Chapter 7: Autonomy
Christian Economics: Student's Edition
[Updated: 1/18/18]
Now Herod was angry with the people of Tyre and Sidon, and they came to him with one accord, and having persuaded Blastus, the king's chamberlain, they asked for peace, because their country depended on the king's country for food. On an appointed day Herod put on his royal robes, took his seat upon the throne, and delivered an oration to them. And the people were shouting, The voice of a god, and not of a man! Immediately an angel of the Lord struck him down, because he did not give God the glory, and he was eaten by worms and breathed his last. But the word of God increased and multiplied (Acts 12:20--24).
Point two of the biblical covenant is hierarchical authority. It has to do with God's delegation of limited sovereignty to man: the dominion covenant. Mankind represents God judicially. Each individual also represents God in his temporary sphere of authority, which is a legal jurisdiction. He speaks in the name of God. He is responsible to God. This is a judicial hierarchy.
The English word hierarchy comes from the Greek word for priest, hieros, and the Greek word for ruler, archon.
Herod was in a position to impose authoritative law in the name of God. Instead, he spoke an authoritative word in his own name. He died a non-authoritative death. This is the arrogance of autonomy in action. King Nebuchadnezzar learned this lesson, and he testified to it in Daniel 4, which he wrote. Herod did not learn this lesson.
The English word autonomy in a transliteration of the Greek word for self, autos, and the Greek word for law, nomos. Autonomy means self-law.
The first person to declare judicial autonomy was Eve. She was deceived (I Timothy 2:14). The first person to declare his judicial autonomy self-consciously was Adam. He refused to submit himself to God's law. He could have eaten from the tree of life at any time. This would have been a covenant meal. God had offered him access to this tree. Adam refused to take advantage of this opportunity to secure eternal life for himself. Instead, he ran a test on God's word vs. the serpent's word. He took a chance on death, when he could have had life for certain. But to accept life on these terms was unacceptable to him. He would have had to submit to God's word in preference to the serpent's. If he was present when Eve was verbally tempted, he could have taken her to the tree of life immediately. If she did it alone, he could have led her in a prayer of forgiveness. Then he could have led her in a communion meal from the tree of life. But then there would have been no test of God's law. After that, the forbidden tree would have been no threat. The positive sanction of life would have removed the threat of death. But that would have meant judicial subordination to God. It would have ruined Adam's test of God's word. It would have placed him in a judicial hierarchy in which he possessed limited sovereignty, but not absolute sovereignty. He wanted absolute sovereignty. He wanted autonomy.
Adam decided that he would be in charge of the test. He substituted his own concept of ethical cause and effect for God's. He decided that God's law is not self-attesting. It needed verification. Adam decided that he was the self-appointed agent of verification in history. Eve was not self-conscious about this. She had been deceived. Adam was not deceived. He substituted his empirical law for God's authoritative law.
He did not accept the fact that God had laid down the law to him. He would now lay down the law to God. He would run the test of God's word on his own authority.
Covenant-breaking men believe that they either lay down the law or else autonomously interpret it and apply it to historical circumstances. A humanistic scientist does not believe that mankind has established the laws of nature. He believes that no one established laws of the universe. Nature is autonomous, he declares. Its laws are independent of everything except nature. They arose out of nature. He also believes that scientists can discover nature's laws and put them to use for mankind, either for good or evil. The law-order of nature is therefore separate from ethics. Mankind, not nature, is the source of ethics for humanists. With respect to using nature, man is in charge of some aspects of nature. The realm of man's control over nature is expanding, we are told. The supreme examples are nuclear fission and nuclear fusion. Scientists, we are told, have unlocked the secrets of the atom. Then politicians made decisions as to how these secrets should be used: for weapons or for electrical power generation.
This concept of man's hierarchical relationship to nature raises a series of problems. These problems are at bottom philosophical, but they are also practical. These are questions of sovereignty. Is man sovereign over nature, or is nature sovereign over man? Who speaks on behalf of whom? Who speaks the final authoritative word?
