Ideology vs. Free Thought?

Permabear

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Permabear

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20Cent

Q. Whats the difference between an Episcopal and a Southern Baptist?
A. No one cares except those involved.

Most people don't have the time or the inclination to study fringe political ideas that have zero relevance to day to day life. One doesn't need to read the complete works of Marx, Lenin or Trotsky to decide that pure socialism isn't a good idea. Extremist positions have been found to be almost always bad news, actually any country the adopts an "ism" as a fundamental part of its structure don't tend to do well.

The idea that its due to a lack of education or brainwashing that these ideas aren't more popular is nonsense. Its because they are bad ideas!

Permabear

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KyussBishop

The idea that you have to read full texts from authors on a subject to understand and criticize its fundamentals is really just another way trying to monopolise authority to speak about a subject to be honest, and to try and create an elitist excuse to attack posters; I would not expect anyone here to read through some of the deliberately dense and obfuscatory founding texts supporting Austrian economics.

I actually think that with the texts that are deliberately obfuscated to conceal the flaws/bias in their arguments, it can actually be damaging to try and wade through them unless you are simultaneously methodically picking apart the flawed arguments it proposes (which nobody can be expected to have the patience for); without this, you more easily become subject to false information sinking in as 'truth' through repetition, a bit like you'd pick up bias from news stories if you leave some shíte like Sky News on in the background all the time.

Some of these books are heavy on prose and deliberate obfuscation, and heavily lay on repeated unbacked assertions, just for the sake of trying to indoctrinate that information; the fallacious arguments and unbacked assertions come so fast and thick, that you're just going to be fatigued and waste a lot of time trying to pick it apart, so you're either going to have to continue on and just (for the sake of practicality) accept the false/dubious assertions (potentially leading to bias through repetition), or just stop and simply not waste your time.


Some of the principal dishonest methods you encounter in the books, you encounter here as well even; the litany of knowingly fallacious arguments put forward here a lot of the time, is just a front to avoid actually discussing a topic.

What possible excuse is there for engaging in an argument you know is fallacious? Everybody knows that generalizations are (generally ) fallacious, and that to knowingly make inaccurate generalizations is dishonest, but that is one of the single most-employed arguments here; that coupled with endless straw-men usually.
How do people reconcile themselves intellectually with the very visibly dishonest arguments that get employed? (this, to be honest, is one of the motivators in having me post regularly on the general topic; I really wonder deeply what the motives are behind some of the dishonest methods of argument, and am loathe to let some of them go unexposed; curiosity on that point, and on theoretical politics/economics in general, keeps me enthused)


There seems to be a notion that to be 'serious' in your criticisms of something, you have to expend an inordinate amount of time digging through texts in order to be 'qualified' to speak of it.
That would be like a Christian saying I can't criticize religion unless I read through the bible and its supporting texts, that I'm not 'qualified' to do that because I haven't studied it in detail; you don't need a degree in something to be able to point out obvious flaws in it (and in my time developing my arguments, and just out of general interest, I've spent a very large amount of time regularly reading up on/about economics).

That kind of deliberate attempt to create an elitist 'intellectual' barrier is also a way of trying to enforce a social barrier as well (in addition to the constant push towards 'Us vs Them' dichotomies in arguments, with fictional examples of 'socialism' being the eternal enemy to rally against).

southsiderosie

MOD NOTE:

I need to make two points here.

First, some of these comments are getting way too personal. Please dial it down.

Second, in regards to this comment:

The idea that you have to read full texts from authors on a subject to understand and criticize its fundamentals is really just another way trying to monopolise authority to speak about a subject to be honest, and to try and create an elitist excuse to attack posters; I would not expect anyone here to read through some of the deliberately dense and obfuscatory founding texts supporting Austrian economics.

This is the political theory forum. If people want to discuss politics in a general way, they can do it in the main forum, but this sub-forum exists explicitly to discuss political theory. So if you or anyone else want to have a debate about Austrian economics, Marxism, pluralism, nationalism, or whatever 'ism' is at the heart of a thread, it is not unreasonable for other posters to expect you to have some familiarity with the text - or at least the main arguments of that particular school of thought.

