WEBVTT NOTE Mises: The Musical 1 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:04.000 I'll get it. 2 00:00:04.000 --> 00:00:08.000 Please, could you repeat your explanation? 3 00:01:00.000 --> 00:01:10.000 Just a couple words about this piano. This is a Boesendorfer, a nine and a half foot imperial grand piano, the largest grand piano in the world. 4 00:01:10.000 --> 00:01:18.000 And it's right here in our conservatory named in honor of Joanne B. Rothbard, who was a great lover of music along with her husband Murray. 5 00:01:18.000 --> 00:01:27.000 They used to take classes in early music at Columbia University. In between writing treatises on history and economics, they were both great music scholars. 6 00:01:27.000 --> 00:01:36.000 So we're very pleased to have this instrument here. Tonight, you're fortunate enough to be at the debut performance of Mises the Musical. 7 00:01:39.000 --> 00:01:41.000 This is opening night. 8 00:01:42.000 --> 00:01:44.000 And it's closing night too. 9 00:01:51.000 --> 00:01:53.000 Guaranteed to lose money. 10 00:01:54.000 --> 00:01:56.000 There are four seats over here. 11 00:01:57.000 --> 00:02:13.000 Let me introduce to you Arlene Zenert. She's the pianist and a largely responsible friend who produced this. 12 00:02:13.000 --> 00:02:26.000 She was engaged in a very interesting thing over the last few years of reviving the Mises songs that the Mises circle used to sing and translating them into English and making them accessible. 13 00:02:26.000 --> 00:02:33.000 The music you'll hear tonight is the real stuff. This is the stuff that was really sung in Vienna by the Mises Circle. 14 00:02:33.000 --> 00:02:41.000 So, there's nothing phony about this. It seems like we made all this stuff up, but it's all true. 15 00:02:49.000 --> 00:02:51.000 Let me introduce to you the players. 16 00:02:51.000 --> 00:03:07.000 Well, after a while, they don't make their entrance for a while, but Paul Sweezy visited the Mises seminar back in the 1920s before he converted to Marxism. 17 00:03:07.000 --> 00:03:22.000 He is a typical neoclassical economist from Harvard. He's played by Hans Trulli, who will make his entrance a little bit later. 18 00:03:22.000 --> 00:03:26.000 I told him for some reason he reminds me of a Boston Marxist. I wasn't sure why. 19 00:03:26.000 --> 00:03:37.000 And then A.W. Stonyer was a Fabian Socialist and he's played tonight by Marcus Grahegg, who will make his entrance a little bit later. 20 00:03:37.000 --> 00:03:43.000 Felix Kaufman is the author of all these songs. He wrote the words. 21 00:03:43.000 --> 00:03:49.000 Is there more space over there? 22 00:03:50.000 --> 00:03:56.000 Some more chairs would probably be pulled in to be mined up. 23 00:03:56.000 --> 00:04:00.000 But Kaufman was a philosopher, and he used to write these. 24 00:04:00.000 --> 00:04:03.000 There's one more chair over there if somebody can get through. 25 00:04:03.000 --> 00:04:06.000 So throw somebody in. 26 00:04:06.000 --> 00:04:07.000 But Kaufman was a philosopher. 27 00:04:07.000 --> 00:04:11.000 He wrote all these words, and he would take notes during the seminar 28 00:04:11.000 --> 00:04:14.000 and come up with songs the next week and pass them out to everybody 29 00:04:14.000 --> 00:04:16.000 and get everybody singing them. 30 00:04:16.000 --> 00:04:28.000 So, Kaufman and I are being played by our own dear David Gordon, here he is, so David, here he is. 31 00:04:28.000 --> 00:04:33.000 Everybody says that Kaufman was a mischievous fellow. 32 00:04:33.000 --> 00:04:42.000 Gottfried Habler was a great friend of Mises, who flirted somewhat with Keynesianism, midlife, 33 00:04:42.000 --> 00:04:50.000 Friedrich also wrote some very good books on trade theory and business cycle theory, and tonight he's played by Tom D. Lorenzo. 