[Truth To Power]

I'm too old for castles in the clouds...

Or facts in evidence...?

You notice TP has his panties in a twist?

You made that up. Inevitably.

I loved that line where he said economics is determined by economies.

For anyone without the training, he just told us this is his religion.

I.e., respect for facts of objective physical reality rather than veneration for "authorities."

[late]

I.e., respect for facts of objective physical reality rather than veneration for "authorities."

You just wandered into the philosophy of science. I've studied it.

Notions about reality, and how we come to know it, is the province of philosophy. Even early philosophers had to deal with the problem of how we come to know things.

In the 20th Century, a science of perception developed, and philosophy had to come to terms with that. Richard Rorty is the most famous of the initial phase. I like to call him the Moses of the Philosophy of Science.

There is no objective reality, except that we assume something like it exists.

We need measurement because our senses are so fallible. Scientists, mostly physicists, wandered into philosophy trying to make sense of what they were dealing with.

First thing they did was to ditch the language, and customs, of traditional philosophy. The guy I studied was Ronald N Giere. You don't have the background to be able to read him, but I mention him because the idea of you trying is wonderful.

Back to economics, briefly, economists determine what economics say. Your religion is outside mainstream economics. The underlying idea is not completely without merit. But it needs work neither of us are capable of doing.

[Truth To Power]

But here's the thing -- *you* consider 'fruits of their labor' to include the 'immortality' of capital, as the 'yardstick' / measurement of the economic exploitation of human labor, per hour of every day.

No, I have identified the fact that property in the fruits of one's labor cannot enable exploitation of labor, while property in others' rights to liberty, like slave deeds, land deeds, and IP monopolies, makes exploitation of labor both possible and inevitable. Even Marx understood that capitalist exploitation of labor had to await the Enclosures, which deprived workers of their liberty to use land to survive, forcing them to seek wage labor with employers in the towns on whatever terms they could get, or starve to death.

In other words it's not even about the immortality of flows of capital, but moreso it's about the cash-*flow*, which can't really be allowed to *slow down* because then it's obviously performing at less than its full potential.

No, that is absurd garbage with no basis in economic fact. Unlike the return to privileges like slave deeds, land deeds, and IP monopolies, the return to producer goods tends to be competed away. The principal beneficiary of capitalist exploitation of labor is therefore the privileged, especially the landowner, not the factory owner. Marx merely pretended that the most successful factory owners were the entire population of factory owners, and that the great majority of factory owners, who just broke even or lost money, did not exist.

People's *incomes* depend on the machinations of equity capital, unfortunately, for jobs and the resulting actually *socially productive* segment of production, and/or all other kinds, under capitalism.

No, that's just more absurd Marxist garbage contrary to economic fact. People's incomes depend on how much of their wages the privileged are legally entitled to steal from them, not anything the owners of producer goods do. Google "Law of Rent" and start reading.

Capital here takes on godlike powers -- all hail equity capital!

Yes, the miraculous difference between the modern worker's standard of living and the Neolithic one has been caused by those who contributed the producer goods that increased production. Godlike powers indeed.... though evil, lying Marxist know-nothings pretend that there is no difference between the owner of producer goods getting rich by making everyone else richer and the privileged -- especially landowners -- getting rich by making everyone else poorer.

Still fairy-tale if you're pivoting everything around *equity* values.

You made that up. The only relevant values are free market values.

The meritocracy never existed,

But contribution to production merits a commensurate share of production.

and the *dollars* (etc.) its 'value' is measured in -- FIRE superstructural / social-convention aspects, basically -- are just as culturally biased, one could safely say.

I'm not advocating, defending or justifying the current system but an entirely different and incomparably superior one.

The stealing is that of the workers' surplus labor value.

So when the factory owner's contribution of producer goods increases production tenfold using exactly the same amounts of land and labor, with the result that the worker's wage is doubled and the landowner's rent quintupled while the factory owner barely breaks even, it is somehow the factory owner who is stealing the worker's surplus value...?

Somehow, I kinda figured it'd be something like that...

