Principles of Economics ... Translated -- 5 min 20 sec
"Mankiw's 10 principles of economics, translated for the uninitiated", by Yoram Bauman, standupeconomist.com. Presented at the AAAS humor session, February 16, 2007. The talk is based on a published article in Annals of Improbable Research -- LINK.
In recent months I have noticed a shift in emphasis, in skeptical circles, from the subject of religion to that of economics. It does make sense given the change in US Presidential Administrations from an individual who appeared to rely a bit much on divine intervention to a person that could be accused of have a bit too much faith in governmental intervention. For example, this morning I noticed that there were as many new discussions over at Atheist Nexus on the subject of economics as religion. Like religious claims,I firmly believe that economic theories are worthy of critical analysis. I am not an expert on economics, however, I can see a discussion of this nature going bad for a lot of the same reasons I felt that the religious issue wasn't being handled properly. Chief among these concerns is the fact, and it is hard not to notice, that economics is a subject which makes it very easy to disguise opinion as fact and for someone who knows little about the subject to sound like they know what they are talking about. My late father used to say that:
"Half-educated people are the most dangerous people there are ... Because they sound like they know what they are talking about ..."Furthermore, emotions are bound to run, if anything, even higher due to the real world consequences of economic theories becoming economic policies. This is not to say that religious beliefs don't have real world consequences ... They most certainly do. However, saying that you don't believe someone's personal savior was God on Earth or born of a virgin is a little bit different than saying that it is someone's own fault that they have become homeless.
I'm not one of those people who goes out and debunks Michael Moore movies. On a personal level I think that he should have gotten Ray Bradbury's permission before aping the title of Bradbury's book for Fahrenheit 9/11 and I think that some of his more provocative allegations regarding links between the family of then President George W. Bush and that of Osama bin Laden had a lot to do with propelling the September 11 Conspiracy Theories from the back pages of UFO magazines to the comment sections of my personal webpages. This, by the way, was something that really upset me as I just did not like President George W. Bush. It wasn't even anything to do with politics I simply disliked the man personally and it was a very uncomfortable and, in my view, unfair situation for me to have been placed in to have to essentially defend a man I personally despised. Those are all side issues. While I don't generally take an interest in Moore's work and I have no intention of seeing his new film Capitalism: A Love Story this particular piece of YouTubery could not help but catch my eye when it appeared on the Atheist Media Blog a few weeks ago.
Michael Moore Capitalism is Anti Christian -- 1 min 11 sec
Now being the obnoxious infidel of the bellicose variety everyone knows me to be my first reaction was, quite naturally, that if, Moore could make the case that Capitalism was anti-Christian then, it was my duty to defend Capitalism as a part of my great strategy to finally make the world stop believing in things that aren't true. But about a second later it occurred to me that that kind of dualism fosters more false beliefs than Christianity ever could and that it was entirely possible for BOTH Michael Moore and capitalism to be flawed. Because one is flawed does not, by any stretch of the imagination, make the other less flawed. It is a radical idea, but I think that skeptical analysis and critical thinking actually DO require an appreciation of nuance.
On top of that, I cannot, quite frankly, support some of the ideas which were being put forward by capitalism's secular proponents in the comment section where I found that video eg: abolishing the minimum wage, privatizing the public schools, turning social security over to (frankly untrustworthy) private equity markets, etc, et..al, ad nauseam ...
In fact, I think that these are TERRIBLE ideas with no rational basis for them whatsoever. This sort of thinking actually comes down to embracing corruption and cruelty when there are, in fact, several rational arguments why abolishing private enterprise would be problematic economically. This sort of feeling that the world was moving away from my ideals was amplified when I went to check a story on the webpage of our local newspaper regarding a house fire in my neighborhood only to find 20 comments from right-wing losers saying that the fire department is socialism and needed to be abolished. This is the classic example of irrational dualism. Just because it may not be a good idea to abolish capitalism does not mean that everything noncapitalist must need be abolished.
