[LBird]

ALB wrote:

LBird wrote:

I'm quite happy to play Cassius to your Brutus, Alan,

Interesting alliance between a Know Nothing and a Can't Know Anything !

Brilliant, ALB!

[LBird]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

…by all means start a let's put the knife into Kunkel thread and whoever else you think is misleading and diversionery …a very long list …and i will happily add a few dagger strokes.

I'm quite happy to play Cassius to your Brutus, Alan, in our determined campaign to kill any Caesar-like economist.

[LBird]

pgb wrote:

Which makes me wonder: have you actually read his book?

Since I’ve already said on this thread that I’ve received and started to read the book, and I’ve already provided some quotes from Piketty, it ‘makes me wonder’ what the intent of your question is. I’ve already pointed out that your ‘tone’ in your first post to me was ‘uncomradely’, and I’m minded to think that you’re continuing in this vein.But, to give you the benefit of the doubt, I’ll assume that you’re just a bit slow, rather than being insulting.Your main failure, so far, is to completely misunderstand the nature of the term ‘cooked’ in relation to ‘data’, in my posts. You appear to think ‘data’ can be either ‘raw’ or ‘cooked’, depending upon the trustworthiness of the ‘scientist’. For you, the nature of the ‘data’ is dependent upon the morality of the scientist. And you ‘trust’ Piketty.

pgb wrote:

…you say that Picketty's data is "cooked"; he asked questions that already fitted in with his answers; his book is "ideological" (as opposed to "scientific"); he is a used-car salesman; just another apologist for capitalism, displays bad conscience, and of course is also a "hired prizefighter".

Yes, Piketty is employing ‘cooked data’, he is employing an ideology which determines his questions and answers, and he is what you say I’ve said.

pgb wrote:

I have been very slow in reading Picketty and am only now up to page 300. But nothing I have read so far gives the slightest support to your claims. Despite my long established skepticism regarding French theorists in many disciplines, I was pleasantly surprised to find Picketty lucid, no bullshitting, fair-minded in his assessment of others (incl. Marx), and certainly intellectually honest.

You seem to have no grasp of science and its method, pgb, notwithstanding your ‘pleasant surprise’. This has nothing to do with ‘lucidity’, ‘fairmindedness’ or ‘honesty’. The scientific issue is that all scientists select their ‘data’: Piketty, me, you, Einstein, Marx, etc., etc. All ‘data’ is ‘cooked’, in this sense. My posts, if you’d read them, constantly show this contrast between the mythical, bourgeois-inspired ideology of ‘raw data’ and the scientific method which stresses the ‘theory-ladenness of data’. The only ‘raw data’ is ‘everything, everywhere, at all times’. The pretence that any ‘slice’ of reality is ‘raw’ is a myth: to ‘slice’ is to ‘cook’. Selection means parameters of selection, and parameters mean pre-existing ideology.

pgb wrote:

In the end, all you seem to be saying is that your "ideology" would select different economic and social issues as objects of study than the issues Picketty has chosen. Which is not saying very much, and provides no ground at all for making judgments on the quality and significance of Picketty's research.

Well, do you make your “judgments on the quality and significance of Picketty's research” based upon Piketty’s ideology or upon Communist ideology? Or do you pretend to be an ‘individual’ with a unique opinion? That is, some sort of ‘liberal’ ideology. You haven’t been open with us, have you?I’m open in my exposure of my ideology, and thus my viewpoint or stance, from which I make my judgments of Piketty. I agree with Marx, that bourgeois economists (like Piketty) are ‘hired prize fighters’ of the bourgeoisie, and not ‘objective’ commentators upon ‘raw data’.So, Piketty can be lucid, fairminded and honest, from a bourgeois perspective, and still be bullshitting us Communists. That’s because he himself doesn’t understand how capitalism works; if he did, he’d be a Communist.

pgb wrote:

Which makes me wonder: have you actually read his book?