34 00:04:58.000 --> 00:05:05.000 Fritz Machlum was very much responsible for Human Action having been published. He gave a very positive review of it. 35 00:05:05.000 --> 00:05:13.000 I was a good friend of Mises's dad, they're ups and downs, but also another great theorist, and he's played by Joseph Salerno. 36 00:05:17.000 --> 00:05:32.000 And then Hans Meyer was a problematic figure. He was a disciple of Max Weber, a social democrat who makes an appearance in Mises's autobiography. 37 00:05:32.000 --> 00:05:38.000 He goes along very well with the people who ran Mises out of Austria. 38 00:05:38.000 --> 00:05:50.000 He thrived under the Nazis, Hans Meyer, and he is played tonight by our own dear Roderick Long. 39 00:05:50.000 --> 00:05:55.000 And of course we all know at this period Hayek was a great disciple of Mises 40 00:05:55.000 --> 00:05:59.000 and his successor at the business cycle institute. 41 00:05:59.000 --> 00:06:05.120 There is this song tonight you will hear about the Business Cycle Institute, and so we thought 42 00:06:05.120 --> 00:06:11.800 the thing in who should play Hayek, who else but Walter Block. 43 00:06:11.800 --> 00:06:16.920 Our last player needs no introduction. 44 00:06:16.920 --> 00:06:20.080 The author of the Mises biography, the man who knows Mises probably better than any living 45 00:06:20.080 --> 00:06:25.080 person, Erwin Gieter-Holstein. 46 00:06:25.080 --> 00:06:39.080 Ludwig von Mises, the Musical 47 00:06:39.080 --> 00:06:45.080 Now, come on. You're telling me that the state and society can be deduced from the principle of marginal utility? 48 00:06:45.080 --> 00:06:49.080 I claim Streiske is implausible at best. 49 00:06:49.080 --> 00:07:13.080 No, no, no. That's a caricature. We are not here debating the merits of anarchism. We are merely saying that through marginal utility, properly understood, we can demonstrate the merits of market economics in ways that eluded our predecessors. It might be the very foundation of liberalism itself. 50 00:07:13.080 --> 00:07:21.080 Well, I suppose anything properly understood can be the foundation of anything else properly understood. 51 00:07:26.080 --> 00:07:28.080 Gentlemen, define me. 52 00:07:35.080 --> 00:07:42.080 Slightly irritated by the fact that my former collaborators speak with this Yankee accent. 53 00:07:43.080 --> 00:07:56.080 But as to substance, the trouble with early liberalism and the reason for its intellectual 54 00:07:56.080 --> 00:08:07.080 failure, I believe, was its lack of a purely scientific foundation, one rooted not in any 55 00:08:07.080 --> 00:08:16.080 are all crepes, but in the rational analysis of the acting man. 56 00:08:26.080 --> 00:08:33.080 If I may be so told, I should disagree with everybody. 57 00:08:33.080 --> 00:08:38.080 and Fundamentals. 58 00:08:41.080 --> 00:08:46.080 You have all failed to come to terms with the teachings of Marx. 59 00:08:46.080 --> 00:08:48.080 They were. 60 00:08:48.080 --> 00:08:53.080 He says it's the theory of ideal points. 61 00:08:53.080 --> 00:08:56.080 The way to where? 62 00:08:56.080 --> 00:08:58.080 Oh, no. 63 00:09:03.080 --> 00:09:14.080 It says it here. I'll tell you where. Nowhere. 64 00:09:25.080 --> 00:09:28.080 I suspect you are up to your usual tricks. 65 00:09:33.080 --> 00:09:38.080 I was just thinking. 66 00:09:43.080 --> 00:09:45.080 Same as you. 67 00:09:48.080 --> 00:09:51.080 I'm still thinking. 68 00:09:52.080 --> 00:09:55.080 This whole scene could be set to music. 69 00:09:58.080 --> 00:10:00.080 If I may, again. 70 00:10:00.080 --> 00:10:02.080 Yes, yes, remember. 71 00:10:03.080 --> 00:10:19.080 Professor Meier and I have long because of greed. It seems to me that what we need is rational discussion and calm is a deliberation. 