Sunday, March 3, 2013
No choice
By having to pick some currency in which to charge taxes, and by having to pick to pick some language in which to record information, the government cannot not choose a currency and a language for the territory whereas it rules.
Saturday, February 16, 2013
No risk free assets
If
1) A security's risk is defined as the variability of return, and
2) US government T-bills' return is not fixed, and
3) a risk-free asset is defined as one with zero risk,
then
T-bills are not risk-free assets.
1) A security's risk is defined as the variability of return, and
2) US government T-bills' return is not fixed, and
3) a risk-free asset is defined as one with zero risk,
then
T-bills are not risk-free assets.
Wednesday, February 6, 2013
Governance versus profit
No failure in corporate governance disproves the apodictic axiom of aiming at profit maximizing in every and all properly defined firm or entreprenurial project. What a failure in corporate governance demonstrates is merely the coexistence within the company of several differenciated firms, at least one of which exerts what from the ownership's point of view of the other firms is seen as coercion. This coercion, just to be clear, is different from market competition.
Sunday, February 3, 2013
Planned or spontaneous?
 |
| Picture 1 |
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| Picture 2 |
After seeing the second picture, take another look at the first one again and answer again the first question. Did your opinion change?
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| Picture 3 |
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| Picture 4 |
Does this fourth picture somehow change your answer to the question with respect to the third photo? (Once again, compare the third and fourth pictures.)
How many "disordered" cubes there are out of the two?
Is one of them already solved? If so, can you say which one?
Can it be that both are already solved?
Can it be that none is already solved?
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| Picture 5 |
Friday, January 25, 2013
To believe or not to believe
It seems incredible to me that some people believe in God, but it seems even more incredible that some people don't.
Thursday, January 10, 2013
A manifesto on the epistemology of economics
1. The prime cause of economic phenomena is purposeful behavior. Economics qua economics doesn't have any more to explain once it arrives at this prime cause.
2. Every economic phenomenon is caused ultimately caused by the prime cause. Something not linkable to the prime cause is, ex definitione, not economic.
3. Through logic, it is possible to develop explanations about economic phenomena whose logic concatenation could not be obvious at first sight.
4. The interaction of the purposeful behavior of different agents or of the same agent through time or of the same agent with regard to different goals could generate the emergence of spontaneous orders which are themselves purposeless.
5. The method of economic logic is useful to explain economic orders and, through this, to arrive at pattern predictions, empirically falsifiable.
6. Economic logic is logically falsifiable in the sense that the chain of reasoning can be proven wrong by not obeying the logic method.
7. Economic logic is empirically falsifiable in principle, in the sense that its primitive assumptions can be proven not to be present in a factual situation.
8. Economic logic is often empirically not falsifiable in practice, in the sense that there is empirically impossible sometimes or always to falsify some primitive assumptions. For instance, it is impossible to empirically falsify that an assumed agent is not such. At the end, the attribution of some assumptions to facts is often a matter of faith. For instance, there is an ultimate impossibility for you to falsify whether this text is the work of an agent (i. e. the external successful fruit of a will) or just characters randomly disposed. Under a model which assigns equal chance to a list of characters to be randomly disposed in each position for a string of some positions, the chance that this exact text be the fruit of pure chance is higher than zero. So, at the end there is an inextricable, this is a necessary, portion the faith, even if small, in your hypothesis that this text is a fruit of some will, a purposeful behavior, an economic phenomenon.
9. Whichever which is not logically and therefore generally modelable is history, is particular.
10. The particular can be approached through statistics, but this, to be sure, is not economic logic.
2. Every economic phenomenon is caused ultimately caused by the prime cause. Something not linkable to the prime cause is, ex definitione, not economic.
3. Through logic, it is possible to develop explanations about economic phenomena whose logic concatenation could not be obvious at first sight.
4. The interaction of the purposeful behavior of different agents or of the same agent through time or of the same agent with regard to different goals could generate the emergence of spontaneous orders which are themselves purposeless.
5. The method of economic logic is useful to explain economic orders and, through this, to arrive at pattern predictions, empirically falsifiable.
6. Economic logic is logically falsifiable in the sense that the chain of reasoning can be proven wrong by not obeying the logic method.
