WEBVTT NOTE I. Acting Man 1 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.800 Part 1. Human Action 2 00:00:03.800 --> 00:00:07.600 Chapter 1. Acting Man 3 00:00:07.600 --> 00:00:13.900 1. Purposeful Action and Animal Reaction 4 00:00:13.900 --> 00:00:17.100 Human action is purposeful behavior. 5 00:00:17.100 --> 00:00:24.900 Or, we may say, action is will put into operation and transformed into an agency, 6 00:00:24.900 --> 00:00:28.100 is aiming at ends and goals, 7 00:00:28.100 --> 00:00:34.820 is the ego's meaningful response to stimuli and to the conditions of its environment, 8 00:00:34.820 --> 00:00:41.620 is a person's conscious adjustment to the state of the universe that determines his life. 9 00:00:41.620 --> 00:00:48.260 Such paraphrases may clarify the definition given and prevent possible misinterpretations, 10 00:00:48.260 --> 00:00:54.420 but the definition itself is adequate and does not need compliment or commentary. 11 00:00:54.420 --> 00:01:08.420 Conscious or purposeful behavior is in sharp contrast to unconscious behavior, that is, the reflexes and the involuntary responses of the body's cells and nerves to stimuli. 12 00:01:08.420 --> 00:01:21.420 People are sometimes prepared to believe that the boundaries between conscious behavior and the involuntary reaction of the forces operating within man's body are more or less indefinite. 13 00:01:21.420 --> 00:01:27.940 This is correct only as far as it is sometimes not easy to establish whether concrete behavior 14 00:01:27.940 --> 00:01:33.780 is to be considered voluntary or involuntary, but the distinction between consciousness 15 00:01:33.780 --> 00:01:40.460 and unconsciousness is nonetheless sharp and can be clearly determined. 16 00:01:40.460 --> 00:01:46.660 The unconscious behavior of the bodily organs and cells is for the acting ego no less a 17 00:01:46.660 --> 00:01:50.800 datum than any other fact of the external world. 18 00:01:50.800 --> 00:01:57.100 A working man must take into account all that goes on within his own body, as well as other 19 00:01:57.100 --> 00:02:02.500 data, for example, the weather or the attitudes of his neighbors. 20 00:02:02.500 --> 00:02:07.720 There is, of course, a margin within which purposeful behavior has the power to neutralize 21 00:02:07.720 --> 00:02:10.760 the working of bodily factors. 22 00:02:10.760 --> 00:02:15.980 It is feasible, within certain limits, to get the body under control. 23 00:02:15.980 --> 00:02:21.940 Man can sometimes succeed through the power of his will in overcoming sickness, in compensating 24 00:02:21.940 --> 00:02:28.340 for the innate or acquired insufficiency of his physical constitution, or in suppressing 25 00:02:28.340 --> 00:02:30.080 reflexes. 26 00:02:30.080 --> 00:02:35.600 As far as this is possible, the field of purposeful action is extended. 27 00:02:35.600 --> 00:02:41.620 If a man abstains from controlling the involuntary reaction of cells and nerve centers, although 28 00:02:41.620 --> 00:02:49.020 Although he would be in a position to do so, his behavior is, from our point of view, purposeful. 29 00:02:49.020 --> 00:02:54.700 The field of our science is human action, not the psychological events which result 30 00:02:54.700 --> 00:02:56.500 in an action. 31 00:02:56.500 --> 00:03:02.500 It is precisely this which distinguishes the general theory of human action, praxeology, 32 00:03:02.500 --> 00:03:04.740 from psychology. 33 00:03:04.740 --> 00:03:11.900 The theme of psychology is the internal events that result or can result in a definite action. 34 00:03:11.900 --> 00:03:16.500 The theme of praxeology is action as such. 35 00:03:16.500 --> 00:03:24.420 This also settles the relation of praxeology to the psychoanalytical concept of the subconscious. 36 00:03:24.420 --> 00:03:29.660 Psychoanalysis, too, is psychology and does not investigate action but the forces and 37 00:03:29.660 --> 00:03:34.120 factors that impel a man toward a definite action. 38 00:03:34.120 --> 00:03:41.780 The psychoanalytical subconscious is a psychological and not a praxeological category. Whether 39 00:03:41.780 --> 00:03:47.980 an action stems from clear deliberation, or from forgotten memories and suppressed desires 40 00:03:47.980 --> 00:03:53.980 which from submerged regions, as it were, direct the will, does not influence the nature 41 00:03:53.980 --> 00:04:01.620 of the action. The murderer, whom a subconscious urge, the id, drives toward his crime, and 42 00:04:01.620 --> 00:04:07.880 The neurotic, whose aberrant behavior seems to be simply meaningless to an untrained observer, 43 00:04:07.880 --> 00:04:09.580 both act. 44 00:04:09.580 --> 00:04:14.240 They, like anybody else, are aiming at certain ends. 45 00:04:14.240 --> 00:04:18.840 It is the merit of psychoanalysis that it has demonstrated that even the behavior of 46 00:04:18.840 --> 00:04:26.360 neurotics and psychopaths is meaningful, that they too act and aim at ends, although we 47 00:04:26.360 --> 00:04:31.560 We who consider ourselves normal and sane call the reasoning determining their choice 48 00:04:31.560 --> 00:04:37.480 of ends nonsensical and the means they choose for the attainment of these ends contrary 49 00:04:37.480 --> 00:04:39.800 to purpose. 50 00:04:39.800 --> 00:04:47.480 The term unconscious as used by praxeology and the term subconscious as applied by psychoanalysis 51 00:04:47.480 --> 00:04:52.680 belong to two different systems of thought and research. 52 00:04:52.680 --> 00:04:57.900 Praxeology, no less than other branches of knowledge, owes much to psychoanalysis. 53 00:04:57.900 --> 00:05:03.100 The more necessary is it, then, to become aware of the line which separates praxeology 54 00:05:03.100 --> 00:05:06.900 from psychoanalysis. 55 00:05:06.900 --> 00:05:10.140 Action is not simply giving preference. 56 00:05:10.140 --> 00:05:15.580 Man also shows preference in situations in which things and events are unavoidable or 57 00:05:15.580 --> 00:05:17.340 are believed to be so. 58 00:05:17.340 --> 00:05:24.380 Thus a man may prefer sunshine to rain, and may wish that the sun would dispel the clouds. 59 00:05:24.380 --> 00:05:30.260 He who only wishes and hopes does not interfere actively with the course of events, and with 60 00:05:30.260 --> 00:05:32.940 the shaping of his own destiny. 61 00:05:32.940 --> 00:05:39.020 But acting man chooses, determines, and tries to reach an end. 62 00:05:39.020 --> 00:05:44.860 Of two things, both of which he cannot have together, he selects one and gives up the 63 00:05:44.860 --> 00:05:46.660 other. 64 00:05:46.660 --> 00:05:52.580 Action therefore always involves both taking and renunciation. 65 00:05:52.580 --> 00:05:59.180 To express wishes and hopes and to announce planned action may be forms of action insofar 66 00:05:59.180 --> 00:06:04.300 as they aim in themselves at the realization of a certain purpose. 67 00:06:04.300 --> 00:06:08.980 But they must not be confused with the actions to which they refer. 68 00:06:08.980 --> 00:06:15.160 They are not identical with the actions they announce, recommend or reject. 69 00:06:15.160 --> 00:06:22.480 Action is a real thing. What counts is a man's total behavior and not his talk about planned 70 00:06:22.480 --> 00:06:28.560 but not realized acts. On the other hand, action must be clearly distinguished from 71 00:06:28.560 --> 00:06:34.760 the application of labor. Action means the employment of means for the attainment of 72 00:06:34.760 --> 00:06:41.540 ends. As a rule, one of the means employed is the acting man's labor, but this is not 73 00:06:41.540 --> 00:06:48.160 are not always the case. Under special conditions, a word is all that is needed. He who gives 74 00:06:48.160 --> 00:06:55.560 orders or interdictions may act without any expenditure of labor. To talk or not to talk, 75 00:06:55.560 --> 00:07:03.480 to smile or to remain serious, may be action. To consume and to enjoy are no less action 76 00:07:03.480 --> 00:07:09.480 than to abstain from accessible consumption and enjoyment. 77 00:07:09.480 --> 00:07:15.680 The theory consequently does not distinguish between active or energetic and passive or 78 00:07:15.680 --> 00:07:17.840 indolent man. 79 00:07:17.840 --> 00:07:23.120 The vigorous man industriously striving for the improvement of his condition acts neither 80 00:07:23.120 --> 00:07:29.320 more nor less than the lethargic man who sluggishly takes things as they come. 81 00:07:29.320 --> 00:07:33.760 For to do nothing and to be idle are also action. 82 00:07:33.760 --> 00:07:37.240 They too determine the course of events. 