On cui bono: Are historical actors really that motivated by money? For instance, having read many articles on the influence of central banking in the Wilson Administration I find it very unlikely that a progressive president would have so many business friends and would be very willing to involve the fortunes of a whole country in a doubtful world war just to satisfy the investments of bankers -and this president was a leftist! Why is it that even avowedly anti-business/gov. complex politicians should be in easy agreement with businessmen, such a thing defies common sense. Indeed, I've lived in the US and having perused its general culture I cannot find one instance in everyday life where the proposition," if your're really rich and powerful you should risk virtually everything including the life and property of yourselves and others to invade the whole world so a addition to your riches is attained." is admitted to be one worth acting on. Why is it then that businessmen and presidents, assuming that they are just as steeped in their native cultures, should do an about face upon receiving power? I am completely stumped by this phenomenon in libertarian-styled histories and as a history buff myself, I very much would like an answer on this subject. (Of course maybe people are this unusual I don't know; I was good at AP US History so maybe I'm just diluted ).
As for praexology and history I think that the economist cannot predict the future because if people act then they will incorporate this prediction into their actions and so change the future making it unpredictable. But what if the economist uses logic to predict past actions which are unchangeable. Is it possible that there can be prediction as applied to past events?
What are the definitions of economic calculation and revealed preference?
And for my last question: Where can I find more human action study guides. I've been reading them on LvMI but there are only 32 I can find.
Thanks
fakename: I find it very unlikely that a progressive president would have so many business friends
Why? Because someone told you that progressive's were "anti-business?"
How would someone without business friends get to be President in the first place?
fakename:I cannot find one instance in everyday life where the proposition," if your're really rich and powerful you should risk virtually everything including the life and property of yourselves and others to invade the whole world so a addition to your riches is attained."
When did Wilson ever risk his own life and fortune?
Peace
As for the progressives being anti-business, it seems that they were from their policies and from their rhetoric. If a person is anti-business to the extent that he worries about a cabal of the rich won't he easily see that if he allows a group of rich men to aid him in gov. that he is doing exactly what he is against?
As for becoming president without business friends it might be that if a prog. really didn't like businessmen he would refuse their help and be contented with being a minor-league player leaving lefties with better views of these people to run the show. I don't believe though, that you can become president without such friends.
And wilson, owing to the visscitudes of war, didn't know if fighting germany and the other cent. powers would be without incident either in the present or in the future. One of these incidents could be an attack on america and as he is an american, he stands in danger of an attack. This consitutes his risk.
You're forgetting the possibility of letting the "right kind" of people be in power, and in business. I don't think so-called progressives are inimical to such a notion. They're the elite, they deserve all the wealth and power because they, and not the stupid bourgeois peons, know best how to use it for the "common good".
-Jon
Freedom of markets is positively correlated with the degree of evolution in any society...
fakename:it seems that they were from their policies and from their rhetoric
Someday you'll learn that regulating is pro-business, not anti-business.
You think the Fed hurts the banksters?
fakename:One of these incidents could be an attack on america and as he is an american, he stands in danger of an attack. This consitutes his risk.
Was germany to send a transaltanic zeppellin to bomb the White House? His risk was zero. The only people who bore any risk where those put on boats and shipped to where the zeppelins already were. And of course tax payers who's risk was 100% as they stood to gain nothing from the war except taxes and debt.
Wilson rewarded his friends with war funds through the War Finance Corporation, which was the entire point.
It's not that regulation is actually pro or anti business but rather whether the politicians think that it is or isn't. My question is one of subjective motivations not of one objective facts. For instance, some people may think that a plague is going to occur and so they huddle everyone together thereby causing a plague. The former part of this scenario illustrates subjective motivation and the latter objective facts. It would be very surprising if in fact the people mentioned intended both to cause the plague and to avoid it, simply because two contraries cannot be both true. It is even harder to justify Wilson (or any other progressive) since he seems to hold both that all business is bad and that some business (like bankers) are good. I mean, WTF?
As for the safety of wilson, I think you're correct on that count. Indeed it seems even more likely that a person would get into a risky situation only AFTER knowing his personal risks were low.