An economics, investment, trading and policy blog with a focus on Modern Monetary Theory (MMT). We seek the truth, avoid the mainstream and are virulently anti-neoliberalism.
Exactly. It is interesting to see how economists and other experts predictably line up behind a rationale that supports their normative persuasion, even in the face of facts disconfirming claims. It's pretty transparent that the arguments are over norms and that "facts" are fitted to the reasoning that gets to desired conclusion. In any sort of complex argument, "facts" are highly selective.
BTW, I am not singling anyone out here for criticism. We are all confined to the cage of our own mindset, and that people agree just shows that they share the same mindset.
The purpose of debate ("dialectic") is to bring out these issues and push some sunshine on them so that hidden presuppositions, sophistical arguments, confusion over fact and rule, and conflation of positive and normative, etc, get illuminated.
No one has the ocean in their bucket. That's why we debate issues in a spirit of truth-seeking.
Well, actually Laura, Karl Popper thought that all of our knowledge is conjectural, and that it was up to us to make our conjectures testable. See: http://www.amazon.com/Bundle-Conjectures-Refutations-Scientific-Knowledge/dp/0415285941/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1327039071&sr=1-4
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Shorter version: All advocacy is political, even when it's for the status quo.
geerussell: All advocacy is political
Exactly. It is interesting to see how economists and other experts predictably line up behind a rationale that supports their normative persuasion, even in the face of facts disconfirming claims. It's pretty transparent that the arguments are over norms and that "facts" are fitted to the reasoning that gets to desired conclusion. In any sort of complex argument, "facts" are highly selective.
BTW, I am not singling anyone out here for criticism. We are all confined to the cage of our own mindset, and that people agree just shows that they share the same mindset.
The purpose of debate ("dialectic") is to bring out these issues and push some sunshine on them so that hidden presuppositions, sophistical arguments, confusion over fact and rule, and conflation of positive and normative, etc, get illuminated.
No one has the ocean in their bucket. That's why we debate issues in a spirit of truth-seeking.
A theory, in the scientific sense, is an explanation for a set of facts.
Explanations that can be tested are also known as hypotheses.
A conjecture is an explanation that cannot be tested. These are also known as 'just so' stories.
We seek explanations in order to help us understand the universe, but an explanation that has no predictive power is useless.
Predictions are more valuable than explanations, just as facts are more valuable than opinions.
Well, actually Laura, Karl Popper thought that all of our knowledge is conjectural, and that it was up to us to make our conjectures testable. See: http://www.amazon.com/Bundle-Conjectures-Refutations-Scientific-Knowledge/dp/0415285941/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1327039071&sr=1-4
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