Organizational / network considerations aside, what's the *administration* here?

Voters.

[Truth To Power]

You just wandered into the philosophy of science.

No, I've been here for decades.

I've studied it.

But to little effect....

Notions about reality, and how we come to know it, is the province of philosophy. Even early philosophers had to deal with the problem of how we come to know things.

But they did not have the benefit of Darwin.

In the 20th Century, a science of perception developed, and philosophy had to come to terms with that. Richard Rorty is the most famous of the initial phase. I like to call him the Moses of the Philosophy of Science.

How appropriate: you like your religion traditional.

There is no objective reality, except that we assume something like it exists.

You thus disqualify yourself from any discussion of science.

We need measurement because our senses are so fallible. Scientists, mostly physicists, wandered into philosophy trying to make sense of what they were dealing with.

Darwin already made sense of it.

First thing they did was to ditch the language, and customs, of traditional philosophy. The guy I studied was Ronald N Giere. You don't have the background to be able to read him, but I mention him because the idea of you trying is wonderful.

<yawn> I hold a degree in philosophy, with honors, from an internationally respected university. There's nothing especially deep or difficult in Giere.

Back to economics, briefly, economists determine what economics say.

No they don't, any more than climatologists determine what climate does. Honest economists (there are a few) try to figure out what economics says, just as honest climatologists try to figure out what climate says.

Your religion is outside mainstream economics. The underlying idea is not completely without merit. But it needs work neither of us are capable of doing.

I have done the work. You are evidently incapable of understanding it, if you were even willing to, which you are not.

[late]

You thus disqualify yourself from any discussion of science.

Ironic, that.

One of the things that happened in the 20th Century is that the relationship between something, and our ideas about it, became more and more tenuous.

As I said before, when actual scientists started doing philosophy of science, first thing they did was throw out the language and customs of traditional philosophy.

Because you haven't studied 20th century philosophy, there is no way you can read this, but this is the book I have:

https://www.amazon.com/Explaining-Science-Cognitive-Conceptual-Foundations/dp/0226292053/ref=sr_1_4?crid=39JUVHNYEBFE9&keywords=ronald+n+giere&qid=1678915848&sprefix=ronald+n+giere%2Caps%2C133&sr=8-4

[ckaihatsu]

But here's the thing -- *you* consider 'fruits of their labor' to include the 'immortality' of capital, as the 'yardstick' / measurement of the economic exploitation of human labor, per hour of every day.

No, I have identified the fact that property in the fruits of one's labor cannot enable exploitation of labor, while property in others' rights to liberty, like slave deeds, land deeds, and IP monopolies, makes exploitation of labor both possible and inevitable. Even Marx understood that capitalist exploitation of labor had to await the Enclosures, which deprived workers of their liberty to use land to survive, forcing them to seek wage labor with employers in the towns on whatever terms they could get, or starve to death.

You're sidestepping the simple empirical fact of *accumulations over generations*.

[QUESTION 001] How would 'corporate personhood' / corporate power, be *handled* exactly, within the polity of your dreams.

[QUESTION 002] How would new incoming generations be *raised* in relation to the pre-existing world of money / resources, particularly regarding their 'earningness' / morality / material-contribution to society?

TLDR: What are the kids owed, and what's expected of anyone / everyone?

In other words it's not even about the immortality of flows of capital, but moreso it's about the cash-*flow*, which can't really be allowed to *slow down* because then it's obviously performing at less than its full potential.

No, that is absurd garbage with no basis in economic fact. Unlike the return to privileges like slave deeds, land deeds, and IP monopolies,

the return to producer goods tends to be competed away.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tendency_ ... it_to_fall

The principal beneficiary of capitalist exploitation of labor is therefore the privileged, especially the landowner, not the factory owner.

Wouldn't that depend on the respective [1] *rentier* values (land / real estate), and the [2] *equity* values (factory / mass production) -- ?

For any given scenario / situation, that *ratio* ([equity] over [rentier]) may vary *widely*, so it's kinda rents-vs.-labor-exploitation, in terms of competitiveness over a piece of the labor value pie.