72 00:10:19.080 --> 00:10:28.080 Only in this way can we truly appreciate the implications of this service's innovative approach to science. 73 00:10:33.080 --> 00:10:46.080 I have a point of doctrine that you should really hear Attempt a refutation, but you will not come here 74 00:10:46.080 --> 00:10:59.080 I call myself a liberal, but not from days of yore I say all things differently than those who came before 75 00:10:59.080 --> 00:11:08.080 A liberal anyone can be, but in being alone the reasons see. 76 00:11:08.080 --> 00:11:17.080 I know this, cause marginal utility sets proper light on economy. 77 00:11:17.080 --> 00:11:25.080 I know this, cause marginal utility sets light on economy. 78 00:11:29.080 --> 00:11:50.080 I agree, but not yet. 79 00:11:50.080 --> 00:11:54.080 Now, do you agree? 80 00:11:54.080 --> 00:12:04.080 I agree that you are convinced of your position, Professor, but there is another thing to look at. 81 00:12:05.080 --> 00:12:10.080 I have some ideal types we cannot do without. 82 00:12:10.080 --> 00:12:15.080 Or else we're really crippled, cause nothing else works out. 83 00:12:15.080 --> 00:12:28.080 I therefore keep my values, had a distant sense, but he who thinks worth a thousand, in my view has no chance. 84 00:12:28.080 --> 00:12:40.080 I state my values in black ink, so that you will know just what I think. 85 00:12:40.080 --> 00:12:50.080 I know this, because marginal utility Sheds profit light on economy 86 00:12:50.080 --> 00:12:58.080 I know this, because marginal utility Sheds light on economy 87 00:12:58.080 --> 00:13:08.080 I've saved my values in black ink So that you all know just what I think 88 00:13:08.080 --> 00:13:18.080 I know this, because marginal utility Sheds from the light on the economy. 89 00:13:18.080 --> 00:13:26.080 I know this, because marginal utility Sheds from the light on the economy. 90 00:13:38.080 --> 00:13:50.080 The root of the difference lies in method. We are Austrian, whereas Meyer holds too tightly to the teachings of the German historical school. 91 00:13:50.080 --> 00:13:52.080 You don't need it. 92 00:13:52.080 --> 00:13:54.080 A schmolarite. 93 00:13:54.080 --> 00:14:05.080 Collegiate for inspection, that is the confection, Sorted, feed off fire and render law, 94 00:14:05.080 --> 00:14:12.080 Some will are of this way, proceeding in this way, Provide a mechanism without flaw, 95 00:14:12.080 --> 00:14:16.080 And though the thinking's brittle, their work will not be lent, 96 00:14:16.080 --> 00:14:22.080 So gratitude we fill and will express, But such a data set theory will not be get, 97 00:14:22.080 --> 00:14:26.080 The efforts of this kind invite redress. 98 00:14:26.080 --> 00:14:29.080 Well, at least I'm not being singled out. 99 00:14:29.080 --> 00:14:33.080 In fact, I suspect we have an even more formidable enemy in our midst. 100 00:14:33.080 --> 00:14:35.080 Don't say it. 101 00:14:35.080 --> 00:14:39.080 The Vizieries! 102 00:14:39.080 --> 00:14:42.080 Some claim another thing. 103 00:14:42.080 --> 00:14:47.080 The science has one real basis, natural value, and it's very cool. 104 00:14:47.080 --> 00:14:50.080 Should you not comprehend those speculation linens, 105 00:14:50.080 --> 00:15:12.080 This is well-trod territory, isn't it, gentlemen? 106 00:15:12.080 --> 00:15:18.080 Let us all move on to greener pastures and agree, Mises is our true teacher. 107 00:15:18.080 --> 00:15:20.080 Let us raise a glass to our host. 108 00:15:20.080 --> 00:15:22.080 Hear, hear! 109 00:15:22.080 --> 00:15:28.080 But with professor Mises, seven all that he uses, 110 00:15:28.080 --> 00:15:30.080 Thoughts of truth from those who love retort, 111 00:15:30.080 --> 00:15:33.080 Thinking begins at seven and lasts till nearly eleven, 112 00:15:33.080 --> 00:15:36.080 But certainty supply is never shorted, 113 00:15:36.080 --> 00:15:40.080 For all ears end suspension, everyone's attention turned to him, 114 00:15:40.080 --> 00:15:47.080 With wisdom on parallel, with knowledge apodictic, 115 00:15:47.080 --> 00:15:55.080 Better looms realistic, theory alone cannot out-hunger crowd. 