7. Economic logic is empirically falsifiable in principle, in the sense that its primitive assumptions can be proven not to be present in a factual situation.
8. Economic logic is often empirically not falsifiable in practice, in the sense that there is empirically impossible sometimes or always to falsify some primitive assumptions. For instance, it is impossible to empirically falsify that an assumed agent is not such. At the end, the attribution of some assumptions to facts is often a matter of faith. For instance, there is an ultimate impossibility for you to falsify whether this text is the work of an agent (i. e. the external successful fruit of a will) or just characters randomly disposed. Under a model which assigns equal chance to a list of characters to be randomly disposed in each position for a string of some positions, the chance that this exact text be the fruit of pure chance is higher than zero. So, at the end there is an inextricable, this is a necessary, portion the faith, even if small, in your hypothesis that this text is a fruit of some will, a purposeful behavior, an economic phenomenon.
9. Whichever which is not logically and therefore generally modelable is history, is particular.
10. The particular can be approached through statistics, but this, to be sure, is not economic logic.
Sunday, January 6, 2013
Saturday, December 29, 2012
The part and the whole
Can you know the whole by observing the part? If you are grasping the whole by the part, then you're not observing the part indeed: you're observing the whole from a specific viewpoint. As long as a viewpoint necessarily leads to another viewpoint, you're grasping the whole.
A true part doesn't allow to know the other parts. It is necessary but not sufficient to know the whole. However the part conveys some information about the whole which can be classified in two categories: one, definite but limited knowledge about the whole; two, reduction of the possible true assertions which can be given about the whole, or which is the same, some information about what the whole is not.
A true part doesn't allow to know the other parts. It is necessary but not sufficient to know the whole. However the part conveys some information about the whole which can be classified in two categories: one, definite but limited knowledge about the whole; two, reduction of the possible true assertions which can be given about the whole, or which is the same, some information about what the whole is not.
Friday, December 28, 2012
An explicit bet
The Fed members seemed to agree that unemployment was to high and that they were ready to concede a slightly higher inflation in order to reduce the unemployment rate.
This is how on its December FOMC statement, the Fed decided to undertake a monetary policy which basically increases the quantity of money in the economy. The goal was that more money means more credit and more general activity and, at the end, more employment (less unemployment) and production, even if recognizing a cost through more inflation. But the Fed is more explicit: the statement asserts that a reduction on the unemployment rate is going to be pursued as long as inflation doesn't reach 2.5%
The Phillips curve is a supposed relation between unemployment and inflation. What is the shape of that curve at any point in time? What does it shift (changes the shift) of that curve? Those are empirical questions over which economists have debated for years.
With their very explicit, quantitatively measurable policy, what the Fed members are telling amounts to bet that the Phillips curve has a specific shape, a shape such that lays under the point {unemployment: 7.7, inflation 1.6}. This is so, because only such a curve (drawn as the green curve in the graph), allows to reach an unemployment rate of 6.5% or less before reaching an inflation of 2.5% or more.
However, if the Phillips curve lays over the point {unemployment: 7.7, inflation 1.6}, i. e. if the Phillips curve has a shape as that of the blue curve on the graph, then the Fed is going to reach the 2.5% inflation milestone before reducing unemployment under 6.5%, being therefore unable to reach the undartaken goal of having an unemployment of 6.5% or less with an inflation of 2.5% or less.
Next months and years are going to be really interesting in matching reality against the Fed view on the Phillips curve, is going to be a rarely good contribution to the empirical debate, and is going to give a very clear case study to economics teachers.
Green or blue? Make your bet!
Saturday, December 22, 2012
Mean means: true versus merely apparent economics
Explanation of economic phenomena is rarely an end in itself, some times a means for technological ends, and near to always a pretext to deceive others and oneself.
Wednesday, December 19, 2012
A praxeological modelling of government
Every right is exclusive: it aims to exclude all others from commanding that over what the right is invested.
A right is only meaningful when there are means, available (included being to the knowledge of) to the right owner, to successfully defend it against any other attempt to violate it.
A rules structure is any list of all not conflicting rights.
Conflict comes from the confronting of two or more different rules structures.
