Austrian School: Crap/Not Crap?

[love detective]

What a pathetic, pompous twat you truly are.

Your technique of argumentation is pathetic. You've been exposed as a fraud and a fake, and your only recourse is to personal abuse. Useless.

If you don't like the fact that you also have collected some oddballs as bedfellows on this I don't mind if you take it out on me and abuse me Philip

 

[love detective]

I don't think Friedman thinks that the money supply is endogenous, does he? I mean, a central assumption of Monetarism is that the money supply can and should be controlled by the central bank. That hardly fits in with what lbj has been saying here. The opposite in fact.

I never said he did - I was pointing out how all over the shop LBJ is on this (in general), one minute he's arguing for stuff that Friedman would agree with, the next he is, as you say, arguing for the complete opposite

edit: and while he was arguing the friedman line, he was doing exactly the same to me as he is now, i.e. saying i didn't understand what he was saying, maintaining that he was absolutely correct in what he was saying, calling me pompous for pointing out where he was wrong on it, accusing me of not responding to his posts when in fact it was him not responding to mine - exactly the same MO

 

[Captain Hurrah]

If you don't like the fact that you also have collected some oddballs as bedfellows on this I don't mind if you take it out on me and abuse me Philip

Phil was saying the opposite about you when it suited. That is, when you confronted ViolentPanda.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

I never said he did - I was pointing out how all over the shop LBJ is on this (in general), one minute he's arguing for stuff that Friedman would agree with, the next he is, as you say, arguing for the complete opposite

edit: and while he was arguing the friedman line, he was doing exactly the same to me as he is now, i.e. saying i didn't understand what he was saying, maintaining that he was absolutely correct in what he was saying, calling me pompous for pointing out where he was wrong on it, accusing me of not responding to his posts when in fact it was him not responding to mine - exactly the same MO

On this thread, I have been trying to understand and present the ideas of Minsky, and providing links to show where what I am saying is coming from. You do not acknowledge this, but prefer these constant personal attacks.

 

[love detective]

and on this thread me responding to things that you write that I see as wrong and pointing out why I think they are wrong are now 'constant personal attacks' are they

You are obviously entitled to your own opinion, but I would be surprised if anyone would see my contributions on this thread as 'constant personal attacks'

when you were arguing for the (completely incorrect) pro-friedmanite line about money in previous threads, you were doing exactly the same as you have done on this thread, confidently asserting you knew exactly how things worked while patting yourself on the back for coming up with this great new theory of money (and value) and complaining that anyone who didn't agree with you just didn't understand your arguments and were being pompous and belittling you and attacking you

 

[ymu]

Try re-reading the thread lbj. Carefully, and with an open mind. I think ld is getting impatient with you, but I don't think it's fair to say it's more attack than content. Not by a long chalk. Positively charming compared to me when someone persistently misinterprets a medical paper.

 

[phildwyer]

I guessed as much, as it seemed a fairly obvious direct self-contradiction. Shame phil won't try and make a contribution instead, he's not stupid.

It was retaliation, not contradiction. And I've made many substantive contributions to this and other threads.

The problem as I see it is that Love Detective has failed to see the implications of the fact that money is a purely psychological phenomenon, a sign. In this he follows the discipline of "economics" as a whole, though not critics of that discipline such as Marx--whose advances on political economy were made possible precisely by applying philosophical concepts to the spurious ideology of "economics."

Because it is a purely psychological phenomenon, there is no reason why money should have any essential qualities at all. It can have any qualities we choose to attribute to it--including non-referentiality (it need not refer to anything material or objective).

For most of human history, for example, money was believed to be incapable of autonomous reproduction, as in interest. Now we see it very differently.

The other thing to bear in mind in this discussion is that money, or the economy, should not be treated in isolation, as if they were real empirical phenomena. They are rather part of general human culture. Thus the rise to power of money, and the revelation of its nature as a sign, must be seen as part of a more general rise of signs and representation to cultural prominence and determining power.

 

[phildwyer]

Phil was saying the opposite about you when it suited. That is, when you confronted ViolentPanda.

What are you on about now? I never agreed with Love Detective about anything.

 

[love detective]

It was retaliation, not contradiction.

what was it retaliation for?

The problem as I see it is that Love Detective has failed to see the implications of the fact that money is a purely psychological phenomenon, a sign. In this he follows the discipline of "economics" as a whole, though not critics of that discipline such as Marx--whose advances on political economy were made possible precisely by applying philosophical concepts to the spurious ideology of "economics."....

