thank you.

(I see my next post was already a bit outdated when posted.)

[stringjack]

Can we quit with the irrelevant philosophical musings. We are after all discussing human action.

Well, I am. We may just not have found your off-switch yet.

Stringy, Misesian economics is a synthetic a-priori science. Formal logic is not sufficient, (but nonetheless necessary), while obseravtions remain unnecessary.

Yes, I get that. If 'all humans act' is synthetic, doesn't 'human' have to be specified independently of 'act'? And if it does, the question is then whether the statement is true a priori or not.

[Hazlitt]

Let's get back on topic guys, human action - stringjack - do you concede that you cannot refute the statement "humans act" ?
[COLOR="White"].[/COLOR]

[Seos]

Let's get back on topic guys, human action - stringjack - do you concede that you cannot refute the statement "humans act" ?
[COLOR="White"].[/COLOR]

That was never the goal, the goal stringjack and I have is to show that "all humans act" is not indubitable.

[stringjack]

Let's get back on topic guys, human action - stringjack - do you concede that you cannot refute the statement "humans act" ?
[COLOR=white].[/COLOR]

I'm afraid I don't (though I'm not necessarily trying to). If I understand correctly, it's insufficient for me to concede that humans act; I must also concede that the claim is true a priori.

[Hazlitt]

That was never the goal, the goal stringjack and I have is to show that "all humans act" is not indubitable.

Ok that may not have been your goal, but it was certainly mine.

If you are saying that the statement "all humans act" is not unquestionable, I would disagree and say that it is.

So if you would like to post some empirical proof that no other humans other than you act, I await your reply.
[COLOR="White"].[/COLOR]

[Hazlitt]

I must also concede that the claim is true a priori.

That is something we can all agree on and the basic axiom of misesian economics



There is little or no point asking Misesians to prove that humans act because by its definition we openly state that we believe the science of human action to be studied logically and not empirically.
[COLOR="White"].[/COLOR]

[stringjack]

That is something we can all agree on and the basic axiom of misesian economics

And since that hasn't been conceded...

There is little or no point asking Misesians to prove that humans act because by its definition we openly state that we believe the science of human action to be studied logically and not empirically.
[COLOR=white].[/COLOR]

And that's fine (crazy, of course, but perfectly fine). The question, however, was why one would start with one set of axioms rather than some other. The answer, if I understand correctly, was something like the assertion that the claim 'all humans act' is indubitable. It was conceded that the claim 'I act' looks like it might be indubitable. It just isn't obvious how one gets from there to the stronger claim. Obviously, one could create an internally consistent system which included the basic axiom 'all humans can fly'. Why would one want to?