Conflict is a case of absence of cooperation (the only other case of absence of cooperation being autarky).
The set of actions, either by one agents or by more, aimed to defend a rules structure, i. .e. to attack any other rules structure, conforms a government.
A government is, by definition, in conflict (i. e. in war) with any other government.
Two apparent governments which are in no conflict whatsoever, i. e. which defend the same rules structure, are not two governments but two parts of one same government.
One apparent same government which changes a rules structure, i. e. which enters into conflict with a previously defended rules structure at least in some part, it is not the same government than before but other government, therefore an enemy of the former, even if it is composed by the same people, and governs in the same place than the former. A change in the rules structure is, in kind and regardless of magnitude, akin to a coup d'état.
The apparent "meta-right" of having the right to change other rights amounts to the effective non-existence of those other rights. As long as some have the effective power to change others' rights, the others don't have rights but only the some.
A right is only meaningful when there are means, available (included being to the knowledge of) to the right owner, to successfully defend it against any other attempt to violate it.
A rules structure is any list of all not conflicting rights.
Conflict comes from the confronting of two or more different rules structures.
Conflict is a case of absence of cooperation (the only other case of absence of cooperation being autarky).
The set of actions, either by one agents or by more, aimed to defend a rules structure, i. .e. to attack any other rules structure, conforms a government.
A government is, by definition, in conflict (i. e. in war) with any other government.
Two apparent governments which are in no conflict whatsoever, i. e. which defend the same rules structure, are not two governments but two parts of one same government.
One apparent same government which changes a rules structure, i. e. which enters into conflict with a previously defended rules structure at least in some part, it is not the same government than before but other government, therefore an enemy of the former, even if it is composed by the same people, and governs in the same place than the former. A change in the rules structure is, in kind and regardless of magnitude, akin to a coup d'état.
The apparent "meta-right" of having the right to change other rights amounts to the effective non-existence of those other rights. As long as some have the effective power to change others' rights, the others don't have rights but only the some.
Sunday, December 9, 2012
Government, Inc.
Wouldn't be better if government ownership were embodied on stock? After all, elections are already driven by little more than financial power.
Monday, November 19, 2012
Capitalandbor
The difference between capital and land is that capital is a produced input. What is, I ask, the economic relevance whatsoever that an input is previously produced or unproduced? Also, what's the economic relevance of distinguishing between labor, input humanly embodied, and not humanly embodied inputs? Is a worker produced or unproduced or a mix of both, and does this have any economic relevance whatsoever?
Inputs classification among land, capital, and labor obeys to an interest in political science corresponding to the England of the Industrial Revolution, but since the viewpoint of modern economic theory, that classification is absolutely irrelevant if not actually damaging to the development of the theory.
If any, a distinction between debt and equity would be less useless.
Inputs classification among land, capital, and labor obeys to an interest in political science corresponding to the England of the Industrial Revolution, but since the viewpoint of modern economic theory, that classification is absolutely irrelevant if not actually damaging to the development of the theory.
If any, a distinction between debt and equity would be less useless.
Sunday, November 18, 2012
Alchemy economics
Chartism (euphemistically, technical "analysis") is alchemy economics in three senses:
1) it pursues golden correct price forecasts,
2) it ultimately doesn't achieve it,
3) it eventually brings closer the understanding of true economic science.
1) it pursues golden correct price forecasts,
2) it ultimately doesn't achieve it,
3) it eventually brings closer the understanding of true economic science.
Thursday, November 15, 2012
A manifesto on general epistemology
1. Everything in the physical universe is deterministic, i. e. caused, i. e. related to the rest of the physical universe.
2. Knowing all the causes, the effect is necessarily known.
3. Not knowing all the causes, possible causes are tried (tested). This is basically an heuristic process.
4. What is a cause is a different question of how is that a cause interact so as to provoke an effect. Determining what is a cause is forecasting. Determining how is that a cause interact is explaining.
5. Not knowing the total logic of a cause-effect relation, i. e. not being able to fully explain a cause-effect relation (including but not limited to not being able to fully forecast the full list of causes which provoke an effect), possible causes are tried (tested). This process of finding provisional hypothesis is basically an heuristic process.