And I wonder if you even know what you’re doing, reading Piketty’s book. Do you know Piketty’s ideology? Do you even know your own? Do you know what science is? Do you know that all science is ideological, and that all scientists are ideological? If you don’t know any of these things, please read up on it before you continue beyond page 300. Otherwise, you’ll continue to waste your time on the rest of the book.

[LBird]

pgb wrote:

I've not read everything of Marx by a long way, but describing someone as "a hired prize-fighter for the bourgeoisie" doesn't sound like Marx to me.

Here's the source, pgb. A bit about 'science' and 'disinterested' enquiry, too.

Karl Marx, Afterword in Capital, wrote:

In France and in England the bourgeoisie had conquered political power. Thenceforth, the class struggle, practically as well as theoretically, took on more and more outspoken and threatening forms. It sounded the knell of scientific bourgeois economy. It was thenceforth no longer a question, whether this theorem or that was true, but whether it was useful to capital or harmful, expedient or inexpedient, politically dangerous or not. In place of disinterested inquirers, there were hired prize fighters; in place of genuine scientific research, the bad conscience and the evil intent of apologetic.

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/p3.htm%5BPenguin Classics edition, p. 97]So, I have it on good authority that Piketty is displaying 'the bad conscience and the evil intent of apologetic'.

[LBird]

pgb wrote:

You on the other hand, seem to have an aversion to the use of statistical data (and of mathematics generally) in economic analysis. So can you tell me please what sources you would use if you were to undertake the same task as Picketty, ie. to map the elusive shape of wealth and income inequality in modern capitalist societies? Picketty uses the World's Top Incomes Database (WITD, accessible on the Net), National Income and other data from various governments, estate tax returns etc. I like his honesty in saying that these sources, though the most extensive ever assembled, are yet incomplete and imperfect. However, since you believe that facts are constituted by theory (and ideology) I assume that the data you would use re inequality would be quite different than Picketty's data since he is a "bourgeois economist" with a different theory (and ideology) to you, a Communist. So what data would you use?

I'm not sure where this uncomradely tirade came from, pgb.I've never expressed "an aversion to the use of statistical data (and of mathematics generally)".I've always argued that any scientist should reveal their 'ideological' beliefs, which determine what counts as 'data', whether statistical, mathematical, anecdotal, literary, palaeological, religious, philological, mythical, etc., etc.The 'data' I would use would be 'data' produced by my ideology.I'm a Communist.Since we live in a capitalist society, most of the 'data' we need is either not collected or is not regarded as 'economic data'.The data that does exist is ignored by Piketty, and all other bourgeois economists.I'm quite happy for 'statistical and mathematical' techiques to be employed to produce 'data' referring to 'exploitation'.But first, we need a unit of exploitation to be defined and measured. Of course, we would already be aware that much 'exploitation' is not 'objectively measurable', and so is not so amenable to 'mathematics or statistics' and can't be captured as a 'unit', as it regards such subjective proletarian experiences as feelings of boredom or resentment.As a simple example, I would argue that 'personal happiness' would be an 'economic measure' within Communist economics. This could be determined by asking each worker how they 'feel' about their work, on a scale of 1 to 10. Any worker scoring less than 10 would be offered a different job.This sort of 'statistics and mathematics' is meaningless to the profession of economics.Our Communist 'economics' would be a world away from Piketty's bourgeois concerns.

[LBird]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

Why did he include solutions that he even considers to be extremely unlikely to be turned into policy?This seems to be what his fellow professionals all draw attention to (as i have quoted from)…

I think he knows his solutions require a jettisoning of 'mathematical' economics, and that his profession isn't ready to do so, yet at least. His 'fellow professionals' aren't yet ready to return to 'political economy' (which is, in effect, what Piketty is pleading for) and prefer to persevere with 'economics' (ie. neo-classical, individualist, mathematics).They seem suspicious of where 'political economy' might go… given where it all ended up last time, in another book called 'Capital'.

