Wednesday, August 11, 2021
More accuracy
I'm encouraged when I see hints of a trend away from holocaustal orthodoxy. Last week I noted this James Hankins essay on the decadence of philosophy.
Nathan Smith writes on the decadence of economics as an academic field. He slams the mind-destroying effects of tenure:
Moreover, it remains hard to open people’s eyes to the stupidity of much empirical economics, because the econometrics treadmill is useful as a make-work and credentialing program for tenure seekers. “Publishing” is really the wrong word for what journals do in the age of SSRN. They certify work, for a fee, the return on which may consist in a “peer-reviewed” publication leading to tenure. If journals are sometimes as boring to read as a stack of resumes, that’s because they largely serve the same function. Job applications masquerade as science because perverse customs make original scholarship—however trivial, wrong, and/or unread that scholarship may be. That’s the price of admission to a career explaining demand, supply, and market equilibrium to undergraduates.Job applications masquerading as science. On the fucking dot. Concluding, Smith approaches my theme of science as entertainment, attempting to rebuild science as a hobby outside of the OFFICIAL TEMPLE OF WAR AND GENOCIDE.
What do you do when the emperor has no clothes? Other people need to step up and provide leadership. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the Enlightenment sprang not from established universities, but from gentleman soldiers and courtiers and statesmen, popular writers and clergymen, bohemians and sponges, who boldly called themselves philosophers and lived up to the name. Today, similarly, economics’ best hopes lie in uncredentialed economists from business, journalism, and government, abetted by academic mavericks.Now that we see where the Enlightenment led, it's time for a counter-enlightenment. The enlightenment bred the myth of Free Will and Meritocracy, which allowed psychopathic monsters to justify their holocausts. It began immediately with the French Terror in 1789, and continued seamlessly through the "Virus" Terror of 2020. The pre-1700 idea of reality was accurate. The universe has unchanging resonances. Our job is not to defy the universe and create chaos. Our job is to find and measure the real resonances and try to swing with them, joyfully and loosely. LOOK ABOUT YOU. TAKE HOLD OF THE THINGS THAT ARE HERE. TALK TO THEM. LET THEM TALK TO YOU.
Labels: Carver, Entertainment, Equipoise
¶ 10:03 AM
