The Glade 4.0

[youtube]d0nERTFo-Sk[/youtube]

Howdy everyone.

Welcome Back, RD.

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Well Ali Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezade had a thousand tales
But master you in luck 'cause up your sleeves you got a brand of magic never fails...
...Mister Aladdin, sir, What will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, Jot it down -You ain't never had a friend like me
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Bah beat me to this by 4 minutes! (and howdy!)

Welcome back, RD.

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Grenade 3 Sports Drink. It's fire in the hole.. Your hole!

RD! Yay!

Civil War! I'm with Hayek!

Hi RD =)

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“Strong people are harder to kill than weak people, and more useful in general”. - Mark Rippetoe

I'm curious as to where RangerDave sits on that divide; I think we all know where my position and such resides.

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Welcome back RangerDave!

Thanks for the welcome back, folks!



Well, I lack the knowledge necessary to really analyze and compare their views, but as you know, I tend to (i) split the difference between competing views from intelligent, good-faith advocates and (ii) trust expert consensus absent compelling evidence of error. So, given the reputations and respect both Keynes and Hayek enjoy, I'm inclined to be wishy-washy and say that I think both offer useful but imperfect insights into how the economy (and government intervention therein) works.

In terms of policy, I suspect the dominance of Keynesian (and Monetarist) theory in contemporary economics has probably been a bit too overwhelming and is thus in need of a corrective critique, particularly as regards "long-run" sustainability. However, it seems hard to deny the usefulness of Keynesian/Monetarist policy interventions in softening the short- and medium-run pain of economic downturns.

In other words, I have no flippin' idea, so I'm gonna play it safe! *chuckle*

Wimp! Heheh, WB RD.

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"Dress cops up as soldiers, give them military equipment, train them in military tactics, tell them they’re fighting a ‘war,’ and the consequences are predictable." —Radley Balko

RangerDave:

Alright, I'll state quite simply that "John Maynard Keynes was wrong" (tm), and give you this link as a starting point ...

"How Government Prolonged the Great Depression

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RD this idea that reality exists in the middle is illogical in the extreme.

If we have two people with two opposing views both with a large number of adherents. The first desires to kill you and the second desires for you not to be harmed - is the correct solution then to only have yourself maimed?

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"...but there exists also in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to attempt to lower the powerful to their own level and reduces men to prefer equality in slavery to inequality with freedom." - De Tocqueville

You're doing a good job of providing an example of a Golden Mean fallacy and you are correct; the right answer is not necessarily in the middle all the time.

However, merely showing that the fallacy exists is not enough - you need to show why the right answer is not necessarily in the middle in this particular case. The example you gave only shows how the fallacy works; it doesn't establish anything about this issue.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

I cannot show this to anyone in the specific incident until they understand the mistake in the general.

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"...but there exists also in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to attempt to lower the powerful to their own level and reduces men to prefer equality in slavery to inequality with freedom." - De Tocqueville

It's also possible there is no "right way" or "wrong way" here. Two mutual fund managers may take two very different tactics with regard to investing, and yet achieve the same end result. Neither was right, neither was wrong. It is entirely possible that someone could combine elements of the two and end up performing far better. It is also possible that someone could combine elements of the two and end up performing far worse.

There's a tendency among ideologues to look at the world in binary ways. Many, perhaps most things are not simply right or wrong, black or white.

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Well Ali Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezade had a thousand tales
But master you in luck 'cause up your sleeves you got a brand of magic never fails...
...Mister Aladdin, sir, What will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, Jot it down -You ain't never had a friend like me
█ ♣ █

So why didn't you show it right after you gave the example to illustrate the fallacy?

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

That is all true, and is implied by the name "Golden Mean fallacy" although perhaps "Golden Median fallacy" would be more linguistically correct. The name comes from assuming that the best solution is the "average" of all possible solutions, whether 2 or more, and whether extreme or relatively similar.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

There is no point in speaking more until it is affirmed that the general case is understood.

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"...but there exists also in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to attempt to lower the powerful to their own level and reduces men to prefer equality in slavery to inequality with freedom." - De Tocqueville

Thanks for the link, Khross. I'll give it a read when I get home from work tonight. Regarding your comment that Keynes was just flat wrong, though, do you really believe his theories were completely and utterly wrong on every major point, or do you think at least some of his views have merit? If the latter, could you point out a few of the topics about which you think he had useful insights?

Agreed, if the assertion is in the form of "B is between A and C; therefore B is correct." However, that's not what I'm asserting. My view is that "Neither A nor C are likely to be 100% correct or 100% incorrect; therefore there is some combination of the two (though not necessarily the midpoint), B, which is likely to be more correct than either A or C."

It's an assertion of probability given the available evidence (and my limited ability to evaluate such evidence), not logical necessity.

It is not much better to be of the consideration that "B is between A and C; therefore B is more likley correct.".

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"...but there exists also in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to attempt to lower the powerful to their own level and reduces men to prefer equality in slavery to inequality with freedom." - De Tocqueville

Think of it like an investing strategy. Given necessarily imperfect knowledge, I am more likely to protect and gradually increase my assets if I have a diversified portfolio than if I put all my eggs in one basket.

Ditto for economic theories. Given the limits of human knowledge and wisdom, neither the Keynesians nor the Austrians (nor anyone else, for that matter) are likely to have it all figured out, so a policy approach that considers and incorporates elements of both perspectives is more likely to avoid catastrophic error and thus be successful in the long-run than a policy approach that marries itself wholly to a single world-view.

I thought the scope was limited to the theory of the business cycle outlined in the video - not the scope of the entirity of the two schools of thought.

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"...but there exists also in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to attempt to lower the powerful to their own level and reduces men to prefer equality in slavery to inequality with freedom." - De Tocqueville

Ah, I see. Nah, I posted the video mostly because its general topic and funny/geeky feel are things I associate with the Glade, so I figured it'd be a good way of saying "hello" in my first post back. The specific issues addressed in it go beyond my knowledge base, so when we started getting into a real conversation, I was just talking about Keynesian vs. Austrian schools of thought in general.

Oh ok.

Keynes sucks.

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"...but there exists also in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to attempt to lower the powerful to their own level and reduces men to prefer equality in slavery to inequality with freedom." - De Tocqueville