[LBird]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

I'm asking this question …Who did Piketty write his book for (rather than why)…

It seems that the ‘target audience’ for his book, Alan, is his own profession: that is, the bourgeois economists.

Piketty, Capital, p. 32 wrote:

To put it bluntly, the discipline of economics has yet to get over its childish passion for mathematics and for purely theoretical and often highly ideological speculation, at the expense of historical research and collaboration with the other social sciences… This obsession with mathematics is an easy way of acquiring the appearance of scientificity….Hence they must set side their contempt for other disciplines and their absurd claim to greater scientific legitimacy, despite the fact that they know almost nothing about anything….The truth is that economics should never have sought to divorce itself from the other social sciences and can advance only in conjunction with them.

And although you wanted ‘who’ rather than ‘why’, I have to hazard a guess as to ‘why’.I think that many experienced bourgeois economists can see that their discipline is disappearing up its own arse, under the deleterious influence of ‘anglo-saxon’ mathematics, and even students of economics in the universities have recently started becoming restless with being taught essentially meaningless mathematical formulae. I think that it’s no co-incidence that Piketty is French, and so from a different ‘European’ tradition which is far more aware of history (1871?), than the smug British-American ‘mathematical and statistical’ number-crunching idiots, who pay no attention to meanings or contexts, social, cultural and historical.So, I think Piketty is a good bourgeois economist, who seeks to wake up, to open the eyes, of his fellow capitalism-sympathisers and ideologists, before his profession becomes entirely worthless to the bourgeoisie in the class war. ‘Economics’ needs to regain some credibility, and Piketty is there to help.Piketty is, in the words of Marx, a hired-prizefighter for the bourgeoisie. We Communists shouldn’t be taken in by his ideology, methods, ‘data’ or resultsI think Piketty’s book is the result of a theoretical crisis with the economics profession, and will probably have no lasting effect (either within the profession or with the wider public), unless we are about to see the crumbling of the Anglo-Saxon, Thatcher/Reagan, Hayek/Friedman ideological axis within the discipline of economics.Whatever the outcome of that internecine struggle, we Communists have to pose a fundamentally different alternative, based upon Marx, or bourgeois economics will simply march on in either the old ‘mathematical’ mode or a new Pikettian form, both to our detriment.

[LBird]

Brian wrote:

Wow LBird you've just gone and written a brill review, unfortunately my opinion – like your post – is ideologically biased and falls at the first hurdle. 

But 'ideology' is not a 'hurdle', to be either 'fallen over' or, perhaps you are suggesting, to be best avoided entirely.'Ideology' is the inescapable enabler, the horse which we ride, to jump the hurdles.I openly give the name of my horse, because I employ the proper scientific method in the horse race that is science.Those who refuse to name their horse are not actually running the horse race on foot, they are just pretending. Believe me, they're on a horse!Come on, Communist! We're in the lead!

Brian wrote:

Nevertheless, it clarifies it lot of the points you have been making over several months. Just hope when the review does appear in next months Socialist Standard it carries a disclaimer along the lines you are suggesting.

Well, I would expect the periodical title of Socialist Standard would give a clue as to the mount!But, yes, perhaps the reviewer will make explicit their particular hobby horse.Is your horse named 'positivism', Brian?

[LBird]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

i think Lbird may be right…you ask the questions that will fit in with your answers and that is because of the ideas you already hold in your head…ideology.

