The Self-Sustainable Micro-Community Approach: Haiti

[The Red Herring]

Forever scarring the memory of millions, the events of January 12th 2010 have challenged Haiti to endure the sudden loss of over 150,000 people. However infamous this day will remain in history, the outset of the tragedy has only exacerbated the country’s long struggle with poverty, stifling further its ability to meet its potential in each of the three core dimensions of Human Development – education, public health and living standard. Haiti’s drastic environmental degradation problems and disproportionate illiteracy levels epitomize the challenges that thousands of communities around the world will need to confront as a new decade ensues.

Innovative and comprehensive, The Self-Sustainable Micro-Community concept is at the forefront in addressing these challenges. SSMC establishes at its centerpiece the construction of a 27 prefabricated-unit community equipped with the fundamental components of development, targeting critical issues encompassing energy autonomy, agro-environmental restoration, public health and education. Each of these issues are approached through comprehensive programs – further detailed in sections below – in view of mushrooming development in regional areas around the community.

This SSMC model combines short-term relief – the units being 85% prebuilt at the time of arrival – with long-term development, meeting both aspects of Haiti’s urgent needs. Each unit has a capacity to house 10 to 15 people, projecting the size of the community to revolve around 220 inhabitants. In view of reducing high socio-economic disparities and potential social tensions between residents of the micro-community and inhabitants in immediate surrounding areas, Dynamic Development calls for the implementation of a progressive landscape – best attained by providing relief tents to neighboring inhabitants.

The long-term autonomy and self-reliance of the micro-community will be built on the establishment of 3 educational units, 1 computer center unit, 3 medical units, 1 Solar Water-Distillation Cylinder, 1 crop plantation, 1 chicken farm, access to fishing and the widespread use of renewable energies. This autonomy allows the micro-community to act as an economic and educational engine, gradually lifting regional standards of living. Among myriad expansionary development features of the community, education is largely our overarching focus in seeking regional development. Teaching inhabitants from neighboring villages ways to detect disease symptoms, to build basic solar ovens, to individually purify water and to cultivate a crop plantation without eroding the soil, are all a part of the underlying objective of having a regional impact. Likewise, training in basic medical procedures will also be provided both inside and outside of the community – along with the previously mentioned educational programs – in view of maximizing the micro-community’s effectiveness. For instance, training in standard childbirth procedures can substantially help improve the condition of women in the broader area. In today’s global environment, Dynamic Development requires to accompany regional education programs with regional connectivity programs. For this end, a CyberBus – a bus equipped with solar-powered WiFi and computers – will circulate across villages following a fixed itinerary in order to connect non-community inhabitants to global knowledge, including access to websites like Wikipedia or Youtube.

The sum of these programs – further detailed in following sections – subsequently set a framework in which the SSMC is an instrument – and not an end – to incrementally spread human development regionally.



WELCOME TO BEDASSY

1. COMMUNITY COMPONENTS:

16 Shelter Units
Each Unit has a housing capacity ranging from 10 to 15 people
3 Educational Units
Educational Units Will Reserve 1/3rd of its Teaching Space for Non-Community Residents
3 Medical Units
Aspiring Doctors & Nurses Will be Selected to Receive Hands-On Training
Medical Units will hold information sessions to teach residents about disease prevention measures they can employ in their daily lives
2 Sanitary Units (Showers + Restrooms
Men & Women Separated)
1 Computer Center Unit
1 Kitchen Unit
1 Orphanage Unit
1 Community Plaza (Building Social Cohesiveness)
§ TOTAL: 27 UNITS + An Additional 300 Tents for Surrounding Neighborhoods in Order to Avoid High Socio-Economic Disparities
________________________________________________________________________
INFRASTRUCTURE

Assisting Short-Term Relief through Prefabricated Housing Units
Meeting Long-Term Needs
Anticipating Natural Hazards
Earthquakes, Floods & Hurricanes
Leaving a 0 Carbon Footprint
Recycling Used Water for Irrigation
The Grey Water Cistern System
Insulation: Moderating Indoor Temperatures
500 Trees
Preventing Soil Erosion or Keeping the Soil Fertile
Stabilizing the Concentration of Water in the Soil
Preventing Floods, Droughts and Mudslides
NOTA BENE: Units will have devised systems to completely open on one side in order to accommodate the Haitian cultural custom of ‘living outdoors’.
________________________________________________________________________
DEVELOPMENT PROJECTS