After the uncontrollable yawning and little nap you'll have processed in your sleep that if the company is *large* and has a *big* footprint on the overall real estate then maybe it has big *equity valuations* while maybe vacant farmland *doesn't* so much.

(Also: Progressive-vs.-reactionary, in terms of costs to the *worker* / employee, to their *wages* -- in relation to what the product of their labor is *sold* for, for revenue.)


[11] Labor & Capital, Wages & Dividends

Spoiler: show

---


Also, I gotta add that the worker is not *productive* on any given *rentier* property, like land / real estate (one's own *housing*), or any other assets and/or resources.

The worker *is* productive / producing commodities, while doing what they're being *paid* to do. Would you like to take a moment here to *reflect* on this reality, TTP -- ? (grin)

I *say* that because you *eschew* the labor theory of value by simply turning away from it. All you can see is the pool party of people, without having a clue as to where they all came from.

Here's a recent treatment:

Mainstream neoclassical economics is curiously only concerned with valuations *after* the initial production process, and its cost, for the freshly minted commodity off the assembly line. What *they* call 'the secondary market' (used books, for example) is actually the *third* market, because the *first* market was whoever put the initial production of the commodity into motion, for the initial production of the commodity. The first *customer* is actually the *secondary* market, per the reader's confirmation, the customer being the first to receive the mint-condition product.

So marginal utility only addresses *post*-production, *consumer*-intrinsic 'diminishing returns', like anything else in the material world, for anything materially bought / invested-in.

Here's my standing critique of the currency face-value / 'exchange value' under capitalism:


You're saying 'supply-and-demand', but you haven't addressed the point about this that I've raised previously, about money having to do a physically-impossible *triple-duty* of valuating these three *different* economic components: [1] manufacture, [2] supply-and-demand, and [3] the consumer's own subjective use-value, or 'utility'.

viewtopic.php?p=15253101#p15253101

viewtopic.php?p=15257425#p15257425

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Marx merely pretended that the most successful factory owners were the entire population of factory owners, and that the great majority of factory owners, who just broke even or lost money, did not exist.

I think Marxists-types don't include the *broadcast of the horse race* because it's the *material gain* aspect itself -- a distinct social privilege -- that's enabled by *any* political economy, like that of capitalism.


Social Production Worldview

Spoiler: show

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People's *incomes* depend on the machinations of equity capital, unfortunately, for jobs and the resulting actually *socially productive* segment of production, and/or all other kinds, under capitalism.

No, that's just more absurd Marxist garbage contrary to economic fact. People's incomes depend on how much of their wages the privileged are legally entitled to steal from them, not anything the owners of producer goods do. Google "Law of Rent" and start reading.

You're absolving equity capital of all wrong, and I just can't live in that worldview, TTP. Rentier capital extracts rents (rent for housing) and interest payments on capital (loans / debt) (necessarily-non-productive assets and resources) (from the *pre-existing* overall economy), at the same time that *equity* capital exploits surplus labor value from every worker, every hour of the workday -- but at least it alone has the power of 'enabling' / controlling industrial mass production.

Capital here takes on godlike powers -- all hail equity capital!

Yes, the miraculous difference between the modern worker's standard of living and the Neolithic one has been caused by those who contributed the producer goods that increased production.

At the expense of the *worker*:

A worker who is sufficiently productive can produce an output value greater than what it costs to hire him.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surplus_value

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Godlike powers indeed.... though evil, lying Marxist know-nothings pretend that there is no difference between the owner of producer goods getting rich by making everyone else richer and the privileged -- especially landowners -- getting rich by making everyone else poorer.

---

Which is pretty funny, coming from a Marxist. The process of changing from injustice to justice is actually simple: stop stealing, and require the privileged to pay for what they are taking. All that's needed is political will.

Still fairy-tale if you're pivoting everything around *equity* values.

You made that up. The only relevant values are free market values.

I've got you on record *somewhere* acknowledging the distinction between equity capital, and rentier-type capital -- you're back to twisting and turning and dancing-between-the-raindrops again.

