The Science of Libertarian Morality 11/03/2010
 From Reason.com A new social psychology study explores the moral formation of the libertarian personality. Ronald Bailey | November 2, 2010 When it comes to morality, libertarians are often typecast as immoral calculating rationalists who also have a somewhat unseemly hedonistic bent. Now new social science research shows that libertarians are quite moral, just not in the same way that conservatives and liberals are. University of Virginia social psychologist Jonathan Haidt has done considerable previous work probing the moral differences between American liberals and conservatives, but came to recognize that a significant proportion of Americans did not fit the simplistic left/right ideological dichotomy that dominates so much of our political and social discourse. Instead of ignoring outliers, Haidt and his colleagues chose instead to dig deeper. The result: A fascinating new study, “Understanding Libertarian Morality: The psychological roots of an individualist morality,” to be published in a forthcoming issue of The Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. In probing the moral thinking of libertarians, the study uses the “largest dataset of psychological measures ever compiled on libertarians,” involving moral surveys of more than 10,000 self-identified libertarians gathered online at the website yourmorals.org, run by Haidt and colleagues. Read more at Reason.com. 5 Comments Judgement in Justice 11/02/2010
 Amartya Sen writes in his "The Idea of Justice": Lord Mansfield, the powerful English judge in the eighteenth century, famously advised a newly appointed colonial governor: ‘consider what you think justice requires and decide accordingly. But never give your reasons; for your judgement will probably be right, but your reasons will certainly be wrong. ’ This may well be a good advice for tactful governance, but it is surely no way of guaranteeing that the right things are done. (pp. 4-5) This quote and Sen's response were responsible, last night, for my realizing that my thesis in the philosophy of justice does not hinge so much on the contrast between ideal theory and non-ideal theory, but on the contrast between theory and practice. Very little attention is paid in the philosophy of justice to actual practices of justice, and how agents of justice in fact make concrete judgements. These agents may not at all need theories of justice, whether such theories are ideal or non-ideal. The critics of ideal theory in justice tend to offer non-ideal theory as the proper alternative. My thinking is that a focus on practice rather than on theory may be a better, or at least an unexplored, alternative. In other words, with plenty of reservations and caveats, I am inclined to agree more with Lord Mansfield than with Amartya Sen re: the quote above. Hayek vs. Keynes Rap: the Sequel 11/01/2010
Russ Roberts and John Papola created a sequel to their brilliant first music video (more than 2 million views on YouTube!). Justice Theories and Practices 10/28/2010
 The abstract of an early version of my thesis in the philosophy of justice: The philosophy of (distributive or social) justice is dominated by two assumptions: ideal theory and statism. These two assumptions combine to form a top-down approach in which philosophical ideas about justice are supposed to inform public policy questions and practices of justice. The major complaint about ideal theory is however that it has become too disconnected with the real world to fulfil this role. This paper first sketches an bottom-up alternative to statism, namely pluralism which involves a variety of agents such as charities, businesses, foundations and private individuals who either intentionally, or as unintended consequences of their actions, are engaged in justice-increasing practices, and then goes on to argue that in this alternative the disconnect between theory and practice is likely to largely disappear. This discussion will unearth a more fundamental assumption that dominates the current literature on justice, namely the idea that there is or can be a general, more or less definite answer to the question what the principles of a just society are. The pluralist alternative in which diversity and context-sensitivity play crucial roles undermines this assumption. This position is clarified by comparing the search for such principles to the now largely abandoned search in the philosophy of science for a general, abstract methodology for science. Bob Murphy debating Paul Krugman 10/22/2010
 This is such a great idea for so many reasons. (the only downside is that only people from the US, Canada, the UK, and Australia seem to be able to make the pledge on the website) Murphy's website Murphy's article archive on Mises.org Realism and counterfactuals Redux 10/21/2010
 In my previous post I described how the related ideas of non-precisive abstraction and counterfactual analysis appear to make exact, realistic and informative economic laws a real possibility. In this post however I describe the severe limitations of this view. The main problem becomes clear once we realize that in addition to exactitude, realism and informative value we want something else from economic laws: we want them to be useful. The problem with the counterfactual view is that there is a trade-off between realism and exactitutde on the one hand, and usefulness on the other.
(what follows is still rather confused and sketchy, but there may be a good idea in there somewhere) Jon Elster about functionalist explanations 10/20/2010
 Jon Elster Jon Elster makes an important point about functionalist explanations. Such an explanation is valid only if it satisfies these five criteria.
(1) Y is an effect of X (2) Y is beneficial for Z (3) Y is unintended by the actors producing X (4) Y (or at least the causal relationship between X and Y) is unrecognized by the actors in Z (5) Y maintains X by a causal feedback loop passing through Z.‘ If an analysis satisfies all five criteria it is an example of a functionalist explanation. Elster points out that all too often in sociology authors claim to have given a functionalist explanation for the presence of an institution or some other aggregate phenomenon whereas in fact only criteria (1)-(4) are satisfied. The causal feedback loop in such cases is postulated or assumed rather than demonstrated. The only example of a functionalist explanation in the social sciences that Elster can think of is the selection argument of the Chicago School. But doesn't the persistence of money meet these criteria as well?  Are there economic laws that – pace e.g. Daniel Hausman and Nancy Cartwright - are both exact, realistic and informative about the real world? In this post I briefly describe the views of Austrian economists/philosophers
Guido Hülsmann and Roderick Long who think that indeed there can be such laws, criticize these views and present a possible way forward. Willpower a nearly unlimited resource? 10/16/2010
 A new study finds: "In a paper published this week in Psychological Science, the researchers challenge a long-held theory that willpower -- defined as the ability to resist temptation and stay focused on a demanding task -is a limited resource. Scientists have argued that when willpower is drained, the only way to restore it is by recharging our bodies with rest, food or some other physical distraction that takes you away from whatever is burning you out. Not so, says the Stanford team. Instead, they've found that a person's mindset and personal beliefs about willpower determine how long and how well they'll be able to work on a tough mental exercise. "If you think of willpower as something that's biologically limited, you're more likely to be tired when you perform a difficult task," said Veronika Job, the paper's lead author. "But if you think of willpower as something that is not easily depleted, you can go on and on."" Read more. Is humanitarian aid like arms trade? 10/15/2010
 For good reason many people are appalled by the international trade in arms intended for warfare. The trade capitalizes on what is perhaps the most horrific feature of politics, namely war, and the trade may well enable and help perpetuate such wars.
Humanitarian aid exactly tries to alleviate the suffering that goes with war, and as such it has gotten a much better rep. But some say that humanitarian aid similarly capitalizes on, enables and worsens violent conflict. An article by Philip Gourevitch (who earlier wrote a haunting book about the genocide in Rwanda) reviews a book by Dutch journalist Linda Polman that claims as much: | KoenArchivesNovember 2010 CategoriesAll |
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