PakistanContinued from previous post on Subjectivity Concealed in Index Numbers. Because modern epistemology rejects values as being just opinions, and only accepts facts as knowledge, values have be to disguised in the shape of facts. What better way to do this than by embodying them in cold hard and indisputable numbers? This post discussed how the … Continue reading »
Empiricism holds that observations are all that we have. We cannot penetrate through the observations to the hidden reality which generates these observations. Here is a picture which illustrates the empiricist view of the world: The wild and complex reality generates signals which we observe using our five senses. The aspects of reality which we … Continue reading »
When we think about epistemology (theory of knowledge), then we are doing meta-thinking. That is, we are thinking about thoughts people have, which they think is “knowledge”. Because there are many many wrong ideas, and very few right ideas, we must learn to think critically. Unless we do so, our thoughts will be captured by … Continue reading »
Foundations for modern social sciences were laid in the early twentieth century, and were strongly influenced by logical positivism. The central idea of positivism is that science is true and valid because it deals (principally) with observables, while religion is false and invalid because it deals (principally) with unobservables. For a detailed discussion, see “Logical Positivism … Continue reading »
The problem at the heart of modern economics is buried in the logical positivist methodological foundations created in the early twentieth century by Lionel Robbins. Substantive debates over the content actually strengthen the illusion of validity of these methods, and hence are counterproductive. As Solow said about Sargent and Lucas, you do not debate cavalry … Continue reading »
Below, I will reproduce extracts from the opening Chapter, titled as above, of Karl Polanyi’s The Great Transformation: the Political and Economic Origins of Our Times . This is essential background in conjunction with the history of Central Banking which was covered in Lecture 13 of Advanced Macro II . The central concept underlying the course is that of “Entanglement (Lecture 18B) “ – … Continue reading »
Polanyi offers a deep historical study of how European societies based on traditional values of cooperation and social responsibility were transformed into modern secular societies. In Polanyi’s terminology, social relations became embedded within the market, creating a market society driven by the imperative of commercialization, which makes money the measure of all things, including human … Continue reading »