20Cent

Permabear wrote: »

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The thread isn't about your ideology in particular its about all of them in general. It just got sidetracked. I wouldn't participate in a discussion about them because it doesn't interest me, this thread does, trying to learn a bit about what motivates ideologues. Your example would be more correct if it was a religious person posting into a political discussion calling everyone stupid because they haven't read the complete works of letters from Fr Episcopalian to the Corintians in the original Latin. Its a bit of a cop out as SouthsiderRosie says at least a familiarity with the main arguments of that particular school of thought is enough.

Permabear wrote: »

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Totally agree, thats pretty much what I wrote.

Duggys Housemate

Permabear wrote: »

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The zeal of the convert. I've read, or read sympathetic synopses of Mises, Hayek, Rand, et al. And I remain a non-libertarian. This can happen, just as you can read Marx and not become a Marxist. However, there are no Marxists on this thread.

Today I read a stinging denunciation of the Croke Park agreement online. I now think it should be re-visited. Ronan Lyons has recently convinced me that a site tax is better than a property tax, as it doesn't penalize improvements in houses, but does penalize dereliction. These are "right wing" ideas, and/or the ideas of a right wing economist. On the other hand Krugman makes more sense to me on QE than monetarists, or Austrians. This is not the thread for that, though...

This is the nature of the scientifically trained mind. As I said I would be a Marxist, if I thought it worked. Or a libertarian if I thought that worked. I know that that is hard for ideologues to understand, since moderation has been described as an ideology in itself. It is that claim, which is in fact a postmodernist claim; the claim that all ideas are relative, that all are ideological which I say is wrong, agreeing with the OP. Theology is not the same as science, and extremism not the same as empiricism.

It doesn't surprise me that I am not dealing with science graduates when I engage in these philosophical debates. But the debates are not just about philosophical abstract systems, they are economic. And on that Marxists have nothing, the libertarians little or nothing.

The point about ideologues is that no evidence is going to sway their opinion. Ronan on site tax swayed mine - though I started off hostile. However the fact that growth was greater in 1945-1980 when taxes were higher is not going to change the libertarian argument that low taxes equal economic growth. Its not in the philosophy so it is rejected.

But I not arguing here to change the mind of ideologues, Marxist or Libertarians, but to convince neutrals - lurking or posting - that ideologues are distinct from free thinkers.

The Bishop!

Denerick wrote: »

Not that this thread should descend into another battle in the eternal libertarian/social democrat wars, but I've always found that people of certain ideological extremities of thought (Be they right or left wing) lack an ability to think outside the box, or consider ideas that may offend their natural ideological instincts. One of the reasons I love Orwell so much is that he was never afraid to tell his own socialist bedfellows to 'bugger off' from time to time.

I'm repeating what's already been said at this stage but to give my non-political science educated 2 cents worth anyway.

Speaking in broad terms, history shows that the if you give too much power and responsibility to the state or remove too much from the state, the result is tyranny for the common man.

Freedom is a delicate balance between too much government and too little. What far left communists and far right libertarians and anarcho-capitalists don't seem to get or deliberately avoid is that serfdom exists at either end of this spectrum.

You could say that free thought has largely prevailed over these extremes. The result is the modern social democratic system - a combination of the tenets both of capitalism and socialism, where free enterprise and hard work are rewarded while at the same time grinding poverty has been somewhat ameliorated.
Although worryingly in recent times many countries have experienced a rightward lurch economically, influenced by well financed sources who have subverted the democratic process and who wish to shred the social contract and dismantle public health, welfare and education, effectively returning us to the lassez faire 19th century in terms of living and working conditions.

Someone pointed out that the term idealogue can technically be applied to both a rigid exponent and a moderate alike. That may be true, but for all intents and purposes it still describes a dogmatic political and/or economic stance and is commonly prefixed with the word dangerous.
It's not an unfair prefix in my view, at least to describe those that advocate for that system in it's purest form, all the while ignoring or deeming unimportant its socially detrimental consequences.

