If you'll excuse me for just a quick second. (Temporal Marginal Utility?)

Miscellaneous Newbies
1

Hey, i’m new to the forums here. I’m not in college yet and the school I went to didn’t offer economics, so what education I have is a result of private studies. I’m interested in economics, but more so in praxeology (Human Action served as my introduction to both economics and praxeology (i never finished it, but have read enough of it)). I’ve spent a good deal of time ponder the topic and have come to several conclusions of my own (which may already be out there)

As is put forward in Human Action, people act entirely egocentricly (specifically to alleviate a perceived unease). Personally, i agree with this fully; however, my classmates were never very accepting of this (selfishness is a vice to them, whereas improvidence is a vice to me). The question was posed on several occasion why self-sacrifice and other seemingly contradictory actions occur. I thought about it and wanted to test the waters with the explanation:

1 → somewhere in Human Action it is discussed how the farther away (temporally) something is the less we prioritize it / expect gratification from it (sort of like a temporal law of diminishing marginal utility)

2 —> if you were then to graph the individual’s cumulative expected returns at any given instant they would neccessitously approach something similar to an asymptote or limit (both because we cannot live forever and because of the above mentioned “temporal marginal utility”)

3 —> just as their would be a pleasure side, there would be a pain side. resulting in a rough felicitis calculus (if i may borrow an idea from cesare beccaria)

4 —> if you then add then negative pain calculation to the positive pleasure calculation, the resulting function will represent the individual’s outlook on life (depressed, optimistic, etc) at any given instant (it will not be quantitative of course) (i’ll refer to this as the magnitude line)

5 —> information determines the curve of the function. this explains why new events affect people’s outlook on life as well as their emotional reaction (emotions are, in my opinion, a subconscious mechanisms for steering the individuals towards greatest satisfaction)

6 —> using the above, several things should become clear:

  • the combination of the individual’s fear of death (the act of dying) combined with the value of the magnitude line could potentially point to whether or not an individual is suicidal

  • if an individual action’s magnitude line (consider it a rail road track) is considered superior to the incumbent one the individual will deviate

  • if an action results in death, but its overall magnitiude line is superior to the incumbent one, the individual will choose that action over life. an easy way to consider this (albeit simplified and inadequate) is:

a) that if the pleasure offered by an action resulting in death is greater than that which can otherwise (in the mind of the individual) be attained otherwise they will be willing to die for it

b) likewise, an action alleviating pain (but which results in death) such that the magnitude line is improved will is both logical and understandable (birthing the illusion of self-sacrifice)

Soo… there’s a lot more to be discussed here I am sure. The above probably needs revision and may be entirely incorrect (though i hope not). I would love to hear your thoughts on it. thanks!

2

Because people value self sacrifice. Because people achieve self fulfillment through self sacrifice, some more than others.

3

I just want to say welcome to the forum. It is refreshing to have a poster join who understands basic economics and praxeology. Hope you enjoy your stay.

4

That proposition (quoted and boldfaced above) is circular. Emotions define the level of satisfaction of an action (and therefore, emotions define the action of the greatest satisfaction).

5

From Les Soirées de la Rue Saint-Lazare By Gustave de Molinari.

ECONOMIST

I will do better; I will start by defining man, at least from the economic point of view.

Man is a combination of physical, moral, and intellectual forces. These various forces need to be constantly maintained and restored by the assimilation of forces like themselves. When they are not restored, they perish. This is as true for the intellectual and moral forces as for the physical ones.

Accordingly, man is obliged to assimilate new forces perpetually. How is he informed of this necessity? By pain. Any depletion of forces is accompanied by a pain. Any assimilation of forces, any consumption, is accompanied, on the contrary, by enjoyment. Stimulated by this double goad, man constantly endeavours to maintain or increase the total sum of physical, moral, and intellectual forces that comprise his being. That is the reason for his activity.

When this activity is exerted, when man acts with a view to restoring or increasing his forces, we say that he labours. If the elements from which man draws the powers he assimilates were always within easy reach and already prepared for consumption, his labour would be reduced to very little. But it is not so. Nature has not done everything for man; she has left him with much to do. If she liberally provides him with the raw material of all the things necessary for his consumption, she obliges him to fashion this raw material in various ways in order to make it consumable.

The preparation of things necessary for consumption is called production.

How is production accomplished? By the action of man’s forces or faculties upon the elements provided by nature.

Before consuming, man is thus obliged to produce. Any production involving an expenditure of forces gives rise to pain, to sorrow. We submit to this pain, we endure this sorrow, with a view to obtaining enjoyment, or, what amounts to the same thing, to spare oneself greater suffering. One obtains this enjoyment, one avoids this suffering, through consumption. Production and consumption, enjoyment and suffering – that is the totality of human life.

CONSERVATIVE

What are you daring to say? In your eyes, is enjoyment the sole end that man may set for himself on earth?