RENEWABLE ENERGY: RECONCILING HAITI WITH HAITIAN LIVELIHOODS

Solar and Wind Power are cornerstone to the community’s energy independence, environmental restoration and long-term viability. In this vein, Bedassy’s autonomy embodies a prelude of the kinds of the measures that thousands of communities around the world will need to embrace over the 21st Century.
Solar and Wind Energy will power lighting, WiFi systems and hot ater
Assessing the level of the community consumption & production of resources (water & electricity) over the first 11 months
‘11 Months’ is the period during which strict management of resources will be enforced in of avoiding potential shortages
The usage of water and electricity will subsequently be monitored closely and distributed selectively
Providing Electricity to Surrounding Neighborhoods
Storing Electricity Surpluses in Batteries
Redistributing Surpluses to Neighboring Areas
DISEASE PREVENTION

Empowering People through Knowledge
Teaching People to Purify Water Themselves by Evaporation
Solar Ovens can be built with materials as simple as aluminum foil
and cardboard and can allow people regionally2 to purify their water
Teaching People about the Importance of Sanitary Habits
Giving Medical Training to People from Neighboring Areas
Early Detection
Teaching People about Disease Symptoms
Providing Disease Screenings & Vaccination Services
Fighting Vector-Borne Diseases (Esp. Malaria & Dengue Fever)
75% of infected cases are children.
Installing Mosquito Nets on All Unit Openings
Equipping Every Unit with Anti-Mosquito Products
Equipping Medical Unit with anti-malarial drugs
EDUCATION

Building a Positive & Constructive Community Dynamic
Promoting Community Values of Generosity, Compassion, Curiosity and Initiative
Engaging the Youth in “Community Service Week-Ends” to Rebuild Neighboring Communities
1/3rd of Classes Reserved Non-Community Residents
Training the Teachers and Nurses of Surrounding Areas
Opening Up Residents to Global Knowledge Locally Through the Technology Center & Regionally Through The Cyber-Bus
Developing Emergency Drills
WOMEN’S RIGHTS

Teaching Women to Read and Write
Giving Them Access to Mobility in the Socio-Economic Ladder
Setting a Goal of a 50/50 Male/Female Ratio in the Distribution Community Tasks
Providing Family Planning
Informing Women about Contraception
Enabling Women to Make an Educated Choice
Providing Pre- & Post-Natal Care
Assisting Deliveries & Caesarean Sections
Providing HIV Screenings & Vaccination Services
________________________________________________________________________

HUMAN DEVELOPMENT

All of the development programs articulated in the previous section were designed to independently address fundamental issues necessary for the long-term viability of a healthy and autonomous community. However these programs may differ in nature, they all serve the common objective of incrementally raising the standards of human development in the broader region.

Building an Autonomous Livelihood
• Fish & Chicken Farming
 These two types of farming are incredibly nutritious immediate sources of food. Their particular advantage is that they are harmless to the environment – unlike the cattle or goats that feed off vegetation.

• Cultivating a Shade-Grown Plantation

 The advantages of growing crops in the shade of trees are numerous. In the case of Haiti, the main ones are related to food security, environmental restoration and public health.

o With regards to environmental restoration, trees play a key role in moderating the concentration of water in the soil, reducing the effects of both droughts and floods, which is particularly important in Haiti given the tropical climate conditions and hurricane-prone geographic area. This plays a particularly important role in Haiti given its subtropical climate and hurricane-prone geographic location. Furthermore, taking into account that the roots of trees maintain the soil, Haiti’s absence of forestry has largely become a security issue over recent years, as the soil grows increasingly eroded – causing massive landslides during torrential rain seasons.

o With regards to food security and public health, trees are central in slightly different ways. The roots and the leaves of trees provide incredibly rich nutrients, rejuvenating the fertility of the soil over time and making the plantation a reliable and sustainable source of food supply. Furthermore the trees themselves can be an excellent source of fruit and spices, diversifying the kind of foods available to the community. Finally, the tree’s utility in reducing the severity of droughts and floods is as beneficial for agriculture – in preserving the crops – as it is for public health. Indeed, droughts and particularly floods are extremely conducive to the spread of vector-borne diseases like Malaria, Dengue Fever (mosquito-borne diseases), leptospirosis (rodent carried disease), Cholera and Diarrhea (water-borne).