Duggys Housemate

Permabear wrote: »

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I don't have a theory. I am merely pointing out the flaws in yours. As for the WWII I am not site what you are saying. Does war lead to economic growth afterwards in all cases? ( from my historical readings it doesn't - depressions tended to follow wars as with the end of the Napoleonic wars for instance) and wars if they promote growth during the war it's because of state spending.

Where we are now with lower taxes and economic growth is : no theory is proven correct.

Permabear

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KyussBishop

Whatever peoples views are, they don't adopt them just for merely being 'left wing', in the kind of partisan-based thinking you're implying; most of the posters not subscribing to Libertarianism seem to be generally open to new political ideas and reshaping of their own views, whereas most Libertarian subscribers seem to rigidly select political views based on whether or not they match the Libertarian/Austrian framework of ideas.

That's the essence of ideological thinking; prejudging any political ideas based on whether or not they agree with your own pet ideology, particularly when you decide to favour policies/theory which are dubious/inferior with regards to credibility.

That's a large part of what pragmatism is about: Selecting the optimal, most credible policies, regardless of whether or not they fit your favoured ideological framework, and acknowledging when certain policies of your favoured ideology are inferior.


There's none of this kind of pragmatic discussion when it comes to Libertarianism or Austrian economics, no acknowledgment of criticism or weakness in arguments supporting it, no acknowledgment that just 'maybe' a particular criticism is valid or that there may be a better way of doing things; anything not conforming to or supporting it 100% is fought against.

Maybe I'm mistaken, maybe this isn't the case; if that's so, then why not hear a bit of criticism of Austrian/Libertarian policies from supporters? Is there any part their supporters are critical of, or is criticism verboten?

That's another thing separating ideological thinking from pragmatic: willingness to self-criticize and acknowledge problems.
I don't think there's anyone critical of Libertarianism who is not also heavily critical of government, inefficiency/waste in the public sector, bad regulation, handling of monetary policy, and all sorts of things Libertarians are also critical of.

Dr Galen

KyussBishop wrote: »

then why not hear a bit of criticism of Austrian/Libertarian policies from supporters?

We won't be doing that in this thread, because that would be OT, you get me?

FWIW, in order for discussions like this to be of any merit and value, I think posters need to think hard about posting with some honesty. Honestly in how their portray their political/social/economic views and starting points. Just bear that in mind if you would.

Cheers

DrG

20Cent

Permabear wrote: »

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So the contention is that there is no such thing as a free thinker we are all motivated by some ideology deep down?
I'd disagree for the reasons below. But if it is the case then there is no such thing as free thought which is a disturbing concept!!

How does that explain those who have left and right wing views? The vast majority of people in fact. Consumer goods best left to the private sector, policing public, health a mixture of both. If things were to change and a private system meant that everyone would get affordable healthcare I'd be all for it but don't see that happening and don't have the faith in the markets to provide that.
I think the free thinker acknowledges the circumstances without prejudice or at least tries to. All ideologies have good and bad in them but also have inherent limitations. A free thinker should be able to depend on solid arguments for their positions and require evidence. They should also be able to criticise their own ideas and belief systems, ideologies tend not to do this.

Plus I don't see Occupy as an exclusively left wing particularly, lots of right wingers involved. Paying gamblers who lost using public money is the opposite of capitalism. Ron Paul came out in support of the Occupy Wall Street.

Duggys Housemate

Permabear wrote: »

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One of the tributes of ideologues is to assume that everybody else is. Nearly every post by you is an attack on mythical leftists, in this thread. There may be left-wingers here - I am not one - the debate is about ideology.

Permabear wrote: »

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I believe him. Ideologues see all other belief systems as an ideology. Thats what we are here to decide. The mods seem to think that we should honestly state positions - ok, I am a rational empiricist.

KyussBishop

Duggys Housemate wrote: »

One of the tributes of ideologues is to assume that everybody else is. Nearly every post by you is an attack on mythical leftists, in this thread. There may be left-wingers here - I am not one - the debate is about ideology.

