God and Logic
A standard argument against the notion of the God of the Bible–even deployed by Mises in Human Action–is that God wouldn’t act in the sense that Austrian economists use that term. Specifically, beings act (meaning they use means to achieve ends) in order to remove uneasiness. But an omnipotent being wouldn’t have felt uneasiness, so he/it wouldn’t need to act. Yet the God of the Bible is clearly acting throughout history.
This is related to the more general atheist argument that goes like this: It is logically impossible for God to be omnipotent and omniscient. (He could be one or the other, but not both.) If God knows for sure who is going to win the World Series next year, then He renders Himself powerless to change it.
I can’t quite remember, but I bet when I was an atheist, I thought these were knock-down arguments. Now, they seem like silly brain teasers, comparable to the trick in algebra where you divide by zero and “prove” that 1=0. To deny that the God of the Bible exists, based on the above arguments, to me now seems akin to denying that propositions have truth value, because if they did, then I could say “I am lying” and make the universe blow up.
Rather than trying to unpack the logical puzzles directly, let me first explain my conception of God’s relation to the material universe. If my description is right (insofar as it goes–not that I could conceive of the full story), then the above puzzles fall away.
First of all, I think that God existed before time itself. In other words, it’s not that a clock was running, and then after two billion years God created the material universe. No, God created space and time together. (This is even consistent with modern physics. I.e. it is an obsolete Newtonian conception that could imagine the passage of time before any matter existed.)
The way I picture it, the whole history of the universe–what we perceive as past, present, and future–is a big timeline and God is outside of that timeline. So picture a guy with a beard and white robes at the top, and then underneath him is a ruler. The universe starts (whether with the Big Bang or the Genesis account, take your pick) on the left side of the ruler. Jesus comes down somewhere in the middle section, and then Jesus returns at the right side of the ruler.
Humans live their lives, moving left to right along tiny portions of the ruler. But from God’s perspective, all time periods are equivalent; there is no “past” or “future,” just like Mercury isn’t farther or closer than Jupiter to God. He’s not a part of the physical universe, so the dimensions of space don’t make sense with reference to Him. By the same token, the dimension of time is meaningless to Him. It’s just a way of describing a particular event in the universe that He creates, the way a novelist could refer to a particular sentence in his book.
So if my description is on the right track, we see how the clever puzzles fall away. God removes His felt uneasiness in one grand action. In one fell swoop, God created the whole universe, knowing everything that would happen at its inception and exactly how it would end. From our puny human perspective, we see it unfolding “over time.” But that’s not how God perceives it.
It’s also not the case that God periodically intervenes in human history. On the contrary, every moment of existence is a total expression of His omnipresent will. It’s not that God delegates “normal events” to the laws of physics, but occasionally He doesn’t like the way things are going, so He overrides Nature by acting and performing a miracle.
No, in my view, every single thing in the history of the universe–from the resurrection of Jesus to the nuclear reaction in a star 3 billion light-years away–is a direct manifestation of the choices God made when designing His creation. As an elegant flourish–and also to make things more comprehensible and “orderly” to us–He made the material universe obey very simple laws. It’s akin to a poet telling a great story, while obeying iambic pentameter. God tells His story of love and redemption, even while the atoms in our bodies obey seemingly mechanical laws.
So Mises is right: The God of the Bible does remove His felt uneasiness in one fell swoop. It just appears to us a succession of different actions, because we move through the dimension of time. But it’s all flowing from the same design, the same original act of creation, that was conceived by God when He decided that it would be “good” to have the universe (as well as all of our souls etc.) rather than just Him existing by Himself.
As far as the World Series puzzle, again it seems sophomoric to me, a play on words and not really something that sheds light on whether the Bible is true or false. When God created the universe, it’s not as if He has to first deal with Moses, then deal with Constantine, then deal with Calvinists, then deal with the anti-Christ, etc. No, He interacts with His creation in one glorious instant of creation, because He is outside (or beyond) time itself. He doesn’t have to wait around for the end of the world; He directly experienced it the moment He created all of spacetime.
