There are a few thousand other books you should read - going back to Plato. You should also understand linear algebra and multivariate calculus. You should understand the equations in economics - even for the economics you disapprove of. This means working through people like Von Mises and Fridman that are enemies of socialism. If you want a meaningful framework through which economics should be approached mathematically you should read Brian Arthur as he was the first economist (to my knowledge) to apply dif frac calc and path dependencies into models.

So if by educated you mean you've read a few thousand books dating back to Athens and have a highly developed understanding of mathematics, history and economics then cool. If you mean you read some "Marxist" books and you've somehow a great command of human knowledge then go crawl under a fucking rock please.

Breadtube thread.

All hail /u/Yeuph, master of a thousand other books you should read

  • happybadger [he/him]
    ·
    4 years ago

    " Lmfao I have read a lot more philosophy than Marx but as he says "The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways. The point, however, is to change it." "

    Yeah sure, that was Dewey's criticism of philosophers of his time too. Its not a stupid observation.

    As for calculus you quoted Marx above. Exactly how do you expect people discuss economics beyond a neophyte conceptual level if not with calculus? I mean your argument is refuting the observations of Copernicus; which along with the discovery of Cicero's letters propelled us to a civilization that was able to overcome feudalism and at least acknowledge some basic rights humans have under liberalism.

    At some point you need to be able to describe - when talking to educated capitalists or neoliberal economists - how worker-owned economies work. Von Mises criticized this idea heavily; and he did so largely with equations (that I think are bullshit). Still if you want to be taken seriously be serious people you do need ways to describe how such economies operate. Largely this work has never been done IMO and it leads to neoliberals being able to dominate conversations about economics while leftists defer to pure philosophy.

    The thing that bothers me about a lot of leftists - and its why I spend so much time reading "enemies of humanity" (like Von Mises) philosophy is because we do need to be able to deal with their criticisms at a high level - as Varofoukis does.

    And frankly I do have a hard time listening to people claim how educated they are if they don't understand 300 year old mathematics; if they can at least respect it and acknowledge its importance but are "bad at math" - that's fine. I don't want to dismiss everyone's opinion that couldn't learn mathematics due to our failed educational system that was/is being crushed under capitalism - but we can at least acknowledge the importance.

    I'm going to take a class in geometry (Socrates? Ever heard of him you fucking acolyte?) so that I can design a locker that lets me shove this nerd into it forever. Like when you put two mirrors against each other at an angle and it's an endless world of mirrors inside. I shove him into one and there's another locker behind it. Every 10th locker I'll ask if he knows an equation that will make Narnia appear behind the next one to save him. Then it's just another locker regardless of whatever answer he has.

    • GnastyGnuts [he/him]
      ·
      4 years ago

      Philosophy is good, but it can make people into weird nerds that think everything is about ideas and arguments, and they forget that most people actually engage with the world by living in it and responding to...material conditions.

      • happybadger [he/him]
        ·
        4 years ago

        What got me is that was after I had described labour as a universal metabolic process that both bees and architects participate in. Biodiversity is baked into that and it only explains where the value comes from in that biodiversity as each species' labour affects its ecosystem.

        Nope, they value biodiversity. It's more gooder than badder things like Marxism.

    • REallyN [she/her,they/them]
      ·
      4 years ago

      mean your argument is refuting the observations of Copernicus; which along with the discovery of Cicero’s letters propelled us to a civilization that was able to overcome feudalism

      yeah....that's why we transitioned from feudalism.
      yeesh....and I thought I was dumb.

      • happybadger [he/him]
        ·
        4 years ago

        It reminds me of this equally pretentious philosophy student who tried to le debate my simpleton labour theory of value. They never made a coherent argument, only pointing out what kind of philosophical arguments I made with "I can disagree with that". Everything was met with a PHI101 definition what they were looking at. When I asked what their alternative to it was, they said "I value biodiversity". They refused to translate that into some kind of actionable framework beyond "things that reduce biodiversity are bad".

        The most gifted child I've seen on reddit. Real square-block-smashed-through-round-hole-because-squares-are-gooder energy.