Don't
miss Greg Nyquist's weekly
comments on all matters economical, including thoughts on the current
economy, the direction in which it is headed, and where it is likely to
end up, along with remarks concerning the sad state of economic theory
at the present time both within academia and without.
A sketch of a new method of
examining economic problems which stresses discovering the factual
evidence before making moral conclusions. Ten principles are advanced
illustrating this new way of looking at economic reality.
A
call for a
reconstruction
of business cycle theory based on the seminal insights of two of
Böhm-Bawerk's greatest students, Ludwig von Mises and Joseph
Schumpeter, with a constructive critique of Austrian trade cycle theory
thrown in for good measure.
A scathing indictment
of economics as it practiced within academia, with particular focus on
the pedantic theories under which the study of economics groans. The
methodology of mathematical economics is here thoroughly exposed and
discredited.
A spoof on the appalling
tendency
in academic economics to replace sound analysis with mathematical
equations. Criticizes not only Keynes, but Milton Friedman for good
measure.
Why
does
democracy fail to adequately express the so-called "will" of the
people? Has democracy been betrayed by its leaders, or are
there
other reasons that explain this alleged anamoly? In this
essay,
Greg Nyquist explains what explains the difference between democracy as
it is explained in political theory and democracy as it appears in the
real world of fact. In the process, several surprising
conclusions are reached.
Machiavelli has for many
centuries
been represented as a counselor for the wicked, the man to whom tyrants
went to school. He is also blamed for being the first "secular"
political thinker in Western Civilization. Greg Nyquist challenges
these baseless assumptions and sets the record straight concerning what
Machiavelli really thought and wrote.
Economists have long been
complaining about something they call externalities, by which they mean
the social costs of production that aren't accounted for in private
cost calculation. Externalities such as pollution and tasteless
construction projects are used to justify all manner of government
interference in the market — some with at least a modicum of
justification, others simply gratuitious and self-defeating. Economists
have conveniently forgotten another species of externality, the moral
externality, which describes the moral costs arising from social
behavior that are borne by innocent bystanders.
The Machiavel
Review
is
pleased to present this classic reprint of Thomas Babbington Macaulay's
groundbreaking essay on Machiavelli, published in 1827, edited with
commentary by Greg Nyquist.
A few remarks on the curious
way in
which a sentimental attachment to egalitarianism thwarts the ability to
understand simple truths about the nature of human differences.
What is true and what is false
in
the modern conservatism? This essay looks at the philosophical
foundations of conservatism to come up with some intriguing and perhaps
controversial answer.
Read Greg
Nyquist's
book reviews at amazon.com. The reviews cover a wide range of
topics, from philosophy and economics to literature and computers. The
reviews of Karl Popper, George Santayana, and Ayn Rand have garnered
particular notice.
Greg
Nyquist examines to what extent a philosophy of realism is consistent
with what is commonly refered to as a "spiritual life," concentrating
particularly on the question of God's existence and its possible
relation to spiritual development.
Greg
Nyquist reviews Scott Ryan's controversial book length essay, Objectivism
and the Corruption of Reality,
which attempts to critique Rand's
epistemological ideas from the perspective of "objective idealism."
Realism has long been regarded as the
philosophy of
the "tough-minded," as William James put it. In this seminal essay,
Greg Nyquist explains what it means to be a realist and why realism
must assume a truculent
form to be effective.
Favorite
quotes from realist
philosophers illuminating the follies of idealism, ideological
fantasizing, philosophy as make-believe, and other forms of wishful
thinking.
Read Greg Nyquist's scathing book-length polemic against Rand's utopian
theory of human nature and her unfortunate betrayal of realism, the
first book to really challenge the empirical claims of Rand's
Objectivist philosophy.
Don't
miss Greg Nyquist's weekly (or
thereabouts) scathing comments about American culture, of both the
popular and more serious variety. Included are book, movie, and music
reviews.
A review of Ruth Miller's Saul
Bellow: A Biography of the Imagination
which sets the record
straight about the Nobel Prize winning author's alleged male chauvinism.
Excerpts
from novel about an intractable student that takes on the radical left
idealogues that dominate America's Universities.
The Machiavel
Review is an
independent web journal dedicated to defending realism and fact-based
analysis in philosophy, literature, politics, economics, and the arts.
We sedulously avoid anything that smacks of wishful thinking or
ideological presumption, prefering merely to see things as they are,
regardless of how horrible they may appear in the light of our desires.