Creating Partnerships with COOPs to Promote Community & Generate Income (Exporting Saffron Pineapples and Other Tropical High-Value Added Crops)
Fostering Long-Term Regional Development
• Educational Out-Reach Weekend Program Will Physically Expand Development in Neighboring Villages

• Teaching People to Build Solar Ovens (Made Out of Aluminum Foil & Cardboard as represented in image above)

• Equipping People of Neighboring Villages with Training in All Fundamental Areas Necessary for the Functioning of Any Society

 Education programs will be critical on the short-term to establish efficacious disease prevention measures, spread sustainable agricultural techniques, etc. On a long-term perspective, these programs tailored for non-community inhabitants embody effective tools to substantively further the SSMC’s overarching purpose – bettering living standards in neighboring areas outside of the community.

________________________________________________________________________

DEVELOPMENT ⇔ MORALE

EMPOWERING AMPUTEES IN A NEW SOCIETY

• Hardly one month after the earthquake, the New York Times reported a rising number of 8,000 Haitians having undergone amputations following severe – and often potentially fatal – crush injuries

• Amputees embody among the deepest wounds of Haiti’s tragedy and their suffering will be a daily reminder of that which has been lost

• Giving amputees an opportunity to play a part and strive in society is at the forefront of recovering Haiti’s long-term morale

• Bedassy will reserve 5 Shelter Units for physically disabled Haitians – looking for inhabitants from diverse villages and neighborhoods

• Amputees will be taught ways to develop full mobility in view of overcoming their condition

• Amputees will have access to equal training in all areas offered to community residents – medical, literacy skills, computing skills, etc.

• Recreational Physical Activities will be available, tailored to the capacities and preferences of the amputees

DEVELOPING A SPECIAL OLYMPIC REGIONAL SPORT TOURNAMENT –SHOWCASING RESILIENCE

• Amputees will be encouraged to engage in competitive sport activities

• Upon high skill performance, community amputees will be encouraged to train other young disabled individuals from their home village in view of forming athletic sport teams

• The ultimate result would be region-wide Special Olympic Sport Tournaments

• Sport tournaments have always proved to be powerful instruments in bringing people together, generating hope and inspiration in communities recovering from sinister tragedies

________________________________________________________________________

MEASURING SUCCESS

Success of the SSMC model and of the overarching Dynamic Development concept will be assessed differently at given points in time depending on the way they meet short and long-term goals.

During the first 11 months of the project, the SSMC will be deemed successful if it demonstrates an ability to remain environmentally friendly over time, successfully increase regional connectivity and avoid a major a major disease outbreak – or contain it if one occurs. Long-term success criteria will focus on the SSMC’s ability to develop autonomy and to expand development in neighboring communities.

With regards to the SSMC’s short-term environmental success, we look forward to report that the community is successfully maintaining a 0 carbon footprint while meeting its energy needs for all of its tasks. Likewise, we look forward to announcing the 1,000th tree being planted in the crop field. Concerning regional connectivity, we aim at having an immediate regional impact by providing programs for literacy and basic computer skills through the Cyber-Bus, which will operate like a mobile classroom, circulating across numerous villages. For this, our aim is to report by the end of the first 11 months that the Cyber-Bus is effectively assisting 700 people per week and 100 per day. Additionally, avoiding or containing a major disease outbreak is another important objective, for which we aim to provide all community residents with fundamental vaccines and medical screenings within the first two weeks after the completion of the infrastructure’s construction. Naturally, the public health program’s ultimate goal would be to report a 0 infection level or as previously stated the successful containment of whichever cases occur.

Assessing the SSMC’s long-term success will depend mostly on the way it fulfills its fundamental purpose – acting as an autonomous engine mushrooming development regionally. Success in planting the desired amount of trees will be instrumental in achieving of these two goals. For instance, trees play a key role in moderating the concentration of water in the soil, reducing the effects of both droughts and floods, which is particularly important in Haiti given the tropical climate conditions and hurricane-prone geographic area. The impact of trees is therefore not only remarkably beneficial for agriculture but prevents the establishment of propitious breeding conditions for Malaria and Dengue Fever mosquitoes – two problematic disease vectors in the region. For these reasons, planting 1000 trees is our immediate goal but will not be an end in itself. Finally, the SSMC’s success in expanding development regionally will largely be evaluated and measured by the evolution of local levels of education and overall living standard in neighboring villages. For this end, we aim at reporting the successful training of 20 teachers, 20 nurses and 20 farmers – with sustainable agricultural techniques – in four different villages over a period of 11 months. Each of these trainees will then be able to form their peers in their local neighborhoods, gradually raising levels of literacy, public health levels and living standard.

