Friday, July 18, 2003

The Dust of Empire by Karl Meyer Posted here Friday, July 18, 2003 at 8:22:01 PM       I just finished The Dust Of Empire by the NYT correspondent long for the middle east, Karl Meyer. The subtitle tells it all: "The race for mastery in the asian hearland." This differentiated world along the silk route, from Kosovo east through Bulgaria, Turkey, Georgia Armenia, Azerbaijan, across the Caspian sea,  from there with Kazakstan always on the north, and Afghanistan always on the south,  through Iran, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan. Tajikistan, and Kyrgyzstan, till we reach China. A world of details and passions, often invaded for three thousand years, always winning, now ermeated by ex soviet migrations and American military amazingly present in odd places, and a few big oil companies. Oil the black shit of animals and plants long gone, supports the black gold mystique, and it is central to American and European "foreign policy." This book is a good backgrounder. ********

More on Mirowski Posted here Friday, July 18, 2003 at 4:11:17 PM       There are several courageous parts to Mirowski. He sees the combination of the shift from equilibrium theory to thermodynamics to control mechanisms as ideology and pragmatics for ww2 control science, leading to post ww2 cold war thinking (out of mechanized game theory), along with the mathematizing of economics, social science, genetics.. his political analysis of the key players (and their insanity or depression) is amazing for the level of detail and passion, and the always experimental Joycian use of language.   The book is not just about economic ideas, it is about institutions, power, money, careers, the confabulation of governance with control mechanisms,and the fatful impact on all of us when the market becomes a single machine, and humans have to adapt.     He says the human-machine interface problem is solved by equating human with rational with math with mechanical, therefore the human-machine interface is reducible to a machine machine problem. the computer as an ensemble of programs that get results let economics avoid Godel's problem in the calculability of market equilibria, and allow economic experimental science to replace humans with computers. He raises the issue of how socialist planning and economic machinery are really the same thing. The introductory chapter is playful but hardly the guts of the book.   He gives lots of credit to others, and his strategy is to be an economic historian who brings his history up to the moment; at which point he becomes a theoretician with productive possibilities, and hence a factor in the history he writes.   ********

From the solk road journal Posted here Friday, July 18, 2003 at 10:45:05 AM     Funny thought: I haven’t seen a single American doing what I am doing the entire time. A few Germans, two Italians and one French couple are going the distance but no Americans. There is something wrong with that. I am hoping that my work here will change some of that. Yeah, I’ve met some American soldiers and the occasional American businessman but no ‘travelers.’ They just aren’t out here. It is like Central Asia is this big black hole in the American psyche. It doesn’t exist, yet we have soldiers here in Bishkek. We have soldiers in Uzbekistan. As a matter of fact they are crawling all over the place there. We have a base in Termiz and Qarshi, although that stuff is technically "hush-hush." Bullshit, if you ask me. Why does the American government hide it? Regardless, we have a presence. We are here and we know so little of the place and its traditions. So little of what makes the people tick. And we know so little of the Ferghana. And the Ferghana is ripe for trouble. Just look at the borders. They are absurd. There will be trouble there. WIll it be communal or international? I don't know. But the Ferghana is one of the most Islamicized places in the planet. "Wahhabi's are all over the place," said Melanie, a French girl I met in Samarkand who is doing research on the Wahhabis in Uzbekistan. "It is the same people, organization, that is trying to grow its influence in Burma." "Burma?" "Yeah, long story." I have often thought that Americans can't see the eurasian landmass because our maps put the US in the center, europe on the right, asia on the left, and we miss the fact that the edges meet, and meet substantially. ********

Letting companies avoid pension funding. Posted here Friday, July 18, 2003 at 9:37:05 AM     WASHINGTON, July 18 (Reuters) - U.S. companies with underfunded pension plans would get relief for three years under legislation backed by the House of Representatives Ways and Means Committee on Friday. This is immportant as part of the tendency to let corporations have the profits from the bubble years, but put retirees and taxpayers at risk to cover the bills. Part of the larger tendency to aid capital at the expense of all others. the rhetoric is of successful economic expansion being able to pay this off, but the reality is that it may not and this way capital has pulled out its gains leaving the downside to the rest of society. the savings and loan at 150B from taxpayers is the model. The problem is that it is not going to work well, and shows private gain over social leadership. ********

Mirowski's Machine Dreams Posted here Friday, July 18, 2003 at 9:17:09 AM     Mirowski's Machine Dreams paints out fully the place game theory, computers, thermodynamics, and military contracts all intersect to produce much of the cold war agenda, and the mathematization of economics, social science and biology. The book is brilliant both in details and language. Amazig that it is so well written and so broad and detailed. He also, as an economic historian bringing the history up to the moment, becomes a theoretican of economics. Interesting strategy.   Fundamnetal is his view that the human-machine interface problem is solved (so to speak) by treating the human side as rational, rational as logical, logical mathematical, math as machine. Hence the human-machine problem beomces a machine-machine problem. Next, he argues persuasively that the computer has, by being a pragmtic ensemble of programs, allowed the thinkers to avoid the problems of Godel's theorem.   The general mathematizing of reality, and treating it as though it is an adequate modelling, when it is not, is core to the Machine Dreams analysis. (books) ********