From Human Action:
. From time
immemorial men in thinking, speaking, and acting had taken the uni-
formity and immutability of the logical structure of the human mind
as an unquestionable fact. All scientific inquiry was based on this as-
sumption. In the discussions about the epistemological character of
economics, writers, for the first time in human history, denied this
proposition too.
Marxism asserts that a man’s thinking is determined
by his class affiliation. Every social class has a logic of its own. The
product of thought cannot be anything else than an "ideological dis-
guise" of the selfish class interests of the thinker. It is the task of a
“sociology of knowledge” to unmask philosophies and scientific
theories and to expose their “ideological” emptiness. Economics is a
“bourgeois” makeshift, the economists are “sycophants” of capital.
Only the classless society of the socialist utopia will substitute truth
for “ideological” lies.
This polylogism was later taught in various other forms also.
Historicism asserts that the logical structure of human thought and
action is liable to change in the course of historical evolution. Racial
polylogism assigns to each race a logic of its own. Finally there is
irrationalism, contending that reason as such is not fit to elucidate
the irrational forces that determine human behavior.
Such doctrines go far beyond the limits of economics. They ques-
tion not only economics and praxeology but all other human knowl-
edge and human reasoning in general. They refer to mathematics
and physics as well as to economics. It seems therefore that the task
of refuting them does not fall to any single branch of knowledge but
to epistemology and philosophy. This furnishes apparent justifica-
tion for the attitude of those economists who quietly continue their
studies without bothering about epistemological problems and the
objections raised by poIylogism and irrationalism. The physicist does
not mind if somebody stigmatizes his theories as bourgeois, Western
or Jewish; in the same way the economist should ignore detraction
and slander. He should let the dogs bark and pay no heed to their
yelping. It is seemly for him to remember Spinoza’s dictum:
“Indeed, just as light defines itself and darkness, so truth sets the standard for itself and falsity.”
However, the situation is not quite the same with regard to eco-
nomics as it is with mathematics and the natural sciences. Polylogism
and irrationaIism attack praxeology and economics. Although they
formulate their statements in a general way to refer to all branches
of knowledge, it is the sciences of human action that they really have
in view. They say that it is an illusion to believe that scientific re-
search can achieve results valid for people of all eras, races, and social
classes, and they take pleasure in disparaging certain physical and
biological theories as bourgeois or Western.
But if the soIution of
practical problems requires the application of tbese stigmatized doc-
trines, they forget their criticism. The technology of Soviet Russia
utilizes without scruple all the results of bourgeois physics, chemistry,
and biology just as if they were valid for all classes. The Nazi engi-
neers and physicians did not disdain to utilize the theories, discoveries,
and inventions of people of “inferior” races and nations. The be-
havior of people of all races, nations, religions, linguistic groups, and
social classes clearly proves that they do not endorse the doctrines
of polylogism and irrationalism as far as logic, mathematics, and
the natural sciences are concerned.
So, bottom line, what Mises is saying to the OP from the grave is. “How come you are asking this on an economics forum? Why don’t you go to a Physics or Engineering forum and point out that they are making a rather silly and unproven assumption, mainly that their logic is true in all times and places? All those bridges will just blow up the moment someone who thinks differently than you guys walk across it.”