......The other thing to bear in mind in this discussion is that money, or the economy, should not be treated in isolation, as if they were real empirical phenomena. They are rather part of general human culture. Thus the rise to power of money, and the revelation of its nature as a sign, must be seen as part of a more general rise of signs and representation to cultural prominence and determining power.

Probably the biggest strawman i've seen from you to date - how you can write the above, when I have been writing things like the below in relation to this stuff ever since I started talking about it here is beyond me

the usage of money & finance in the present day are expressions of the underlying system of social relations - they are produced by it - you can't just skim them of the top of the system and by doing so produce a new system. you have to obliterate the essence that produces and reproduces them. it's not a question of economics or economic policy, it's a profoundly social issue and one about relations between people and things, it's about the social form of human working activity

Once again you have been caught out posting in bad faith, being disingenuous and frankly a rather poor lier

(obviously i don't agree with you that money is purely a sign though, i.e. an expression without an essence - I have a more insightful and meaningful analysis of that than you do which is touched upon in the post of mine I quoted. i am happy to take you through that slowly and from the basics so you may improve your own rather muddled and mystifying perspective on this)

 

[phildwyer]

what was it retaliation for?

Well you make a veritable principle of belittling your opponents:

and by the way, if people go about pompously projecting an air of authority about a subject they know very little about, then I think it is important to belittle them

A principle that you have applied consistently throughout this thread. Mine wasn't the most witty or appropriate response, admittedly.

Probably the biggest strawman i've seen from you to date - how you can write the above, when I have been writing things like the below in relation to this stuff ever since I started talking about it here is beyond me

You've also been talking of the "economy" as if it were an autonomous sphere, and your entire analysis is marred by your failure to take into account the implications for "economics" of extra--"economic" discourses such as philosophy.

I'll respond to your substantive disagreement with my case in a separate post.

 

[phildwyer]

obviously i don't agree with you that money is purely a sign though, i.e. an expression without an essence

I wouldn't say that it doesn't have an essence--although I probably just have. What I meant is that money (or rather financial value etc) has no material essence, no physical being at all. It only exists in the human mind.

So if it does have an autonomous essence--one that human beings cannot just change whenever they feel like it--then it is completely unique in the realm of things that have no physical existence. Everything else that exists only in the human mind, human beings can change at (collective) will.

And it is true that money does show a unique combination of objective and subjective characteristics. In fact I'd argue that these include the power to reproduce, and therefore to function as a completely independent agent.

So money is an immaterial essence that exists only in the human mind, and yet is not controlled by that mind, but rather controls it, or attempts to do so. It also has the power to reproduce and to effect changes in the external world independently of any human intervention, or at the very least to get human beings to follow its interests rather than their own.

So what then is money?

 

[love detective]

You've also been talking of the "economy" as if it were an autonomous sphere, and your entire analysis is marred by your failure to take into account the implications for "economics" of extra--"economic" discourses such as philosophy.

you see, what you wrote in the last post and this one gets to the crux of your failings in approach to these kind of topics

If you'd actually read all of capital (which i presume you haven't) you would see that the method employed by Marx is one that partakes in different levels of analysis at different layers of perspective - vol 1 of capital is arguably the deep essence of the argument, and moving through the volumes we approach something reaching, but not quite there, the more surface forms phenomenal forms.

Such that when dealing with the more surface like/phenomenal forms, a different form of both analysis and language is employed - this is driven primarily by the topic and not the philosophical underpinnings of the person doing the analysis.

So when you barge onto a thread like this that is involved with the discussion of some detail on a topic, you instantly think that because people are involved in the discussion of detail and 'concrete' aspects of it (a thing you are incapable of partaking in as you are analytically & intellectually ill-equipped to do so) that somehow that analysis is not bedded into any deeper framework/substance which shapes the approach to the whole thing.

Unlike you phil, I am entirely capable of switching the level of analysis so it is appropriate to the topic, the combination of a deeper framework/structure guiding the analysis of the more detailed/phenomenal forms makes for a much more rounded analysis.