Finally, given that human development presupposes that inhabitants are in a psychological mindset of seeking to build better future, the SSMC addresses the critical non-material impact that ‘morale’ will have on the success of the programs. Intensive rehabilitation programs will set an initial goal of enabling the community’s 75 amputees with mobility abilities within the first 11-month time frame. As amputees demonstrate enhanced skills, they will be encouraged to participate in sport activities in an incrementally competitive environment. This step is aimed at allowing amputees to develop high physical performance abilities, to later on teach to peers from their village of origin. As previously stated, the ultimate goal is to establish region-wide sport tournaments – generating hope and inspiration through the amputees’ dynamism and sheer resilience.

_____________________________________________________________________
COST CHART

THE CONTAINER
Unitary Price: $2,400
Shipping-Style Container. 8 Foot Tall, 8 FootWide, and 40 Foot Long. Corten Steel. 1.25" thick.Marine Plywood Floor. Very Light Weight. Theseunits are ready to ship on a boat and stack. They are equipped with a strong locking door at one end. Possibility to cut openings for two doors andseveral small windows 6-8--for ventilation and natural light. Possibility to save the cutouts for shutters.
WINDOWS
Unitary Price: $2,000
Price-competitive windows that could be salvaged--$50 each. Possibility of installing glass doors with shutters – all equipped with insect screens.
SHUTTERS
Unitary Price: 750
Possibility to hinge and set up latching for the cutouts in view of a tightly sealed closing system for hurricanes or for security.
CISTERN TANKS
Unitary Price: $2,000
Gutters added after setting up would direct the water to plastic tanks, placed under the container. A 12 Volt DC pump – similar to a vehicle fuel pump – would transport the water from the lower cisterns to the upper one. The resulting gravity-fed water system would push the water through a filter and solar heating.
SOLAR PUMP & PIPING
Unitary Price: $1,500
Generating Solar Hot Water
SOLAR REFRIGERATOR
Unitary Price: $1,500
A small super insulated fridge would run directly off the solar power. The resulting cold would be stored like electricity in a battery, powered by solar panels on the roof. These panels would run the solar pump and charge two other marine batteries. The ‘Chest Type’ Fridge/Freezer only uses about 300 watts per day.
ROOF SOLAR PANELS
Unitary Price: $10,000
Possibility to bottle and store inside the box at the time of shipping. Solar Panels would be pre-made, ready to attach and hurricane proof. Panels would have a size of 3 KW and cover most of the roof,
reinforcing insulation. The rest of the roof would be protected by the solar hot water system, preventing container to overheat in full sun.
NOTE: Lowering the amount of solar wattage would substantially reduce this cost. Today the price per KW is less than $5000
KITCHEN
Unitary Price: $2,500
Placed along the of the 40' long and equipped with open shelves, a stainless steel sink & a lightweight cement counter. A solar oven would be included and a hibachi or camp stove burner for boiling water.
TOILETS
Unitary Price: $1,200
Compost toilets need no power and reprocess the raw sewage – making it usable within 6 months. Possibility to use a self-contained unit for smaller volumes of water use.
LARGE SEWAGE TANK
Unitary Price: $2,000
The tank houses are horizontal axis barrels that require to be manually turned about every week. This aerates and accelerates decomposition. The end product is dry, solid and non-odorant – requiring it to be shoveled out after six months.
BATHROOM AREA
Unitary Price: N/A
Built-inshowers, lined with recycled rubber sheeting made from tires (eco-surfaces). This rubber is high quality, strong and waterproof.
The room would be framed with steel studs and sheathed on one side with marlite-type pressed wood. The outside of the bathroom wall would display built-in shelves. Showerheads with pullcords
shut off automatically, allowing to save water. Finally, compost toilets use less than 8 oz of water per flush.
BED / COUCH
Unitary Price: $100
Possibility of fold-down single beds along the walls. The beds can be plywood – or perhaps a light sheet of metal – with a 4-foot foam pad.
TABLE, CHAIRS, INSULATION, UPPER WINDOWS, KITCHEN COOKWARE AND SILVERWARE
Unitary Price: $2,000
The surface of the inside of the box would be a 1- foot thick fiberglass coated insulating panel – keeping the unit cooler in the summer. Upper windows would contribute to ventilation and natural light – allowing more usable wall space and privacy.
TOTAL Per Unit: $30,450
NOTE: Quantity could reduce prices by 10% – 20%