It’s become clear since Einstein that this sequence really is the ‘scientific method’. Of course, this contradicts entirely the supposed basis of ‘science’(especially ‘physics’), from Newton onward, by which humans were supposed to have unmediated access to ‘reality’ through passive sense-based observation. That was the myth of positivism, that ‘physics’ produced a ‘truth’ which reflected ‘reality’. And this myth was supposed to provide the basis for all attempts to make other scientific disciplines more like physics, that is, more ‘objective’. Hence, in history, for example, von Ranke’s now notorious plea to historians, to stop moralising and “simply to show how it really was (wie es eigentlich gewesen)” (see Carr, What is History, p.. Of course, we now know that ‘morals’ can’t be removed from either history or physics (or, indeed, economics). Humans (and their ideologies, morals, beliefs, etc.) are at the heart of the scientific method. There is no simple ‘raw data’ to passively examine, not even in physics.So, to sum up the two methods, the mythical scientific method is:1 raw data2 neutral collection3 neutral presentation (ie. the ‘facts’)4 theories, implications, lessons drawn (the only ‘active’ stage)Based on this mythical method, some regard Piketty’s book as representing the third stage (ie. the ‘facts’ or ‘raw data’). Thus, anyone can read the ‘facts’ or ‘raw data’ and draw their own conclusions. For this bourgeois method, the ideology begins with the fourth stage, and thus the arguments are about which ideology is correct for interpreting the ‘raw facts’.It’s bollocks, comrades.The proper scientific method (and it always has been this, the positivists were pretending otherwise) is:1 raw data (ie. everything, everywhere, at every time)2 human social consciousness (including ideology and theories)3 selection from ‘everything, etc.’ based on human parameters4 presentation of pre-chosen ‘facts’ (allegedly ‘raw data’, but in reality ‘pre-cooked data’)5 implications, lessons drawn (the second ‘active’ stage)Now, we can see that Piketty’s book represents the fourth stage (ie. the ‘cooked data’). If one merely ‘accepts’ Piketty’s data, one is already being bullshitted. Criticism must start, for the scientific method, at stage 2. Piketty’s ideological beliefs must be consciously criticised, prior to reading his book, to allow the scientist to understand Piketty’s selection parameters, and thus why he’s actively picked some ‘data’ and (often unconsciously) rejected most of the other data (which is favourable to Communist ideology).As ajj has perhaps come to realise, “you ask the questions that will fit in with your answers and that is because of the ideas you already hold in your head…ideology”Piketty asked the questions (selected the ‘raw data’) that fitted in with his answers (to fit his preconceived ideas) that is because it’s the human condition (the ideas we already hold in our heads). Humans are social and cultural products, not simply sense-based registers of all external data.Piketty is a reformist, who selected from ‘everything’ (ie, the world we live in) the ‘facts’ that suit his reformist ideology. Not surprisingly, the conclusions that he draws are reformist solutions to reformist problems.No-one can read Piketty ‘un-ideologically’. The book is ideological, and one’s reading of it is ideological. The proper scientific method demands that we expose our ideologies, both in writing and reading, to others. As Einstein insisted, knowledge is relative to ‘the enquirer’ (conceived as a society, or perhaps for Marxists, a mode of production/social formation) As Communists, we can do this; but the bourgeoisie can’t. They have to maintain the pretence that they and their books are not ideological, and that they simply deal with the ‘real world’ of ‘hard facts’.It can’t be done in physics, and it can’t be done in economics.Human understanding, and thus meaning, are at the heart of science.The real world doesn’t present itself to humans unbidden.Piketty is a used-car salesman. Kick the tyres before buying, comrades.

[LBird]

ALB wrote:

Isn't he talking here about poor countries (rather than poor people within countries) …

Well, here's the quote again, fuller:

Piketty, Capital, p. 71, wrote:

To sum up, …the principle mechanism for convergence at the international as well as the domestic level is the diffusion of knowledge. In other words, the poor catch up with the rich to the extent that they achieve the same level of technological know-how, skill, and education…

[my bolds, were '…' last quote]Once again, I can't find any evidence within the chapter for this summary assertion by Piketty.Perhaps it's one of his own fish which got away. Lousy choice of tackle, method, pond, and furthermore poor execution of those choices by Piketty?

[LBird]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

A serious question from me now to those who have read the book.