6. An heuristic theory cannot be accepted, i. e. cannot be taken as a complete explanation of some effect. An heuristic theory can only be failed to be rejected in the sense of being unable to find an obvious contradiction. It takes only an asserted contradiction to reject an heuristic hypothesis.
7. A heuristic theory calls for statistic inferential tests as the process to determine its definite rejection or its everlasting provisional failure to reject it.
8. An explanation is a logical structure which if free from logical errors cannot be contradicted by reality. Due to the complex nature of the reality far beyond of human ability to explain (or the totality of reality is explained or not), explanations are only mental logical structurizations.
9. A structure or model is a logical structurization in which the effects are fully explainable through the causes.
10. A model can only be proved wrong through finding a logical error. It can never be proved wrong through empirical testing.
11. In the aim of reality only particular explanations are possible. The study of reality is always the study of concrete episodes, it is history.
12. A model can be used to advance an understanding of an empirical, i. e. historical or real, phenomenon even if the full exhaustive explanation of reality is impossible.
13. An exhaustive explanation of reality would be an explanation of all reality, through all times and all spaces. It would include, but wouldn't be limited to, the reduction of mental phenomena to physical phenomena. Given that the very cerebral process which would aspire to such an explanation would of need require physical changes in the process of explaining, that would create a loop to eternal development of explanation which, under the physical limitations of human nature are not just technological but logically impossible.
14. In order to use a model to advance the understanding of specific aspects of reality, an identification of the model's concepts with heuristically defined aspects of reality must to be achieved. An example in economics would be the identification of the concept of agent with a specific human being, for instance. The question of whether a regular adult, or child, or an idiot, or a baby, or the most intelligent animal in the world, or a regular dog, or a mouse, or a roach, or a bacteria, or a molecule, or a plant, or a piece of wood, or a chair, or an office, or a factory or the state, or a religion, or the universe is an agent or not, is at the end an heuristic decision whose appropriateness depends, in science, of its power to advance understanding, whose appropriateness in advance, depends, in technology, of its power to allow the assembly of inventions which work.
2. Knowing all the causes, the effect is necessarily known.
3. Not knowing all the causes, possible causes are tried (tested). This is basically an heuristic process.
4. What is a cause is a different question of how is that a cause interact so as to provoke an effect. Determining what is a cause is forecasting. Determining how is that a cause interact is explaining.
5. Not knowing the total logic of a cause-effect relation, i. e. not being able to fully explain a cause-effect relation (including but not limited to not being able to fully forecast the full list of causes which provoke an effect), possible causes are tried (tested). This process of finding provisional hypothesis is basically an heuristic process.
6. An heuristic theory cannot be accepted, i. e. cannot be taken as a complete explanation of some effect. An heuristic theory can only be failed to be rejected in the sense of being unable to find an obvious contradiction. It takes only an asserted contradiction to reject an heuristic hypothesis.
7. A heuristic theory calls for statistic inferential tests as the process to determine its definite rejection or its everlasting provisional failure to reject it.
8. An explanation is a logical structure which if free from logical errors cannot be contradicted by reality. Due to the complex nature of the reality far beyond of human ability to explain (or the totality of reality is explained or not), explanations are only mental logical structurizations.
9. A structure or model is a logical structurization in which the effects are fully explainable through the causes.
10. A model can only be proved wrong through finding a logical error. It can never be proved wrong through empirical testing.
11. In the aim of reality only particular explanations are possible. The study of reality is always the study of concrete episodes, it is history.
12. A model can be used to advance an understanding of an empirical, i. e. historical or real, phenomenon even if the full exhaustive explanation of reality is impossible.
13. An exhaustive explanation of reality would be an explanation of all reality, through all times and all spaces. It would include, but wouldn't be limited to, the reduction of mental phenomena to physical phenomena. Given that the very cerebral process which would aspire to such an explanation would of need require physical changes in the process of explaining, that would create a loop to eternal development of explanation which, under the physical limitations of human nature are not just technological but logically impossible.