Written by Jacob Helberg of George Washington University and Published through the George Washington University Roosevelt Institute, for which I am the Deputy Policy Director.

[N3bu]

Wow, seriously. That's a good idea. Maybe we shoudl start adapting it as way to help other poor countries.

[lmasdlkjasdoiajusdlknm]

Quote:

EMPOWERING AMPUTEES IN A NEW SOCIETY

• Hardly one month after the earthquake, the New York Times reported a rising number of 8,000 Haitians having undergone amputations following severe – and often potentially fatal – crush injuries

• Amputees embody among the deepest wounds of Haiti’s tragedy and their suffering will be a daily reminder of that which has been lost

• Giving amputees an opportunity to play a part and strive in society is at the forefront of recovering Haiti’s long-term morale

• Bedassy will reserve 5 Shelter Units for physically disabled Haitians – looking for inhabitants from diverse villages and neighborhoods

• Amputees will be taught ways to develop full mobility in view of overcoming their condition

• Amputees will have access to equal training in all areas offered to community residents – medical, literacy skills, computing skills, etc.

• Recreational Physical Activities will be available, tailored to the capacities and preferences of the amputees

DEVELOPING A SPECIAL OLYMPIC REGIONAL SPORT TOURNAMENT –SHOWCASING RESILIENCE

• Amputees will be encouraged to engage in competitive sport activities

• Upon high skill performance, community amputees will be encouraged to train other young disabled individuals from their home village in view of forming athletic sport teams

• The ultimate result would be region-wide Special Olympic Sport Tournaments

• Sport tournaments have always proved to be powerful instruments in bringing people together, generating hope and inspiration in communities recovering from sinister tragedies

_______________________________________________

This segment I argue is what essentially makes this approach a great one for alleviating the plights of Haitians. There is a keen understanding that you have of this situation as evident by your exclusion of the idea of providing prosthetic limbs likely because they are not organic and are artificial. Prosthetics also leaves in huge room for big business meddling and making life worse for the amputees. Prosthetics also are made of plastic which is synthesized our of oil. These plastic prosthetics never biodegrades unlike their more natural and real counterparts. This approach ensures that the community remains organic instead of artificial, which is what industrialization and big business would bring.

I therefore commend this approach.

[The Infamous Unami]

How about we stop investing so much in Haiti, given that it's 99% likely to fall to s**t again in six months, and start funding some of our other foreign aid projects again? Our foreign aid resources are in fact limited, and right now they are being very unfairly distributed based upon which tragedy gets the most press coverage.

Not to be bitter, even though I am, but my team here in Sulu isn't going to receive another medical pallet until July because of this s**t. And our inability to help the populous is starting to show.

Helping Haiti = Not helping other people, so I'm against spending gazillions of bucks turning Haiti into a self sustained commune paradise while the people right in front of me can't even get clean gauze for stab wounds.

[Herobane]

The Red Herring

However infamous this day will remain in history

Are you kidding? I've already forgotten about it!

[Apocryphal Libertarian]

Interesting, though I have a few comments and concerns (I'm a bit sleep deprived myself, so these will likely be brief and possibly nonsensical).

Cost. These units, even full and per individual, are going to cost several times pre-crisis GDP per capita. As well as creating a 'have and have not' mentality between those people lucky enough to be chosen (lottery?) and those in the surrounding 'tents', this also presents severe problems with growth and scalability of the program in general.

Misallocation of resources. Story: A charity I work with recently received a thank you note for the microscope we sent a school in Africa, which was a problem since we had sent three microscopes. Looking into the matter, we found out that two of them had been diverted to the local hospital, since they didn't have any microscopes either. Now, here you're talking about dropping in both a permanent and mobile data center and the best purpose you have in mind in a poverty-stricken disaster zone is education? I doubt their makeshift capital currently has that kind of gear. It's not needed in the center of a micro-community, it's needed in the center of the entire dang nation. Arguably, this might eventually allow the country to network, but could only happen after decades of growth.

