A interview with a old heretedox Brazilian economist made me dig up my materials on marxist economics (old stuff from my graduation) and give it some thought. In short words this economist was dismissing mainstream economics as a valid understanding of things simply because the heavy focus on math (both in theory, in application and in empiric research) removed contradictions from the discipline and for him social sciences needs not to adhere to logic. This is very common reasoning among marxists thinkers in any field of philosophy and social sciences in Brazil.
This is the reason why my marxist economics discipline started with "refutation" of classic logic. It consists in using Zeno's Paradox to prove movement cannot not be logically understood but it can be understood via dialectics (because it accepts contradictions). This is the reason why according to then economists should stay away from math and do not shy away from contradictory definitions. Here comes my questions/topics for discussion:
1. Zeno's Paradox is solved and the solution I know is accessible to anyone with Calculus 101. Were people following marxian dialectics THAT bad at math or am I missing something ?
2. Zeno's Paradox is used as a argument for us to accept contradictions. But in the moment I accept contradictions, I have no more reasons to disbelieve in logic because I shouldn't care about paradoxes anymore, including zeno's. In other words, if the initial premise was true (Zeno's Paradox implies classical logic contradicts itself) the conclusion is that both classical logic and Marxian dialectics are contradictory, so why should I choose to accept one and not the other ?
3. The argument is for us to accept contradictions like "A is and isn't B" but this is literally never used on marxist theory as far as I know. For example, Marx evokes his dialectics to describe how any point of history is both itself and the precursor of the next moment. And It's popular thesis among marxist economists in Brazil that money can only be described in dialectical terms because it is both a public good and the thing everyone search for and this is some form of argument that only marxists truly understand monetary policy (I'm surely this is a doctoral thesis of someone here in Brasil that got famous). You may note that in none of those cases a actual "A is and isn't B" ever appears. In fact a good that everyone seeks and is public is completely devoid of contradiction and is 100% understandable mathematically (ex: general equilibrium with one single public good). It does really feels like attacking logic is merely a excuse to blindly dismiss alternative views and criticism and not something Marx actually builds uppon. It's also used a lot by marxist thinkers to justify their own logical errors, making then criticism-proof.
4. If Marxist dialectics was actually true, wouldn't physics (who is very interest in the behavior of things in movement) use it instead of math ? Why the argument is build upon explaining moving points (zeno's paradox) and out of nowhere it is the defining philosophy of SOCIAL sciences and non-applicable in natural ones ?
Conclusion: My marxist political economy class makes no sense (as expected) and I can't believe teachers are paid (very well paid, those teachers are paid around 9x the Brazilian median salary!) to teach that. And I know most other classes in Marxist political economy in South America are structured in the same way, you can literally find this whole zeno's paradox talk in multiple class notes of teachers of many different universities or different countries and even in text books. The scope of this is just depressing.
I know there are some Marxist users out there, so I expect some counterarguments or clarification from people who adhere to revolutionary theory or just know revolutionary literature better then me (not so hard, since I literally studied that for a whole bunch of 2 days of my life). I would also like to ask from philosophers academics what their opinion in this matter. Do marxist dialectics and marxist theory have a big influence over the academy in your respective countries ?
Zeon's paradox isn't a paradox. As you noted, it's solved and well understood. The only reason it's a "paradox" is because the math is phrased in a counterintuitive way that sounds paradoxical to someone who doesn't fully grasp what's going on.
Any theoretical framework that needs to disprove logic itself (and purports to do so) is, bluntly, BS.
Anyone who is using language (sensibly) is using logic. The two are completely inseparable. The use of language to reject logic always entails a tacit acceptance of logic, and thus should be regarded with maximal skepticism.
So your statement (2) is really the best reason to reject this brand of reasoning. Unlike Zeno's paradox, the paradox that a Marxist runs afoul of when he reasons this way is very real: that paradox being that you can't reject logic without using logic to explain why.
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A limit of time is fixed for thee
Which if thou dost not use for clearing away the clouds from thy mind
It will go and thou wilt go, never to return.
When marxists talk about contradictions they mean stuff like capitalism needing to pay workers as little as possible while relying on workers to buy things so the economic system goes around
This is, of course, a delusional caricature of the operation of a free labor market (how exactly do you suppose a worker decides how much to ask for in salary negotiations?) but I've never met a Marxist that understood that anyway.
