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The action axiom "is the fundamental and universal truth that
individual men exist and act by making purposive choices among
alternatives" (Younkins 2004b, p. 1). For Mises, the action axiom is
the "first principle" of economics, from which all other economic
truths can be deduced a priori (meaning, roughly, that once you
accept the action axiom, these other truths are self-evident and
require no sensory evidence to verify them).
Action implies two important things. First,
it implies a
values scale; an individual, subjective ranking of values, or goals,
which the actor in question desires to reach. Secondly, it implies
that a means-end framework is held by the actor. That is, the actor
has ends which he wishes to reach, and employs certain means to reach
them. These ends (or "values") are subjective; they depend entirely on
the desires and preferences of the actor in question. The means which
the actor employs to reach his ends are also subjective; whether or
not the means actually will assist the actor in achieving his end, he
believes that they will, and he is therefore acting rationally. For
Mises, to act means "purposeful behavior… or, aiming at ends and
goals…" (Mises 1963, p. 11). Action is rational choice in the face of
scarcity.
These two truths (that an
actor has a values-scale and a means-end framework which he employs to
reach those values) are only two of the many things implied by the
action axiom. The importance which Mises placed on human rationality
is evident; for him, the rational mind is the all-important tool of
the economist.
Objectivism places a
similar importance on rationality. For the objectivist, "Rationality
is man's basic virtue, the source of all his other virtues… The virtue
of Rationality means the recognition and acceptance of reason as one's
only source of knowledge, one's only judge of values and one's only
guide to action… It means a commitment to the reality of one's own
existence" (Rand 1964, p. 20). The Austrian economist goes so far as
to claim rationality as the appropriate method for discovery of
economic truth; the objectivist goes further, and asserts that
rationality is the appropriate method for discovery of all aspects of
reality, in ethics as well as intellectual endeavors. The difference
between the two conceptions of reason is that while the Austrian
economist bases his methodology on a prioristic reasoning, the
objectivist's reasoning is more grounded in empirical truth, and the
reality of the physical world. Nonetheless, the two disciples are
compatible; the objectivist can quite consistently be an Austrian
economist, and vice versa. As Hans Hoppe puts it:
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A priori knowledge must be as much a mental thing as a
reflection of the structure of reality, since it is only through
actions that the mind comes into contact with reality… Acting is a
cognitively guided adjustment of a physical body in a physical
reality… a priori knowledge… must indeed correspond to the
nature of things. The realistic character of such knowledge would
manifest itself not only in the fact that one could not think
it to be otherwise, but in the fact that one could not undo
its truth (Hoppe 1995, p. 9). |
Knowledge, according to Hoppe, must be based in both reality and the
mind, especially knowledge of human action. Economics focuses on human
action, and reason, as the tool which man uses to integrate and
isolate information received from his senses, is the appropriate tool
for this study. Herein lies the connection between the Austrian
methodology and the objectivist worldview.
The objectivist
recognizes that reason, the use of his rational mind, is man's tool
for choosing and striving after his values. "Rationality is a matter
of choice – and the alternative [man's] nature offers him is: rational
being or suicidal animal" (Rand 1957, p. 931-932). This ability to
choose between life and death, rather than blindly following animal
instincts, is what sets man apart in the world. "The ingenuity of man
is his noblest and most joyous power" (Rand 1957, p. 682). Man's
individual ability to rationally choose among alternatives, and even
create new alternatives when he is unsatisfied with those available,
is what makes it necessary, and possible, for him to have values and
codes of morality (valid or invalid). It is this ability which makes
human action possible. And it is this ability which requires that man
discover, and adhere to, a rational code of morality which has a
strong foundation in reality and truth.
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Reality Is Real – Existence Exists |
What Objectivism offers that sets it apart from other philosophical
systems is this: Objectivism says that knowledge is achievable
– that reality is not only knowable but must be acknowledged.
In short, Objectivism accepts and embraces the reality which
mainstream philosophy evades. "Objectivism, with its confident
assertion that philosophical problems can be solved once and
for all – that there are two sides to every question, the right side
and the wrong side – is profoundly antithetical to the philosophical
tradition of the twentieth century" (Merrill 1991, p. 90).
Objectivism holds reality
itself as a philosophical standard of value. Values come from reality,
and so are not subjective in a broad sense, but only in an individual
one. That is to say: good and evil are objective, but the individual
good (or "value") which each man pursues is a subjective choice which
he makes for himself. Man's choice of values is indeed subjective, but
the values which he may choose among are not. Once he has chosen his
goal, reality imposes on him a standard which dictates how he may or
may not reach that goal. "Since values are determined by the nature of
reality, it is reality that serves as men's ultimate arbiter" (Rand
1967, p. 24).