ECONOMIST

Do not forget that we are here dealing with moral and intellectual enjoyment as well as physical enjoyment. Do not forget that man is a physical, moral, and intellectual being. Will he develop from this triple point of view or will he deteriorate? – that is the whole question. If he neglects his moral and intellectual needs in order to satisfy his physical appetites alone, he will deteriorate morally and intellectually. If he neglects his physical needs in order to increase his moral and intellectual satisfactions, he will deteriorate physically. In either case he will suffer on the one hand while enjoying to excess on the other. Widsom consists in maintaining the balance of faculties with which we are provided, or in producing this balance when it does not exist. But political economy need not concern itself, directly at least, with this interior ordering of human faculties. Political economy merely examines the general laws of the production and consumption of wealth. The manner in which it is appropriate for each individual to distribute the restorative forces if his being is a question of morals.

To suffer as little as possible, physically, morally, and intellectually – to have as much enjoyment as possible, from this triple point of view – such, I short, is the great motive force of human life, the pivot around which all our existences turn. This motive force, this pivot, is called Interest.

SOCIALIST

You regard interest as the sole motive force of human action, and you say that interest consists in avoiding pain and obtaining pleasure. But is there, in man, no nobler motive force to which one can appeal? Rather than being succumbing to the inferior enticement of personal satisfaction, can one not be moved by the higher stimulus of love for humanity? Instead of yielding to interest, can’t one obey devotion?

ECONOMIST

Devotion is just one of the constituent parts of interest.

CONSERVATIVE

What do you mean by that? Aren’t you forgetting that devotion involves sacrifice and that sacrifice involves suffering?

ECONOMIST

Yes, sacrifice and suffering in one respect, but satisfaction and enjoyment in another. When one devotes himself to his neighbour, one condemns oneself, usually at least, to a material deprivation, but one experiences in exchange a moral satisfaction. If the pain outweighs the satisfaction, one does not devote oneself.

CONSERVATIVE

And the martyrs?

ECONOMIST

The martyrs themselves would bear witness on behalf of my claims. The moral feeling of religion exceeded in their case the physical instinct of self-preservation. In exchange for their physical sufferings, they experienced a more intense moral enjoyment. Those who lack a high degree of religious feeling do not expose themselves, willingly at least, to martyrdom. Why not? Because when the moral satisfaction is weak, one finds physical suffering too high a price to pay for it.

6

first of all, it makes me smile that someone would catch and point out something like that. your suggestion that the above is a circular is a good one which (to me) seems to arise from the inadequacy of my explanation.

1 —> i was primarily refering to emotions like sadness, anger, and fear

2 —> perhaps the emotion accompanying satisfaction is not synonymous with satisfaction itself

  • consider the brain’s reward system, which teaches the individual to engage in (perceivedly) beneficial behaviors through positive emotions

i’ll have to think more about your point though (it’s a good one).

7

I really enjoyed this piece; however, i have an ammendment to make to it (which may be incorrect, but no matter).

The problem I have with Mr. de Molinari is his clinging onto morality (which to me is reminiscent of Freud’s superego)

Now that I’ve stated why I dislike his piece, I will be courteous enough to explain why I think that the explanation is wayward:

I wrote a paper on a very similar topic recently… it was actually for a philosophy class and the paper was not at all relevant to

what we were learning, but I persuaded the teacher to let me write about what i wanted to. hopefully this will be elucidating…

A Genealogy of Society and the Social Impulse

Throughout history, a myriad of great minds have pondered the inscape of society, often arriving at unique conclusions. From this amalgamation of meditations, several distinctive schools of thought have emerged. At the vanguard of popular conceptualizations, altruism has and is steadily becoming the predominant social order. Inasmuch as some would consider it a passing fancy, many philanthropic doctrines are deeply rooted in cultural mores. In properly isolate the origins of this philosophy and, subsequently, assess its significance, thorough analysis of the genealogy of society must be undertaken.

For early human beings, the social instinct was not primordial, but rather a learned reaction. In Human Action: A Treatise on Economics, Ludwig von Mises, renowned economist and founder of praxeology, brilliantly deduces that society is “the outcome of a purposeful utilization of…the higher productivity of the division of labor”.[1] Far from being a synthetic a priori judgment, recognition of the benefits of the division of labor would have required a wealth of empirical data. Long before people consciously understood this concept, a subtle part of the brain known as the adaptive unconscious noticed it. Functioning as a rapid decision-making center, the adaptive unconscious “operates - at least at first - entirely below the surface of consciousness…send[ing] its messages through weirdly indirect channels, such as the sweat glands in the palms of our hands”.[2] The manifestation of these subliminal transmissions constitutes the better part of feelings. It falls out that emotions are an unconscious mechanism for steering the individual towards the perceived optimization of profit[3]. Otherwise expressed, they are “manifestations of the adaptation of the organism to its external and its internal environment”.[4] Grasping the inherent advantages of cooperation, the adaptive unconscious developed emotions to promote collaboration. Social emotions, such as sympathy, friendship, and love, therein originated; the burgeoning of which yielded the social impulse.

