Mises, Quine, and the analytic/synthetic distinction.

Miscellaneous General
1

Mises was a neo-Kantian in the sense that he presented human action as a category of knowledge, rooted in the synthetic a priori. His methodology relies on the analytic/synthetic distinction, because (according to Mises) the fact that men act purposefully is analyticly true.

I’m wondering if any (more recent) Misesians have updated their arguments in light of the attacks on the analytic/synthetic distinction, from Quine and others. What is the Misesian response to these attacks? If anyone could point me to some literature on the subject, that’d be great.

Praxeology and Linguistics
All Statements are Praxeological Statements
2

The analytic/synthetic distinction is merely an artifact of language-based explanation. In other words, it’s useful in casual speech to distinguish between two types of statements: those that are “logically necessary” (analytic) and those that “factually correspond with reality” (synthetic). For example, “All bachelors are unmarried.” vs. “There have been black dogs in the world.”

But when we really get down to it, both statements are “analytic” for most people, because most people have a set of assumptions that already entails that there have been black dogs in the world. For example, most people have seen black dogs, and one of their assumptions is that what they see (under certain conditions) is “in the world.”

Hence both statements can be phrased as “logically” necessary (i.e., “analytic”) given the premises most people have in evaluating them:

“Bachelor” means unmarried man.

Therefore, all bachelors are unmarried.

I have seen black dogs.

Everything I have seen is something that has been in the world.

Therefore, there have black dogs in the world.

Indeed, both statements are “analytic.” There is no difference, other than that one relies on a different category of premises than the other. As with virtually everything in philosophy, people have let verbal phrasing - which is after all just a communicate device - distort their reasoning, leading to a grand mess of nonsensical theory. I am amazed at this time and time again.

Now someone can correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think Mises exactly relies on the distinction, but instead just uses it for purposes of explanation.

A way to rephrase Mises’s notion that “the fact that men act purposefully is analytically true” without referencing the analytic/synthetic issue is as follows:

“The fact that men act purposefully follows from my premises (and I have a reasonable expectation that it follows from your premises as well).” Or even simpler, “The fact that men act is obvious.”*

*While this is quite accurate, it is too easy to misinterpret, and/or it will make people say, “Well so is my theory!” Remember that one putting forth a theory must do two things at once: (1) phrase the theory accurately so as to avoid people poking holes in it, and (2) bridge the inferential gap with one’s readers with enough explanatory, relatively “casual” verbiage to enable people to grasp your intended meaning.

3

Mises doesn’t rely upon it, all that will be necessary for his argument is that the denial of it is self-contradictory. Whether it’s “analytic” or “synthetic” is quite frankly uninteresting. I’d recommend you read Laurence BonJour’s In Defense of Pure Reason as he lays into Quine pretty heavily and has some very interesting arguments on rationalist epistemology’s behalf.

4

If the distinction goes away, I think that a lot of the strength in his argument does, too. For instance, his argument against the possibility of socialism is that no private property → no exchagnes → no prices → no rational allocation of reasources. Without the analyitic/synthetic distinction, I don’t think that this verbal argument is enough. Mises would have to demonstrate that his premises are “true in the real world” in order for his argument to true (analyitically, or otherwise).

This seems to be the route that Hayek took, by the way. I wonder if Quine’s arguments played a role in this.

5

Mises argument is true for all worlds. so if ‘the real world’ is just one among those, doesn’t look like we have much to worry about

6

How do you know this?

7

How do you know the LNC applies for all possible worlds?

8

Certainly not analyticly.

9

Could you kindly explain which of the premises in the argument against socialism that you quoted would have to be demonstrated as true in the real world?

10

All of them, I would guess. I don’t know. to be honest I’m not really that familar with Quine’s arguments — I was just wondering if they would pose a challange to Mises and his approach to the social sciences. Since I’m not finding much information on the subject, I’m guessing that the answer is no.

11

I’m going to go out on a limb here and ramble on about something I know very little about.

An intellectual used to have it easy. The axioms of geometry were considered self evident by everyone, the rules of logic Euclid employed were also considered self evident, and the results he got were unshakably true. And there was not much else that was considered significant knowledge of the real world.