Yes, echoing this as it is a recurring thing; in the past there have been regular attempts to pin my views to the ideology of Marxism, despite me explicitly rejecting some of the primary founding parts of that, and describing how my views can be supported without relying on Marxism.

This was a generalization of my views that the accusing posters appeared to know was not true, yet persisted with anyway, and you have the same thing with accusing people of being 'left-wing' and the like, as a pejorative (even when everyone has a mix of views); this seems to be hinting at a partisan bias, and that 'balance' and objectivity can be found by trying to balance left-wing views with right wing views, but this is not any kind of balance.

That particular way of framing the debate, appearing to try and push people into extreme black and white positions with "Us vs Them" type thinking, can be used (when combined with the idea that 'balance' is a mix of all views) as a way of altering what should be viewed as an acceptable, non-partisan, objective, non-ideological viewpoint; i.e. it pushes towards portraying the middle ground between two extremes as more balanced, when that middle ground is easily shifted by one side taking on even more extreme policies.


This is what you see in the US media to an extent; the range of debate is limited based on partisan issues between policies the two main parties disagree on (and where they agree, there is little substantive debate, even if the policies are totally reprehensible), and this is in no way objective or balanced.

This kind of generalizing, as well as picking a major 'enemy' to rally against (Marxism/Socialism/'the left'), pushes away from rational thinking, towards more emotive socially-reinforced thinking; this is the kind of stuff that can be accurately described as fitting ideological behaviour.

This is why all of the left-wing vs right-wing type generalizations (and their variants) are fallacious/false, and are a (sometimes deliberate) barrier to rational discussion.

Permabear

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Permabear

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KyussBishop

Permabear wrote: »

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What generalizations about Libertarians exactly, can you point out and put to question?
If people identify with Libertarianism and proclaim to support their policies, there is a pretty limited pool of theory/policies to pick from which you can say they support, so it's not like there's much room for generalizing.

I don't identify with or proclaim to support Marxism, and specifically disagree with it, so it takes quite a degree of generalization to take some of the policies I support and try to fit them to Marxism.
I don't recall the last time a supporter of Libertarianism/Austrian-economics last disclaimed any views attributed to them, as I did Marxism.

The entire 'left-wing' pejorative generalization as well, is probably the most blatant kind of generalization that can be used as well, seeing as just about everyone has political views mixed between left/right.

In the end, the key difference here is you (and other supporters) specifically identify with Libertarianism, whereas I (and many others) don't identify with any one political/economic ideology.


EDIT: I note as well actually, no contesting the claim of using knowingly-inaccurate generalizations, just a charge of hypocrisy; so that is implicitly acknowledged at least.

The Bishop!

The Occupy Movement can not honestly be described as "far left" or anything of the sort. Its participants and supporters are drawn from all sides of the political spectrum.

From Wiki: It is an international protest movement against social and economic inequality, its primary goal being to make the economic structure and power relations in society fairer. Different local groups have different foci, but among the prime concerns is the claim that large corporations and the global financial system control the world in a way that disproportionately benefits a minority, undermines democracy and is unstable.

The way some people make them out, you'd swear they were calling for immediate worldwide seizure of the means of production or something.:)

It's a depressing fact that any criticism of neoliberalism or corporate globalisation results in you being assigned the extremist far lefty tag.

Eliot Rosewater

Duggys Housemate wrote: »

One of the tributes of ideologues is to assume that everybody else is. Nearly every post by you is an attack on mythical leftists, in this thread. There may be left-wingers here - I am not one - the debate is about ideology.

I think you might be interpreting the claim that everyone is influenced by ideology a little too strongly. I don't think the claim is that everyone has a personal ideology which provides the same set of answers independent of the circumstances.

Rather, I think what is being said is that basically everyone has a subjective measuring stick that they use to judge policies. Even the most dedicated empiricist pragmatist has to have a measuring stick to convert empirical and circumstantial evidence into policy opinions. For instance, should the government introduce school vouchers? There's no universally correct answer to that question. Your opinion will depend on how much emphasis you place in a universal curriculum, how you judge the effect of "talent segregation", how much credence you give to the opinions of teachers, and so on. These factors change with each individual person. The measuring stick effectively encodes this information, allowing one to balance the different factors and reach a policy opinion.

