As a follow-up to some of the themes raised by guests on Volume 95 of the Journal, listeners may want to read a piece by political theorist Mark T. Mitchell (author of Michael Polanyi: The Art of Knowing and The Politics of Gratitude). Published on the Front Porch Republic, an online intellectual cooperative dedicated to exploring the place of place in our lives, Mitchell’s article (“The Dismal Science vs. Community”) is a discussion of a book by Harvard economist Stephen A. Marglin.
Marglin’s book, The Dismal Science: How Thinking Like an Economist Undermines Community (Harvard University Press, 2008), examines ways in which economics — like all sciences — presents a limited picture of human nature and human well-being, concealing more about the kinds of creatures we are than it reveals. Like biology, economics has become a powerful ideology, in Mitchell’s words,
a self-contained worldview with its own set of values as well as a particular epistemology and ontology. In short, modern economics is not simply a means by which exchanges can be described or even a set of tools that ensure optimal efficiency of market transactions. The ideology of economics is a way of seeing the world. It forces reality into a preconceived structure and subsequently deigns to rule this truncated world with all the authority of science. The modern discipline of economics is, among other things, imperialistic in its aims and destructive in its consequences.
Links to posts and programs featuring Richard DeClue:
- Why economists need meta-economics — Joseph Pearce on the key insight of E. F. Schumacher
- The public and political dimensions of gratitude — Peter Leithart and Mark Mitchell both assert that gratitude has a public and political concern, and that Christianity caused a significant shift in the understanding of gratitude. (19 minutes)
- The personal element in all knowing — Mark Mitchell connects key aspects of Michael Polanyi’s conception of knowledge with Matthew Crawford’s insistence that real knowing involves more than technique. (34 minutes)
- The obligation of prodigality — Daniel Bell on the hedonistic logic of the “new capitalism”
- The nature of freedom reconsidered — In anticipation of this Fall’s Areopagus Lecture entitled “‘For Freedom Set Free’: Retrieving Genuine Religious Liberty,” we present selections from interviews with three MARS HILL AUDIO guests who have raised questions about the modern understanding of freedom. (27 minutes)
- Re-imagining economic obedience: lessons from Wendell Berry — The order of Creation, says Wendell Berry, is closer to that of a drama than that of a market. That quality should inform how we imagine economic life to be well-ordered.
- Post-liberalism of an earlier generation — Allan C. Carlson discusses an anthology of articles from Free America, a magazine published between 1937 and 1947 whose writers believed that political democracy could only survive if coupled with decentralized economic democracy. (26 minutes)
- Milton Friedman meets Augustine — We present an interview from our archives with theologian William Cavanaugh, in which he examines the free market, consumerism, globalization, and scarcity, all parsed within an unabashedly theological framework. (37 minutes)
- Mars Hill Audio Journal, Volume 95 — FEATURED GUESTS: Stewart Davenport, William T. Cavanaugh, J. Matthew Bonzo, Michael R. Stevens, Craig Gay, Eugene Peterson, and Barry Hankins
- Mars Hill Audio Journal, Volume 71 — FEATURED GUESTS: Peter Augustine Lawler, David Koyzis, Roger Lundin, Craig Gay, Steven Rhoads, and R. Larry Todd
- Mars Hill Audio Journal, Volume 147 — FEATURED GUESTS: R. Jared Staudt, Jason Peters, D. C. Schindler, Craig Gay, Mary Hirschfeld, and Patrick Samway
- Mars Hill Audio Journal, Volume 146 — FEATURED GUESTS: Mark Mitchell, Hans Boersma, Henry T. Edmondson, III, Brian Clayton, Douglas Kries, Conor Sweeney, and Carole Vanderhoof
- Mars Hill Audio Journal, Volume 134 — FEATURED GUESTS: Chris Armstrong, Grevel Lindop, Michael Martin, William T. Cavanaugh, Philip Turner, and Gisela Kreglinger
