At 15:35 19/12/02 -0500, Ed wrote:
<<<<
One also has to recognize that economic concepts are ideologically based.
At 1:09 PM +0000 12/20/02, Keith Hudson responded to Ed:
This is where I think you are completely and utterly wrong -- at least as
regards some economists.....
But I treat economics as a fascinating intellectual discipline -- in
exactly the same way as I regard history, or genetics, or psychology, or
neuroscience, or biology, or chemistry (though, as a chemist, I find this
boring!) or whatever.
I regard economics in exactly the same way as Kenneth Boulding did -- whom
I met and had a fascinating conversation with at Coventry Quaker Meeting
House 20 years ago, not long before he died -- as an interdisciplinary
subject central to the subject of man.
Hi Keith,
Are you suggesting that there is a method that
allows a human being to think and speak about a subject in such a way
that it can be free of 'point of view', attitudes, values, beliefs,
assumptions? It seems to me that you believe that some previous
economic geniuses wrote 'the truth, the whole truth and nothing but
the truth about "economics". In other words you seem to
believe that there are 'universal objective truths'. In the 1920's
a group called the 'Vienna Circle of Logical Positivists' was
formed and they set about to prove precisely that. Their influence is
still felt within philosophy, history and science.
Take care,
Brian
