In Human Action (p. 25 of the Scholar's Edition), Mises states:"There are for man only two principles available for a mental grasp of reality, namely, those of teleology and causality. What cannot be brought under either of these categories is absoluteIy hidden to the human mind. An event not open to an interpretation by one of these two principles is for man inconceivable and mysterious. Change can be conceived as the outcome either of the operation of mechanistic causality or of purposeful behavior; for the human mind there is no third way available."The language of this quote is somewhat ambiguous. Teleology is a less fundamental form of causality. Although Mises states "It is true, as has already been mentioned, that teleology can be viewed as a variety of causality", to claim that causality and teleology are the "two principles available" is somewhat ambiguous. Instead, he should have claimed that causality is the only principle available, and then claimed that teleology is a particular elaborated type of causality.This proposition seems to be somewhat self-evident or intuitive. However, I am not completely convinced. Does anyone have any further discussion or explanation of this quote? I desire a more complete argument that claims that causality is the sole foundation of human reasoning.
If I wrote it more than a few weeks ago, I probably hate it by now.
I. Ryan:This proposition seems to be somewhat self-evident or intuitive. However, I am not completely convinced. Does anyone have any further discussion or explanation of this quote? I desire a more complete argument that claims that causality is the sole foundation of human reasoning.
I don't think you will find what you're looking for. Austrian epistemology is dualistic. There are the two categories: teleological, dealing with values, purpose, satisefaction, ends, free will, ect. and the causal (physical, material), dealing with space and time, conservation of momentum, means, constantly operating cause and effect relationships, determinism, and so on.
If a human being could know the causes of their own actions before they make them, they would have to regard themselves as an automaton, entirely predictable. However this would mean that they are unable to make choices which would contradict action in the first place. So humans cannot consider it possible to understand the causes of their own action. This is what is meant by having a free will.
On the other hand if there was no regularity in the rest of the universe, outside of ourselves, we would be unable to anticipate future states of affairs and thus interfere with the natural course of the universe to bring about the most highly desired state of affairs. Once again, this would negate action, purposeful choosing. So, we must also regard the universe as somewhat predictable.
There is no escaping the dualism. And Hoppe develops this further in his tiny little ingenious book here. Austrian epistemology is superior by far to anything any philosopher has come up with, except maybe Aristotle.
summary of what Hoppe says about categories in Economic Science and the Austrian Method:
Immanuel Kant said that all propositions can be classified in a two-fold way:
analytic (true/false on basis of formal logic alone) vs. synthetic (all other prop’s)
a priori (observations are not necessary to establish truth/falsity) vs. a posteriori (they are)
Kant claimed that synthetic a priori truths existed: propositions whose truth-value can be definitely established even though formal logic is not sufficient for doing so and observations are unnecessary. Mises agreed and in this sense Mises was a Kantian. Kant gave mathematics and geometry but also e.g. the principle of causality as examples.
So what makes such propositions true according to Kant? Their truth follows from self-evident axioms. But not self-evident in a psychological sense, but in the sense that we cannot deny their truth without contradicting ourselves. We can find such truths through reflecting on ourselves as knowing subjects. Reflection/reason, because it is an inner rather than observational experience, can understand things as being necessarily the way they are because it has produced it according to its own design.
This raises the problem of idealism (reality created by the mind) though, and Mises may have solved this by insisting that our mind is one of acting persons and so our mental categories (synthetic a priori) are ultimately grounded in categories of action. Action bridges the gulf between the mental and the physical and so provides us with a realist epistemology. So we can have a realist epistemology that gives us true synthetic a priori knowledge by reflecting on the concept of action. Causality for example must be presupposed if we are to act.
Thus in true Kantian spirit the categories values, ends, means, choice, preference, cost, profit and loss, time, causality and the resulting principles (marginal utility, association, etc.) are not observable or psychologically self-evident, but are about reality and can be had from reflective understanding into the nature of action. This is what Mises made explicit.