You however are only capable of operating (and i use that phrase in the loosest sense) at the most abstract and detached levels, which means that when it comes to any situations where that deeper essence needs to be applied to more concrete topics, you are unable to do so, and your frustruation of that inability on your part, leads to the kind of defence mechanism that we see being put into operation above. That is what makes you unsuitable and ill-equipped, not only to take part in discussions like this, but to even understand them

You are the type of abstract philosopher that Marx detested

 

[love detective]

I wouldn't say that it doesn't have an essence--although I probably just have.

you did indeed say it was 'purely' a sign (and indeed further on in this very post you posit money as the essence, so it does seem like you are a bit all over the place as to what you actually think it is)

What I meant is that money (or rather financial value etc) has no material essence, no physical being at all. It only exists in the human mind.

I agree that value is nothing but a social relation - can you please point me to where I have said otherwise?

the fact however that it is immaterial, does not mean it is not objective - and my characterisation of it as a social relation provides something that your characterisation of it as just existing in the mind doesn't - which is to emphasise that it is a relation between people and things - i.e. robinson crueso and value would be complete strangers. This means that it can't be magiced into existence from thin air purely by an individual thinking about it as you cringingly imply in relation to abstract labour (or as others do in relation to creating money by purely tapping away on their keyboards). It's embedded in and stems from the social relations between people and things in this society as they go about the necessary reproduction of that society and the social relations of it (backed up by extra-economic forces when those 'natural' ones are at risk)

So if it does have an autonomous essence--one that human beings cannot just change whenever they feel like it--then it is completely unique in the realm of things that have no physical existence. Everything else that exists only in the human mind, human beings can change at (collective) will.

verging into strawman territory again here - my explanation of value (and the money that is an, imperfect, expression of it) does not for one minute grant it any essence except from the human beings whose working social relations is its lifeblood

And it is true that money does show a unique combination of objective and subjective characteristics. In fact I'd argue that these include the power to reproduce, and therefore to function as a completely independent agent.

and here is where you slip back into the fetishing of money (not to mention completely contradicting what you just said in the last post) - the function and flows and activities of money, masks the real underlying human activities which leads to the 'illusion' that money in and off itself has the power to reproduce or is capable of functioning as a completely independent agent. You have completely contradicted your previous point here, don't you see that - you are all over the place with this one i'm afraid. Your previous 'proof' that money has the indpendent agency to reproduce itself in and off itself, was pointing to putting money in a bank account and then seeing interest be added to it - ergo money has reproduced itself. this is the ultimate fetishisation - that you accept at face value that what happened just happened and did not involve a whole series of underlying human led activities that produced the surplus value which eventually was distributed in the form of interest to the owner of that bank account. Complete fetishisation of the object by the subject there phil

So money is an immaterial essence that exists only in the human mind, and yet is not controlled by that mind, but rather controls it, or attempts to do so.

well putting aside the fact that money is the expresion and not the essence - then yes bog standard,feuerbach/alienation/fetishism concepts here phil - religion/value comes from within us as human beings, but is seen to stand over us, we externalise our own human powers and attribute them to something external to us, which gives it the power over us, the more we give it the less we have etc..but it is is still our power

It also has the power to reproduce and to effect changes in the external world independently of any human intervention

no it doesn't, if humans didn't exist or went extinct tomorrow, money would not be doing any of the things that you assert it has/does - i.e. possess the capacity to function as a completely independent agent, to self produce in and off itself - this simple observation pulls the rug out from underneath your whole philosophical approach to it

or at the very least to get human beings to follow its interests rather than their own.

as discussed above, money does not have its own interest separate from those human beings whose sum total of social relations give rise to it

So what then is money?

and expression of social human relations and their social working activities in reproducing themselves and their society - not an independent agent as you assert, not something that would continue to exist if the human relations that give it its lifeblood did not exist, and not something that has the power to independently reproduce itself in and off itself

 

[JimW]

the fact however that it is immaterial, does not mean it is not objective - and my characterisation of it as a social relation provides something that your characterisation of it as just existing in the mind doesn't - which is to emphasise that it is a relation between people and things - i.e. robinson crueso and value would be complete strangers. This means that it can't be magiced into existence from thin air purely by an individual thinking about it (or tapping away on their keyboards). It's embedded in and stems from the social relations between people and things in this society (backed up by extra-economic forces when those 'natural' ones are at risk)

This is the aspect that seems entirely clear to me, even if I can struglle to get my head round some of the nitty gritty.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Try re-reading the thread lbj. Carefully, and with an open mind. I think ld is getting impatient with you, but I don't think it's fair to say it's more attack than content. Not by a long chalk. Positively charming compared to me when someone persistently misinterprets a medical paper.

