As I’ve detailed elsewhere, though, we cannot rely on ourselves to properly differentiate deliberative processes from automatic ones.
In regard to the Austrian preference for circular reasoning, if it is true that “action” is “purposeful behavior,” then what determines the logical connection if not a definitional equivalence? If one wants to claim that “one’s highest value” is one’s observed choice, then how is that necessarily true besides Austrian makeshift definitions? I am not actually expecting answers; I’ve heard them before. But I am still befuddled by how Austrians consider their outmoded epistemology the last bastion of economic truth. The fields of neuroscience, psychology, and empirical economics have all made significant inroads in questioning our old beliefs, as all science should; to Austrians, a dictionary is all that is needed to deduce universal truths.