83 00:07:37.240 --> 00:07:42.720 Wherever the conditions for human interference are present, man acts no matter whether he 84 00:07:42.720 --> 00:07:46.560 interferes or refrains from interfering. 85 00:07:46.560 --> 00:07:52.800 He who endures what he could change acts no less than he who interferes in order to attain 86 00:07:52.800 --> 00:07:54.920 another result. 87 00:07:54.920 --> 00:08:01.120 A man who abstains from influencing the operation of physiological and instinctive factors which 88 00:08:01.120 --> 00:08:04.880 he could influence also acts. 89 00:08:04.880 --> 00:08:12.340 Action is not only doing, but no less omitting to do what possibly could be done. 90 00:08:12.340 --> 00:08:18.240 We may say that action is the manifestation of a man's will, but this would not add anything 91 00:08:18.240 --> 00:08:24.240 to our knowledge, for the term will means nothing else than man's faculty to choose 92 00:08:24.240 --> 00:08:30.580 between different states of affairs, to prefer one, to set aside the other, and to behave 93 00:08:30.580 --> 00:08:35.780 According to the Decision Made in Aiming at the Chosen State and Forsaking the Other 94 00:08:35.780 --> 00:08:39.620 2. 95 00:08:39.620 --> 00:08:43.500 The Prerequisites of Human Action 96 00:08:43.500 --> 00:08:49.660 We call contentment or satisfaction that state of a human being which does not and cannot 97 00:08:49.660 --> 00:08:52.880 result in any action. 98 00:08:52.880 --> 00:09:00.480 Acting man is eager to substitute a more satisfactory state of affairs for a less satisfactory. 99 00:09:00.480 --> 00:09:06.020 His mind imagines conditions which suit him better, and his action aims at bringing about 100 00:09:06.020 --> 00:09:08.400 this desired state. 101 00:09:08.400 --> 00:09:14.080 The incentive that impels a man to act is always some uneasiness. 102 00:09:14.080 --> 00:09:19.280 A man perfectly content with the state of his affairs would have no incentive to change 103 00:09:19.280 --> 00:09:20.280 things. 104 00:09:20.280 --> 00:09:22.960 He would have neither wishes nor desires. 105 00:09:22.960 --> 00:09:24.800 He would be perfectly happy. 106 00:09:24.800 --> 00:09:26.120 He would not act. 107 00:09:26.120 --> 00:09:29.800 He would simply live free from care. 108 00:09:29.800 --> 00:09:37.800 To make a man act, uneasiness and the image of a more satisfactory state alone are not sufficient. 109 00:09:37.800 --> 00:09:44.800 A third condition is required, the expectation that purposeful behavior has the power to remove, 110 00:09:44.800 --> 00:09:48.800 or at least to alleviate, the felt uneasiness. 111 00:09:48.800 --> 00:09:52.800 In the absence of this condition, no action is feasible. 112 00:09:52.800 --> 00:09:58.800 Man must yield to the inevitable. He must submit to destiny. 113 00:09:58.800 --> 00:10:02.800 These are the general conditions of human action. 114 00:10:02.800 --> 00:10:06.800 Man is the being that lives under these conditions. 115 00:10:06.800 --> 00:10:10.800 He is not only homo sapiens, but no less, homo agens. 116 00:10:10.800 --> 00:10:14.800 Beings of human descent, who either from birth 117 00:10:14.800 --> 00:10:18.800 or from acquired defects, are unchangeably unfit for 118 00:10:18.800 --> 00:10:22.800 any action, in the strict sense of the term, and not only in the legal sense, 119 00:10:22.800 --> 00:10:26.800 are practically not human. 120 00:10:26.800 --> 00:10:32.480 Although the statutes and biology consider them to be men, they lack the essential feature 121 00:10:32.480 --> 00:10:34.400 of humanity. 122 00:10:34.400 --> 00:10:38.280 The newborn child, too, is not an acting being. 123 00:10:38.280 --> 00:10:44.160 It has not yet gone the whole way from conception to the full development of its human qualities. 124 00:10:44.160 --> 00:10:51.620 But, at the end of this evolution, it becomes an acting being. 125 00:10:51.620 --> 00:10:54.120 Unhappiness 126 00:10:54.120 --> 00:11:00.080 In colloquial speech we call a man happy who has succeeded in attaining his ends. 127 00:11:00.080 --> 00:11:06.560 A more adequate description of his state would be that he is happier than he was before. 128 00:11:06.560 --> 00:11:12.000 There is, however, no valid objection to a usage that defines human action as the striving 129 00:11:12.000 --> 00:11:13.960 for happiness. 130 00:11:13.960 --> 00:11:17.320 But we must avoid current misunderstandings. 131 00:11:17.320 --> 00:11:23.900 The ultimate goal of human action is always the satisfaction of the acting man's desire. 132 00:11:23.900 --> 00:11:29.300 There is no standard of greater or lesser satisfaction other than individual judgments 133 00:11:29.300 --> 00:11:35.540 of value, different for various people and for the same people at various times. 134 00:11:35.540 --> 00:11:42.300 What makes a man feel uneasy and less uneasy is established by him, from the standard of 135 00:11:42.300 --> 00:11:48.380 his own will and judgment, from his personal and subjective valuation. 136 00:11:48.380 --> 00:11:53.660 Nobody is in a position to decree what should make a fellow man happier. 137 00:11:53.660 --> 00:12:00.340 To establish this fact does not refer in any way to the antitheses of egoism and altruism, 138 00:12:00.340 --> 00:12:07.940 of materialism and idealism, of individualism and collectivism, of atheism and religion. 139 00:12:07.940 --> 00:12:13.420 There are people whose only aim is to improve the condition of their own ego. 140 00:12:13.420 --> 00:12:18.040 There are other people with whom awareness of the troubles of their fellow men causes 141 00:12:18.040 --> 00:12:24.040 There is as much uneasiness as, or even more uneasiness than, their own wants. 142 00:12:24.040 --> 00:12:29.040 There are people who desire nothing else than the satisfaction of their appetites for sexual 143 00:12:29.040 --> 00:12:34.480 intercourse, food, drinks, fine homes and other material things. 144 00:12:34.480 --> 00:12:40.880 But other men care more for the satisfactions commonly called higher and ideal. 145 00:12:40.880 --> 00:12:46.960 There are individuals eager to adjust their actions to the requirements of social cooperation. 146 00:12:46.960 --> 00:12:52.700 There are, on the other hand, refractory people who defy the rules of social life. 147 00:12:52.700 --> 00:12:57.000 There are people for whom the ultimate goal of the earthly pilgrimage is the preparation 148 00:12:57.000 --> 00:12:59.240 for a life of bliss. 149 00:12:59.240 --> 00:13:03.620 There are other people who do not believe in the teachings of any religion and do not 150 00:13:03.620 --> 00:13:08.260 allow their actions to be influenced by them. 151 00:13:08.260 --> 00:13:12.060 Praxeology is indifferent to the ultimate goals of action. 152 00:13:12.060 --> 00:13:17.540 Man's findings are valid for all kinds of action, irrespective of the ends aimed at. 153 00:13:17.540 --> 00:13:21.580 It is a science of means, not of ends. 154 00:13:21.580 --> 00:13:26.140 It applies the term happiness in a purely formal sense. 155 00:13:26.140 --> 00:13:32.740 In the praxeological terminology, the proposition, man's unique aim is to attain happiness, is 156 00:13:32.740 --> 00:13:34.420 tautological. 157 00:13:34.420 --> 00:13:41.300 It does not imply any statement about the state of affairs from which man expects happiness. 158 00:13:41.300 --> 00:13:47.540 The idea that the incentive of human activity is always some uneasiness, and its aim always 159 00:13:47.540 --> 00:13:54.860 to remove such uneasiness as far as possible, that is, to make the acting men feel happier, 160 00:13:54.860 --> 00:13:59.860 is the essence of the teachings of eudaemonism and hedonism. 161 00:13:59.860 --> 00:14:05.500 Epicurean ataraxia is that state of perfect happiness and contentment at which all human 162 00:14:05.500 --> 00:14:09.940 activity aims, without ever wholly attaining it. 163 00:14:09.940 --> 00:14:15.800 In the face of the grandeur of this cognition, it is of little avail, only that many representatives 164 00:14:15.800 --> 00:14:21.880 of this philosophy failed to recognize the purely formal character of the notions pain 165 00:14:21.880 --> 00:14:26.800 and pleasure, and gave them a material and carnal meaning. 166 00:14:26.800 --> 00:14:32.200 The theological, mystical, and other schools of a heteronomous ethic did not shake the 167 00:14:32.200 --> 00:14:37.940 core of Epicureanism, because they could not raise any other objection than its neglect 168 00:14:37.940 --> 00:14:41.460 of the Higher and Nobler Pleasures. 