Now when conceiving of the universe, God would have known that (say) at coordinates XYZ, at time T, Bill Green would pray and ask God to tell him which team to bet on. God could choose to tell Bill or not. But God wouldn’t then be “boxed in,” because He doesn’t experience the passage of time between telling Bill and then having a team win the World Series. When God decided on the charge of an electron, how much mass the sun would have, and so forth, He already knew not only who would win the World Series at time T+5, but also that Bill would be asking Him this question at time T. Such a possibility doesn’t limit His omnipotence any more than saying, “Could God make a flying octopus?”
“I Walked Downstairs, Wiser”
I can’t remember the exact line, but I’m referring to Ralphie in A Christmas Story after he decodes the commercial for Ovaltine. (Incidentally, the best argument against democracy I have come across is that this movie gets only 8.1 out of 10.)
In an earlier post I was aghast at the Orwellian behavior of Fox “News” when it flipped the footage from the CPAC convention, to paint Ron Paul in an embarrassing light. I got two general reactions:
(1) “Bob Fox does this stuff all the time. Why are you shocked?”
(2) “Bob you are insane. This was obviously a mistake; Fox said it was a mistake. You Paul fans are paranoid.”
Well the (1)’s have it. I hadn’t caught this Jon Stewart bit before; it seals the case in my mind. (And for those who still think it was an honest mistake: Isn’t it funny that when the interns at Fox screw up, they do it in a way that helps Michele Bachmann and hurts Ron Paul? Maybe this is a topic for behavioral economics or something, where people subconsciously do things that will make their bosses happy.)
Tom Woods Has Still Got It
Holy cow Tom is amazing in this interview with Dennis Miller. If some of you up-and-coming libertarians wonder, “Why is Tom such a big deal, and I’m stuck arguing with people on Bob’s blog?”, here’s your answer.
I am not even going to spell out all the subtle nuances in how he managed to intrigue Miller without coming off as a “Paultard.”
Beyond the expert sense of persuasiveness, Tom also exhibits courage. I have to confess, I think I would have been afraid of having Dennis Miller not think I was a cool kid at the end of the interview. But Tom was willing to risk it…and hence Dennis Miller thought he was a cool kid.
Hey Tom, “What’s it like?”
(I’m trying to be funny of course in this post, but really, I am going to listen to this interview again tomorrow and study it. Tom might not even have realized why it “worked,” but I noticed several things that he did to lead to the climax.)
Yet Another Person Loses His Job Over a Tasteless Joke
As someone who regrets things blogged or spoken at least once a week, I am disturbed by this trend whereby people make a joke in poor taste and then have to resign. Part of it is that it’s so random: There must be thousands of people a day who Tweet things that could cost them their job, but they just don’t get picked up.
Anyway, the latest example is a (former) Fellow at NYU who said some dumb things in response to the Egyptian mob’s attack on Lara Logan. What’s interesting is that I first learned of this guy’s existence from listening to Glenn Beck and another right-wing talk radio host (may have been Rush but I can’t remember for sure), and needless to say their point was how “the Left” cares nothing for Americans or women, and places politics above people.
Here is Nir Rosen’s side of the story. It’s a little bit too huffy for an apology, if you ask me, but I always like learning the larger context when you hear something “unbelievable” like this. (And yes, I would love to see an article from an 18-year-old intern at Fox explaining how he screwed up the CPAC tapes.)
Also, it should go without saying, but let’s not take chances: It was awful what happened to Lara Logan and I hope she recovers from the attack.
TNR Anoints the Next Ron Paul
As I write this post, I feel the same way as I do on the 4th of July when I light a bottle rocket and then run away…
How do you kids like this? Scott Sumner is touting Gary Johnson, and The New Republic says he is the next Ron Paul. If the article is accurate, he really does sound cool. But by all means let’s have another brawl:
Like Ron Paul, whom he endorsed in 2008, Johnson is an unabashed libertarian-and, in some ways, a purer one (he’s pro-choice, pro-free trade, and pro-immigration). So, while he’s no culture warrior or foreign policy hawk—he opposed the war in Iraq and the troop surge in Afghanistan—he outflanks any Republican on fiscal issues, proposing an immediate, across-the-board 43 percent spending cut. “We’re on the precipice,” he says, of the country’s finances. To illustrate what lies in the abyss, at times he flashes his favorite prop: a $100 trillion bill from Zimbabwe that he keeps in his wallet.
