Moishe Postone argues that Marx produced a Critique of Political Economy, not a Critical Political Economy. The latter, however, is assumed by many, perhaps most, of those who call themselves Marxist Economists -- a label which, if Postone, Fredy [sic] Perlman, et al are correct, is an oxymoron. The best "Marxist" 'economists' tend to focus more on politics and history than on "economics" as ordinarily conceived.

A German friend refers to those who think "Marx" is the German spelling of "Ricardo."

Carrol

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Science for the People Discussion List [mailto:SCIENCE-FOR-THE-
> [log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Tadit Anderson
> Sent: Monday, September 24, 2012 1:48 PM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: Social construction of science
> 
> as suggested the construction of Science is a social process. As a side
> point I have been following Steve Keen of Debunking Economics. One of the
> interesting things about Steve Keen has been how he deconstructs the
> ideological basis of economics science particularly when he deconstructs
> the abuse of mathematics to confuse the public and themselves in support
> of the courtier retirement plan.
> 
> He has recently spent about a month working with the Field Institute for
> Mathematics in Montreal to move his economics to another higher level.
> Because Neoclassical economics is a cultural echo chamber really of
> wishful thinks. And then here rub while much of the left is wringing their
> hands about the in vivo melt down, it seems odd that though the left has
> adopted an inequalities focused economics that is buckled to essentially
> neo-classical economics, which is in essence "conservative<" as in not
> interested at all in the issues of inequality, except to make distribution
> more un-equal. Somewhere in the round of musical chairs,what has been
> installed is a behaviorist and even mainly a "micro-economics" a'la M.
> Friedman where the notion of "human nature" is brought out is often used
> to ex poste to explain the inequality. Much like Romney's 47% fictions
> which are particularly welcomed by other racists and elitists.
> 
> The adoption of the neo-classical assumptions by the nominal left makes
> for possibly greater damage to those focused upon inequality/ie than what
> was accomplished by decades of suppression of the nominal left, than what
> has been accomplished by the left adopting neo-classical economics. All
> this makes for some interesting translations some of a decidedly zombie
> character.
> 
> Apart of this possibly goes back to Marx's adoption of several economic
> concepts from the British "empiricists," which most should know was also a
> self referential piece of self congratulatory ideology is in the fashion
> of the Royal Academy of Science legacy, of science being an avocation of
> the wealthy.
> 
> Back to Keen, his economics is in the mode of the best that the social
> sciences have. Again, his process calls into question the entire
> foundation of the social science being more conservative ideological
> fictions, than social science based upon capacities. Think Hannah Arendt,
> not P. Samuelson.
> 
> fast forward, Tadit
> 
> 
> 
> On Mon, 24 Sep 2012 13:31:05 -0400, Mitchel Cohen
> <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> 
> > I agree with what the author is stating here. But
> > it avoids the real argument, which is not that
> > scientific projects involve social networks of
> > people to make real, but of whether the
> > underpinnings of science are objective,
> > ubiquitous and absolute, and stand apart from the
> > ideological (subjective) frameworks of political movements.
> >
> > It is worth pondering Marx's thoughts on ideology as a material force.
> >
> > Mitchel
> >
> >
> >
> > At 01:21 PM 9/24/2012, Sam Anderson wrote:
> >
> >
> >>
> >> Social construction of science
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> <<Sociology of science simply wants to take a
> >> moment to notice science as something that is made by groups of people>>
> >> This entry was posted on September 24, 2012, in
> >> <http://alicerosebell.wordpress.com/category/science/>science,
> >> <http://alicerosebell.wordpress.com/category/sociology/>sociology
> >> and tagged
> >> <http://alicerosebell.wordpress.com/tag/philosophy-of-science/>philosophy
> >> of science,
> >> <http://alicerosebell.wordpress.com/tag/science/>science,
> >> <http://alicerosebell.wordpress.com/tag/social-constructivism/>social
> >> constructivism,
> >> <http://alicerosebell.wordpress.com/tag/sociology-of-science/>sociology
> >> of
> >> <http://alicerosebell.wordpress.com/tag/sociology-of-science/>science.
> >>
> >>  ”The Knowledge Construction Union”, the
> >> IoE take to the streets, en mass.
> >>
> >> Saying science is a social construction does not
> >> amount to saying science is make believe. It
> >> puzzles me that this even needs saying, and yet
> >> it does, again and again and again.
> >>
> >> Just because something is socially constructed
> >> doesn’t mean it isn’t also real.
> >>