Then along came challenges to the axioms, Marx challenging logic itself [though I doubt that has to be taken seriously], and a new kid on the block, scientific induction, which was coming up with spectacular real world results. So that what we thought was the best and only way to arrive at the truth [start with self evident axioms] was taking an ignoble second place to a very intellectually unsatisfying way [if it works, it must be true].

A search began for a path back to the Garden of Eden.

The first question that had to be tackled was, how can we make sure we won’t get fooled again? What criteria will make sure that any axioms we choose this time around will really be self evident? This turned out to be a very difficult task, one might say impossible, basically. And this is where where Quine fits in, showing that it’s not that easy.

The second question was, how can we give some repectability to the very fishy, logically unsatisfying methods of discovery applied scientists were using? I think it’s Hume who first showed how weak their arguments really were logically, despite their undeniable success. And I don’t think anyone has really done much in this field, despite great efforts.

Where does Mises fit into this scheme? As he writes in the intro to Human Action, economics was coming under attack in his time, for very ugly reasons. People did not like the conclusions it was arriving at. Things like: don’t steal people’s money and everyone will become wealthier automatically as time passes. Just stay out of the way. Forget socialism, interventionism, planned economies, tarrifs, unions, they all are doomed to failure.

So they attacked it from every angle. 1. Your assumptions are flawed. 2. Your logic is flawed. 3. You personally, Mr Economist, are immoral.

So the first thing Mises felt obligated to do was defend the methods economists were using. The hardest one to deal with was number 1. What with the impossibility, basically, of knowing in a rock solid fashion that our axioms are true in any field whatsoever, and the logical shakiness of inductive reasoning, where could he turn?

Now the truth is, if it were not for the fact that so much money and power were at stake, no one would doubt for a second his axioms. Of course people use means to achieve ends. Can there be any possible doubt about that? And all the arguments claiming no axiom can be known to be self evident [like Quine’s] are all highly theoretical. No one in real life uses them to doubt, say, the law of gravity, even though they could, in theory.

But Mises found an argument that did a little better than a mere appeal to the evidence staring us in the face. The old “Try to disprove me and you are just giving another instance that I am right” trick.

End of ramble. Be interesting to see what someone more well informed on these matters has to say.

12

Smiling Dave, great post, very informative. If this is what you know little about, I’ll have to check your post history on what you know a lot about. Also curious to see if others disagree with anything you said.

13

Certainly not analyticly.

The argument on whether the praxeological a priori is analytic or not stems from the fact that Mises sometimes says the premises of the action axiom (a conceptual truth) are “unpacked”, which is akin to an analytic truth (like unmarried men being already ‘contained’ in the word ‘bachelor’.) Personally I find the whole debate on analytic vs synthetic truths pointless, a mere linguistic barrier. There’s ways you can turn any synthetic a priori truth into an analytic one, bolstering the strength of the analytic a priori. I’d give Henry Veatch’s Two Logics and the BonJour book I mentioned a read for very interesting critiques and expansions on this Kantian dichotomy. It’s been a while since I’ve read them so I can’t remember quite a lot but they have awesome clarifications of the concepts in them that will help people understand the topic better. BonJour also has a great discussion on the problem of induction and geometry, that would nicely supplement Hoppe’s own arguments.

All of them, I would guess. I don’t know. to be honest I’m not really that familar with Quine’s arguments — I was just wondering if they would pose a challange to Mises and his approach to the social sciences. Since I’m not finding much information on the subject, I’m guessing that the answer is no.

Indeed not. They pose more of a threat to the analytic-synthetic dichotomy than anything else.

14

Jesse, I would claim that Quine actually dismantles the Misesian rebuke of empiricism. Quine, in essence, claims that whatever we were calling “a priori knowledge” is within a web of belief that originates from sensation.

15

What exactly is a “sensation”? Is it an experience of the public world, such as that of my computer sitting in front of me?

16

Your neural intake, “the triggering of sensory receptors” as Quine said.

17

What is a “neural intake”? What is a “triggering of sensory receptors”? It would be easier to just directly respond to what I already said:

18

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sensory_receptor

19

Is that a yes or a no to my original question?

20

Ha! Fine, you’re right. The only caveat I want to make is that sensory receptors are more fundamental than your consciousness.