Hmm, abortion, One World trade pacts, immigration… All we’re lacking is a discussion of religion. Oh wait:
There are certain shibboleths in presidential politics that even the most forthright candidates feel obliged to repeat, certain topics they feel compelled to avoid. Yet talk to former New Mexico Governor Gary Johnson, the unorthodox 2012 GOP hopeful, and those rules go out the window. Ask about church, and he says he doesn’t go. “Do you believe in Jesus?” I ask. “I believe he lived,” he replies with a smile.
I believe He lives.
Charles Plosser, Our Man on the Fed?
I explain at Mises.org. However, we Austrians must always engage in product differentiation and so:
[B]ecause the Austrians have a rich model of capital, they can explain why a painful bust, or recession, is necessary. In other words, after the central bank backs off and lets interest rates rise to their correct level, the entrepreneurs and workers can’t simply slap their foreheads and say, “Whoops, let’s try that again.” The economy can’t simply revert to its position on the eve of the boom, because irrevocable investment decisions have been made.
This point actually shows the deficiency in the focus on worker retraining, exhibited by Plosser in the quotation above, or by Chicago School economist John Cochrane, who argued in late 2008, “We should have a recession. People who spend their lives pounding nails in Nevada need something else to do.”
By focusing primarily on skill/occupation mismatch, Plosser and Cochrane overlook the important role of capital consumption during the boom period, which Mises emphasized. If a recession were merely about retraining workers, then Krugman’s critique of the Austrian theory would make more sense: after all, it presumably took some time to train the new construction workers (and investment bankers) when they went into their occupations during the housing boom, so why are we stuck with an awful recession when they need to leave those industries?
But as my simple sushi story demonstrated, we can easily understand a large surge in unemployment when we realize that the underlying capital structure — the tools, equipment, and goods-in-process — of the whole economy went along for the ride too.
For a snappy quotation to supplement Cochrane’s, I’d say this: After the housing bubble burst, the problem wasn’t just that some construction workers should have been busboys; the problem was also that some backhoes should have been ovens.
Fox News Incredible Deception on Ron Paul CPAC Win
This is absolutely incredible. I have tried to figure out if this is a reverse hoax (i.e. a fake YouTube setting up Fox News), but I don’t see how.
I realize it’s a bit long, but I encourage you to sit through the whole thing. By the end, you will realize why all the elements were necessary to appreciate the enormity of what Fox apparently did. (HT2 LRC)
According to some of my critics in the comments of this post, we affiliated with the Mises Institute are paranoid and overly sensitive when it comes to the treatment of Ron Paul. I’m sure you guys can explain why Ron Paul did something to earn the above treatment. I mean really, if he hadn’t gone to CPAC in the first place, this wouldn’t have happened, so when you think about it, he asked for it….
Seriously, there’s no way around this, right? Even though the guy at the podium has a similar outfit, it is clearly different footage because in one clip he has something around his neck, but not in the other.
PPI Continues to Alarm, So BLS Will Change It
Bob Wenzel does a good job explaining the alarming trend in the Producer Price Index. I strolled over to the BLS website to see for myself, and was nonplussed by the front-page explanation that they are introducing a new “experimental aggregation system” for the PPI:
Currently, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) uses the stage-of-processing (SOP) system as the key structure for analyzing producer prices. This system aggregates commodity price indexes for processed and unprocessed goods and is organized into three stages: finished goods, intermediate goods, and crude materials for further processing. Over the past 20 years, the BLS has expanded Producer Price Index (PPI) coverage to include price indexes for many service and construction activities. To expand the scope of coverage for the PPI, BLS recently developed an experimental aggregation system that includes price changes for goods, services, and construction sold to all portions of final demand and intermediate demand, based on information from the Bureau of Economic Analysis’ Input/Output accounts.
Huh that’s kind of interesting. I wonder if the new numbers will make reported PPI inflation higher or lower than the old approach?
UPDATE: I should point out that right now, it apparently truly is “experimental”:
“The aggregation system described here is in its experimental phase, and the PPI program is seeking feedback from its users.”
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