There is an assumption there that I am misinterpreting minsky/keen.

 

[love detective]

i'm responding to your words on a screen, if these are articulations of your own ideas or someone elses, it makes no difference - you make a point, and i respond to it - if you are unable to rebut those points/rebuttals then it says something about your original point

As i've pointed out, you consistently fail or unable to come back on any of the specific rebuttals or detailed responses I make to your posts (other than vague generalised 'oh i still think i'm right type stuff but i don't have time to explain why at the moment')

And you mix up, conflate and confuse so many of the categories and concepts that you use, which I think shows that you don't understand what you are talking about. Both myself and ItWillNeverWork picked up on an example of this a page or so back when you were confidently putting forward empirical evidence of one thing as conclusive proof of something else - this is like saying that because someone has observed that 10,000 cars pass through a stretch of a road in an hour it's prove that Phil Dwyer likes cheese, and unless I can disprove the evidence of those ten thousand cars passing through that stretch of road then I am unable to disprove that Phil Dwyer likes cheese

 

[love detective]

This is the aspect that seems entirely clear to me, even if I can struglle to get my head round some of the nitty gritty.

getting your head round the nitty gritty means you're not a proper philosopher though

 

[phildwyer]

So now you're trying to overwhelm us with sheer volume, is that it?

I have to do some work today, so I'll have to respond at greater length later. For now though:

you did indeed say it was 'purely' a sign (and indeed further on in this very post you posit money as the essence, so it does seem like you are a bit all over the place as to what you actually think it is)

You seem to be positing an opposition between sign and essence. But this is a false opposition: signs have essences just like anything else. There's no contradiction in money being both sign and essence.

In fact I've no idea how you can deny this. If money didn't have an essence it wouldn't have an objective existence. If it wasn't a sign, we couldn't use it to buy things. So it seems that the confusion is all yours.

I think the source of our difference, on this matter anyway, is the dual nature of money. I don't think you can seriously deny that money is a sign. What you mean is that it is a referential sign, it refers to labor-power. And logically speaking this is true.

However the merest glance at the world should suffice to convince us that it is not empirically true. What actually happens in the real world is that we behave as though money were a non-referential sign--a "performative" sign that carried its value within itself and achieved objective effects autonomously.

And we do this even though we know this assumption to be false. When has a lack of logic been a bar to empirical existence?

 

[love detective]

i've always said money is an expression of an underlying thing - you're way off again with this portrayal (it's you who has clumsily categorised it in various places as 'purely a sign' , 'the essence' and now a sign and an essence - and now you have to try and tie together all these clumsy characterisations into something solid, producing absurdity upon absurdity) - and for you to state, in general, that there is no contradiction/oppostiion between sign and essence is absurd (although this stance from you explains your demented bishop berkleyism) - look out the window today and you see the sun moving from one side to the other, there's no contradiction here is there between that sign/phenomenal thing and the underlying essence is there? just as there is no contradiction between the phenmonal observation of interest being credited to a bank account and the essence of the human activities that have to take place for the whole series of events that this distribution of surplus value is dependent on - oh no, what you see is what happens and what happens is what you see - no need for science as things are just explained by describing back what those things are

good to see you employing the LBJ approach of picking up on a small point and avoiding the general substance of responses to you, usually employed when unable to counter the detail

get on with your work philipa

 

[phildwyer]

I think the source of our difference, on this matter anyway, is the dual nature of money. I don't think you can seriously deny that money is a sign. What you mean is that it is a referential sign, it refers to labor-power. And logically speaking this is true.

However the merest glance at the world should suffice to convince us that it is not empirically true. What actually happens in the real world is that we behave as though money were a non-referential sign--a "performative" sign that carried its value within itself and achieved objective effects autonomously.

And we do this even though we know this assumption to be false. When has a lack of logic been a bar to empirical existence?

Replying to oneself on a messageboard is probably a sign of madness, but it seems worth emphasizing the above.

The difference between LD and myself seems to rest on the nature of reality. We can presumably agree that money is alienated labor-power (i.e. a referential sign), and also that it appears to be soemthing entirely different--a sign with inherent meaning/value.

But is what appears to happen what really happens? I think that, after a certain stage, we have to acknowledge that (in a sense) it is. If money really does, in practice, rule the world as an independent power, then it does little good to point out that it is not, logically speaking, an independent power.