169 00:14:41.460 --> 00:14:48.120 It is true that the writings of many earlier champions of eudaemonism, hedonism and utilitarianism 170 00:14:48.120 --> 00:14:53.860 are in some points open to misinterpretation, but the language of modern philosophers and 171 00:14:53.860 --> 00:15:00.440 still more that of the modern economists is so precise and straightforward that no misinterpretation 172 00:15:00.440 --> 00:15:04.440 can possibly occur. 173 00:15:04.440 --> 00:15:08.180 On Instincts and Impulses 174 00:15:08.180 --> 00:15:12.560 One does not further the comprehension of the fundamental problem of human action by 175 00:15:12.560 --> 00:15:15.920 the methods of instinct sociology. 176 00:15:15.920 --> 00:15:21.360 This school classifies the various concrete goals of human action and assigns to each 177 00:15:21.360 --> 00:15:25.460 class a special instinct as its motive. 178 00:15:25.460 --> 00:15:31.060 Man appears as a being driven by various innate instincts and dispositions. 179 00:15:31.060 --> 00:15:37.160 It is assumed that this explanation demolishes once for all the odious teachings of economics 180 00:15:37.160 --> 00:15:39.220 and utilitarian ethics. 181 00:15:39.220 --> 00:15:46.780 However, Feuerbach has already justly observed that every instinct is an instinct to happiness. 182 00:15:46.780 --> 00:15:53.300 The method of instinct psychology and instinct sociology consists in an arbitrary classification 183 00:15:53.300 --> 00:15:58.500 of the immediate goals of action and in a hypostasis of each. 184 00:15:58.500 --> 00:16:04.900 Whereas praxeology says that the goal of an action is to remove a certain uneasiness, 185 00:16:04.900 --> 00:16:10.640 instinct psychology says it is the satisfaction of an instinctive urge. 186 00:16:10.640 --> 00:16:15.140 Many champions of the instinct school are convinced that they have proved that action 187 00:16:15.140 --> 00:16:22.460 is not determined by reason, but stems from the profound depths of innate forces, impulses, 188 00:16:22.460 --> 00:16:27.720 instincts and dispositions which are not open to any rational elucidation. 189 00:16:27.720 --> 00:16:33.040 They are certain they have succeeded in exposing the shallowness of rationalism and disparage 190 00:16:33.040 --> 00:16:40.100 economics as a tissue of false conclusions drawn from false psychological assumptions. 191 00:16:40.100 --> 00:16:46.360 Yet rationalism, praxeology and economics do not deal with the ultimate springs and goals 192 00:16:46.360 --> 00:16:52.780 of action, but with the means applied for the attainment of an end sought. 193 00:16:52.780 --> 00:16:58.900 For unfathomable the depths may be from which an impulse or instinct emerges, the means 194 00:16:58.900 --> 00:17:04.460 which man chooses for its satisfaction are determined by a rational consideration of 195 00:17:04.460 --> 00:17:07.700 expense and success. 196 00:17:07.700 --> 00:17:12.500 He who acts under an emotional impulse also acts. 197 00:17:12.500 --> 00:17:17.940 What distinguishes an emotional action from other actions is the valuation of input and 198 00:17:17.940 --> 00:17:20.020 output. 199 00:17:20.020 --> 00:17:28.060 Inflamed with passion, man sees the goal as more desirable, and the price he has to pay 200 00:17:28.060 --> 00:17:33.100 for it as less burdensome than he would in cool deliberation. 201 00:17:33.100 --> 00:17:38.620 Men have never doubted that even in the state of emotion, means and ends are pondered, and 202 00:17:38.620 --> 00:17:44.200 that it is possible to influence the outcome of this deliberation by rendering more costly 203 00:17:44.200 --> 00:17:47.380 the yielding to the passionate impulse. 204 00:17:47.380 --> 00:17:52.900 To punish criminal offenses committed in a state of emotional excitement or intoxication 205 00:17:52.900 --> 00:17:59.060 more mildly than other offenses is tantamount to encouraging such excesses. 206 00:17:59.060 --> 00:18:04.820 The threat of severe retaliation does not fail to deter even people driven by seemingly 207 00:18:04.820 --> 00:18:07.480 irresistible passion. 208 00:18:07.480 --> 00:18:12.240 We interpret animal behavior on the assumption that the animal yields to the impulse which 209 00:18:12.240 --> 00:18:14.620 prevails at the moment. 210 00:18:14.620 --> 00:18:20.340 As we observe that the animal feeds, cohabits and attacks other animals or men, we speak 211 00:18:20.340 --> 00:18:25.280 of its instincts of nourishment, of reproduction and of aggression. 212 00:18:25.280 --> 00:18:31.600 We assume that such instincts are innate and peremptorily ask for satisfaction. 213 00:18:31.600 --> 00:18:34.000 But it is different with man. 214 00:18:34.000 --> 00:18:39.460 Man is not a being who cannot help yielding to the impulse that most urgently asks for 215 00:18:39.460 --> 00:18:41.340 satisfaction. 216 00:18:41.340 --> 00:18:46.960 Man is a being capable of subduing his instincts, emotions and impulses. 217 00:18:46.960 --> 00:18:50.240 He can rationalize his behavior. 218 00:18:50.240 --> 00:18:56.360 He renounces the satisfaction of a burning impulse in order to satisfy other desires. 219 00:18:56.360 --> 00:18:59.600 He is not a puppet of his appetites. 220 00:18:59.600 --> 00:19:03.720 A man does not ravish every female that stirs his senses. 221 00:19:03.720 --> 00:19:07.360 He does not devour every piece of food that entices him. 222 00:19:07.360 --> 00:19:11.100 He does not knock down every fellow he would like to kill. 223 00:19:11.100 --> 00:19:14.940 He arranges his wishes and desires into a scale. 224 00:19:14.940 --> 00:19:18.780 He chooses, in short, he acts. 225 00:19:18.780 --> 00:19:26.240 What distinguishes man from beasts is precisely that he adjusts his behavior deliberately. 226 00:19:26.240 --> 00:19:31.940 Man is the being that has inhibitions, that can master his impulses and desires, that 227 00:19:31.940 --> 00:19:37.780 has the power to suppress instinctive desires and impulses. 228 00:19:37.780 --> 00:19:42.780 It may happen that an impulse emerges with such vehemence that no disadvantage which 229 00:19:42.780 --> 00:19:48.420 its satisfaction may cause appears great enough to prevent the individual from satisfying 230 00:19:48.420 --> 00:19:49.420 it. 231 00:19:49.420 --> 00:19:52.620 In this case, too, there is choosing. 232 00:19:52.620 --> 00:19:58.020 Man decides in favor of yielding to the desire concerned. 233 00:19:58.020 --> 00:20:00.300 3. 234 00:20:00.300 --> 00:20:04.120 Human Action as an Ultimate Given 235 00:20:04.120 --> 00:20:09.120 Since time immemorial, men have been eager to know the prime mover, the cause of all 236 00:20:09.120 --> 00:20:15.160 being and of all change, the ultimate substance from which everything stems and which is the 237 00:20:15.160 --> 00:20:18.000 cause of itself. 238 00:20:18.000 --> 00:20:19.760 Science is more modest. 239 00:20:19.760 --> 00:20:25.040 It is aware of the limits of the human mind and of the human search for knowledge. 240 00:20:25.040 --> 00:20:30.800 It aims at tracing back every phenomenon to its cause, but it realizes that these endeavors 241 00:20:30.800 --> 00:20:35.400 Computers must necessarily strike against insurmountable walls. 242 00:20:35.400 --> 00:20:40.820 There are phenomena which cannot be analyzed and traced back to other phenomena. 243 00:20:40.820 --> 00:20:43.280 They are the ultimate given. 244 00:20:43.280 --> 00:20:48.420 The progress of scientific research may succeed in demonstrating that something previously 245 00:20:48.420 --> 00:20:55.060 considered as an ultimate given can be reduced to components, but there will always be some 246 00:20:55.060 --> 00:21:01.980 Irreducible and Unanalyzable Phenomena, Some Ultimate Given. 247 00:21:01.980 --> 00:21:08.620 Monism teaches that there is but one ultimate substance, dualism that there are two, pluralism 248 00:21:08.620 --> 00:21:10.500 that there are many. 249 00:21:10.500 --> 00:21:13.740 There is no point in quarreling about these problems. 250 00:21:13.740 --> 00:21:16.660 Such metaphysical disputes are interminable. 251 00:21:16.660 --> 00:21:21.140 The present state of our knowledge does not provide the means to solve them with an answer 252 00:21:21.140 --> 00:21:31.700 Materialist monism contends that human thoughts and volitions are the product of the operation 253 00:21:31.700 --> 00:21:36.620 of bodily organs, the cells of the brain and the nerves. 254 00:21:36.620 --> 00:21:42.260 Human thought, will and action are solely brought about by material processes, which 255 00:21:42.260 --> 00:21:48.100 one day will be completely explained by the methods of physical and chemical inquiry. 256 00:21:48.100 --> 00:21:53.860 This, too, is a metaphysical hypothesis, although its supporters consider it as an unshakable 257 00:21:53.860 --> 00:21:57.940 and undeniable scientific truth. 