14. In order to use a model to advance the understanding of specific aspects of reality, an identification of the model's concepts with heuristically defined aspects of reality must to be achieved. An example in economics would be the identification of the concept of agent with a specific human being, for instance. The question of whether a regular adult, or child, or an idiot, or a baby, or the most intelligent animal in the world, or a regular dog, or a mouse, or a roach, or a bacteria, or a molecule, or a plant, or a piece of wood, or a chair, or an office, or a factory or the state, or a religion, or the universe is an agent or not, is at the end an heuristic decision whose appropriateness depends, in science, of its power to advance understanding, whose appropriateness in advance, depends, in technology, of its power to allow the assembly of inventions which work.
Wednesday, October 17, 2012
Blackmail law
If
1) an agent A believes that other agent B has command over what A considers a good i,
2) A prefers i to other good j,
3) A has command over j, and
4) B knows 1) and 3),
then
B has command over j.
1) an agent A believes that other agent B has command over what A considers a good i,
2) A prefers i to other good j,
3) A has command over j, and
4) B knows 1) and 3),
then
B has command over j.
Wednesday, September 12, 2012
Sexual education
Good sexual education is learning how to discipline the body so as to pursue long-term happiness.
Bad sexual education is about how dealing with an uncontrolled body, it's about damage control.
Worst sexual education is misleading the body towards depravity, a.k.a. soul slaving by a body gone mad. It's the opposite of sexual freedom.
Good sexual education is learning about the meaningful role of sex in human fulfillment of happiness. It's about love.
Shallow sexual education is learning about body parts and bodily functions which are anyway written in instinct.
Good sexual education is about duty rather than pleasure, which paradoxically leads to pleasure.
Bad sexual education is about pleasure rather than duty, which paradoxically leads away from enduring pleasure.
Good sexual education is about using sex in pursuit of happiness.
Bad sexual education leads to sacrificing happiness to void sex.
Good sexual education leads towards enjoying sex.
Bad sexual education leads towards suffering sex, towards sex as a vice.
Good sexual education is about love for others.
Bad sexual education is about selfishness.
Bad sexual education is about not being an adolescent mother. It gives ideas about postponing which "make sense" far beyond adolescence.
Good sexual education is about not being a single mother. It gives ideas about how to start a family.
Good sexual education is about children, and becoming parent as a means. It's about giving.
Bad sexual education is about the selfish pleasure of parenting using the child as a means. It's about asking. It's about human pets.
Good sexual education is about lifetime compromise. It's about matrimony.
Bad sexual education is about good-while-rendering. It's about a civil contract useful when the expected breakup arrives. It's about planning divorce. It's cynical.
Good sexual education is about human dignity, about what makes our bodies sacred, about respecting ourselves.
Bad sexual education is about how to put on a condom as to avoid chlamydia.
Bad sexual education is about statistics.
Good sexual education is about not judging the neighbor and custody of the own eyes.
Good sexual education leads to being a good person.
Bad sexual education leads to being a bad person.
Good sexual education is about highlighting that the most natural thing is for sex to be considered taboo; this is, something which is not irreverently talked about but something intimate, special.
Bad sexual education aims at eliminating the taboo character of sex, turning it into base, mean, and coarse. That's why sexual explicitness is everywhere attached to bad manners and lack of education.
Bad sexual education is about learning to use condoms.
Good sexual education about learning not to use porn.
Bad sexual education is about looking for pleasure.
Good sexual education is about running away from danger and pain.
Bad sexual education is about how dealing with an uncontrolled body, it's about damage control.
Worst sexual education is misleading the body towards depravity, a.k.a. soul slaving by a body gone mad. It's the opposite of sexual freedom.
Good sexual education is learning about the meaningful role of sex in human fulfillment of happiness. It's about love.
Shallow sexual education is learning about body parts and bodily functions which are anyway written in instinct.
Good sexual education is about duty rather than pleasure, which paradoxically leads to pleasure.
Bad sexual education is about pleasure rather than duty, which paradoxically leads away from enduring pleasure.
Good sexual education is about using sex in pursuit of happiness.
Bad sexual education leads to sacrificing happiness to void sex.
Good sexual education leads towards enjoying sex.
Bad sexual education leads towards suffering sex, towards sex as a vice.
Good sexual education is about love for others.