Praxeology then says that all economic propositions that claim to be true must be shown to be deducible by means of formal logic from the undeniably true material knowledge re the meaning of action. All economic reasoning then consist in:
understanding of categories of action and changes occurring in them
a description of a world in which categories of action assume concrete meaning (e.g. Robinson Crusoe world, world with several actors, world of barter, etrc.)
a logical deduction of consequences which result from performance of some action in this world, or of changes in this situation for an actor.
If there ain’t no flaw in reasoning then the conclusions are necessarily true and economics is like an applied logic.
humans can reason over things without causal relations, like geometery etc....
Where there is no property there is no justice; a proposition as certain as any demonstration in Euclid
Fools! not to see that what they madly desire would be a calamity to them as no hands but their own could bring
Stephen Forde:I don't think you will find what you're looking for. Austrian epistemology is dualistic. There are the two categories: teleological, dealing with values, purpose, satisefaction, ends, free will, ect. and the causal (physical, material), dealing with space and time, conservation of momentum, means, constantly operating cause and effect relationships, determinism, and so on. If a human being could know the causes of their own actions before they make them, they would have to regard themselves as an automaton, entirely predictable. However this would mean that they are unable to make choices which would contradict action in the first place. So humans cannot consider it possible to understand the causes of their own action. This is what is meant by having a free will. On the other hand if there was no regularity in the rest of the universe, outside of ourselves, we would be unable to anticipate future states of affairs and thus interfere with the natural course of the universe to bring about the most highly desired state of affairs. Once again, this would negate action, purposeful choosing. So, we must also regard the universe as somewhat predictable. There is no escaping the dualism. And Hoppe develops this further in his tiny little ingenious book here. Austrian epistemology is superior by far to anything any philosopher has come up with, except maybe Aristotle.
As Mises states in Human action, teleology is a variant of causality. Therefore, the fundamental logical structure of the human mind is causality. In fact, my question could be reworded to include the "dualism" concept that you mentioned without altering the conclusion.
nirgrahamUK:humans can reason over things without causal relations, like geometery etc....
(1) The sum of the angles of the enclosed shape is 180 degrees. Therefore, the shape is a triangle.
(2) The shape is a triangle. Therefore, the sum of the angles of the enclosed shape is 180 degrees.
Would this not be an example of synchronous causation? If X is true, Y is true. Y does not follow X in time; instead, Y is true the instant X is true. Conversely, if Y is true, X is true. X does not follow Y in time; instead, X is true the instant Y is true. There is not a physical causation; but, there is a conceptual causation. If X is not true then Y is not true as well. If you disagree, how would you explain geometry? Does your position disagree with Mises' position (as shown in my original post)?
It seems to me you are reading too much into that specific paragraph of Mises, the ones to either side, calrify. He is not strictly and boldy saying that humans cant understand anything that does not contain causal relations.just before the paragraph he says there is only one mode of action which is human and comprehensible to the human mind.
i think he is underlining the point that when we consider human action, notions of causality and teleolegy are indespensable.
he goes on to write An event not open to an interpretation by one of these two principles (causality / teleolegy) is for man inconceivable and mysterious.
I think investigating the Mathematical relations and truths of the geometery of triangles is irrelevant to what Mises is writing about, which is human action.
It is a stretch to say that angles adding up causes triangles, and that being triangular causes numbers to add up. It is simply not a causative relation between the various facts of triangles. In a sense is evidence that analysis etc can be done over concepts without causal relations. but of course no analysis can be done without someone to do the analysis, and we cant conceive of analysing math problems without teleolegy and causation. (i.e. teleology, "i desire to know more of triangles", causation 'putting pen to paper leads to marks, the marks can be seen and interpreted by the brain of the analyser' etc. Mises is saying these arent dispensable concepts vis-a-vis Human Action.
Thats my laymans understanding.