This "wall of irrationality" is very similar to the problems I ran into in trying to discuss religion. For instance, when I would try and, politely, point out the implausibility certain arguments regarding Astrotheology (which isn't even a real word by the way) I just couldn't get anyone to listen (instead I got emailed a reading list of Atheist books that I had already read and which the sender clearly had not read). It turns out that some of the great secular firebrands like Sam Harris and Bill Maher are supporters of some forms of activism which go, very badly, against a lot of the goals that I am trying to accomplish. I was attacked for pointing this out from people I thought to be rational. Some of them even started to defend some of Maher's outlandish statements regarding Western Medicine. This would be like a skeptic who agrees with Dennis Kucinich on a single issue such as healthcare feeling the need to defend his belief that he was in communication with extraterrestrials.
Another similarity to religion is the fact that the study of economics is very, very complicated. For instance, in the religious debate, someone unfamiliar with Hebrew or Greek might easily take at face value claims such as the that the word Israel was derived from the Egyptian myths of Isis and Ra. It actually means "he who wrestles with God" in reference to Genesis 32:22-31 where the patriarch Jacob has his name changed to Israel for having won a wrestling match with God. This is even more scandalous, if you ask me, but neither here nor there. The point of the matter is that subjects such as: Econometrics, Advanced Calculus and even Differential Topology, while essential to the development of economic models, look an awful lot like Greek or Hebrew to an average, ordinary blogger and if, one truly wishes to disprove these economic models without any understanding of how they are constructed or tested then, he or she is very likely to get in over his or her head and, from what I've seen, very quickly.
Furthermore, as most skeptics are too aware, there are large number of BIZZARRE Conspiracy Theories regarding the Federal Reserve floating around Google Video and YouTube and it is not always apparent when discussing economic policy with someone that an individual's concerns are genuine and informed by accurate and unbiased data as opposed to being misinformed by border-line-antisemitic-rhetoric originating with the John Birch Society.
Zeitgeist Debunked Again -- 8 min 39 sec
Again, as I have said about the religious issue, there are a lot of aspects of economic policy which can be critically examined without either having to go back and get a degree in the subject or falling prey to crack-pot pseudoscholarship. I don't believe this myself, but a rational case can be made that Monetary Policy isn't doing all that it promised with regards to controlling inflation and unemployment and that we might wish to reconsider Wage and price Controls. Or I can play both ways, I've seen some very rational studies which indicate that the counter-recessionary effects of Fiscal Policy are only temporary and are thus incapable of stimulating any real economic growth. Again, I'm not convinced of that myself but it is something to consider before we let the Government borrow another $800 Billion in hopes of jump-starting the economy. But efforts to get one's facts straight needs to be apparent.
Sadly, very sadly, these aren't the kinds of discussions I see going on with regards to the economy at all. Instead it all graduates toward that irrational dualism I referred to earlier as a red flag that what I am about to hear isn't going to be very helpful. Either someone feels that the entire free-enterprise system or the United State's (and probably other country's) social safety net(s) are in need of abolishment, the sooner the better and no exceptions, ifs, ands or buts. The fact of the matter is that A LOT of people starved to death unnecessarily under both Communism and Robber Barron Social Darwinism (although, to be fair, I am told that Communism has taken the lead in the last decade and by a fairly wide margin at that) and both the public and private sectors have been, and continue to be, integral components of this great era of innovation which has been witnessed in the United States (and across The World) since World War II.
To summarize, I just don't see why a community which values reason and rationality needs to get involved in board wars advocating such ridiculous extremes. I understand that a pro-science point-of-view does not immunize someone from the increasing polarization in American (and probably other Country's) public discourse, however, I honestly see economics as an issue where it is not only possible but beneficial to stick to facts and realistic objectives which can contribute to the national dialog and rationally inform public policy. Also, my experience is that the the tactic of stringing together little provocative tidbits of disconnected history in order to blame one's opponent for all of the discomfort in the world today is a tactic exclusively used by pseudoscientists. Frankly, if you find yourself doing that, whether it be: religion, politics, economics or on matters of science, you really should ask yourself if you are advancing a: pro-science, rational and secular world-view or not.
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