 

[phildwyer]

DP

 

[love detective]

Replying to oneself on a messageboard is probably a sign of madness, but it seems worth emphasizing the above.

The difference between LD and myself seems to rest on the nature of reality. We can presumably agree that money is alienated labor-power (i.e. a referential sign), and also that it appears to be soemthing entirely different--a sign with inherent meaning/value.

But is what appears to happen what really happens? I think that, after a certain stage, we have to acknowledge that (in a sense) it is. If money really does, in practice, rule the world as an independent power, then it does little good to point out that it is not, logically speaking, an independent power.

yeah you can reply/respond to your own posts but not others - easier that way eh

those cows over there in the distance look really small, so it does little good to point out that they are not, logically speaking, really small

the sun looks like it revolves around the earth, so it does little good to point out that it does not, logically speaking, revolve around the earth - i mean what benefit could that possibly bring us about understanding the world/universe we live in

if you come across as a dick, it does little good to point out that you are not, logically speaking, really a dick

 

[phildwyer]

i've always said money is an expression of an underlying thing - you're way off again with this portrayal (it's you who has clumsily categorised it in various places as 'purely a sign' , 'the essence' and now a sign and an essence - and now you have to try and tie together all these clumsy characterisations into something solid, producing absurdity upon absurdity) - and for you to state, in general, that there is no contradiction/oppostiion between sign and essence is absurd (although this stance from you explains your demented bishop berkleyism) - look out the window today and you see the sun moving from one side to the other, there's no contradiction here is there between that sign/phenomenal thing and the underlying essence is there?

This is madness.

"Sign/phenomenal thing" wtf?

You are equating a sign with a phenomenal thing, are you? You think that when I see the sun I am seeing a sign? Am I talking to a looney?

Seems like you're just posting without thinking now, in your excitement.

get on with your work philipa

Just as an aside: why do you of all people think that feminization is an insult?

 

[phildwyer]

the sun looks like it revolves around the earth, so it does little good to point out that it does not, logically speaking, revolve around the earth - i mean what benefit could that possibly bring us about understanding the world/universe we live in

Stop. Wait. Think.

The sun is not a sign. Is it? IS IT? Is it?

No of course it is not a fucking sign. So why do you treat it like a sign?

[When your posts start channeling Pulp Fiction you know it's time for a break...]

 

[love detective]

This is madness.

"Sign/phenomenal thing" wtf?

You are equating a sign with a phenomenal thing, are you? You think that when I see the sun I am seeing a sign?

your empirical observation of the 'sun moving around the earth' is in contradiction with the essence of the real underlying movements of the celestial bodies

you can try and avoid the topic by reducing it, as usual, to personal abuse - but it just shows further, as if any further proof was needed of course, that you have been caught out once more in your pseudo intellectual ramblings

Seems like you're just posting without thinking now

you're obviously rubbing off on my philipa

Just as an aside: why do you of all people think that feminization is an insult?

are you uncomfortable with terms of affection between males dear?

 

[phildwyer]

your empirical observation of the 'sun moving around the earth' is in contradiction with the essence of the real underlying movements of the celestial bodies

Where to start?

OK, to start with: you seem to be under the impression that, empirically speaking, it looks as though the sun moves around the earth.

But you are wrong even in this initial assumption. What would it look like empirically if the earth moved around the sun?

 

[love detective]

Stop. Wait. Think.

The sun is not a sign. Is it? IS IT? Is it?

reduced to gross misrepresentation, your beat, admit it philip

 

[love detective]

Where to start?

OK, to start with: you seem to be under the impression that, empirically speaking, it looks as though the sun moves around the earth.

But you are wrong even in this initial assumption. What would it look like empirically if the earth moved around the sun?

notice how your excuse for being unable to respond to the substantive points of my posts (here and here) was because you didn't have time and were far too busy, yet have spent the last half an hour wittering on like a demented loon trying to find a loophole to extract yourself out of your mess and indeed to create as much noise as you can to take away attention from the points you are unable to deal with

beat

 

[phildwyer]

notice how your excuse for being unable to respond to the substantive points of my posts (here and here) was because you didn't have time and were far too busy, yet have spent the last half an hour wittering on

Up to this point you are absolutely correct. Nature of the beast innit.

I'll go to work now, but rest assured that I will deal with the posts to which you refer in due course.

 

[love detective]

of course you will philipa dear, of course you will

now run away child