The thing is, even if we accept the caricature at face value, this analysis is wrong. A contradiction is a statement of the form "P and not P." The statement "I want to pay my workers as little as possible, and I also want them to spend that money buying things from me" is not of that form.
Regarding your first question, I don't think Calculus sufficiently solves Zeno's Paradox to the extent that most people believe. Calculus gives us a way to traverse infinite distance in a finite amount of space, a la limits, however that would not technically resolve the walk through the forest parable. continually halving the distance between you and the edge of the wood means that you technically never reach the edge of the forest. People point to calculus as a solution, but I don't think that would respond to the asymptotic nature of Zeno's parable. You are approaching a limit (the edge of the forest) but never reaching it.
I also think it is a mischaracterization to claim that dialectical materialism is fundamentally concerned with movement. My understanding is that it is concerned with the interplay between different parties and elements. How these groups/individuals/theories interact and the conflict between them is the way we understand the world and truth claims in general under a paradigm of dialectical materialism. While that could entail some type of spatio-temporal movement, that is not necessarily a constitutive feature of what Marx is talking about.
As combo player pointed out, its not a question of p versus ~p, that is the realm of logic and not what Marx is referring to, he is talking about 'apparent contradictions.' (Although, as an aside, quantum physics seems to indicate that something can be simultaneously p and ~p which has very interesting implications for both modern physics as well as fundamental concerns of metaphysics and ontology.)
Finally, I haven't seen this interview, but it seems problematic even for a Marxists to dismiss the use of math in contemporary economics. I think that theory and math need to work together when it comes to economics, regardless if it is used to justify Marxism or Free-market Capitalism. Under a Marxists paradigm, how would it be possible to establish the divide between the Proletariat and the Bourgeoise without analysis of income inequality or some similar statistic. I think there could be an argument to be made for relying more on math than theory or vice versa, but to claim that we should completely reject one of those seems like a bad move. The theory guides what numbers and stats become relevant and math justifies the proposed theories.
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War is peace!
Freedom is slavery!
Ignorance is strength!
The thing is, even if we accept the caricature at face value, this analysis is wrong. A contradiction is a statement of the form "P and not P." The statement "I want to pay my workers as little as possible, and I also want them to spend that money buying things from me" is not of that form.
I also think it is a mischaracterization to claim that dialectical materialism is fundamentally concerned with movement. My understanding is that it is concerned with the interplay between different parties and elements. How these groups/individuals/theories interact and the conflict between them is the way we understand the world and truth claims in general under a paradigm of dialectical materialism. While that could entail some type of spatio-temporal movement, that is not necessarily a constitutive feature of what Marx is talking about.
As combo player pointed out, its not a question of p versus ~p, that is the realm of logic and not what Marx is referring to, he is talking about 'apparent contradictions.' (Although, as an aside, quantum physics seems to indicate that something can be simultaneously p and ~p which has very interesting implications for both modern physics as well as fundamental concerns of metaphysics and ontology.)
You're talking about a logical contradiction, not the word as used in dialectical materialism. That's why I said "when marxists talk about contradictions". They don't use it to mean an impossible thing but rather two aspects of a system that are at odds with each other. Words can have different definitions in different academic contexts.
If that was the case there's no reason to believe that economics cannot be understood analytically. It means economic theories, that talks about quantities (prices, amount of goods, money, interests) should be presented in a mathematical fashion as that is the only way to ensure each claim is a direct result of assumptions made and nothing else. That is a far more productive, clear and fallacy proof way to approach theory then mere historical rhetoric.
Marxist economists (the few that still exists) have failed to do that, claiming that Marxist theory lack of internal consistency is a reflection of the dialectic method that transcends formal logic.
Regarding your first question, I don't think Calculus sufficiently solves Zeno's Paradox to the extent that most people believe. Calculus gives us a way to traverse infinite distance in a finite amount of space, a la limits, however that would not technically resolve the walk through the forest parable. continually halving the distance between you and the edge of the wood means that you technically never reach the edge of the forest. People point to calculus as a solution, but I don't think that would respond to the asymptotic nature of Zeno's parable. You are approaching a limit (the edge of the forest) but never reaching it.