258 00:21:57.940 --> 00:22:02.940 Various doctrines have been advanced to explain the relation between mind and body. 259 00:22:02.940 --> 00:22:07.740 They are mere surmises, without any reference to observed facts. 260 00:22:07.740 --> 00:22:13.540 All that can be said with certainty is that there are relations between mental and physiological 261 00:22:13.540 --> 00:22:14.640 processes. 262 00:22:14.640 --> 00:22:21.360 With regard to the nature and operation of this connection, we know little, if anything. 263 00:22:21.360 --> 00:22:27.000 Concrete value judgments and definite human actions are not open to further analysis. 264 00:22:27.000 --> 00:22:32.440 We may fairly assume or believe that they are absolutely dependent upon and conditioned 265 00:22:32.440 --> 00:22:34.280 by their causes. 266 00:22:34.280 --> 00:22:40.760 But as long as we do not know how external facts, physical and physiological, produce 267 00:22:40.760 --> 00:22:46.780 To face in a human mind definite thoughts and volitions resulting in concrete acts, we have 268 00:22:46.780 --> 00:22:51.560 to face an insurmountable methodological dualism. 269 00:22:51.560 --> 00:22:56.400 In the present state of our knowledge, the fundamental statements of positivism, monism 270 00:22:56.400 --> 00:23:03.440 and panphysicalism are mere metaphysical postulates devoid of any scientific foundation and both 271 00:23:03.440 --> 00:23:08.120 meaningless and useless for scientific research. 272 00:23:08.120 --> 00:23:14.120 Information and experience show us two separate realms, the external world of physical, chemical 273 00:23:14.120 --> 00:23:20.400 and physiological phenomena, and the internal world of thought, feeling, valuation, and 274 00:23:20.400 --> 00:23:22.620 purposeful action. 275 00:23:22.620 --> 00:23:28.220 No bridge connects, as far as we can see today, these two spheres. 276 00:23:28.220 --> 00:23:33.600 Identical external events result sometimes in different human responses, and different 277 00:23:33.600 --> 00:23:38.440 External events produce sometimes the same human response. 278 00:23:38.440 --> 00:23:41.120 We do not know why. 279 00:23:41.120 --> 00:23:45.680 In the face of this state of affairs, we cannot help with holding judgment on the essential 280 00:23:45.680 --> 00:23:49.100 statements of monism and materialism. 281 00:23:49.100 --> 00:23:54.720 We may or may not believe that the natural sciences will succeed one day in explaining 282 00:23:54.720 --> 00:24:00.680 the production of definite ideas, judgments of value and actions in the same way in which 283 00:24:00.680 --> 00:24:09.680 In which they explain the production of a chemical compound as the necessary and unavoidable outcome of a certain combination of elements. 284 00:24:09.680 --> 00:24:15.680 In the meantime, we are bound to acquiesce in a methodological dualism. 285 00:24:15.680 --> 00:24:19.680 Human action is one of the agencies bringing about change. 286 00:24:19.680 --> 00:24:23.680 It is an element of cosmic activity and becoming. 287 00:24:23.680 --> 00:24:27.680 Therefore, it is a legitimate object of scientific investigation. 288 00:24:27.680 --> 00:24:33.840 As, at least under present conditions, it cannot be traced back to its causes, it must 289 00:24:33.840 --> 00:24:39.360 be considered as an ultimate given and must be studied as such. 290 00:24:39.360 --> 00:24:44.460 It is true that the changes brought about by human action are but trifling when compared 291 00:24:44.460 --> 00:24:48.660 with the effects of the operation of the great cosmic forces. 292 00:24:48.660 --> 00:24:53.920 From the point of view of eternity and the infinite universe, man is an infinitesimal 293 00:24:53.920 --> 00:25:00.440 for Man, Human Action and its vicissitudes are the real thing. 294 00:25:00.440 --> 00:25:06.420 Action is the essence of his nature and existence, his means of preserving his life and raising 295 00:25:06.420 --> 00:25:10.660 himself above the level of animals and plants. 296 00:25:10.660 --> 00:25:17.060 However perishable and evanescent all human efforts may be, for man and for human science 297 00:25:17.060 --> 00:25:20.440 they are of primary importance. 298 00:25:20.440 --> 00:25:32.040 4. Rationality and Irrationality. Subjectivism and Objectivity of Praxeological Research. 299 00:25:32.040 --> 00:25:39.760 Human action is necessarily always rational. The term rational action is therefore pleonastic 300 00:25:39.760 --> 00:25:45.700 and must be rejected as such. When applied to the ultimate ends of action, the terms 301 00:25:45.700 --> 00:25:50.340 Rational and Irrational are inappropriate and meaningless. 302 00:25:50.340 --> 00:25:57.420 The ultimate end of action is always the satisfaction of some desires of the acting man. 303 00:25:57.420 --> 00:26:02.420 Since nobody is in a position to substitute his own value judgments for those of the acting 304 00:26:02.420 --> 00:26:08.620 individual, it is vain to pass judgment on other people's aims and volitions. 305 00:26:08.620 --> 00:26:15.620 No man is qualified to declare what would make another man happier or less discontented. 306 00:26:15.620 --> 00:26:20.300 The critic either tells us what he believes he would aim at if he were in the place of 307 00:26:20.300 --> 00:26:26.440 his fellow, or, in dictatorial arrogance, blithely disposing of his fellow's will and 308 00:26:26.440 --> 00:26:34.460 aspirations, declares what condition of this other man would better suit himself, the critic. 309 00:26:34.460 --> 00:26:40.740 It is usual to call an action irrational if it aims, at the expense of material and tangible 310 00:26:40.740 --> 00:26:52.300 In this sense, people say, for instance, sometimes with approval, sometimes with disapproval, 311 00:26:52.300 --> 00:26:58.340 that a man who sacrifices life, health or wealth to the attainment of higher goods, 312 00:26:58.340 --> 00:27:03.500 like fidelity to his religious, philosophical and political convictions, or the freedom 313 00:27:03.500 --> 00:27:09.220 and flowering of his nation, is motivated by irrational considerations. 314 00:27:09.220 --> 00:27:16.620 However, the striving after these higher ends is neither more nor less rational or irrational 315 00:27:16.620 --> 00:27:19.780 than that after other human ends. 316 00:27:19.780 --> 00:27:24.980 It is a mistake to assume that the desire to procure the bare necessities of life and 317 00:27:24.980 --> 00:27:33.260 health is more rational, natural or justified than the striving after other goods or amenities. 318 00:27:33.260 --> 00:27:38.900 It is true that the appetite for food and warmth is common to men and other mammals, 319 00:27:38.900 --> 00:27:43.900 And that, as a rule, a man who lacks food and shelter concentrates his efforts upon 320 00:27:43.900 --> 00:27:49.840 the satisfaction of these urgent needs, and does not care much for other things. 321 00:27:49.840 --> 00:27:55.220 The impulse to live, to preserve one's own life, and to take advantage of every opportunity 322 00:27:55.220 --> 00:28:01.420 of strengthening one's vital forces, is a primal feature of life, present in every living 323 00:28:01.420 --> 00:28:02.420 being. 324 00:28:02.420 --> 00:28:09.660 However, to yield to this impulse is not, for man, an inevitable necessity. 325 00:28:09.660 --> 00:28:14.460 While all other animals are unconditionally driven by the impulse to preserve their own 326 00:28:14.460 --> 00:28:22.520 lives and by the impulse of prolification, man has the power to master even these impulses. 327 00:28:22.520 --> 00:28:27.140 He can control both his sexual desires and his will to live. 328 00:28:27.140 --> 00:28:32.020 He can give up his life when the conditions under which alone he could preserve it seem 329 00:28:32.020 --> 00:28:39.260 Man is capable of dying for a cause or of committing suicide. 330 00:28:39.260 --> 00:28:46.020 To live is, for man, the outcome of a choice, of a judgment of value. 331 00:28:46.020 --> 00:28:49.500 It is the same with the desire to live in affluence. 332 00:28:49.500 --> 00:28:54.780 The very existence of ascetics and of men who renounce material gains for the sake of 333 00:28:54.780 --> 00:29:00.340 clinging to their convictions and of preserving their dignity and self-respect is evidence 334 00:29:00.340 --> 00:29:05.800 Notice that the striving after more tangible amenities is not inevitable, but rather the 335 00:29:05.800 --> 00:29:07.980 result of a choice. 336 00:29:07.980 --> 00:29:14.220 Of course, the immense majority prefer life to death and wealth to poverty. 