Values which a man may
strive toward exist in reality before he chooses among them. He may
choose to live or to die; life and death exist as possible choices
regardless of his decision. He may choose to accept and act upon the
choices presented to him by reality or he may choose to deny them and
"live" in the non-rational surreality which the philosophers of the
twentieth century would have him believe is his only option; insanity
and rationality exist as possibilities no matter what he decides.
Reality will not change to make way for his subjective whim (if he
desires something which is impossible); existence exists. The power of
the individual is the power of choice, and of striving towards the
chosen values. Reality is necessarily man's standard of choice as well
as his source of values to choose among. It is this unflinching claim
on reality as a moral standard which is Objectivism's distinction in
the fields of philosophy and ethics.
It is precisely this
adherence to reality which makes Austrian economics unique in its
field; the object of economics, for the Austrian, is to obtain valid
knowledge about the real world and how humans interact with it. As
Mises said, "[t]he end of science is to know reality" (Mises 1963, p.
65). The ultimate aim of the observing economist is to think his way
to objective and rational truth, in the form of economic laws and
theories. Mises defined the subject matter of economics (rather
awkwardly) as follows: "The elucidation and the categorical and formal
examination of… the regularity of phenomena with regard to the
interconnectedness of means and ends… is the subject matter of
economics" (Mises 1963, p. 885). In other words, economics is
interested in reality; specifically that aspect of reality which is
evident in the way that humans use means to achieve ends. Formally
observing the regularity of human action in this respect is what the
economist does; this is the truth which he searches for. For the
economist as well as for the objectivist, truth "is the recognition of
reality; reason, man's only means of knowledge, is his only means of
truth" (Rand 1961, p. 126) For the Austrian economist, reason is both
his subject of study (specifically, how humans employ reason as one
means to achieve their subjectively acquired values) and his means of
study (since for Mises, economic thought is aprioristic in nature, and
relies solely on the action of reason to reach a logical conclusion or
assertion).
Reason and rationality,
though, are even more important than this. It is through the proper
understanding of reason that both Mises and Rand managed to
successfully bridge the so-called mind-body dichotomy which had
bothered philosophers for centuries. The relationship between value
and reason is what made this possible; value is based implicitly on
the relationship between rational man and reality. It is rational
valuation which bridges the problematic mind-body gap.
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The Mind-Body Dichotomy and Its Answer |
The mind-body gap (or dichotomy) is only one of three dichotomies
which nineteenth century philosophers grappled with. Ayn Rand argues
that all three are invalid. The first is the analytic-synthetic
dichotomy, which we will not touch on in this paper; the second is the
mind-body dichotomy, which states that man must choose between his
mind and/or soul (which serves as the symbol of spiritual things) and
his body (which serves as the symbol of material things); and the
third is the is-ought problem, which stems directly from the mind-body
dichotomy, and which states, essentially, that since one cannot know
reality (since there is no connection between the mind and physical
reality), then one cannot advocate codes of behavior for oneself or
other humans. David Hume is one of the most important philosophers
involved in the beginning of this debate; it was he who pointed out
that even if one can know reality, such knowledge is not enough
to determine moral oughts. An argument along the lines of "man is
a living being, therefore one ought not to kill him," is an
invalid argument. How can one use an argument based on what 'is' to
determine what one 'ought' to do? So goes the argument based on the
mind-body/is-ought argument, which Mises and Rand both solved
satisfactorily.
The mind-body dichotomy
began, historically, with the French philosopher René Descartes.
Famous for arguing that a thing must be true, if he was capable of
conceiving a clear and distinct idea of it(1),
he wrote that:
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because, on the one hand, I have a clear and distinct idea of
myself, in as far as I am only a thinking and unextended thing,
and as, on the other hand, I possess a distinct idea of body, in
as far as it is only an extended and unthinking thing, it is
certain that 'I'… that is, my mind, by which I am what I am… is
entirely and truly distinct from my body, and may exist without it
(Descartes 1974 p. 165). |
Descartes believed that since he had a "clear and distinct idea" of
his body and his mind existing separately, then mind and body must
indeed be two separate substances; and in this logically invalid
argument one can see the source of the unnecessary problem which vexed
philosophers for centuries to come.
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