The sum of the series (1/2)^n is equal to two (or approach 2 infinitely). In either case we know it is a finite value and thus we know for sure the distance is finite to begin with. This is enough to solve the "paradox".
Yes, if you always walk only half the distance you will never reach the edge of the forest in any finite iteration. But the issue is, you don't have to walk half the distance. The claim calculus provide is not "if you walk all the halve distances you will walk the whole distance". The claim is "to walk the whole distance indeed you have to walk all the infinity halve distances and that's possible because the sum of all those half distances are finite".
Finally, I haven't seen this interview, but it seems problematic even for a Marxists to dismiss the use of math in contemporary economics. I think that theory and math need to work together when it comes to economics, regardless if it is used to justify Marxism or Free-market Capitalism. Under a Marxists paradigm, how would it be possible to establish the divide between the Proletariat and the Bourgeoise without analysis of income inequality or some similar statistic. I think there could be an argument to be made for relying more on math than theory or vice versa, but to claim that we should completely reject one of those seems like a bad move. The theory guides what numbers and stats become relevant and math justifies the proposed theories.
1. Economic theory is not meant to justify economic systems. Theory is meant to expose their mechanisms, explain their functioning. The judgement of whether a system works or not comes from ideology and morals - and both are outside the realm of positive economics.
2. Don't be surprised but the division between classes is not done numerically by checking some statistics such as income or wealth. It's done qualitatively, based on the roles played during capitalistic production. Capitalists own and accumulate capital while workers rent labor to then in the form of employment contracts. No math involved.
3. My point is that theory itself have to be written mathematically. A scientific claim must not only be verified empirically by statistics and experiments - it must be proved analytically to expose which are the assumptions made to sustain the theory.
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This is the reason why my marxist economics discipline started with "refutation" of classic logic. It consists in using Zeno's Paradox to prove movement cannot not be logically understood but it can be understood via dialectics (because it accepts contradictions). This is the reason why according to then economists should stay away from math and do not shy away from contradictory definitions. Here comes my questions/topics for discussion:
1. Zeno's Paradox is solved and the solution I know is accessible to anyone with Calculus 101. Were people following marxian dialectics THAT bad at math or am I missing something ?
2. Zeno's Paradox is used as a argument for us to accept contradictions. But in the moment I accept contradictions, I have no more reasons to disbelieve in logic because I shouldn't care about paradoxes anymore, including zeno's. In other words, if the initial premise was true (Zeno's Paradox implies classical logic contradicts itself) the conclusion is that both classical logic and Marxian dialectics are contradictory, so why should I choose to accept one and not the other ?
3. The argument is for us to accept contradictions like "A is and isn't B" but this is literally never used on marxist theory as far as I know. For example, Marx evokes his dialectics to describe how any point of history is both itself and the precursor of the next moment. And It's popular thesis among marxist economists in Brazil that money can only be described in dialectical terms because it is both a public good and the thing everyone search for and this is some form of argument that only marxists truly understand monetary policy (I'm surely this is a doctoral thesis of someone here in Brasil that got famous). You may note that in none of those cases a actual "A is and isn't B" ever appears. In fact a good that everyone seeks and is public is completely devoid of contradiction and is 100% understandable mathematically (ex: general equilibrium with one single public good). It does really feels like attacking logic is merely a excuse to blindly dismiss alternative views and criticism and not something Marx actually builds uppon. It's also used a lot by marxist thinkers to justify their own logical errors, making then criticism-proof.
4. If Marxist dialectics was actually true, wouldn't physics (who is very interest in the behavior of things in movement) use it instead of math ? Why the argument is build upon explaining moving points (zeno's paradox) and out of nowhere it is the defining philosophy of SOCIAL sciences and non-applicable in natural ones ?
Conclusion: My marxist political economy class makes no sense (as expected) and I can't believe teachers are paid (very well paid, those teachers are paid around 9x the Brazilian median salary!) to teach that. And I know most other classes in Marxist political economy in South America are structured in the same way, you can literally find this whole zeno's paradox talk in multiple class notes of teachers of many different universities or different countries and even in text books. The scope of this is just depressing.