116 00:15:55.080 --> 00:15:57.080 Very well said. 117 00:16:00.080 --> 00:16:04.080 You know what I think unites all anti-Misesians? 118 00:16:04.080 --> 00:16:08.080 In their hearts, they love the state. 119 00:16:08.080 --> 00:16:13.080 That's true. Remember that story of the two grenadiers returning to the war in Russia, 120 00:16:13.080 --> 00:16:17.080 Here at Napoleon's death, one was so distraught that he killed himself. 121 00:16:17.080 --> 00:16:19.080 Good riddance, I say. 122 00:16:25.080 --> 00:16:28.080 In any case, wasn't that story told in a song? 123 00:16:29.080 --> 00:16:30.080 Yes, Felix. 124 00:16:32.080 --> 00:16:33.080 Yes, Felix. 125 00:16:33.080 --> 00:16:36.080 And then Napoleon haunts his grave, so the story goes, anyway. 126 00:16:36.080 --> 00:16:39.080 And I know what you are thinking. 127 00:16:40.080 --> 00:16:41.080 We all... 128 00:16:41.080 --> 00:16:50.080 We all have leaders we admire. It's just that ours are not statesmen, but intellectuals. 129 00:16:50.080 --> 00:16:59.080 Ah, like my own beloved teacher, Eugen von Boehm-Bawerk. 130 00:16:59.080 --> 00:17:04.080 Let's imagine a scenario. 131 00:17:04.080 --> 00:17:16.080 An Austrian economist hopes that Germany invokes Germany, but in setting a line to the marginal utility scheme is dead. What would any self-respecting Austrian do? 132 00:17:21.080 --> 00:17:28.080 An economist moved to Germany, a learned position to pursue. 133 00:17:28.080 --> 00:17:35.080 This should have been a certainty, for, indeed, he'd learned a thing or two. 134 00:17:35.080 --> 00:17:41.080 One very good man learned the tragic tale of marginal utility. 135 00:17:41.080 --> 00:17:43.080 It was deceased. 136 00:17:43.080 --> 00:17:47.080 Its followers lamented the school's corruption. 137 00:17:47.080 --> 00:17:51.080 Their debt wouldn't increase. 138 00:17:51.080 --> 00:18:01.080 Our economist cried bitterly, oh, for the terrible news. 139 00:18:01.080 --> 00:18:09.080 Oh, that life hadn't been granted me. Gone to the dogs is my muse. 140 00:18:09.080 --> 00:18:16.080 My books, what to become of them? Editions are printed, but no demand. 141 00:18:16.080 --> 00:18:24.960 I might well learn them straight away, wisdom's met its final stand, 142 00:18:24.960 --> 00:18:32.320 dishonor with its death-nail sounding, and my friend's fate betrays me, 143 00:18:32.320 --> 00:18:39.440 and we'll protest with pride about thee, I've got Harry Carrey to say to me, 144 00:18:39.440 --> 00:18:46.440 I shall not do at least thee, this would be no friend reason. 145 00:18:46.440 --> 00:18:53.440 I exchange my life here justifiably, for sacrifice knows its season. 146 00:18:53.440 --> 00:18:59.440 From the treasury of mangers' works, I lay a volume on my breast, 147 00:18:59.440 --> 00:19:06.440 now pen in hand my dagger dear, within my soul may find its rest. 148 00:19:06.440 --> 00:19:20.440 And so I still rely and wait, let my books remain dirt and dusty, but hearty, now complimentary goods, they cry for a battle loud and lusty. 149 00:19:20.440 --> 00:19:35.440 Through boggled advances, over my grave, polemics and lightning affect her, polemics and lightning and thunder are my rise, upwards my enclave. 150 00:19:35.440 --> 00:19:40.440 Put not marginal utility asunder. 151 00:19:48.440 --> 00:19:56.440 Ah, ah, Mr. Svesi from Boston and Mr. Stonier from Boston. 152 00:19:57.440 --> 00:20:03.440 How good you could come to bid us farewell. 