I do medical research, and frankly the empirical world tends to make me ill for reasons most of you can probably appreciate. I felt quite a bit at home when I found myself interested in epistemology of the Austrian persuasion. I’m quite the newbie to the scene, but there are a few things that seem pretty clear to me when reflecting on biological research while reading the Austrians. Exactly how far am I out of my element?..
Considering praxeology, it seems that we in biology make several assumptions without acknowleding them. The idea of vitalism (a force of life independent of biochemistry) is rightfully rejected by philosophers of biology. But considering the logic of biological thought, praxeology validates vitalism. Yes, there is no empirical evidence for vitalism, but from a praxeological perspective, we can make a synthetic a priori statement “humans desire to live”. “Methodological vitalism”??? Considering “methodological vitalism”, praxeology is irrelevant for biology in the empirical realm…UNTIL…we arrive at the science of cognition. Not psychology, but cognition in a materialist sense. Cognitive science is still generally in it’s infancy. Isn’t it worth while using praxeology to warn the empirically obsessed/blinded scientists that at some point they have entered the world of methodological dualism/vitalism? I’m all for the spontaneous order of science, but at some point the logical structure of data interpretation deserves a healthy dose of praxeology, something your average academic is not willing to do, at least not on purpose.
Also, it seems to me that a good way for Austrians to make their role clear and distinct from the neo-classicals is to see the entrepreneur as the scientist of economics. The profit motive spontaneously puts forth experiments performed by the entrepreneur. It is the entrepreneur who makes the empirically relevant efforts in economics. The confusion here is that we are so accustomed to thinking in terms of academic departments that the idea of the economist tends to take up space where tenure is available and is left undefined. The economist (the way Mises defines it) plays the role in economics that a well respected scientist would when putting together review articles. He defines his field by the tacit acceptance/rejection of papers performed by other labs. (Michael Polanyi got it right…science is a tacit and personal market-like process driven by intellectual passions…not a formal, logical, objective set of rules) Likewise, the Austrian economist pieces together the behavior of the entrepreneur, calls it praxeology/history, and joins the ranks of fellow tenure seeking academics.
Maybe I didn’t fully understand, but I really don’t take issue with empiricism in general. Surely deductive reasoning works if given the correct information to start with (and each step is coherent), but evidence beats previously supposed deductive logic every single time. We adjust our theories to the evidence and change the steps in our logical conclusions to meet the evidence. I’m with Karl Popper on this one mostly. Which is why I don’t get the “scientisim” criticism and thinks it rings hollow.
Also, why would praxeology make headway for vitalism? You could still say “humans desire to live” and reduce that to electrochemical reactions. It’s just a simplified representation of those electrochemical reactions.
Perhaps I emphasized vitalism too much. But consider this…could a supercomputer programmed to somehow be free of all human logic or understanding observe life? This device would scan the world and likely observe atoms, chemical compounds, gravity, etc. But would it construct an understanding of PAI-1 gene expression in various vascular beds in different racial, ethnic, sex, and age populations? Maybe. But The science of biology is defined by such studies, particularly in the medical sciences. To logically construct a science of biology, we need to understand what life is. What better way to understand what life is than to be alive?! Hence the synthetic a priori statement that “humans desire to live.” Would my hypothetical science machine observe or understand life?..we can’t say, and that’s exactly the point. It seems to me that biology as a science is dependent on the axiom of human action.
No independently inheritable genetic material. So, no. But the fact that we would consider the question is exactly my point. Would the hypothetical science machine be confused by these “creatures”? Probably not…???
“What does that mean? And what makes that the definition of living?” (have not figured out how to quote on this site yet)
By independently inheritable genetic material, I mean they could not reproduce indefinately on their own without the help of some outside force, like that guy presenting his inventions
It’s not the definition of living. But life as we know it on planet earth and define it in biology is something that has the following characteristics: cellular organization (this one essentially eliminates viruses from the definition), sensitivity (response to stimuli), growth, development, reproduction (those “creatures” would not be able to reproduce on their own), regulation (coordination from organs), homeostasis (maintaining constant internal conditions), and heredity (those “creatures” obtain no inheritable information).
If you find anyone from medical establishment taking seriously mises’ epistemology let me know. I wonder what they came up with, because to me mainstream doctors are no better than mainstream economists and there is no viable alternative to the former.