I’ve got one, too, for those further into the mire than me, so far. I’ve read to the end of chapter one, where I found:

Piketty, Capital, p. 71, wrote:

…the principle mechanism for convergence…is the diffusion of knowledge. In other words, the poor catch up with the rich to the extent that they achieve the same level of technological know-how, skill, and education…

I’m baffled by this conclusion by Piketty. I can’t find any evidence in the chapter for this assertion.Within the UK, the proletariat is better formally-educated than ever before, and yet they haven’t ‘caught up with the rich’.From what I’ve already read in reviews, Piketty argues that the world wars were the context of ‘convergence’ (ie, the rich paid more in money than the poor (who paid in lives, though), and so there was ‘convergence’), so what does he mean by this strange assertion, above?

[LBird]

ALB wrote:

What facts on the ownership of wealth would you select from your ideological point of view and how would you present them?

[my bold]Well, first of all, I'd point out that to concede that the rich 'own' the wealth that they've stolen from us, is a big ideological mistake.It's like conceding that, having stolen a TV from someone's house, that the burglar now 'owns' the TV.What's more, it allows every worker who 'owns' a TV, to feel some identity with someone who also 'owns' things, like a multi-national conglomerate, a shipping line, a string of car factories…We'd be better pointing out, from the start, that 'wealth' is the 'property' of all, and 'ownership of wealth' is an ideological construct aimed at undermining Communist ideas, and that the discussion should be about 'facts on the theft of wealth', not about its 'ownership'.Once we've established that, we could soon establish that Piketty's method ignores the vast majority of 'social products' that the rich have stolen, beyond the physical and monetary assets that he focusses on.You know far more than I do about 'economics', ALB, and you're better suited to point out what Piketty has 'selected through bias' and what 'figures should be rejected'.As for the FT, aren't they capitalists, who select what they want, too? I don't trust a word that they say! But that's because I'm a Communist, not because of their dodgy data arguments.Or do you subscribe to the 'real raw data, open to all, objectively' thesis? I don't, I'm afraid. But that's the basis of our 'scientific' disagreements, too, so I won't pursue it further, here.

[LBird]

Young Master Smeet wrote:

Piketty wrote a book called 'Sharks' in which he discussed the eating habits of sharks. He left out entirely their reproductive habits. Does that disqualify his description of the eating habits of sharks?

But this is your ideological opinion, YMS.In my ideological opinion, he wrote a book called 'Sharks' and discussed only the eating habits of nice, cuddly pussy cats.

YMS wrote:

I employ a team of ideology elves, who hammer at books all night when I'm not looking so I can awaken fresh as a daisy to some ready made conclusions each morning.

Yes, you do. The 'ideology elves' are the ruling class's thinkers, like Piketty. They hammer away, but you really are not looking, are you?Why not employ a different set of elves, like comrades here, and join them, and then we can all consciously 'hammer away' at building our own 'books and conclusions'?I notice you haven't answered my question about your chosen ideology? If you're a reformist, that's fine by me, we can agree to disagree. But then we'll know why we disagree, and realise that it's nothing to with 'raw data' or the need to only read what's written by Piketty (as opposed to 'reading into' what he didn't write).I know from our discussions about 'scientific method' that you seem averse to asking questions about ideology, both others' and your own, but we can't avoid it, from a Communist perspective, at least.If you're not a Communist, fair enough.

[LBird]

Young Master Smeet wrote:

Just to damp us all down with the towel of overworked metaphor: would you criticise a book on the hunting methods of sharks because it doesn't discuss their reproductive methods?  Criticising works for topiics not covered is a fruitless method.  I'm sure Piketty doesn't discuss Hungarian realist cinema in the 1920's, how can we trust a word he says if he doesn't cover Hungarian realist cinema in the 1920's?

But the book's titled 'Hungarian realist cinema in the 1920s'.Surely we're entitled to point out that he's actually written about Japanese Kabuki theatre in the 17th century?I think you underestimate the problems with 'raw data', YMS. It's precisely the gaps, 'the topics not covered', that is at the heart of criticism. Reformists ignore, misidentify, throw away, or even fail to notice, the real issues. 'Real issues' are defined by one's ideology. If you're not a Communist, fine. Ignore the fundamental importance of the gaps in Piketty's book, but you can't criticise Communists for pointing out those gaps.You seem to take the label on the tin as gospel. Some of us are a bit more worldly-wise.What ideology do you employ to understand Piketty's book, YMS?