As cooperation thrived, social conventions gradually emerged. The development of standard behaviors can be seen as an inevitable occurrence arising from the existence of Nash equilibriums. In re society, “a Nash equilibrium embodies a stable ‘social norm’: if everyone else adheres to it, no individual wishes to deviate from it”.[5] Insofar as humanity may drift towards these nodes, it does so only through a makeshift and improvident process of trial and error*.* Byproducts of this stilted progression, cultural variance and normative inexactness are in all places abundant. This imprecision, coupled with the inherent subjectivity of individual scales of value, is such that people voluntarily deviate from the norm as apparently superior avenues arise. For the most part, these alternatives were - and are - detrimental to the remainder of society. In order to safeguard cooperation and his own interests, early man devised loose social contracts. In tandem with the rising complexity of society, these simple agreements grew increasingly convoluted; the structural upshot of which sophistication was the market economy[6]-:

“The social system of the division of labor…[in which] everybody in acting serves his fellow citizens. Everybody, on the other hand, is served by his fellow citizens. Everybody is both a means and an end in himself; an ultimate end for himself and a means to other people in their endeavors to attain their own ends”.[7]

With the introduction of the market, a uniform code of conduct became a necessary construct. As covenants originally pertaining to a select few were applied to an increasing number, the now familiar notion of morals and laws emerged*.* In that logic was yet a formalized discipline, little prevented the influence of early thinkers’ sentiments in the creation of morality. Their subjectivity was primarily a reflection of the social impulse, whereupon “[s]ystems of morals are only a sign-language of emotions”.[8] Failing to understand the underlying stimulus for the social impulse - the advantage of the self -, these philosophers considered social emotions indicative of the substratum of human nature. From this misperception comes the modern understanding of morality as an altruistic affair.

While the numerous flaws in any philanthropic doctrine may now be evident, its usefulness to society and the individual remains to be seen. Action guided by forethought is universally commended as good, right, and moral; whereas conduct driven by momentary impulses is condemned as evil, wrong, and immoral. This correlation is by no means coincidental, but rather of the adaptive unconscious’s design. Regardless of its explicit connotations, morality is only a framework for the satisfaction of the interpersonal agreement for collaborated labor. Given that many individuals are incapable of objective analysis, it can be considered a didactic tool allowing for participation in social synergy. Therefore, a seemingly exocentric morality can be of use to society so long as it is understood to be egocentric in truth.

[1] von Mises, Ludwig. “Human Action: A Treatise on Economics”. pp. 145

[2] Gladwell, Malcom. “Blink”. pp. 10

[3] Here, it is imperative that profit takes into account marginal utility; and, in doing so is representative of the Law of Diminishing Returns

[4] Crile, George W. “Man - An Adaptive Mechanism”. pp 155

[5] Osborne, Martin J. “An Introduction to Game Theory”. pp. 20

[6] As a point of clarification, it is important to note that market economy is not, in the context of Mises’s works, synonymous with capitalism;, but, rather, infers an economic system of interdependency featuring specialization and the exchange of goods and services.

[7] von Mises, Ludwig. pp. 258

[8] Nietzsche, Friedrich. “Beyond Good and Evil”. pp. 57

tell me what you think! thanks

8

so. i’m sorry to bump a piece, it strikes me as lowly and desperate; however, i would really like to hear what people think. i’ll admit i employ some really obnoxious language (probably a result of my inexperience more than anything, that and the terms i use please me becaue they strike me as most correct) regardless, i would love to learn what other intellectuals think (critique, support, questoins). thanks

9

I’m not positive what the over all point is. Explaining why suicide does not contradict praxeology?

The short of it is, people commit suicide when they value death above what they perceive to be their other options.

Your proof seems accurate to me, but I might not the best person to ask.

I suppose we could divide suicides into two categories: Suicide from aspiration, or Suicide from despair. (arbitrary names, feel free to offer improvements) Or, as you named them, Category A and Category B.

10

i suppose its a bit convoluted. originally, i wanted to see what people thought about the magnitude line and overall concept of “temporal marginal utility” as a guiding force in human action. if it holds, their is potential for it predicting (though prob not quantitatively) whether or not people will deviate onto an emerging “track” as new information arises. Praxeology is often considered “the pure logic of choice” and so the above, a method of “divining” choice, would help further its goal. the second part was a critique of “the moral sensation”, aimed at outlining the development of the “social impulse” as an adaptive mechanism → social cooperation is synergistic, and in order to maximize returns we engage in it. i dont know where this here is going, i’m tired.