This measuring stick has a number of components. It is influenced by economic beliefs. For instance, someone who has read Henry Hazlitt's book Economics in One Lesson might hold the economic opinion that the benefits of stimulus plans are outweighed by the costs associated with funding them. Readers of Paul Krugman's New York Times column might hold the opposite view.

The part being referenced when people say something like "everyone has some ideological bias" is that part of the measuring stick that is, I suppose, just pure political opinion. Everyone has a certain notion of the relationship between the individual and the state, and where the balance in that relationship should be. Thus, for instance, banning alcohol isn't generally held as a solution to late-night recklessness in Dublin because people don't believe that the government has a right to control individuals quite that much. If the pragmatist theory were correct, alcohol would be illegal as a "pragmatic" solution to drunken recklessness. But the notion of an abstract right is rearing its head here.

In the libertarian context, the usual problem with any spending-based policy is that it will necessitate raising taxes on others. Naturally, there are pros and cons to it all. But everyone's opinion will be based on their idea of the optimal relationship between the individual and the state. Social democrats might deem the policy justified; i.e., deem that it is justifiable to oblige people to contribute their money to the policy irrespective of what those people think of it. Is that a non-ideological perspective?

Eliot Rosewater

The Bishop! wrote: »

The Occupy Movement can not honestly be described as "far left" or anything of the sort. Its participants and supporters are drawn from all sides of the political spectrum.

But if that is so, why was there such a strong correlation between Occupy Ireland policy platforms (as agreed at Occupy meetings) and the policies of Irish hard-Left parties? Occupy Cork opposed the household charge and supported the Shell To Sea movement. Irish far-Left groups are the only others in the Irish political scene to hold those policy positions, too.

Occupy Dame Street, according to their website, "stands in solidarity with and is inspired by nearly 1000 sister occupations in the evolving global movement initiated by the people of Iceland, Greece, Spain, and Tunisia." The people's movement in Greece, for instance, is clearly of the Left, with its general calls for an end to austerity and for the rich to bear the brunt of the global recession.

ODS go on to also pledge their support for Shell To Sea: "Our demand is that the oil and gas reserves off our coast that were criminally handed away to private corporations be returned to sovereign control." That such a short statement of 360 words actually mentions this relatively-fringe issue is quite significant, in my opinion.

Permabear

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The Bishop!

Eliot Rosewater wrote: »

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If there is a strong correlation between some policies of Occupy Ireland and these so-called hard left parties, that does not necessarily disprove the notion that the Occupy movement in general is itself hard left.
Your definition of what 'hard left' or Permabear's 'far left' would seem to differ from mine in this respect. To me far left means advocating for full nationalisation and public ownership of all private industry etc., just as hard right means full privatisation.

Anyway i was more referring to the aims of the wider Occupy movement which were things like calling for an end to tax havens and tax avoidance, more transparency over business lobbying, and legal reforms to make individual executives more liable for the consequences of their decisions. Nothing too radical there in reality.
Link

Permabear wrote: »

In addition to 20Cent's stances described above, Duggys Housemate's recent contributions to "Is it time to take on the super-rich?"; KyussBishop's to "Tax the rich" and "Kerrigan: Rich have been left alone for too long"; The Bishop!'s to "Romney: Obama voters are the 47% who are dependent on the government," and Memnoch's doggedly anti-Republican contributions to the U.S. Politics forum (along with his positions elsewhere) provide indisputable evidence of left-wing ideological partisanship on behalf of all these posters. Any objective reader would find as much.

So someone who doggedly opposes the U.S. Republican party is now a "left-wing idealogue"?
You can take me now Lord. I've heard everything.:)
I'm a centrist i'll have you know.

KyussBishop

Permabear wrote: »

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A good number of the quoted links boil down to progressive taxation; there are any number of reasons to support progressive taxation, so what exactly is inherently ideological about it?