I know there are some Marxist users out there, so I expect some counterarguments or clarification from people who adhere to revolutionary theory or just know revolutionary literature better then me (not so hard, since I literally studied that for a whole bunch of 2 days of my life). I would also like to ask from philosophers academics what their opinion in this matter. Do marxist dialectics and marxist theory have a big influence over the academy in your respective countries ?
BGU Control
R Aggro
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Any theoretical framework that needs to disprove logic itself (and purports to do so) is, bluntly, BS.
So your statement (2) is really the best reason to reject this brand of reasoning. Unlike Zeno's paradox, the paradox that a Marxist runs afoul of when he reasons this way is very real: that paradox being that you can't reject logic without using logic to explain why.
Which if thou dost not use for clearing away the clouds from thy mind
It will go and thou wilt go, never to return.
This is, of course, a delusional caricature of the operation of a free labor market (how exactly do you suppose a worker decides how much to ask for in salary negotiations?) but I've never met a Marxist that understood that anyway.
The thing is, even if we accept the caricature at face value, this analysis is wrong. A contradiction is a statement of the form "P and not P." The statement "I want to pay my workers as little as possible, and I also want them to spend that money buying things from me" is not of that form.
Which if thou dost not use for clearing away the clouds from thy mind
It will go and thou wilt go, never to return.
I also think it is a mischaracterization to claim that dialectical materialism is fundamentally concerned with movement. My understanding is that it is concerned with the interplay between different parties and elements. How these groups/individuals/theories interact and the conflict between them is the way we understand the world and truth claims in general under a paradigm of dialectical materialism. While that could entail some type of spatio-temporal movement, that is not necessarily a constitutive feature of what Marx is talking about.
As combo player pointed out, its not a question of p versus ~p, that is the realm of logic and not what Marx is referring to, he is talking about 'apparent contradictions.' (Although, as an aside, quantum physics seems to indicate that something can be simultaneously p and ~p which has very interesting implications for both modern physics as well as fundamental concerns of metaphysics and ontology.)
Finally, I haven't seen this interview, but it seems problematic even for a Marxists to dismiss the use of math in contemporary economics. I think that theory and math need to work together when it comes to economics, regardless if it is used to justify Marxism or Free-market Capitalism. Under a Marxists paradigm, how would it be possible to establish the divide between the Proletariat and the Bourgeoise without analysis of income inequality or some similar statistic. I think there could be an argument to be made for relying more on math than theory or vice versa, but to claim that we should completely reject one of those seems like a bad move. The theory guides what numbers and stats become relevant and math justifies the proposed theories.
Freedom is slavery!
Ignorance is strength!
If that was the case there's no reason to believe that economics cannot be understood analytically. It means economic theories, that talks about quantities (prices, amount of goods, money, interests) should be presented in a mathematical fashion as that is the only way to ensure each claim is a direct result of assumptions made and nothing else. That is a far more productive, clear and fallacy proof way to approach theory then mere historical rhetoric.
Marxist economists (the few that still exists) have failed to do that, claiming that Marxist theory lack of internal consistency is a reflection of the dialectic method that transcends formal logic.
The sum of the series (1/2)^n is equal to two (or approach 2 infinitely). In either case we know it is a finite value and thus we know for sure the distance is finite to begin with. This is enough to solve the "paradox".
Yes, if you always walk only half the distance you will never reach the edge of the forest in any finite iteration. But the issue is, you don't have to walk half the distance. The claim calculus provide is not "if you walk all the halve distances you will walk the whole distance". The claim is "to walk the whole distance indeed you have to walk all the infinity halve distances and that's possible because the sum of all those half distances are finite".
1. Economic theory is not meant to justify economic systems. Theory is meant to expose their mechanisms, explain their functioning. The judgement of whether a system works or not comes from ideology and morals - and both are outside the realm of positive economics.
2. Don't be surprised but the division between classes is not done numerically by checking some statistics such as income or wealth. It's done qualitatively, based on the roles played during capitalistic production. Capitalists own and accumulate capital while workers rent labor to then in the form of employment contracts. No math involved.
3. My point is that theory itself have to be written mathematically. A scientific claim must not only be verified empirically by statistics and experiments - it must be proved analytically to expose which are the assumptions made to sustain the theory.
BGU Control
R Aggro
Standard - For Fun
BG Auras