tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8924717973498368006.post1826474909327517438..comments2024-01-01T07:46:50.896+00:00Comments on Effortless Incitement: Marketing actions can modulate neural representations of experienced pleasantnessDoctor Spurthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16403355179680558182noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8924717973498368006.post-32788948821483179952008-06-21T23:08:00.000+01:002008-06-21T23:08:00.000+01:00Sure. If they'd said "it is a basic assumption of ...Sure. If they'd said "it is a basic assumption of some silly economists..." and given one real example, I'd have had no quibble.Doctor Spurthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16403355179680558182noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8924717973498368006.post-58862958207108752472008-06-21T19:38:00.000+01:002008-06-21T19:38:00.000+01:00My comment really was a quibble: I agree they have...My comment really was a quibble: I agree they have the onus and that you were right to call them on it. My sole point was that they seem to be right at least about SOME economists (for the simple reason that there are silly economists, just like there are silly people in any discipline). <BR/><BR/>I agree with everything else you say...Anony Mousehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08077107616686254136noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8924717973498368006.post-14369780807658846602008-06-21T11:22:00.000+01:002008-06-21T11:22:00.000+01:00OK, but isn't the burden of proof on them, to show...OK, but isn't the burden of proof on them, to show that it really is "a basic assumption in economics" that "(EP) from consuming a good depends only on its intrinsic properties and on the state of the individual"? Can I really be expected to justify a negative existential claim before being allowed to call them on this? If they had proper evidence, why not give it, instead of citing another publication that simply asserts the same prejudice?<BR/><BR/>Also, I don't think that modern economics is usefully thought of as being about "pleasantness" at all, but about utility, quantified through revealed preferences. I think it's historically wrong-headed to take current economics as psychological, and even when economics was self-consciously pyschological, which is where Bentham is so relevant, it wasn't as simplistic as they say.<BR/><BR/>You get the same pattern with the view that economics essentially requires agents to care only about their own utility, when it's obvious that an agent can reveal preferences over states of others, so that there is no obstacle to other-regarding preferences. It's similar to the common distortion foisted on natural selection, to the effect that if it's true altruism will never happen.Doctor Spurthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16403355179680558182noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8924717973498368006.post-80265293256093528502008-06-20T14:26:00.000+01:002008-06-20T14:26:00.000+01:00One quibble... while you're right to conclude that...One quibble... while you're right to conclude that a more complex view of EP is compatible with the views of important figures in the history of economics like Bentham, I don't think you get to conclude the authors you criticize are wrong wrt to the economic literature. They could be, but (1) you provide no evidence for this claim and (2) at least in my knowledge of the literature, sometimes a very stripped down version of utility is assumed. I have often observed that some economists are more enamoured with their abstract models than with actual economic behavior, and more than willing to ignore to latter if it's inconvenient for the former.<BR/><BR/>So... a nuanced view of utility is indeed compatible with Benthamite principles, but there are bad economists out there, and plenty of ones with blinkers on (the glories of trained incapacity).Anony Mousehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08077107616686254136noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8924717973498368006.post-43063859335723445612008-06-20T14:21:00.000+01:002008-06-20T14:21:00.000+01:00This comment has been removed by the author.Anony Mousehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08077107616686254136noreply@blogger.com