The meritocracy never existed,

But contribution to production merits a commensurate share of production.

In the production process itself (for that moment or so that it takes on assembly lines) equity values remain mostly *intact* -- and, by extension, over time. But such 'dead labor' valuations are just a *totem*, a *relic*, for some approximation of matching societal material supply, to non-need-based economic 'demand'.


[10] Supply prioritization in a socialist transitional economy

Spoiler: show

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and the *dollars* (etc.) its 'value' is measured in -- FIRE superstructural / social-convention aspects, basically -- are just as culturally biased, one could safely say.

I'm not advocating, defending or justifying the current system but an entirely different and incomparably superior one.

It's single-issue 'single-landlord' politics, while deifying *equity* valuations in your rhetoric.


---

The stealing is that of the workers' surplus labor value.

So when the factory owner's contribution of producer goods increases production tenfold using exactly the same amounts of land and labor, with the result that the worker's wage is doubled and the landowner's rent quintupled while the factory owner barely breaks even, it is somehow the factory owner who is stealing the worker's surplus value...?

Nice picture -- can I do a Google Images search for that?

You simply have the quintessential worldview and mindset of a *capitalist* -- please see if you can address my 2 social-*logistical* points from earlier.


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Somehow, I kinda figured it'd be something like that...

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Organizational / network considerations aside, what's the *administration* here?

Voters.

*Now* we're getting somewhere.

What government-type *services* does this voter-supported administration *host*, TTP?

[ckaihatsu]

---


https://www.youtube.com/results?search_ ... nism+chaos

[Truth To Power]

Ironic, that.

Sad.

One of the things that happened in the 20th Century is that the relationship between something, and our ideas about it, became more and more tenuous.

That says more about our ideas than something.

As I said before, when actual scientists started doing philosophy of science, first thing they did was throw out the language and customs of traditional philosophy.

Quite rightly.

Because you haven't studied 20th century philosophy,

You are being silly again.

there is no way you can read this,

I have already disabused you of that notion, too.

but this is the book I have:

https://www.amazon.com/Explaining-Science-Cognitive-Conceptual-Foundations/dp/0226292053/ref=sr_1_4?crid=39JUVHNYEBFE9&keywords=ronald+n+giere&qid=1678915848&sprefix=ronald+n+giere%2Caps%2C133&sr=8-4

Whereas I have a shelf full of books....

[late]

---


https://www.youtube.com/results?search_ ... nism+chaos

It's not called Chaos Theory now. Be careful with popsci...

[late]

Whereas I have a shelf full of books....

It's not unusual for actual scientists to have never concerned themselves about how science works.

That you can't discuss this beyond one liners tells us more than enough...

Because economics is a social science with an extremely limited ability to do experiments our confidence in the work is lower than it is in the hard sciences. You're funny, but you're also in way over your depth.

Oh, one last thing, the work is called theories. That you think you can perceive an objective reality directly is hysterical.

[Truth To Power]

That you can't discuss this beyond one liners tells us more than enough...

No, what really tells us more than enough is that you haven't offered any argument that requires more than one-liners to address.

Because economics is a social science with an extremely limited ability to do experiments our confidence in the work is lower than it is in the hard sciences.

It's not the difficulty of experimentation, it's the difficulty in defining the basic concepts.

You're funny, but you're also in way over your depth.

That you think you can perceive an objective reality directly is hysterical.

That you think you can't is pathetic.

[ckaihatsu]

It's not called Chaos Theory now. Be careful with popsci...

That's rather *facile*, late -- no, if you look at the link, there's *three* distinct, though related, approaches to scientific exploration / inquiry there: complexity, connectionism, and chaos.

Also here's *my own* treatment of it -- it's *paradigmatic*, basically, as is the one following it:


Order - Complexity - Complication - Chaos

Spoiler: show

‭History, Macro-Micro -- politics-logistics-lifestyle

Spoiler: show

[ckaihatsu]

That you think you can perceive an objective reality directly is hysterical.

That you think you can't is pathetic.