[LBird]

ALB wrote:

Anyway, L. Bird, read on and see, even if he's not fishing in the same pond as you, if he's not catching some of the same fish.

Of course, I’ll carry on reading Pikettys’ book – at the very least, I’ve bloody paid for it, so I’m going to read it!But, I’m inclined to agree with Alan’s points:

alanjjohnstone wrote:

And if you want to use the fishing metaphor …he trawled for his data, and all the catch that isn't suitable for what LBird says to back Piketty's own ideological position which would mean a very different conclusion to a tax, has been thrown back.

Every ideology contains parameters of selection: of what to keep, and of what to throw away, from someone else’s ‘raw data’. But this ‘raw data’ has already been pre-selected by the author’s ideological parameters. So, as well as our own ‘selecting and rejecting’, we have to be aware that a ‘selection and rejection’ has already happened, before we get to someone else’s ‘raw data’. Thus, some ‘raw data’ we would have ‘selected’ has already been thrown away, before we even get the chance to decide. We all have an ideological framework (conscious of it or not), and we are compelled to choose our ‘fish’. And the ‘fish’ that are presented to us are already only a subset of all the fish in the ocean.Piketty, as Alan says, has already thrown away (or failed to even ‘observe’ for catching in the first place, as ‘fish’ as a species are defined by the ‘fisher’) many valuable ‘facts’ or ‘raw data’ that we would recognise as important.

ajj wrote:

And what of his catch…it is being used as bait to lure the bigger fish …people ..on to all their political hooks. And this is all to be put to one side because Piketty produces data…

This point by Alan is a brilliant criticism.Since we recognise that ‘raw data’ is the human product of ignorance, definitions, selection and rejection prior to its status as ‘raw data’ (in fact, it’s already ‘well-cooked data’, data is never ‘raw’ for humans), we have to face the issue of why Piketty ignored, defined, selected and rejected the ‘raw data’ favourable to a Communist stance.And he did. Piketty’s book obscures the case for Communism, rather than builds for it.There might be some ‘facts’ we can extract from his ‘raw data’, but those ‘facts’ will have to be inserted into a different narrative, a different ideological framework, to make sense of them, to give the ‘facts’ meaning. If one employs a reformist ideology, which matches Piketty’s reformist ideology, then the ‘facts’ will make ‘reformist’ sense, and reinforce a ‘reformist’ outlook. One won’t move to a Communist viewpoint from reading Piketty. Perhaps Stuart’s views embody this reformist development.

ajj wrote:

I already said very early…won't make much difference if Piketty is read or not…the people who count will come to their own conclusions (and have done), about capitalism for themselves…

I think I agree with Alan here, too. I don’t think I would recommend Piketty’s book (based upon what I’ve read, so far) for those, already Communist, to learn, or for reformists to move towards Communist ideas. I’d only say to comrades, if you’re wondering what all the fuss is about (like me), then read it and form your own conclusions, but otherwise, since none of us can read everything, just read various reviews on the net, and especially the views of comrades here.Again, to quote Alan:

ajj wrote:

These absurdities should be head-lined, not relegated to a brief mention in passing while we concentrate praise on his diligence in interpreting the archives. It is not a caveat but a core criticism to Piketty.

Hear, hear!If we suggest that workers should taste cod, but then tell workers to look to a fisherman who catches poisonous pufferfish for their consumption, raw and untreated, it is a culinary mistake (and probably a criminal act).To say nothing of a political error.

SocialistPunk wrote:

This question is to those who are reading Piketty's book. Does he at all suggest why the rich seem to be getting a lot richer?

Perhaps, like Franz von Werra, that’s one of the ‘fish’ that merely ‘got away’ from Piketty’s tackle, methods, taste and choice of pond.

[Author]

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