337 00:29:14.220 --> 00:29:20.860 It is arbitrary to consider only the satisfaction of the body's physiological needs as natural 338 00:29:20.860 --> 00:29:27.480 and therefore rational, and everything else as artificial and therefore irrational. 339 00:29:27.480 --> 00:29:32.920 It is the characteristic feature of human nature that man seeks not only food, shelter 340 00:29:32.920 --> 00:29:40.640 and cohabitation like all other animals, but that he aims also at other kinds of satisfaction. 341 00:29:40.640 --> 00:29:46.640 Man has specifically human desires and needs which we may call higher than those which 342 00:29:46.640 --> 00:29:50.360 he has in common with the other mammals. 343 00:29:50.360 --> 00:29:56.480 When applied to the means chosen for the attainment of ends, the terms rational and irrational 344 00:29:56.480 --> 00:30:02.640 Imply a judgment about the expediency and adequacy of the procedure employed. 345 00:30:02.640 --> 00:30:07.360 The critic approves or disapproves of the method from the point of view of whether or 346 00:30:07.360 --> 00:30:11.920 not it is best suited to attain the end in question. 347 00:30:11.920 --> 00:30:17.800 It is a fact that human reason is not infallible, and that man very often errs in selecting 348 00:30:17.800 --> 00:30:20.200 and applying means. 349 00:30:20.200 --> 00:30:25.320 An action unsuited to the end sought falls short of expectation. 350 00:30:25.320 --> 00:30:32.280 It is contrary to purpose, but it is rational, that is, the outcome of a reasonable, although 351 00:30:32.280 --> 00:30:39.560 faulty, deliberation, and an attempt, although an ineffectual attempt, to attain a definite 352 00:30:39.560 --> 00:30:41.000 goal. 353 00:30:41.000 --> 00:30:46.320 The doctors, who a hundred years ago employed certain methods for the treatment of cancer, 354 00:30:46.320 --> 00:30:52.680 which our contemporary doctors reject, were, from the point of view of present-day pathology, 355 00:30:52.680 --> 00:31:20.280 The opposite of action is not irrational behavior, but a reactive response to stimuli on the 356 00:31:20.280 --> 00:31:25.400 Man is a part of the bodily organs and instincts which cannot be controlled by the volition 357 00:31:25.400 --> 00:31:28.040 of the person concerned. 358 00:31:28.040 --> 00:31:34.400 To the same stimulus, man can, under certain conditions, respond both by reactive response 359 00:31:34.400 --> 00:31:36.680 and by action. 360 00:31:36.680 --> 00:31:43.560 If a man absorbs a poison, the organs react by setting up their forces of antidotal defense. 361 00:31:43.560 --> 00:31:49.500 In addition, action may interfere by applying counter-poison. 362 00:31:49.500 --> 00:31:54.760 With regard to the problem involved in the antithesis, rational and irrational, there 363 00:31:54.760 --> 00:32:01.540 is no difference between the natural sciences and the social sciences. Science always is, 364 00:32:01.540 --> 00:32:07.340 and must be, rational. It is the endeavor to attain a mental grasp of the phenomena 365 00:32:07.340 --> 00:32:13.100 of the universe by a systematic arrangement of the whole body of available knowledge. 366 00:32:13.100 --> 00:32:18.940 However, as has been pointed out above, the analysis of objects into their constituent 367 00:32:18.940 --> 00:32:26.020 elements must sooner or later necessarily reach a point beyond which it cannot go. 368 00:32:26.020 --> 00:32:32.220 The human mind is not even capable of conceiving a kind of knowledge not limited by an ultimate 369 00:32:32.220 --> 00:32:36.760 given inaccessible to further analysis and reduction. 370 00:32:36.760 --> 00:32:42.660 The scientific method that carries the mind up to this point is entirely rational. 371 00:32:42.660 --> 00:32:47.700 The ultimate given may be called an irrational fact. 372 00:32:47.700 --> 00:32:53.940 It is fashionable nowadays to find fault with the social sciences for being purely rational. 373 00:32:53.940 --> 00:32:59.200 The most popular objection raised against economics is that it neglects the irrationality 374 00:32:59.200 --> 00:33:06.200 of life and reality, and tries to press into dry rational schemes and bloodless abstractions 375 00:33:06.200 --> 00:33:09.220 the infinite variety of phenomena. 376 00:33:09.220 --> 00:33:12.120 No censure could be more absurd. 377 00:33:12.120 --> 00:33:17.340 Like every branch of knowledge, economics goes as far as it can be carried by rational 378 00:33:17.340 --> 00:33:24.060 Methods, then it stops, by establishing the fact that it is faced with an ultimate given, 379 00:33:24.060 --> 00:33:28.940 that is, a phenomenon which cannot, at least in the present state of our knowledge, be 380 00:33:28.940 --> 00:33:31.580 further analyzed. 381 00:33:31.580 --> 00:33:37.080 The teachings of praxeology and economics are valid for every human action, without 382 00:33:37.080 --> 00:33:41.860 regard to its underlying motives, causes and goals. 383 00:33:41.860 --> 00:33:47.300 The ultimate judgments of value and the ultimate ends of human action are given for any 384 00:33:47.300 --> 00:33:59.820 Praxeology deals with the ways and means chosen for the attainment of such ultimate ends. 385 00:33:59.820 --> 00:34:03.900 Its object is means, not ends. 386 00:34:03.900 --> 00:34:09.640 In this sense we speak of the subjectivism of the general science of human action. 387 00:34:09.640 --> 00:34:14.420 It takes the ultimate ends chosen by acting man as data. 388 00:34:14.420 --> 00:34:20.960 It is entirely neutral with regard to them, and it refrains from passing any value judgments. 389 00:34:20.960 --> 00:34:26.820 The only standard which it applies is whether or not the means chosen are fit for the attainment 390 00:34:26.820 --> 00:34:29.240 of the ends aimed at. 391 00:34:29.240 --> 00:34:36.320 If eudaemonism says happiness, if utilitarianism and economics say utility, we must interpret 392 00:34:36.320 --> 00:34:43.280 these terms in a subjectivistic way as that which acting man aims at because it is desirable 393 00:34:43.280 --> 00:34:45.600 in His Eyes. 394 00:34:45.600 --> 00:34:51.240 It is in this formalism that the progress of the modern meaning of eudaemonism, hedonism 395 00:34:51.240 --> 00:34:57.500 and utilitarianism consists, as opposed to the older material meaning and the progress 396 00:34:57.500 --> 00:35:02.800 of the modern subjectivistic theory of value, as opposed to the objectivistic theory of 397 00:35:02.800 --> 00:35:07.560 value as expounded by classical political economy. 398 00:35:07.560 --> 00:35:14.500 At the same time, it is in this subjectivism that the objectivity of our science lies. 399 00:35:14.500 --> 00:35:20.100 Because it is subjectivistic and takes the value judgments of acting man as ultimate 400 00:35:20.100 --> 00:35:27.580 data not open to any further critical examination, it is itself above all strife of parties and 401 00:35:27.580 --> 00:35:28.800 factions. 402 00:35:28.800 --> 00:35:34.540 It is indifferent to the conflicts of all schools of dogmatism and ethical doctrines. 403 00:35:34.540 --> 00:35:39.460 It is free from valuations and preconceived ideas and judgments. 404 00:35:39.460 --> 00:35:45.340 It is universally valid and absolutely and plainly human. 405 00:35:45.340 --> 00:35:48.220 5. 406 00:35:48.220 --> 00:35:51.980 Causality as a requirement of action. 407 00:35:51.980 --> 00:35:57.660 Man is in a position to act because he has the ability to discover causal relations which 408 00:35:57.660 --> 00:36:02.220 determine change and becoming in the universe. 409 00:36:02.220 --> 00:36:07.380 Reasoning requires and presupposes the category of causality. 410 00:36:07.380 --> 00:36:13.020 Only a man who sees the world in the light of causality is fitted to act. 411 00:36:13.020 --> 00:36:17.900 In this sense, we may say that causality is a category of action. 412 00:36:17.900 --> 00:36:24.700 The category means and ends presupposes the category cause and effect. 413 00:36:24.700 --> 00:36:29.980 In a world without causality and regularity of phenomena, there would be no field for 414 00:36:29.980 --> 00:36:32.820 for Human Reasoning and Human Action. 415 00:36:32.820 --> 00:36:38.060 Such a world would be a chaos in which man would be at a loss to find any orientation 416 00:36:38.060 --> 00:36:39.980 and guidance. 417 00:36:39.980 --> 00:36:46.140 Man is not even capable of imagining the conditions of such a chaotic universe. 418 00:36:46.140 --> 00:36:51.140 Where man does not see any causal relation, he cannot act. 419 00:36:51.140 --> 00:36:53.760 This statement is not reversible. 420 00:36:53.760 --> 00:36:59.560 Even when he knows the causal relation involved, man cannot act if he is not in a position 421 00:36:59.560 --> 00:37:02.680 to Influence the Cause. 422 00:37:02.680 --> 00:37:09.320 The archetype of causality research was, where and how must I interfere in order to divert 423 00:37:09.320 --> 00:37:14.600 the course of events from the way it would go in the absence of my interference, in a 424 00:37:14.600 --> 00:37:18.200 direction which better suits my wishes? 425 00:37:18.200 --> 00:37:24.080 In this sense, man raises the question, who or what is at the bottom of things? 426 00:37:24.080 --> 00:37:29.980 He searches for the regularity and the law because he wants to interfere. 427 00:37:29.980 --> 00:37:35.360 Only later was this search more extensively interpreted by metaphysics as a search after 428 00:37:35.360 --> 00:37:39.880 the ultimate cause of being and existence. 429 00:37:39.880 --> 00:37:44.940 Centuries were needed to bring these exaggerated and extravagant ideas back again to the more 430 00:37:44.940 --> 00:37:51.600 modest question of where one must interfere or should one be able to interfere in order 431 00:37:51.600 --> 00:37:55.640 in order to attain this or that end. 432 00:37:55.640 --> 00:38:01.380 The treatment accorded to the problem of causality in the last decades has been, due to a confusion 433 00:38:01.380 --> 00:38:06.480 brought about by some eminent physicists, rather unsatisfactory. 434 00:38:06.480 --> 00:38:11.280 We may hope that this unpleasant chapter in the history of philosophy will be a warning 435 00:38:11.280 --> 00:38:13.920 to future philosophers. 436 00:38:13.920 --> 00:38:20.280 There are changes whose causes are, at least for the present time, unknown to us. 437 00:38:20.280 --> 00:38:26.560 Sometimes we succeed in acquiring a partial knowledge so that we are able to say, in 70% 438 00:38:26.560 --> 00:38:36.100 of all cases A results in B, in the remaining cases in C, or even in D, E, F, and so on. 439 00:38:36.100 --> 00:38:41.400 In order to substitute for this fragmentary information, more precise information, it 440 00:38:41.400 --> 00:38:47.640 would be necessary to break up A into its elements. As long as this is not achieved, 441 00:38:47.640 --> 00:38:54.120 We must acquiesce in a statistical law. But this does not affect the praxeological meaning 442 00:38:54.120 --> 00:39:00.860 of causality. Total or practical ignorance in some areas does not demolish the category 443 00:39:00.860 --> 00:39:08.280 of causality. The philosophical, epistemological and metaphysical problems of causality and 444 00:39:08.280 --> 00:39:14.740 of imperfect induction are beyond the scope of praxeology. We must simply establish the 445 00:39:14.740 --> 00:39:24.260 Man must know the causal relationship between events, processes, or states of affairs. 446 00:39:24.260 --> 00:39:30.620 And only as far as he knows this relationship can his action attain the end sought. 447 00:39:30.620 --> 00:39:35.140 We are fully aware that in asserting this, we are moving in a circle. 448 00:39:35.140 --> 00:39:40.620 For the evidence that we have correctly perceived a causal relation is provided only by the 449 00:39:40.620 --> 00:40:09.440 6. The Alter Ego 450 00:40:09.440 --> 00:40:15.560 If we are prepared to take the term causality in its broadest sense, teleology can be called 451 00:40:15.560 --> 00:40:18.880 a variety of causal inquiry. 452 00:40:18.880 --> 00:40:21.880 Final causes are first of all causes. 453 00:40:21.880 --> 00:40:29.100 The cause of an event is seen as an action or quasi-action aiming at some end. 454 00:40:29.100 --> 00:40:35.000 Both primitive man and the infant, in a naive anthropomorphic attitude, consider it quite 455 00:40:35.000 --> 00:40:40.440 It is quite plausible that every change and event is the outcome of the action of a being, 456 00:40:40.440 --> 00:40:43.820 acting in the same way as they themselves do. 457 00:40:43.820 --> 00:40:49.880 They believe that animals, plants, mountains, rivers and fountains, even stones and celestial 458 00:40:49.880 --> 00:40:56.440 bodies are, like themselves, feeling, willing and acting beings. 459 00:40:56.440 --> 00:41:02.200 Only at a later stage of cultural development does man renounce these animistic ideas and 460 00:41:02.200 --> 00:41:08.680 substitute the mechanistic worldview for them. Mechanicalism proves to be so satisfactory 461 00:41:08.680 --> 00:41:13.720 a principle of conduct that people finally believe it capable of solving all the problems 462 00:41:13.720 --> 00:41:20.880 of thought and scientific research. Materialism and pan-physicalism proclaim mechanicalism 463 00:41:20.880 --> 00:41:27.120 as the essence of all knowledge and the experimental and mathematical methods of the natural sciences 464 00:41:27.120 --> 00:41:30.560 as the sole scientific mode of thinking. 465 00:41:30.560 --> 00:41:37.260 All changes are to be comprehended as motions subject to the laws of mechanics. 466 00:41:37.260 --> 00:41:42.740 The champions of mechanicalism do not bother about the still unsolved problems of the logical 467 00:41:42.740 --> 00:41:49.040 and epistemological basis of the principles of causality and imperfect induction. 468 00:41:49.040 --> 00:41:53.400 In their eyes, these principles are sound because they work. 469 00:41:53.400 --> 00:41:58.840 The fact that experiments in the laboratory bring about the results predicted by the theories, 470 00:41:58.840 --> 00:42:04.040 and that machines in the factories run in the way predicted by technology, proves, they 471 00:42:04.040 --> 00:42:09.640 say, the soundness of the methods and findings of modern natural science. 472 00:42:09.640 --> 00:42:15.320 Granted that science cannot give us truth, and who knows what truth really means, at 473 00:42:15.320 --> 00:42:20.720 any rate it is certain that it works in leading us to success. 474 00:42:20.720 --> 00:42:27.040 But it is precisely when we accept this pragmatic point of view that the emptiness of the panphysicalist 475 00:42:27.040 --> 00:42:29.080 dogma becomes manifest. 476 00:42:29.080 --> 00:42:34.840 Science, as has been pointed out above, has not succeeded in solving the problems of the 477 00:42:34.840 --> 00:42:37.080 mind-body relations. 478 00:42:37.080 --> 00:42:42.300 The panphysicalists certainly cannot contend that the procedures they recommend have ever 479 00:42:42.300 --> 00:42:47.380 worked in the field of inter-human relations and of the social sciences. 480 00:42:47.380 --> 00:42:53.380 But it is beyond doubt that the principle according to which an ego deals with every human being 481 00:42:53.380 --> 00:42:59.380 as if the other were a thinking and acting being like himself, has evidenced its usefulness 482 00:42:59.380 --> 00:43:03.500 both in mundane life and in scientific research. 483 00:43:03.500 --> 00:43:07.380 It cannot be denied that it works. 484 00:43:07.380 --> 00:43:13.180 It is beyond doubt that the practice of considering fellow men as beings who think and act as 485 00:43:13.180 --> 00:43:17.200 I, the ego, do, has turned out well. 486 00:43:17.200 --> 00:43:22.420 On the other hand, the prospect seems hopeless of getting a similar pragmatic verification 487 00:43:22.420 --> 00:43:27.920 for the postulate requiring them to be treated in the same manner as the objects of the natural 488 00:43:27.920 --> 00:43:29.820 sciences. 489 00:43:29.820 --> 00:43:35.060 The epistemological problems raised by the comprehension of other people's behavior are 490 00:43:35.060 --> 00:43:40.260 no less intricate than those of causality and incomplete induction. 491 00:43:40.260 --> 00:43:45.580 It may be admitted that it is impossible to provide conclusive evidence for the propositions 492 00:43:45.580 --> 00:43:52.380 that my logic is the logic of all other people, and by all means absolutely the only human 493 00:43:52.380 --> 00:43:58.780 logic, and that the categories of my action are the categories of all other people's action, 494 00:43:58.780 --> 00:44:03.660 and by all means absolutely the categories of all human action. 495 00:44:03.660 --> 00:44:09.820 However, the pragmatist must remember that these propositions work both in practice and 496 00:44:09.820 --> 00:44:16.300 in Science, and the positivist must not overlook the fact that in addressing his fellow men, 497 00:44:16.300 --> 00:44:23.020 he presupposes tacitly and implicitly the intersubjective validity of logic and thereby 498 00:44:23.020 --> 00:44:31.320 the reality of the realm of the alter ego's thought and action, of his eminent human character. 499 00:44:31.320 --> 00:44:35.460 Thinking and acting are the specific human features of man. 500 00:44:35.460 --> 00:44:38.480 They are peculiar to all human beings. 501 00:44:38.480 --> 00:44:44.440 They are, beyond membership in the zoological species Homo sapiens, the characteristic mark 502 00:44:44.440 --> 00:44:47.200 of man as man. 503 00:44:47.200 --> 00:44:53.040 It is not the scope of praxeology to investigate the relation of thinking and acting. 504 00:44:53.040 --> 00:44:58.320 For praxeology it is enough to establish the fact that there is only one logic that is 505 00:44:58.320 --> 00:45:04.200 intelligible to the human mind, and that there is only one mode of action which is human 506 00:45:04.200 --> 00:45:07.680 and comprehensible to the human mind. 507 00:45:07.680 --> 00:45:13.840 Whether there are or can be somewhere other beings, superhuman or subhuman, who think 508 00:45:13.840 --> 00:45:18.880 and act in a different way, is beyond the reach of the human mind. 509 00:45:18.880 --> 00:45:24.600 We must restrict our endeavors to the study of human action. 510 00:45:24.600 --> 00:45:30.440 This human action, which is inextricably linked with human thought, is conditioned by logical 511 00:45:30.440 --> 00:45:31.960 necessity. 512 00:45:31.960 --> 00:45:37.640 It is impossible for the human mind to conceive logical relations at variance with the logical 513 00:45:37.640 --> 00:45:44.640 There are, for man, only two principles available for a mental grasp of reality, namely those of teleology and causality. 514 00:45:44.640 --> 00:45:51.640 What cannot be brought under either of these categories is absolutely hidden to the human mind. 515 00:45:51.640 --> 00:46:00.640 An event not open to the human mind is an event that cannot be brought under either of these categories. 516 00:46:00.640 --> 00:46:06.720 be brought under either of these categories is absolutely hidden to the human mind. 517 00:46:06.720 --> 00:46:13.120 An event not open to an interpretation by one of these two principles is, for man, inconceivable 518 00:46:13.120 --> 00:46:15.600 and mysterious. 519 00:46:15.600 --> 00:46:21.080 Change can be conceived as the outcome either of the operation of mechanistic causality 520 00:46:21.080 --> 00:46:23.800 or of purposeful behavior. 521 00:46:23.800 --> 00:46:28.000 For the human mind, there is no third way available. 522 00:46:28.000 --> 00:46:33.420 It is true, as has already been mentioned, that teleology can be viewed as a variety 523 00:46:33.420 --> 00:46:35.320 of causality. 524 00:46:35.320 --> 00:46:40.060 But the establishment of this fact does not annul the essential differences between the 525 00:46:40.060 --> 00:46:42.700 two categories. 526 00:46:42.700 --> 00:46:47.600 The pan-mechanistic worldview is committed to a methodological monism. 527 00:46:47.600 --> 00:46:54.080 It acknowledges only mechanistic causality, because it attributes to it alone any cognitive 528 00:46:54.080 --> 00:46:59.840 Value, or at least a higher cognitive value than to teleology. 529 00:46:59.840 --> 00:47:02.680 This is a metaphysical superstition. 530 00:47:02.680 --> 00:47:08.840 Both principles of cognition, causality and teleology, are, owing to the limitations of 531 00:47:08.840 --> 00:47:14.840 human reason, imperfect and do not convey ultimate knowledge. 532 00:47:14.840 --> 00:47:21.520 Causality leads to a regressus in infinitum, which reason can never exhaust. 533 00:47:21.520 --> 00:47:27.600 Theory is found wanting as soon as the question is raised of what moves the prime mover. 534 00:47:27.600 --> 00:47:34.760 Either method stops short at an ultimate given which cannot be analyzed and interpreted. 535 00:47:34.760 --> 00:47:40.520 Reasoning and scientific inquiry can never bring full ease of mind, apodictic certainty 536 00:47:40.520 --> 00:47:43.760 and perfect cognition of all things. 537 00:47:43.760 --> 00:47:49.400 He who seeks this must apply to faith and try to quiet his conscience by embracing a 538 00:47:49.400 --> 00:47:53.040 A CREED OR A METAPHYSICAL DOCTRINE 539 00:47:53.040 --> 00:47:58.680 If we do not transcend the realm of reason and experience, we cannot help acknowledging 540 00:47:58.680 --> 00:48:01.440 that our fellow men act. 541 00:48:01.440 --> 00:48:06.520 We are not free to disregard this fact for the sake of a fashionable prepossession and 542 00:48:06.520 --> 00:48:09.120 an arbitrary opinion. 543 00:48:09.120 --> 00:48:14.560 Daily experience proves not only that the sole suitable method for studying the conditions 544 00:48:14.560 --> 00:48:44.520 The problem of the study and analysis of other people's action 545 00:48:44.520 --> 00:48:50.320 is in no way connected with the problem of the existence of a soul or of an immortal 546 00:48:50.320 --> 00:48:51.620 soul. 547 00:48:51.620 --> 00:48:57.940 As far as the objections of empiricism, behaviorism and positivism are directed against any variety 548 00:48:57.940 --> 00:49:02.660 of the soul theory, they are of no avail for our problem. 549 00:49:02.660 --> 00:49:08.820 The question we have to deal with is whether it is possible to grasp human action intellectually 550 00:49:08.820 --> 00:49:15.120 if one refuses to comprehend it as meaningful and purposeful behavior, aiming at the attainment 551 00:49:15.120 --> 00:49:18.080 of definite ends. 552 00:49:18.080 --> 00:49:23.040 Behaviorism and positivism want to apply the methods of the empirical natural sciences 553 00:49:23.040 --> 00:49:25.880 to the reality of human action. 554 00:49:25.880 --> 00:49:29.280 They interpret it as a response to stimuli. 555 00:49:29.280 --> 00:49:33.960 But these stimuli themselves are not open to description by the methods of the natural 556 00:49:33.960 --> 00:49:35.700 sciences. 557 00:49:35.700 --> 00:49:41.740 Every attempt to describe them must refer to the meaning which acting men attach to them. 558 00:49:41.740 --> 00:49:47.660 We may call the offering of a commodity for sale a stimulus, but what is essential in 559 00:49:47.660 --> 00:49:53.460 such an offer and distinguishes it from other offers cannot be described without entering 560 00:49:53.460 --> 00:49:59.160 into the meaning which the acting parties attribute to the situation. 561 00:49:59.160 --> 00:50:05.620 No dialectical artifice can spirit away the fact that man is driven by the aim to attain 562 00:50:05.620 --> 00:50:07.820 in Certain Ends. 563 00:50:07.820 --> 00:50:15.000 It is this purposeful behavior, that is, action, that is the subject matter of our science. 564 00:50:15.000 --> 00:50:20.820 We cannot approach our subject if we disregard the meaning which acting man attaches to the 565 00:50:20.820 --> 00:50:27.660 situation, that is, the given state of affairs and to his own behavior with regard to this 566 00:50:27.660 --> 00:50:29.600 situation. 567 00:50:29.600 --> 00:50:34.500 It is not appropriate for the physicist to search for final causes because there is no 568 00:50:34.500 --> 00:50:39.580 No indication that the events which are the subject matter of physics are to be interpreted 569 00:50:39.580 --> 00:50:45.540 as the outcome of actions of a being aiming at ends in a human way. 570 00:50:45.540 --> 00:50:50.980 Nor is it appropriate for the praxeologist to disregard the operation of the acting being's 571 00:50:50.980 --> 00:50:56.580 volition and intention because they are undoubtedly given facts. 572 00:50:56.580 --> 00:51:01.660 If he were to disregard it, he would cease to study human action. 573 00:51:01.660 --> 00:51:07.260 Very often, but not always, the events concerned can be investigated both from the point of 574 00:51:07.260 --> 00:51:11.980 view of praxeology and from that of the natural sciences. 575 00:51:11.980 --> 00:51:16.860 But he who deals with the discharging of a firearm from the physical and chemical point 576 00:51:16.860 --> 00:51:20.300 of view is not a praxeologist. 577 00:51:20.300 --> 00:51:28.820 He neglects the very problems which the science of purposeful human behavior aims to clarify. 578 00:51:28.820 --> 00:51:32.940 From the Servicableness of Instincts 579 00:51:32.940 --> 00:51:38.660 The proof of the fact that only two avenues of approach are available for human research, 580 00:51:38.660 --> 00:51:44.780 causality or teleology, is provided by the problems raised in reference to the servicableness 581 00:51:44.780 --> 00:51:46.780 of instincts. 582 00:51:46.780 --> 00:51:51.820 There are types of behavior which, on the one hand, cannot be thoroughly interpreted 583 00:51:51.820 --> 00:51:57.660 with the causal methods of the natural sciences, but, on the other hand, cannot be considered 584 00:51:57.660 --> 00:52:00.620 as Purposeful Human Action. 585 00:52:00.620 --> 00:52:05.700 In order to grasp such behavior, we are forced to resort to a makeshift. 586 00:52:05.700 --> 00:52:09.300 We assign to it the character of a quasi-action. 587 00:52:09.300 --> 00:52:13.220 We speak of serviceable instincts. 588 00:52:13.220 --> 00:52:15.020 We observe two things. 589 00:52:15.020 --> 00:52:21.020 First, the inherent tendency of a living organism to respond to a stimulus according to a regular 590 00:52:21.020 --> 00:52:22.020 pattern. 591 00:52:22.020 --> 00:52:31.020 and, second, the favorable effects of this kind of behavior for the strengthening or preservation of the organism's vital forces. 592 00:52:31.020 --> 00:52:38.020 If we were in a position to interpret such behavior as the outcome of purposeful aiming at certain ends, 593 00:52:38.020 --> 00:52:44.020 we would call it action and deal with it according to the teleological methods of praxeology. 594 00:52:44.020 --> 00:52:49.020 But as we found no trace of a conscious mind behind this behavior, 595 00:52:49.020 --> 00:52:55.020 We suppose that an unknown factor, we call it instinct, was instrumental. 596 00:52:55.020 --> 00:53:02.100 We say that the instinct directs quasi-purposeful animal behavior and unconscious but nonetheless 597 00:53:02.100 --> 00:53:06.500 serviceable responses of human muscles and nerves. 598 00:53:06.500 --> 00:53:11.540 Yet the mere fact that we hypothesize the unexplained element of this behavior as a 599 00:53:11.540 --> 00:53:16.900 force and call it instinct does not enlarge our knowledge. 600 00:53:16.900 --> 00:53:22.440 We must never forget that this word instinct is nothing but a landmark to indicate a point 601 00:53:22.440 --> 00:53:30.100 beyond which we are unable, up to the present at least, to carry our scientific scrutiny. 602 00:53:30.100 --> 00:53:35.900 Biology has succeeded in discovering a natural, that is, mechanistic, explanation for many 603 00:53:35.900 --> 00:53:41.580 processes which in earlier days were attributed to the operation of instincts. 604 00:53:41.580 --> 00:53:51.180 Nonetheless, many others have remained, which cannot be interpreted as mechanical or chemical responses to mechanical or chemical stimuli. 605 00:53:51.180 --> 00:54:00.580 Animals display attitudes which cannot be comprehended otherwise than through the assumption that a directing factor was operative. 606 00:54:00.580 --> 00:54:08.780 The aim of behaviorism to study human action from without with the methods of animal psychology is illusory. 607 00:54:08.780 --> 00:54:22.780 As far as animal behavior goes beyond mere physiological processes like breathing and metabolism, it can only be investigated with the aid of the meaning concepts developed by praxeology. 608 00:54:22.780 --> 00:54:29.780 The behaviorist approaches the object of his investigations with the human notions of purpose and success. 609 00:54:29.780 --> 00:54:37.780 He unwittingly applies to the subject matter of his studies the human concepts of serviceableness and perniciousness. 610 00:54:37.780 --> 00:54:44.780 He deceives himself in excluding all verbal reference to consciousness and aiming at ends. 611 00:54:45.020 --> 00:54:50.740 In fact, his mind searches everywhere for ends and measures every attitude with the 612 00:54:50.740 --> 00:54:54.860 yardstick of a garbled notion of serviceableness. 613 00:54:54.860 --> 00:55:00.740 The science of human behavior, as far as it is not physiology, cannot abandon reference 614 00:55:00.740 --> 00:55:07.260 to meaning and purpose. It cannot learn anything from animal psychology and the observation 615 00:55:07.260 --> 00:55:13.820 One of the unconscious reactions of newborn infants. It is, on the contrary, animal psychology 616 00:55:13.820 --> 00:55:21.120 and infant psychology which cannot renounce the aid afforded by the science of human action. 617 00:55:21.120 --> 00:55:26.520 Without praxeological categories, we would be at a loss to conceive and to understand 618 00:55:26.520 --> 00:55:33.160 the behavior both of animals and of infants. The observation of the instinctive behavior 619 00:55:33.160 --> 00:55:40.320 of Animals fills man with astonishment and raises questions which nobody can answer satisfactorily. 620 00:55:40.320 --> 00:55:45.840 Yet the fact that animals and even plants react in a quasi-purposeful way is neither 621 00:55:45.840 --> 00:55:53.120 more nor less miraculous than that man thinks and acts, that in the inorganic universe those 622 00:55:53.120 --> 00:55:59.520 functional correspondences prevail which physics describes, and that in the organic universe 623 00:55:59.520 --> 00:56:02.640 biological processes occur. 624 00:56:02.640 --> 00:56:09.240 All this is miraculous in the sense that it is an ultimate given for our searching mind. 625 00:56:09.240 --> 00:56:13.780 Such an ultimate given is what we call animal instinct. 626 00:56:13.780 --> 00:56:20.420 Like the concepts of motion, force, life and consciousness, the concept of instinct too 627 00:56:20.420 --> 00:56:24.480 is merely a term to signify an ultimate given. 628 00:56:24.480 --> 00:56:33.480 To be sure, it neither explains anything nor indicates a cause or an ultimate cause. 629 00:56:33.480 --> 00:56:36.640 The Absolute End 630 00:56:36.640 --> 00:56:42.120 In order to avoid any possible misinterpretation of the praxeological categories, it seems 631 00:56:42.120 --> 00:56:45.880 expedient to emphasize a truism. 632 00:56:45.880 --> 00:56:51.760 Praxeology, like the historical sciences of human action, deals with purposeful human 633 00:56:51.760 --> 00:56:53.420 action. 634 00:56:53.420 --> 00:56:59.740 If it mentions ends, what it has in view is the ends at which acting men aim. 635 00:56:59.740 --> 00:57:07.700 If it speaks of meaning, it refers to the meaning which acting men attach to their actions. 636 00:57:07.700 --> 00:57:12.840 Praxeology and history are manifestations of the human mind, and as such are conditioned 637 00:57:12.840 --> 00:57:17.260 by the intellectual abilities of mortal men. 638 00:57:17.260 --> 00:57:22.040 Praxeology and history do not pretend to know anything about the intentions of an absolute 639 00:57:22.040 --> 00:57:28.360 and Objective Mind, about an objective meaning inherent in the course of events and of historical 640 00:57:28.360 --> 00:57:35.020 evolution, and about the plans which God or Nature or Weltgeist or Manifest Destiny is 641 00:57:35.020 --> 00:57:39.920 trying to realize in directing the universe and human affairs. 642 00:57:39.920 --> 00:57:44.720 They have nothing in common with what is called philosophy of history. 643 00:57:44.720 --> 00:57:50.520 They do not, like the works of Hegel, Comte, Marx, and a host of other writers, claim to 644 00:57:50.520 --> 00:58:00.320 to Reveal Information about the True, Objective, and Absolute Meaning of Life and History. 645 00:58:00.320 --> 00:58:02.680 VEGETATIVE MAN 646 00:58:02.680 --> 00:58:08.800 Some philosophies advise man to seek as the ultimate end of conduct the complete renunciation 647 00:58:08.800 --> 00:58:10.760 of any action. 648 00:58:10.760 --> 00:58:16.980 They look upon life as an absolute evil, full of pain, suffering, and anguish, and apodictically 649 00:58:16.980 --> 00:58:22.500 They deny that any purposeful human effort can render it tolerable. 650 00:58:22.500 --> 00:58:27.980 Happiness can be attained only by complete extinction of consciousness, volition and 651 00:58:27.980 --> 00:58:29.140 life. 652 00:58:29.140 --> 00:58:35.020 The only way toward bliss and salvation is to become perfectly passive, indifferent and 653 00:58:35.020 --> 00:58:37.560 inert like the plants. 654 00:58:37.560 --> 00:58:43.060 The sovereign good is the abandonment of thinking and acting. 655 00:58:43.060 --> 00:58:48.260 Which is the essence of the teachings of various Indian philosophies, especially of Buddhism 656 00:58:48.260 --> 00:58:51.380 and of Schopenhauer. 657 00:58:51.380 --> 00:58:53.660 Praxeology does not comment upon them. 658 00:58:53.660 --> 00:58:59.540 It is neutral with regard to all judgments of value and the choice of ultimate ends. 659 00:58:59.540 --> 00:59:06.060 Its task is not to approve or to disapprove, but only to establish facts. 660 00:59:06.060 --> 00:59:10.020 The subject matter of praxeology is human action. 661 00:59:10.020 --> 00:59:14.960 It is not concerned with human beings who have succeeded in suppressing altogether everything 662 00:59:14.960 --> 00:59:22.620 that characterizes man as man—will, desire, thought, and the striving after ends. 663 00:59:22.620 --> 00:59:30.100 It deals with acting man, not with man transformed into a plant and reduced to a merely vegetative 664 00:59:30.100 --> 00:59:30.860 of Existence.