*Gentlemen, gentlemen* -- ! (grin)


You Are Here

Spoiler: show

[ckaihatsu]

Annnnnndddd, 'the goods':

9. OPTIMIZATION / PERFECTION / FINE-TUNING

8. CONCEIVABLE / IMAGINED / GOAL / WISHFUL THINKING

7. EXPECTED / REASONED / THEORIZED

6. OBSERVED (after) / EXECUTION / HOW-IT-WENT

5. EXPERIMENTATION by SCALE or SCOPE (core, periphery)

4. ACTIVITY / TASK / SOCIAL ORGANIZATION / MATERIAL INPUT-OUTPUT

3. HYPOTHESIS (of new situation) / RESPONSE

2. ANALYSIS (of RELEVANT PAST) / CONFIRMATION

1. OBSERVED (before) / RELEVANT PAST / RESEARCH

database-type functionality

A Few Tools for Your Computer [March 16, 2022]

viewtopic.php?p=15218131#p15218131

[late]

You Are Here

Nope.

"Many people assume that the claims of scientists are objective truths. But historians, sociologists, and philosophers of science have long argued that scientific claims reflect the particular historical, cultural, and social context in which those claims were made. The nature of scientific knowledge is not absolute because it is influenced by the practice and perspective of human agents. Scientific Perspectivism argues that the acts of observing and theorizing are both perspectival, and this nature makes scientific knowledge contingent, as Thomas Kuhn theorized forty years ago. Using the example of color vision in humans to illustrate how his theory of “perspectivism” works, Ronald N. Giere argues that colors do not actually exist in objects; rather, color is the result of an interaction between aspects of the world and the human visual system. Giere extends this argument into a general interpretation of human perception and, more controversially, to scientific observation, conjecturing that the output of scientific instruments is perspectival. Furthermore, complex scientific principles—such as Maxwell’s equations describing the behavior of both the electric and magnetic fields—make no claims about the world, but models based on those principles can be used to make claims about specific aspects of the world." Ronald N Giere

https://philpapers.org/rec/GIESP

[ckaihatsu]

Nope.

"Many people assume that the claims of scientists are objective truths. But historians, sociologists, and philosophers of science have long argued that scientific claims reflect the particular historical, cultural, and social context in which those claims were made. The nature of scientific knowledge is not absolute because it is influenced by the practice and perspective of human agents. Scientific Perspectivism argues that the acts of observing and theorizing are both perspectival, and this nature makes scientific knowledge contingent, as Thomas Kuhn theorized forty years ago. Using the example of color vision in humans to illustrate how his theory of “perspectivism” works, Ronald N. Giere argues that colors do not actually exist in objects; rather, color is the result of an interaction between aspects of the world and the human visual system. Giere extends this argument into a general interpretation of human perception and, more controversially, to scientific observation, conjecturing that the output of scientific instruments is perspectival. Furthermore, complex scientific principles—such as Maxwell’s equations describing the behavior of both the electric and magnetic fields—make no claims about the world, but models based on those principles can be used to make claims about specific aspects of the world." Ronald N Giere

https://philpapers.org/rec/GIESP

Yeah, I was introduced to Kuhn in school -- it's not as clear-cut as you might *like* it to be, though, late:

Kuhn's insistence that a paradigm shift was a mélange of sociology, enthusiasm and scientific promise, but not a logically determinate procedure, caused an uproar in reaction to his work. Kuhn addressed concerns in the 1969 postscript to the second edition. For some commentators The Structure of Scientific Revolutions introduced a realistic humanism into the core of science, while for others the nobility of science was tarnished by Kuhn's introduction of an irrational element into the heart of its greatest achievements.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Struc ... evolutions

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Kuhn challenged the then prevailing view of progress in science in which scientific progress was viewed as "development-by-accumulation" of accepted facts and theories. Kuhn argued for an episodic model in which periods of conceptual continuity where there is cumulative progress, which Kuhn referred to as periods of "normal science", were interrupted by periods of revolutionary science.