- Mars Hill Audio Journal, Volume 118 — FEATURED GUESTS: Gilbert Meilaender, Ron Highfield, Mark Mitchell, Daniel M. Bell, Jr., Helen Rhee, and Peter Brown
- Mars Hill Audio Journal, Volume 115 — FEATURED GUESTS: Arlie Russell Hochschild, Andrew Davison, Adrian Pabst, Gary Colledge, Linda Lewis, and Thomas Bergler
- Mars Hill Audio Journal, Volume 106 — FEATURED GUESTS: Adam Briggle, John C. Médaille, Christopher Page, Christian Smith, Herman Daly, and Thomas Hibbs
- Mars Hill Audio Journal, Volume 102 — FEATURED GUESTS: Daniel M. Bell, Jr., Lew Daly, Adam K. Webb, Stratford Caldecott, James Matthew Wilson, and Thomas Hibbs
- Mars Hill Audio Journal, Volume 100 — FEATURED GUESTS: Jennifer Burns, Christian Smith, Dallas Willard, Peter Kreeft, P. D. James, James Davison Hunter, Paul McHugh, Ted Prescott, Ed Knippers, Martha Bayles, Dominic Aquila, Gilbert Meilaender, Neil Postman, and Alan Jacobs
- Loving your neighbor during a pandemic — Brad Littlejohn reflects on how best to ask and answer some of the questions raised by our current disease-ravaged circumstances, particularly questions related to Christian freedom and love of neighbor. (29 minutes)
- Harbinger of disorder — Mark Mitchell on Michael Polanyi’s recognition of the dangerous dead-end of materialistic reductionism
- Gratitude and stewardship as political postures —
FROM VOL. 118 Mark Mitchell explores the consequences of four concepts that are sadly missing from most political debates today: creatureliness, gratitude, human scale, and place. (18 minutes) - Economics and personhood —
FROM VOL. 147 Mary Hirschfeld argues that modern economics makes some fundamental assumptions about personhood, material goods, and God that prevent the development of a truly human understanding of economic life. (20 minutes) - Doing business: selfishly or generously? — David L. Schindler on Adam Smith’s big mistake
- Distributist & sustainable economics — Two interview from 2010: John C. Médaille summarizes how distributist economics differs from both capitalism and socialism. Then Herman Daly discusses the danger of economic theory abstracted from the actual stuff of Creation. (44 minutes)
- Cultures of chance, cultures of control — Historian Jackson Lears explains how gambling springs from a longing for an experience of “unbidden beneficence,” a repudiation of the idea of control that marks modernity. (49 minutes)
- An impoverished anthropology —
FROM VOL. 146 Mark Mitchell asks whether there is anything that truly binds Americans together beyond their commitment to self-creation. (34 minutes) - A devilish temptation — Wendell Berry explains how the modern Western ideal of the sovereign self enshrines a story of the abandonment of restrictions and restraints in the name of human freedom.
Links to posts and programs featuring Brady Stiller:
- Why economists need meta-economics — Joseph Pearce on the key insight of E. F. Schumacher
- The public and political dimensions of gratitude — Peter Leithart and Mark Mitchell both assert that gratitude has a public and political concern, and that Christianity caused a significant shift in the understanding of gratitude. (19 minutes)
- The personal element in all knowing — Mark Mitchell connects key aspects of Michael Polanyi’s conception of knowledge with Matthew Crawford’s insistence that real knowing involves more than technique. (34 minutes)
- The obligation of prodigality — Daniel Bell on the hedonistic logic of the “new capitalism”
- The nature of freedom reconsidered — In anticipation of this Fall’s Areopagus Lecture entitled “‘For Freedom Set Free’: Retrieving Genuine Religious Liberty,” we present selections from interviews with three MARS HILL AUDIO guests who have raised questions about the modern understanding of freedom. (27 minutes)
- Re-imagining economic obedience: lessons from Wendell Berry — The order of Creation, says Wendell Berry, is closer to that of a drama than that of a market. That quality should inform how we imagine economic life to be well-ordered.
