On Markets

Watching an interesting documentary on economics, which pits Keyensian interventionism against von Hyeck and free markets, it strikes me that this tension, which stretched throughout the 20th century, derives from two views of markets: to the free marketeers, markets are forces of nature, not to be controlled, but to be accepted. To the Keyensians, they are a big machine, to be tuned and fiddled with. From where I stand, they are neither. They both miss the fact that markets are us! The issue of how we control them, how we constrain them, these are questions of self-definition. We therefore need to resolve this collectively, and ideology (either) simply will not do!

 

Another farmer….

The Pink Monkey project is underway. Hans Rosling is on board.

 

Ideology and money

A disinterested observer might opine that the US tends to support just those causes that exhibit a great faith in the value of money.  Many communities are split in this regard, and the debate is normally framed as a clash between religion (which often doesn’t care about money) and political ideology, but that really doesn’t stand up to scrutiny.  So what is this belief in commerce, and why the fuss?

 

Madeline

There will be more books written about the media coverage of the Madeline Mc Cann case than will be written about the case itself.

 

Pleasure and Pain

Theologians have spent so long wondering why there is pain in the world. Would that they had spent as much time wondering why there is pleasure in the world.

… for desire is what makes it all happen. Nietzche’s “will”. Something has to be the prime mover. And desire is what it looks like from here.  But the Islamic “surrender” is not alien, nor the Bhuddist “Om”.

 

What it is like to be a bat….

We are very many P-worlds. Six billion human-centered ones. But there may be an infinity of p’, p” worlds of which we know nothing. That’s what it is like to be a bat.

[Should we regard arbitrary complex processes as worthy of moral consideration, as we do our own P-worlds?  Seems like the only perspective we can possibly take is the one which has our human POV as a reference point.  This is the pickle we are in, and this is the only way forward.]

 

Consequences of the P-R construct

I have recently been fretting that it is possible to swallow my P-R thesis whole, without any discernable consequences.  Jack even pulled me up on this one.  And its not a scientific hypothesis, but a metaphysical one.  So it represents a framework within which old questions can be examined anew, hopefully with the result that previously distinct mysteries may be seen to be related, thus suggesting, perhaps, new ways of understanding them.  One such old chestnut is the nature of truth.  Several interpretations are possible under P-R.  Approximation to R-world, as evidenced by predictive power, and possible relative stability across time, is one such.  This is uncomfortable for many people.  Our baffling ability to cause misery to others, by denying the reality of their P-worlds, and consequent dehumanization is another.  It suggests a basis for what it is to dehumanize, and suggests that the only way to stop this is to acknowledge other realities.  This surely suggests possible developments in the way we deal with crises.  P-R also demands humility with respect to ones own certainties.