I finished the Mike Cody Four-Mile Classic in 46:45, roughly two minutes less than our agreed-upon goal of 48:44. I realize that's a laughably pathetic time for serious runners, but I'm pretty happy with it given that my goal was just to cross the finish line. I know Bob offered a beer, but since we'll be outside the US I'll settle for a taste of protectionism (Mac blogging, can't link, so here's the URL: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa5477/is_200710/ai_n21301892/pg_1).

A reader asked me about the appeal of Marx across the humanities and social sciences in spite of the fact that his system is fundamentally flawed and 20th century attempts to implement his vision are soaked in blood. I can't do much more than speculate on this right now, but I wonder if Marx's appeal stems from its flattery of what Hayek called "The Fatal Conceit." Mises speaks to this a little bit in "The Anticapitalistic Mentality," but if memory serves me correctly he doesn't offer much in the way of systematic evidence.

For readers fortunate enough to have regular multi-disciplinary conversations with earnest and inquisitive thinkers from across the ideological and intellectual spectrum, here's a question to consider: why don't they read Mises and Hayek instead of Marx? Both were, like Marx, systematic and rigorous thinkers of towering intellect who applied their insights beyond economics. Unlike Marx, however, they developed and built on correct theories of value, prices, and business cycles. I realize there's a lot of contention within economics about Misesian/Hayekian business cycle theory, so this last claim is weaker than the first two.

I wonder if path dependence isn't at play here. I agree that the economics of QWERTY can be laid to rest in market settings--Tyler Cowen and Peter Klein have blogged about this recently--but I think it has much to tell us about the dynamics of systems in which feedback mechanisms like prices, profits, and losses are lacking. Is Marx the QWERTY of the ivory tower? I need to think about this in greater detail, but the robustness of the Marxian system in light of his failed theories of value, exploitation, alienation, and class conflict is not apparent to me.

I'll be writing about this periodically as I prep my Econ 323 notes over the next few weeks. I'm always grateful for insight, correction, and reproof; you can reach me at cardena-at-rhodes-dot-edu.