- Post-liberalism of an earlier generation — Allan C. Carlson discusses an anthology of articles from Free America, a magazine published between 1937 and 1947 whose writers believed that political democracy could only survive if coupled with decentralized economic democracy. (26 minutes)
- Milton Friedman meets Augustine — We present an interview from our archives with theologian William Cavanaugh, in which he examines the free market, consumerism, globalization, and scarcity, all parsed within an unabashedly theological framework. (37 minutes)
- Mars Hill Audio Journal, Volume 95 — FEATURED GUESTS: Stewart Davenport, William T. Cavanaugh, J. Matthew Bonzo, Michael R. Stevens, Craig Gay, Eugene Peterson, and Barry Hankins
- Mars Hill Audio Journal, Volume 71 — FEATURED GUESTS: Peter Augustine Lawler, David Koyzis, Roger Lundin, Craig Gay, Steven Rhoads, and R. Larry Todd
- Mars Hill Audio Journal, Volume 147 — FEATURED GUESTS: R. Jared Staudt, Jason Peters, D. C. Schindler, Craig Gay, Mary Hirschfeld, and Patrick Samway
- Mars Hill Audio Journal, Volume 146 — FEATURED GUESTS: Mark Mitchell, Hans Boersma, Henry T. Edmondson, III, Brian Clayton, Douglas Kries, Conor Sweeney, and Carole Vanderhoof
- Mars Hill Audio Journal, Volume 134 — FEATURED GUESTS: Chris Armstrong, Grevel Lindop, Michael Martin, William T. Cavanaugh, Philip Turner, and Gisela Kreglinger
- Mars Hill Audio Journal, Volume 118 — FEATURED GUESTS: Gilbert Meilaender, Ron Highfield, Mark Mitchell, Daniel M. Bell, Jr., Helen Rhee, and Peter Brown
- Mars Hill Audio Journal, Volume 115 — FEATURED GUESTS: Arlie Russell Hochschild, Andrew Davison, Adrian Pabst, Gary Colledge, Linda Lewis, and Thomas Bergler
- Mars Hill Audio Journal, Volume 106 — FEATURED GUESTS: Adam Briggle, John C. Médaille, Christopher Page, Christian Smith, Herman Daly, and Thomas Hibbs
- Mars Hill Audio Journal, Volume 102 — FEATURED GUESTS: Daniel M. Bell, Jr., Lew Daly, Adam K. Webb, Stratford Caldecott, James Matthew Wilson, and Thomas Hibbs
- Mars Hill Audio Journal, Volume 100 — FEATURED GUESTS: Jennifer Burns, Christian Smith, Dallas Willard, Peter Kreeft, P. D. James, James Davison Hunter, Paul McHugh, Ted Prescott, Ed Knippers, Martha Bayles, Dominic Aquila, Gilbert Meilaender, Neil Postman, and Alan Jacobs
- Loving your neighbor during a pandemic — Brad Littlejohn reflects on how best to ask and answer some of the questions raised by our current disease-ravaged circumstances, particularly questions related to Christian freedom and love of neighbor. (29 minutes)
- Harbinger of disorder — Mark Mitchell on Michael Polanyi’s recognition of the dangerous dead-end of materialistic reductionism
- Gratitude and stewardship as political postures —
FROM VOL. 118 Mark Mitchell explores the consequences of four concepts that are sadly missing from most political debates today: creatureliness, gratitude, human scale, and place. (18 minutes) - Economics and personhood —
FROM VOL. 147 Mary Hirschfeld argues that modern economics makes some fundamental assumptions about personhood, material goods, and God that prevent the development of a truly human understanding of economic life. (20 minutes) - Doing business: selfishly or generously? — David L. Schindler on Adam Smith’s big mistake
- Distributist & sustainable economics — Two interview from 2010: John C. Médaille summarizes how distributist economics differs from both capitalism and socialism. Then Herman Daly discusses the danger of economic theory abstracted from the actual stuff of Creation. (44 minutes)
- Cultures of chance, cultures of control — Historian Jackson Lears explains how gambling springs from a longing for an experience of “unbidden beneficence,” a repudiation of the idea of control that marks modernity. (49 minutes)
- An impoverished anthropology —
FROM VOL. 146 Mark Mitchell asks whether there is anything that truly binds Americans together beyond their commitment to self-creation. (34 minutes) - A devilish temptation — Wendell Berry explains how the modern Western ideal of the sovereign self enshrines a story of the abandonment of restrictions and restraints in the name of human freedom.