I’d rather the Austrians know biology than the biologists/doctors know Misesian epistemology. The Austrians have far too much reverence for biology as a hard natural science. It’s not. I think their case can be made stronger with an honest juxtaposition with the poor track record of empirical biology. It’s become a bit of an obsession of mine
Could you list a few examples of how it has failed, in your opinion?
I understand government pollutes everything it touches and it funds scientific research to some degree, but the scientists I’m aware of take their profession seriously. Sure there is some bias, but we had another poster on here talking about how there is a conspiracy regarding black holes and quantam physics with theoretical physcists. I just don’t get what’s in it for them.
The simplest example of how biological empiricism fails is clinical trials. Those not in biological research get the impression that we have these nice, tight models that explain our work. But when it comes to clinical trials, if they fail, entire fields move on from an idea as simple as using antioxidants clinically to treat disease. In a nutshell, biological knowledge is constructed from manipulations of in vitro (cell models) and in vivo (animal/donor models) that only reflect the manipulation. For example, we can deduce the function of a protein by producing genetic “knockout” mice that lack a particular gene and do no produce that protein. If this mouse model (genetically homogenous mice, MUCH different from genetically variable human populations) were to, say, be unresponsive to hypertension inducing stimuli, scientists would decide that protein is a good drug target. Pharm companies develop a drug to block the target and move to clinical trials. If the trial fails, they move on without much more contemplation. All of this is a MUCH different logical structure from the predictable and calculatable world of physics and chemistry where you are dealing with single, measurable entities and not entire organisms. Another way of looking at it is from a Popperian perspective. Popper wrote that in science, we can only falsify claims. Ok, fine. But I hear all too often from non-scientists that “a single falsifying piece of evidence invalidates a hypothesis”. This is not how science works, especially in biology. Michael Polanyi gives a good example of how there was apparently convincing data in the early 20th century to contest the theory of relativity that was out right rejected simply because physicists didn’t didn’t have a good intuition about the data and the interpretations…far from a set of formal, logical connections. In biology, it’s very common in review ariticles to see phrases like “much conflicting work exists in the literature.” It’s true, there is often puzzling conflicting data. We accept this. In fact, in many ways, we have a low level assuption that all of the data we see in biology is complete BS. It’s a very Hayekian, spontaneous process that is a product of the scientists themselves. I like the description given by the economist Bill Butos who describes science as a market-like process (no consumption, only production) that is balanced by the incentives/constraints of publication, citation, and reputation.
My point?..understanding how biology is actually done leads one to see a series of debates that are very similar to those between the Austrians and the neo-classicals. The hubris of mathematical calculation in economics is something strikingly familiar to what I see daily in biology research. That’s why I say praxeology is God’s gift to the academic world. If we can’t make accurate predictions in a science as well developed as biology, surely, we can’t make predictions in the economic sense. This idea could use alot more development, but I still hold firm that the Austrians generally have far too much reverence for biology
Sorry to keep blabbing, but consider one more thing. If someone wanted to take a purely empirical approach to economics, it is imaginable that there would come a time when cognitive science (very much in it’s infancy now) is well developed and economists would start collaborating with the cognitive scientists. ie pointing to a bunch of jumping lines on a screen and saying “there! right there is what economic exchange looks like in the brain! NOW we can make precise economic predictions!” But in biology, there is only so much we can do with human models. We use animal models that can be genetically or chemically manipulated to isolate a single entity and understand that single protein, cell type, etc. Exactly how would you go about doing this to obtain a materialist/psychological understanding of economics? Perform a clinical trial of some entrepreneureal activity inducing drug? Make colonies of genetically homogenous humans and precisely measure neuron firings and correlate them with every economic decision? The conceivable examples are all absurdities that stray far away from economics. Exactly the point. So we must re-evaluate our methods. Luckily, we as humans have a front row seat to having a mind that can process an a priori understanding of the removal of some felt uneasiness…that’s why we should go with that method and not the empirical non-sense we get far too much attention for in science
I think you mix up misesian epistemology (axiomatic-deductive approach) with praxeology (study of human action). Also I don’t understand you reasons for stating this:
Can you elaborate? Anyway I’m interested in this topic. If you have a blog where you pour your thoughts - please provide a link.