09.21.08
If the invisible hand is dead, so is Darwinism. No bailout for Darwin’s theory
Wilson is in the middle of the Darwin Miracle, the immortal suvival of Darwin’s theory, even as its grandfather philosophy, Adam Smith and his precursors, is found wanting.
Don’t let Darwinists get away with: this issue of supposed cooperation is a finesse larded over Darwinian basics, and presumes behind its cute finish to explain the virtues from the vices, to wit, the emergence of cooperation from natural selection, the trump card of pseudo-science that extended the life of the ideology long after its basic flaw, and resemblance to Mandeville to Smith, was exposed as a defect.
Although economic ideology is tenacious, it is also true that at least the economics profession allows dissent, albeit at its fringes, while the Darwin establishment can’t achieve even that.
Please, no bailout for Darwinism: let it go the way of the invisible hand.
Unfortunately I am not convinced of the demise of invisible hand thinking: it will resurface no doubt as panic subsides, if it does.
Darwiniana » Using theories as ideologies: the Oedipus paradox said,
September 21, 2008 at 5:49 pm
[...] Note from the previous post the way that evolutionary/Darwinian theory is being discussed, NOT BY EXTERNAL OBSERVERS ABOUT THE PAST, but agents in present ABOUT THE FUTURE application of the theory, a clear violation of theoretical procedure. The ‘observer’ is in reality an economic agent discussing how a presumed claim about the past should influence our decisions about the future. This incoherence in the use of evolutionary theory is discussed in World History And The Eonic Effect, which demands a new kind of theory. The problem is called the Oedipus Paradox and is discussed here: [...]