Incentives. None are apparent, and that is a glaring omission. Maybe you have some in mind with an unmentioned organizational structure, or you are just going to rely on self-motivation. Either way, I cannot approve of this idea until the incentive structure is laid out. You can't just drop a bunch of equipment from the sky and expect them to efficiently utilized. Give my little sister a laptop and wifi and all she is going to do is go on facebook and watch youtube video of skaters faceplanting themselves, and that's it. Without other incentives, most will only use these resources for instant gratification.

Alternatives. To be quite honest, I think a better plan would be establishing a special economic zone in Haiti maybe lobbying Congress for Haiti free trade, and encouraging foreign direct investment. The export based development strategy might be controversial at times, but it has a proven track record. Also, while income is incredibly correlated with education, I'm more likely to believe that education follows income rather than the other way around.

It's a bold plan, certainly. But I don't think it's going to be the growth engine you're looking for.

[LightWarrior]

Screw Haiti that's so yesterday. Now Chili need's the help of America! Watch as we spread ourselves thin. D:

[Cory Shallow]

Quote:

As well as creating a 'have and have not' mentality between those people lucky enough to be chosen (lottery?) and those in the surrounding 'tents', this also presents severe problems with growth and scalability of the program in general.

See Tutsi, Hutu.

[Dermezel]

Again this approach is based on the concept of Marginal Utility which is admitted to be untestable by one of the key institutional advocates that formulated the pseudoscientific hypothesis.

You may as well have a psychic fix the economy with his magic powers for all the evident good it will likely do.

[Dermezel]

The Red Herring

For this end, a CyberBus – a bus equipped with solar-powered WiFi and computers – will circulate across villages following a fixed itinerary in order to connect non-community inhabitants to global knowledge, including access to websites like Wikipedia or Youtube.

That is one of the most ridiculous things I have ever heard What you mean by "CyberBus" is a bus where some guy drives around with a computer.

The Red Herring

• Amputees embody among the deepest wounds of Haiti’s tragedy and their suffering will be a daily reminder of that which has been lost

• Giving amputees an opportunity to play a part and strive in society is at the forefront of recovering Haiti’s long-term morale

Oh so we use amputees for slave labor now. Brilliant. Maybe we can give them computers and call them "cyber-amputees".

[Dermezel]

Quote:

The Austrian school of economics is very popular in libertarian and anarchist circles today. Part of that school is its methodology which favors building up theories based on axioms of human action. The Austrian school says that these axioms need no empirical verification. I believe any methodology that rejects empirical testing of theories is flawed. Once the scientific revolution reaches the social sciences, any school of thought that denies the empirical method will have to be abandoned just as happened in the physical and biological sciences. If libertarianism and anarchism are bundled together with Austrian economics, our politics will be disgraced along with Austrian economics and we'll receive the same respect as creationism or flat earth geography. Apparently there are economists who call themselves Austrians but are not orthodox in that they accept some empirical testing of their theories. I believe any economic theory must be tested however, not just some peripheral theories, and I will argue for this general rule.

When we study economics, we are dealing with observables. The prices of products, exchange rates of different national currencies, and the employment rate are all things we can observe. If we have a theory about how such things work, we can test that theory's predictions with what we observe and tell how good the theory is based on how close our predictions came to reality. A theory about economics will either make predictions about reality that can be observed or it will not. If it does not make any predictions that we can check, it is a useless theory and cannot tell us anything about our world. If this theory does make predictions, it is meaningful because its claims about the world can be found to be true or false. If this theory continuously succeeds at making correct predictions, we say this is a good theory, at least in the situations that we've tested it in. If there are parts of our theory that can be discarded while still retaining all of our theory's predictive power, those parts should be discarded.

Of course advocates of the Austrian school have objections to these arguments and insist that the empirical method is not a good one for economics. I emailed one of them following an article of his I saw at mises.org which rejected the empirical method. He replied to what I wrote with these things, which are pretty standard arguments from the Austrians.