Bad sexual education is about selfishness.
Bad sexual education is about not being an adolescent mother. It gives ideas about postponing which "make sense" far beyond adolescence.
Good sexual education is about not being a single mother. It gives ideas about how to start a family.
Good sexual education is about children, and becoming parent as a means. It's about giving.
Bad sexual education is about the selfish pleasure of parenting using the child as a means. It's about asking. It's about human pets.
Good sexual education is about lifetime compromise. It's about matrimony.
Bad sexual education is about good-while-rendering. It's about a civil contract useful when the expected breakup arrives. It's about planning divorce. It's cynical.
Good sexual education is about human dignity, about what makes our bodies sacred, about respecting ourselves.
Bad sexual education is about how to put on a condom as to avoid chlamydia.
Bad sexual education is about statistics.
Good sexual education is about not judging the neighbor and custody of the own eyes.
Good sexual education leads to being a good person.
Bad sexual education leads to being a bad person.
Good sexual education is about highlighting that the most natural thing is for sex to be considered taboo; this is, something which is not irreverently talked about but something intimate, special.
Bad sexual education aims at eliminating the taboo character of sex, turning it into base, mean, and coarse. That's why sexual explicitness is everywhere attached to bad manners and lack of education.
Bad sexual education is about learning to use condoms.
Good sexual education about learning not to use porn.
Bad sexual education is about looking for pleasure.
Good sexual education is about running away from danger and pain.
Saturday, September 8, 2012
Obama seen from the eyes of a Latin American
Obama is the President of the United States and, still more important an America citizen. Plus, he seems a very intelligent individual. Nevertheless, Obama can't help being Third World minded and having a decisive non-American background. I don't know how easy is for Americans seeing this, but being myself born in the Third World, living in it, and breathing everyday its deepest short-term sight, its envious desire to abuse the property of others, and its, and its sly lack of respect for values and tradition, I can tell you Americans, from the deepest of my heart, that Obama is a typical Underdeveloped World's leader.
Obama represents that why people abandon Latin America. It is the opposite force to the magic attraction and fascination caused by the Statue of Liberty to those who want to be owners of themselves. Being infatuated with Obama's promises is a symptom of cowardice, of fear of freedom.
Do you want less unemployment? Piece of cake! Reduce the artificial rigidities on labor market; correct incentives on actual workers, unemployed people, and employers.
Do you appreciate the old day's glory when America was seen as the light enlightening the world trough path of development? Embrace authentic freedom again!
May not the American Dream die. It's in the interest of the whole world. May not the Americans buy the siren's sweet, deadly song.
Obama represents that why people abandon Latin America. It is the opposite force to the magic attraction and fascination caused by the Statue of Liberty to those who want to be owners of themselves. Being infatuated with Obama's promises is a symptom of cowardice, of fear of freedom.
Do you want less unemployment? Piece of cake! Reduce the artificial rigidities on labor market; correct incentives on actual workers, unemployed people, and employers.
Do you appreciate the old day's glory when America was seen as the light enlightening the world trough path of development? Embrace authentic freedom again!
May not the American Dream die. It's in the interest of the whole world. May not the Americans buy the siren's sweet, deadly song.
Saturday, September 1, 2012
Verbs
The Diary of a Nonnative English Speaker: I like the easy way in which you just can verb any word in English but I have problems with phrasing together or phrasing up or whatever it must be told out or written down.
Sunday, August 26, 2012
On the production function
Technology is the known recipes to produce output out of inputs. A production function is a relation between quantities of output and respective quantities of inputs required to produce such quantities given the technology.
With perfect knowledge about the list of inputs, the only logical conclusion is that there can be no more that constant returns to scale. With constant returns to scale there cannot be increasing marginal returns.
So, the apparent phenomena of non-constant returns to scale and increasing marginal returns are logically due exclusively to ignorance about the list of inputs required to produce.
With perfect knowledge about the list of inputs, the only logical conclusion is that there can be no more that constant returns to scale. With constant returns to scale there cannot be increasing marginal returns.
So, the apparent phenomena of non-constant returns to scale and increasing marginal returns are logically due exclusively to ignorance about the list of inputs required to produce.
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