> >> St Paul’s Cathedral was made by more people
> >> than Sir Christopher Wren, he relied upon on a
> >> social network. And yet there it still stands,
> >> all its socially constructed reality. I saw it
> >> from the Southbank when I walked down there last
> >> week. I’ve sat on its steps, been inside it,
> >> climbed it, taken photos there, got drunk
> >> outside, argued about it, been dazzled by it.
> >> The thing is real. I do not doubt that. I admit
> >> I only perceive it limited by my human
> >> capacities. I’m quite short sighted, I get
> >> distracted by other things and my view of the
> >> place is coloured by what other people have said
> >> to me about it. But even in my more annoying
> >> “hey, what do we ever really know, really,
> >> really” philosophical moments, I’m pretty sure it exists.
> >>
> >> Indeed, we could argue St Paul’s is only real
> >> – as opposeed to a figment of Chris Wren’s
> >> imagination – beacause it wass socially
> >> constructed. In order to get it built, he relied
> >> upon the labour, ideas, expertise, money,
> >> political will and other resources of whole
> >> networks of other people. If hadn’t been for
> >> this network, I doubt it would have been constructed at all.
> >>
> >> We could say the same for any number of
> >> scientific buildings or institutions too.
> >> CERN’s a good example. It employs nearly 4,000
> >> staff, hosting a further 10,000 visiting
> >> scientists and engineers, representing 113
> >> nationalities drawn from more than 600
> >> universities and research facilities. That’s
> >> without getting into the large, long and complex
> >> networks of broader financial, physical and
> >> intellectual resources they rely up to do their
> >> work.  Arguably, it’s because we socially
> >> construct science that CERN can exist.
> >>
> >> We can also apply this point to scientific
> >> ideas, the construction of which is also social,
> >> as individuals rely on others to check, adapt,
> >> support and inspire them. It’s also worth
> >> adding that just because people came up with an
> >> idea doesn’t mean it doesn’t match reality,
> >> it just means people worked together to find the
> >> best idea about the world they can. Science
> >> isn’t nature, even if in places it might seem
> >> to so have closely described the world that we
> >> use it as a shorthand. To say science is made by
> >> humans isn’t to say the world around them is.
> >> (although there is a “social construction of
> >> reality” strand to sociology of science, this
> >> is only a strand, and it’s a nuanced
> >> philosophical debate which, if you want to
> >> engage with, it’s worth taking time over).
> >>
> >> None of this is to say individuals don’t play
> >> a role, just that they rely on others. The fact
> >> that we can, at least on occasion, collect
> >> together to make stuff like the discovery of the
> >> Higgs boson is one of the things that makes me happy about humanity.
> >>
> >> Sociology of science simply wants to take a
> >> moment to notice science as something that is
> >> made by groups of people. I really don’t get
> >> why people find it as somehow desiring of
> >> undermining science. You could equally see it as
> >> a celebration. If anything, the scientific
> >> community should embrace such detailed study of
> >> the intricacies of their make up, it helps make
> >> cases for more rigorous thinking about funding and immigration policies.
> >>
> >> Some of these points are echoed in a
> >> <http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/sep/22/ig-nobels-celebrate-
> small-beautiful-science>short
> >> piece I wrote for the Guardianat the weekend. If
> >> you want to read more, I suggest you try
> >>
> <http://www.press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/K/bo3684600.html>so
> me
> >> of the original Strong Programme, as well as
> >> <http://www.bruno-latour.fr/node/130>Latour on
> >> networks and
> >>
> <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_K._Merton#Sociology_of_science>Merton
> >> on communalism. Or recent books by
> >> <http://eu.wiley.com/WileyCDA/WileyTitle/productCd-
> 1405187654.html>Sergio
> >> Sismondo and
> >> <http://www.routledge.com/books/details/9780415322003/>Massimiano
> >> Bucchi offer slightly more digestible
> >> introductions. I can also recommend Spencer
> >> Weart’s
> >> <http://www.aip.org/history/climate/index.htm>Discovery
> >> of Global Warming as a good case study in the
> >> social structure of science, it’s a slightly
> >> more engrossing read than abstract theory, or
> >> there was
> >> <http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100324/full/464482a.html>a
> >> nice piece about sociologists at CERN in Nature a while back.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> Sent from Sam + Rosemari's iPad
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > http://www.MitchelCohen.com
> >
> >
> > Ring the bells that still can ring,  Forget your perfect offering.
> > There is a crack, a crack in everything, That's how the light gets in.
> > ~ Leonard Cohen
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >