SM,

It's always fascinating witness hypocrisy in action...as in:

"....your propensity to dish out insults whenever someone disagrees with you is crass and vulgar."

Of course, earlier in the thread one of your apparently courteous and benevolent opening lines to a post went like this -

"I see the screwballs have taken over the thread."

and

"I have stood by and watched as screwballs have bandied around figures...."

You informed David G along the way that his words showed that he was not a logical thinker, not a rational person not a seeker of truth through reality and that he is an enthusiastic disciple of current fads..."

Nothing wrong with a bit of a rhetorical tussle with fellow posters, however, when people feign indignation and look down their middle-class noses, invoke a duel in qualifications and accuse their opponents of being "crass and vulgar" while themselves indulging in precisely the behaviour they criticise - that's hypocrisy.

Nick and Poirot, don't worry about SM. Being a shadow, he has no substance and has never had an original idea in his or her life.

All he or she is capable of is ankle-nipping and making a lot of unintelligible noise.

He's best ignored!

P,

While I understand that I am far from a saint, if you look at previous comments, I have pretty much mirrored his insults. Where he refers to philistines, I refer to screwballs eg his comment.

"The words you have written thus far show clearly that you are not an abstract thinker, not a spiritual person, not a student of philosophy."

Is mirrored by mine.

Nick,

You have provided a comprehensive reading list, and while I will endeavour to tackle some of it, however, I probably won't be able to comment knowledgably before the thread ends.

What I will say in the interim, is that perhaps my economics lecturer was more liberal than most in that he made an effort to point out the limitations, As with any modelling based on limited information, the better the information, the better the modelling. There are definitely areas where the information is sparse, and modelling is really informed guessing such as environmental issues where "value" etc are very hard to determine.

However, there many areas where the information is solid and the models are accurate reflections of human behaviour, and these very firmly predict catastrophe for the Nirvana that Eisenstein envisages.

SM, I can't have DG getting all the credit; I'm the one who introduced philistinism into the debate and Poirot was kind enough to clarify for your benefit.

If you want to look at real accuracy in terms of economic prediction you ought to read Marx's "Capital". He got the revolution wrong, but the rest of the disaster is accurately plotted.

You say Eisenstein's "nirvana" is heading for "catastrophe", but how do you defend the catastrophe that's already more or less assured by standard economics?
Since you know something of the subject I sincerely beg you to tell me, for instance, how it is they can model endless economic growth within a closed system, with finite resources and finite potential for expansion? Which doesn't even take into account that the system being exploited is living, self-regulating (in balance in terms of human chronology) and therefore vulnerable.

I absolutely cannot comprehend you and your ilk! You're blind to the bleedin' obvious, dismissive of evidence, and oblivious to argument.

You can take a running jump. Isn't that what lemmings do?

Fair enough, SM, but if you wish to berate someone for their behaviour and style, it's best not to have been seen to emulate it.

When John Heyood (http://www.actualfreedom.com.au/richard/abditorium/nonesoblind.htm) coined the proverb, 'There are none so blind as those who will not see', he must have had in mind the latter-day adherents (read, religious devotees) of neo-classical economics. Their unshakeable faith in the correctness and validity of their beloved doctrine's mathematical models, in the face of any and all evidence and attempts at rational persuasion to the contrary, surely resembles nothing so much as a bizarre form of secular religious fundamentalism.

At one time, of course, the same could have been said about ultra-orthodox Marxists who refused to acknowledge the perversions of Soviet or Chinese 'communism'. However those days are long gone, and if there are any such people still around, they are - with the exception of the North Korean dictators, hardly in a position to do any harm. The same cannot be said of neoclassical / neoliberal economists, whose distorted worldviews still drive the relentless machine forward each day.

For a big picture perspective on where all we are headed on current trends, have at look at this: http://sphotos-e.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash3/182156_526469684053149_363315334_n.jpg. Bear in mind that the major driver of deforestation is monocultural agriculture, which produces commodities - for profit, and profit alone.

I don't include you in the above, SM, since it appears you are willing to read and reflect on alternative views and critical perspectives of neoclassics with something akin to an open mind. I will be overjoyed if I hear you have purchased and intend to read either The Cancer Stage of Capitalism or Value Wars. Or - even better - both!