I'd simply say that we can view the development of science, then, as being more like a 'punctuated equilibrium' dynamic, or 'technological leapfrogging'.

This *historical* treatment, though, is a different thing from various *approaches* to the *doing* of science / history, like my aforementioned 'History, Macro-Micro' diagram, that uses a *non-reductionist* approach / framework.

[ckaihatsu]

Consciousness, A Material Definition

Spoiler: show

[late]

Yeah, I was introduced to Kuhn in school -- it's not as clear-cut as you might *like* it to be, though, late:


I'd simply say that we can view the development of science, then, as being more like a 'punctuated equilibrium' dynamic, or 'technological leapfrogging'.

This *historical* treatment, though, is a different thing from various *approaches* to the *doing* of science / history, like my aforementioned 'History, Macro-Micro' diagram, that uses a *non-reductionist* approach / framework.

Academia savaged Kuhn. He had to do some backpedalling.

That doesn't make him wrong. He's a big picture guy, and for the lay audience, he's easily one of the best.

When you focus in, the big picture often gets quite fuzzy. Being human, academics will sometimes protect their turf. I think thats most of what was going on there.

"Punctuated equilibrium" is Stephen Jay Gould, and I'm a big fan. If you haven't read him, you should.

And the use of that idea, in this context, seems valid. We get big waves of advancement, and they usually happen along with economic advancement. Although there was some depressing work by a female Brit historian arguing that much of the industrial revolution had it's roots in British military R&D.

We don't read your links. So that last bit, seems ok, but I'm not sure what your saying. What Giere says is that we create models. That dodges traditional notions of causation, or anything else. You don't ask if a model is true, you only ask if it's good enough for what you're trying to do.

[ckaihatsu]

Academia savaged Kuhn. He had to do some backpedalling.

That doesn't make him wrong. He's a big picture guy, and for the lay audience, he's easily one of the best.

When you focus in, the big picture often gets quite fuzzy. Being human, academics will sometimes protect their turf. I think thats most of what was going on there.

"Punctuated equilibrium" is Stephen Jay Gould, and I'm a big fan. If you haven't read him, you should.

There ya go....

Punctuated equilibrium in social theory is a conceptual framework for understanding the process of change in complex social systems. The approach studies the evolution of policy change,[1] including the evolution of conflicts.[2] The theory posits that most social systems exist in an extended period of stasis, which may be punctuated by sudden shifts leading to radical change. The theory was largely inspired by the evolutionary biology theory of punctuated equilibrium developed by paleontologists Niles Eldredge and Stephen Jay Gould.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Punctuate ... ial_theory

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And the use of that idea, in this context, seems valid. We get big waves of advancement, and they usually happen along with economic advancement. Although there was some depressing work by a female Brit historian arguing that much of the industrial revolution had it's roots in British military R&D.

We don't read your links.

'We' -- ? Are you at a coffee shop with *others* around you right now, late? (grin)

So that last bit, seems ok, but I'm not sure what your saying.

This *historical* treatment, though, is a different thing from various *approaches* to the *doing* of science / history, like my aforementioned 'History, Macro-Micro' diagram, that uses a *non-reductionist* approach / framework.

What I'm saying is that one has to have a certain chosen scientific *approach* to the matter at hand, like my history framework's 'non-reductionism' -- consider the distinct difference between the 'hard' sciences, and the 'soft' sciences, and the respective *approaches* for each.


inductive vs. deductive reasoning

Spoiler: show

What Giere says is that we create models. That dodges traditional notions of causation, or anything else. You don't ask if a model is true, you only ask if it's good enough for what you're trying to do.

If any given model, like my own, is expected to be *helpful* then it has to at least be *internally consistent*, so that it will always correspond to any possible situation and/or values -- like a variable in math, or a whole equation.

[late]

There ya go....

https://www.amazon.com/Wonderful-Life-Burgess-Nature-History/dp/039330700X/ref=sr_1_2?crid=OS26XSXEL04&keywords=stephen+jay+gould+books&qid=1679078916&sprefix=stephen+jay%2Caps%2C115&sr=8-2