He started by saying that some things, like the law of demand, are set in stone and that if it wasn't true, then we'd have to throw out all our textbooks because we wouldn't know if the law of demand would be true the next day. But this is bad reasoning because if all our textbooks are wrong, we are best off admitting it frankly and starting anew instead of lying to ourselves to make things easier. Also, if an economic law has passed numerous tests and made many true predictions it is very reasonable to believe it will continue to do so, the very reason we empirically test a theory is to find out how reliable it is.

He stated that one of the central tenets of Austrian economics is that the laws of human action are not falsifiable. But falsifiability is an absolute requirement of a scientific theory. If a theory makes predictions about reality, it can be falsified. All we'd have to do is find what predictions it makes, then test if those predictions are true. If a theory makes predictions that turn out to be false, we know our theory is wrong. Our Austrians seem to be saying that if we observe one thing and our theory tells us something else, we should ignore what we just saw and continue believing in our theory. Our theory won't be falsifiable only if it makes no predictions, and if it makes no predictions, it's useless for anything.

He later said that the premises for human action come from the long-term observations of human behavior and don't need to be continually tested to see if they're true. So he's saying here that situations have been observed where some law appears to hold, in fact numerous situations have backed up the validity of the law. What's odd then is that he seems to be saying that if some other situation comes up that contradicts this law, we should ignore this because the law has held up in so many situations before this happened. But of course this new situation isn't any less valid than any of the others, it happened and if we're interested in the truth, we can't ignore it. Part of scientific reasoning is that we try to prove our theories wrong instead of right. We put them to all sorts of tests to see if they always make correct predictions, and if they continuously pass our tests, we call them good theories and depend on them, though of course they're always up for more testing in other situations and to be tested more accurately. If we have a theory that passes all of our tests for a long time, but then we find a new situation where the theory fails, we don't throw out the theory altogether. Instead we say that the old theory is valid under the circumstances where it was successfully tested before and invalid under the new situations. We'd study these new situations and come up with new theories that explained economic behavior there. Finally, we would, if possible, find one theory that could give correct predictions under the new and old situations without any artificial separation between the two.

He also says that the laws of economics are true because of a certain understanding of how human beings act. The problem with this is that the theory that is built up is nothing more than an idealization of what human beings are. It is how a certain person believes that human beings act, but it's a fairly informal way of trying to figure things out and really isn't something we can depend on. So once we have this economic system built up from our understanding of how humans act, we have to scientifically test it to find if it is true.

Again, Marginalism is untestable pseudoscience.

[Dermezel]

Another example of Marginalists admitting their theory is untestable/goes by a priori knowledge.

Quote:

Mainstream scientists use a well-developed process called the scientific method. This method employs both data and theory. "Data" includes facts, evidence and statistics. "Theory" is the attempt to describe general laws, principles and causes and effects found in the data. Both form a cycle, as data goes into the formulation of theory, whose conclusions then engender more data collection in an attempt to confirm, refute or develop yet more theories. The accuracy of this process is verified by experimentation or prediction. Scientists believe they are on the right path when both theory and data agree; when they disagree, they know something is wrong. It could be the theory is wrong, or the data is badly collected or interpreted.

Austrians accept this method in principle, but argue that it is more appropriate for hard sciences like physics or chemistry, not soft sciences like sociology or economics. The problem is that humans, unlike electrons, have freedom of choice. They are therefore vastly more unpredictable, even if placed in the same situation twice. Within economics, Austrians favor a method called "apriorism." A priori knowledge is logic, or knowledge that exists in a person's mind prior to, and independent of, outer world experience. For example, the statement "two plus two equals four" is true whether or not a person goes out into his garden and verifies this by counting two pairs of tomatoes. What this means is that Austrians reject the attempt to learn economic laws through experiment or real world observation. The only true economic laws are those based on first principles, namely, logic.

As Hayek wrote, economic theories can "never be verified or falsified by reference to facts. All that we can and must verify is the presence of our assumptions in the particular case." (1)

So the mainstream approach is inductive, and the Austrian approach is deductive. The first draws generalizations from the data, the second applies preconceived generalizations to the data. A completely deductive approach is pre-scientific, however, which is why Austrians cannot legitimately claim to use a scientific method. Deduction does occur in science, but the generalizations are primarily based on other data, not a priori assumptions.