Everyone here (Libertarians included) support some degree of government, and since government has to be funded there must be taxes of some kind, so presumably the enforcement of taxation is also universally supported as well; this necessarily means clamping down on tax evasion too.


Also, you are pushing for the left vs right dichotomy again in your post, whereas a lot of the discussion is about ideology and pragmatism; who is to say the pragmatic balance does not lie with the left or the right, on any individual policy?
Is that not a matter of trying to accurately judge the credibility of underlying theories and their effects in the real world, and pick the most fitting? (and is that not an inherently non-ideological method of choosing what policies to support, irrespective of their ideological base?)

Even where someone may hold some policies that can be generalized as 'left', does not inherently show they are ideological in any way, it just shows that it's possible to pigeonhole their views onto one side of a completely arbitrary political axis.
If the balance of pragmatism also falls upon the side that is judged 'left wing', that does not show any kind of ideology either, outside of pragmatism itself.


It seems you confuse the position people fall on that axis, as the representation of whether or not they are ideological, when it has nothing to do with that but with how they came to (and support) their point of view in the first place, and how flexible their views are in the face of new knowledge/experience.

I'm quite happy to espouse a new policy I learn of, if I think it seems like a good idea, even if it has strong ideological roots and even if I am not sure enough to advocate it 100%; it is my reasons for supporting that policy, and how I react to arguments and valid criticism against it, which determines if I am ideological.
Often I'll argue for such a policy just to learn about it better and the arguments for/against it, and later on change my mind when I hear a convincing enough argument against it.

southsiderosie

MOD NOTE:

There has been a mod warning about not personalizing comments, and multiple mod warnings about content. And yet personal jabs and OT sniping continue, on all sides. If this thread is going to stay open, then people are going to need to remain both civil and on topic. There will not be any more warnings - posts that are overly personal and/or off-topic (i.e. a return to libertarian trench warfare, either for or against) will be red carded, and posters potentially banned from this forum. Enough is enough.

Duggys Housemate

Permabear wrote: »

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Selective posting once again. In a series of posts today, I suggest there is little or no difference between the economic situation of the middle classes in Ireland and the welfare classes, dependent on their situation - costs of mortgage, number of children etc. Seek posts on social welfare here here, and here. I am in no sense a left winger, I am a centrist.

Real left wingers attacked my posts. I have no hesitation, however, in taking on the super-rich, a view I share with many of the super-rich - like Soros - who believe that if too much pie is taken by the top 1 percent, it harms capitalism itself. It is inefficent for capitalism that money be concentrated , as it reduces the spending power of consumers, and thus the growth rate of capitalists. They could get a smaller chunk of a larger pie if labour had more strength, and therefore as consumers had more spending power*. This is not monetarism but it is not left wingism either. I would prefer this money go to the middle income groups than the poor, who always have the chance of getting to the middle income with application, but very few of us can become real rich.

The pooling of money has not only issues for power, but for the actual flow of money throughout the economy. Money kept under a bed, or in a bank which is rebuilding it's balance sheet might as well cease to exist as a medium of exchange. Particularly electronic money. There is no virtuous circle for it. I recommend people read Against Thrift, for some ideas on where I stand, however I am not his disciple, or anybodys. I am anti-hair shirtism, to be sure, I detest malthusians - which is arguably, given the red-green alliance these days, a right wing position. On CIF, where I post with a different moniker, I am considered right wing.

But it is par for the course for ideologues to see ideology everywhere else.

A left wing example was a New Statesman article about abortion from Mehdi Hasan, he was arguing from a left wing perspective.He points out that an individuals "right to choose" is a libertarian position, an individualist choice, not normal left wing rhetoric. And yet ideologues on his side turned against him, theoretically there should be no reason to not believe in a large state and oppose abortion but ideology is a tribal thing. If you believe this, you believe this, this and this..

Some of us can and do have independent ideas, however.