153 00:20:05.440 --> 00:20:29.440 Mr. Stoneyard and Mr. Speezy, with these two thou comings easy, that's the feeling here in me, we're so sorry that we're leaving, there is no end to our breathing, what a lovely time we've seen. 154 00:20:29.440 --> 00:20:38.440 Ah, what fond memories you two leave, months and months and months and months, talking about, really, the same two things. 155 00:20:40.440 --> 00:20:42.440 Have you talked to him yet? 156 00:20:42.440 --> 00:20:44.440 So it takes place on the margin? 157 00:20:45.440 --> 00:20:47.440 That's it! 158 00:20:51.440 --> 00:20:53.440 Values are subjective? 159 00:20:53.440 --> 00:20:55.440 Exactly! 160 00:20:55.440 --> 00:21:08.440 Mr. Squeezy came from Boston, didn't worry what it cost him hard to fight with one desire. 161 00:21:08.440 --> 00:21:19.440 Gained some knowledge of re-thinking and prevent his mind from tricking, far beyond his local shrine. 162 00:21:19.440 --> 00:21:30.440 Mr. Sweezy had many questions, but was offered one suggestion more than worth its weighting, though. 163 00:21:30.440 --> 00:21:40.440 Many of the judgements on the margin value small, and values large cannot be changed as life unfolds. 164 00:21:40.440 --> 00:21:44.440 Oh, dear, I am smart as ever. 165 00:21:44.440 --> 00:21:47.440 Sweezy called with great endeavor. 166 00:21:47.440 --> 00:22:02.440 of how global men you will see, agitation, I'll be rousing all of heaven to my spousey, marginal utility. 167 00:22:17.440 --> 00:22:27.440 Teach these Harvard sons of Englishmen what they need to learn. Bye-bye, Mr. Sonnier. 168 00:22:31.440 --> 00:22:33.440 Now let's tell the rest of the story. 169 00:22:33.440 --> 00:22:48.440 But before he bought his ticket, Sweezy's thoughts began to picket, all decisions made that day. 170 00:22:48.440 --> 00:22:57.440 War for numbers, formulations, proceeds of death, operations for God's choices, hell have made. 171 00:22:57.440 --> 00:23:08.440 Feeling queasy? Are Mr. Squeezy noted that it can't be breezy? Naming what's of value true? 172 00:23:08.440 --> 00:23:20.440 Ah, it's not that complicated. Values can't be calculated. People do just what they do. 173 00:23:20.440 --> 00:23:31.440 Mr. Stonier spoke out at long last, spouting notions in sharp contrast to the theory's purest theme. 174 00:23:31.440 --> 00:23:36.440 I was taught to be suspicious. Such free thinking is deprecious. 175 00:23:36.440 --> 00:23:39.440 Ah, but darling, what a scream! 176 00:23:39.440 --> 00:23:52.440 Sadly lacking an understanding, Swords of knowledge I'll be branding when I come back in the fall. 177 00:23:52.440 --> 00:24:02.440 Seeking answers to my queries, Piting insights, exchanges, memory, wisdom plenty for us all. 178 00:24:02.440 --> 00:24:13.440 Grateful for our affiliation, raise a glass in celebration of our gifts and revolutions. 179 00:24:13.440 --> 00:24:20.440 Let me with them on their journey, much success in every journey. 180 00:24:32.440 --> 00:24:46.440 So long, so long, so long, so long as we are on the subject of departures, I do have an announcement. 181 00:24:46.440 --> 00:24:59.440 I have been offered a position in Geneva, given the political outlook in Austria, it does seem best that I should accept it. 182 00:24:59.440 --> 00:25:07.440 Dear Mises, you are the center of our circle. 183 00:25:07.440 --> 00:25:15.440 What does one do? What happens to a circle when it's center of money? 184 00:25:15.440 --> 00:25:19.440 That's what we know for sure. That's what we think of it as theory. 185 00:25:19.440 --> 00:25:41.440 And the circle grieves slow, when its center starts to saunter, its circumference feels empty, disheartened and low. 186 00:25:41.440 --> 00:25:58.240 That a crisis is here to ponder, Brady, I are left to wander. Brady, I are left to wander with nowhere to go. Brady, I am left to wander with nowhere to go.