This is not to say that Austrians do not refer to real-world events and data in their writings. They just don't do it in the usual scientific way. Here is Austrian economist Ken Gaillot, Jr., describing their use of data:

"The Austrian economist sees his task as deducing the implications of human choice under conditions observed in the real world. The assumptions of economic theory are the point at which the theory is empirically verifiable. This approach allows qualitative prediction of economic events, explanation of observed patterns, and evaluation of government policy." (2)

In other words, Austrians get to critique the real world, but the real world is prevented from informing their theories. Even their predictions are "qualitative," not "quantitative" -- meaning they are free to call the government "bad," without being held down to the statistics that would verify this claim.

The Austrian approach to philosophy is a very old one: Rationalism. You have to go back to the 17th and 18th centuries to find when it was last considered a serious philosophical movement. It was widely abandoned after its inadequacies were laid bare by other schools of philosophy: Empiricism, Positivism, and most famously by Immanuel Kant's Critique of Pure Reason. Philosophy has progressed tremendously since Rationalism; the Austrian approach is a relic of history.

The problem with rationalism is that it makes the search for truth a game without rules. Rationalists are free to theorize anything they want, without such irritating constrictions as facts, statistics, data, history or experimental confirmation. Their only guide is logic. But this is no different from what religions do when they assert the logical existence of God (or Buddha or Mohammed or Gaia). Theories ungrounded in facts and data are easily spun into any belief a person wants. Starting assumptions and trains of logic may contain inaccuracies so small as to be undetectable, yet will yield entirely different conclusions.

In fact, if we accepted all the tenets of the Austrian School, we would have a second reason why it fails to qualify as science. To be a science, a school must produce theories that are falsifiable -- that is, verifiable. If a theory's correctness or falseness cannot be verified, then it is not science. Perhaps it's religion, or metaphysics, or an unsupported claim. Austrian economists make claims about the market (such as markets know better than governments), but then deny us the tools for verifying those claims (such as statistics). One might ask: how do they know?

Austrians claim to know these things by logic. But although their literature frequently evokes "a priori" knowledge, this term appears to be misused. Humans are not born knowing that "two plus two equals four." It is something they must learn from their environment, namely, school. Forging this learned knowledge into axioms comes later, and then through a process of trial and error. So in this sense, "a priori" knowledge doesn't even exist, unless one refers to a very basic level of knowledge capability, such as the physical construction of the human brain or animal instincts.

Austrians may be using the term "a priori" to mean logical proofs or axioms, such as "If A=B, and B=C, then A=C." But if Austrians were creating economic axioms that were true by logical force, then the Austrian School would become world famous overnight, whether mainstream economists liked it or not. In truth, Austrian journals are not filled with these kinds of axioms. Their arguments are really no more than theories that are guided or tested by logical proofs. Again, that's no different from what religions do. The fact that we have thousands of different religions in the world is remarkable evidence of the fallibility of this method.

i.e. theory first, evidence second.

[Apocryphal Libertarian]

Dermezel

Again, Marginalism is untestable pseudoscience.

This article condemns the austrian rejection of empiricism, not the concept of marginalism.

Edit: same with the second.

[Dermezel]

Apocryphal Libertarian

Dermezel

Again, Marginalism is untestable pseudoscience.

This article condemns the austrian rejection of empiricism, not the concept of marginalism.

Quote:

The concept of marginal utility grew out of attempts by economists to explain the determination of price. The term “marginal utility”, credited to the Austrian economist Friedrich von Wieser by Alfred Marshall,[20] was a translation of Wieser's term “Grenznutzen” (border-use).[1][2]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marginal_utility

Quote:

Friedrich Freiherr von Wieser (July 10, 1851–July 22, 1926) was an early member of the Austrian School of economics. (Freiherr is a title equivalent to baron, not a personal name.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friedrich_von_Wieser

Quote:

The Marginalist Revolution really began only to take off in the 1880s with the publication of the works of a younger generation which had begun to read up on their works. The wide dissemination of the work of two close disciples of Menger, Friedrich von Wieser (1884, 1889) and Eugen von B�hm-Bawerk (1886, 1889), gave the theories of the Austrian School wider attention.

http://homepage.newschool.edu/het//essays/margrev/phases.htm#revolution

[Apocryphal Libertarian]

The concept is separate from the school, and while the school is criticized for its rejection of empiricism, the concept of marginalism has been largely accepted into mainstream economics. There is likely not a single introductory economics book, Keynesian or otherwise, that does not include the concept of marginal utility.