KyussBishop

Read this article in the Guardian just now, which gets right to the core of the kind of faux-intellectualism behind most ideology, and how that works:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/dec/19/high-culture-fake

Basically, the nub of it is that faux-intellectuals are not interested in the truth, but in holding and maintaining power; a lot of political ideology today, is exactly about holding and maintaining power, and discarding the truth is a primary component for doing this in a lot of cases. So that's another different, and very robust way of describing an ideologue.

This is why it is important to be skeptical of anything remotely anti-science or which rejects empiricism, and why it's good to have an allergic reaction to anything that looks unnecessarily obfuscatory/bullshítty; usually, it is about denying the truth, in order to retain power.


The entire field of economics, with much of its refusal to adapt to conflicting empirical evidence and theoretical problems, is one of the prime examples of this today; however, like the article describes, many of the 'fakes' there don't know they are fake, they think the knowledge they have gained is legitimate.

Soldie

KyussBishop wrote: »

Read this article in the Guardian just now, which gets right to the core of the kind of faux-intellectualism behind most ideology, and how that works:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/dec/19/high-culture-fake

Basically, the nub of it is that faux-intellectuals are not interested in the truth, but in holding and maintaining power; a lot of political ideology today, is exactly about holding and maintaining power, and discarding the truth is a primary component for doing this in a lot of cases. So that's another different, and very robust way of describing an ideologue.

This is why it is important to be skeptical of anything remotely anti-science or which rejects empiricism, and why it's good to have an allergic reaction to anything that looks unnecessarily obfuscatory/bullshítty; usually, it is about denying the truth, in order to retain power.


The entire field of economics, with much of its refusal to adapt to conflicting empirical evidence and theoretical problems, is one of the prime examples of this today; however, like the article describes, many of the 'fakes' there don't know they are fake, they think the knowledge they have gained is legitimate.

That article has nothing to do with economics. It's about Post-Marxist spoofers like Althusser and Lacan, who tie themselves into knots with their obfuscatory and convoluted writings. They do this precisely because it is pseudo-intellectual waffle, and they can easily respond to their detractors with a simple "that's not what I meant". They are the faux-intellectuals, and humanities departments up and down the country treat them as demi-gods. Again, nothing to do with economics. It's plain to see that you have an agenda, which you shoehorn in wherever you see fit. Strange, for someone who is supposedly ideology-free!

KyussBishop

Soldie wrote: »

KyussBishop wrote: »

Read this article in the Guardian just now, which gets right to the core of the kind of faux-intellectualism behind most ideology, and how that works:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/dec/19/high-culture-fake

Basically, the nub of it is that faux-intellectuals are not interested in the truth, but in holding and maintaining power; a lot of political ideology today, is exactly about holding and maintaining power, and discarding the truth is a primary component for doing this in a lot of cases. So that's another different, and very robust way of describing an ideologue.

This is why it is important to be skeptical of anything remotely anti-science or which rejects empiricism, and why it's good to have an allergic reaction to anything that looks unnecessarily obfuscatory/bullshítty; usually, it is about denying the truth, in order to retain power.


The entire field of economics, with much of its refusal to adapt to conflicting empirical evidence and theoretical problems, is one of the prime examples of this today; however, like the article describes, many of the 'fakes' there don't know they are fake, they think the knowledge they have gained is legitimate.

That article has nothing to do with economics. It's about Post-Marxist spoofers like Althusser and Lacan, who tie themselves into knots with their obfuscatory and convoluted writings. They do this precisely because it is pseudo-intellectual waffle, and they can easily respond to their detractors with a simple "that's not what I meant". They are the faux-intellectuals, and humanities departments up and down the country treat them as demi-gods. Again, nothing to do with economics. It's plain to see that you have an agenda, which you shoehorn in wherever you see fit. Strange, for someone who is supposedly ideology-free!

What agenda is that, exactly? (and what ideology do I follow?)

I never said the article is about economics, did I? I explicitly said it is about faux-intellectualism, the denial of truth, and the use of that to promote retention of power at the expense of truth; that is an excellent marker of what an ideologue may do.

You actually don't seem to disagree with anything I said there, yet still accuse me of having an agenda of some sort.