I am an Australian philosopher with a PhD from Flinders University (2019). My PhD thesis is entitled Marx and scientific realism: a Lockean perspective. It can be accessed at either https://theses.flinders.edu.au or https://www.researchgate.net or https://www.academia.edu (or simply google my name and thesis title). I am presently revising this thesis with the hope of eventually publishing it as a book.
My thesis essentially shows that Marx's critique of political economy in Capital Volume 1 is a precursor of contemporary scientific realism, which is the view in the philosophy of science that science not only aims to discover the essence of phenomena (their causal foundations) but is also, at times, successful in doing so. Furthermore, it shows that Marx's scientific realism is in line with the scientific realist tradition that is partly espoused by John Locke's empiricist philosophy. (His empiricist philosophy also partly espoused positivism, which in the philosophy of science is the view which holds that science can never discover the essence of phenomena, it can only reveal instead the regular connections between things.) Prior to establishing this claim, this thesis also shows that when it comes to the question about whether Locke's empiricist philosophy is the main basis of positivism, it shows that it isn't since Locke's empiricist philosophy is ambiguous about such a question. Instead, it shows that David Hume's empiricist philosophy is the true basis of positivism as all latter-day positivistic thinkers accepted his core epistemological principle that there can be no idea of anything unless it is based on an original impression of it. (See the abstract and preface to my thesis for a more expanded view of all this.)
This blog will serve many purposes. First and foremost, it will serve as a platform for drafting out (however rough and sketchy they may initially be) ideas and arguments based on my current research, particularly within the philosophy of economics (and test them against what others say via feedback). Second, it aims to provide a philosophical critique of the dominant school of modern economics - modern orthodox neoclassical economics - both in terms of its core theoretical model (the general equilibrium model of a perfectly competitive market economy) and its underlying methodology (the instrumentalism of Milton Friedman). Third, it will take a Marxist perspective, which is informed by the most up-to-date philosophical and economic positions within Marxism (such as systematic dialectics). Fourth, it will challenge some of our key assumptions about how we look at a modern capitalist society (such as whether we are nothing more than a bunch of competing utility-maximising individuals within a 'market economy' and social class is a redundant analytical concept). Fifth, it will always be informed by a scientific realist view when it comes to comparing different theories of capitalism, in particular, Marx's theory of capitalism with theories of capitalism in neoclassical economics over such things as unemployment, inequality, poverty, etc. Sixth, it is the underlying credo of this 'rough draft' blog that we should take the ideas which shape our thinking about our modern capitalist market society seriously (and definitely not take them for granted), and subject them to philosophical analysis whenever possible if we are to move beyond a superficial and platitudinous account of it. Anyway, these are some of the aims and aspirations of this blog.
As I post things on this blog, it is not my intention to do so on a daily basis; nor is it my intention to run an up-to-date commentary on all current affairs (which is already being done quite well by many others, whether by their own blogs - such as by Richard D. Wolff, David Harvey, Michael Hudson, Robert Paul Wolff, Steve Keen, Bill Mitchell, John Quiggan and Michael Roberts - or through various publications such as CounterPunch in the US). My goal is simply to engage in a serious theoretical discussion of material that arises out of both my current and future research interests, which nevertheless bear on the real world. For it is surely one of the myths or misconceptions that philosophy has nothing to say about the real world in which we all live (except perhaps for the dominant school of economics, modern orthodox neoclassical economics, which seems to serve the interests of the capitalist class).
So, I look forward to posting here and getting some feedback, in the pursuit of a truer or more accurate picture of things on the basis of philosophical reflection about our various worldviews.
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