Here is a practical question that comes out of this larger question of sovereignty vs. authority. If some innovative people have found ways to use nature to work productively for themselves as individuals, and also for others, who is in charge: man or nature? It seems that man is. But this conclusion is called into question by the technological issue of robotics and algorithms. Question: Will scientists produce robots or computer programs that will enable impersonal nature to become conscious and therefore personal, thereby enabling nature to take control of man because of its now vastly superior computational power? This has been a familiar theme in science fiction for over a century. This practical question was first asked by Samuel Butler in 1863 in a letter to a New Zealand newspaper: "Darwin Among the Machines." He wrote a Utopian novel about this, Erewhon, which is nowhere spelled backwards, published in 1872. It contains three chapters, "The Book of the Machines." The novel is about a closed-off society that forbade all mechanical inventions. The problem with the novel is this: only technology and science have enabled societies to overcome grinding poverty since 1800. Always before, population growth had consumed available resources, mainly food. Mankind used nature briefly, but was then starved into submission. This changed with the industrial revolution. Man definitively took control over nature. The symbol of this was the steam engine. But now there are new symbols: the computer and the robot.
This dualism in philosophy came shortly after the steam engine was perfected by James Watt. The German philosopher Immanuel Kant came up with a new theory of man's relation to nature. Nature operates autonomously. Men know nothing of these laws. The laws that men use to interpret nature come from men's minds. Men are free to subjugate nature because their minds grasp nature's regularities. Nature does not control man. Man has freedom. He has morals. These are independent of nature. If they were not, men would not be free to choose. But this raises a problem. If men's hopes, dreams, and plans are independent of nature's control, how can they become tools in man's toolkit of controls over nature? If men's decisions are not under nature, how can men be over nature? What is the basis of the seeming coherence of men's minds and nature? Why is cause and effect only one way: from man to nature? What protects man from an invasion across the drawbridge into men's internal castles of mind, emotion, and ethics? (As a side note, Kant was also the first major Western philosopher to propose a theory of cosmic evolution.)
Kant's dualism between the realm of nature (scientific phenomenal realm) and the realm of freedom (contingent noumenal realm) is called the nature/freedom dualism. It is also called the science/personality dualism. This is no longer some rarified speculation of philosophers. If algorithms can think the way that men do, what is to prevent them from taking control of mankind, or even eliminating mankind? How can men program humanistic ethics into computer programs and robots? No one knows. Even if this is possible, who is to say who the programmer will be? What will his ethics be? What if he thinks that Adolf Hitler was a softie?
These are economic problems. Will computers and robotics eliminate the jobs of millions of people? It is economically efficient for specific employers to substitute computer programs and smart machines for humans. How can we be sure that what is good for specific employers is also good for the masses of workers who may lose their jobs? Microeconomic decisions of employers have macroeconomic effects on the economy. What theory of economics provides accurate guidance for policy-makers? Should the government intervene? To do what? How? With what system of sanctions?
Humanistic economics has no theory of a sovereign God who providentially brings all things to pass. It also has no concept of economic causation as inherently ethical. Economists insist that economic theory is value-free, and must remain value-free. But if economic analysis is value-free, how can it provide accurate insights into a world that is governed by men? Men are inherently ethical, for good or evil. Causation in human institutions is ethical. The Bible makes this clear (Deuteronomy 28). The vast majority of parents have taught this to their children. Humanistic economists tell us that have it all wrong. They insist that what matters economically is efficiency, not ethics. They expect people to believe them. Then they sneak ethics into their analyses through the back door of policy recommendations, which they claim will produce good results, meaning ethically good, i.e., not evil. In short, they cheat. They don't convince anyone except other economists about their supposedly value-free theory. Yet they cannot figure out why their arguments fall on deaf ears. Their arguments are clearly inefficient. So, they shout louder: Economic theory is value-free! No, it isn't.
I ask: How can humanistic economic analysis deal accurately with the realm of economics as a covenantal system of cause and effect that is imposed by God, which economists deny? They want people to believe that a coherent, predictable, ethically decent social system autonomously developed out of voluntary economic exchanges, whether these exchanges were ethical or not. No one believes this except economists. No one should--not even economists.
Point one of the biblical covenant is sovereignty. It asks: "Who's in charge here?" How does this apply to autonomy?
If God does not rule the world as the Creator and Providential Sustainer of the world, then what does?
The Darwinist argues that nothing did until man evolved out of non-man. Man now imputes purpose. He plans. He executes plans. The formerly purposeless universe now has purpose.
Hardly anyone has ever believed this. Anyone who argues in this fashion is doomed to a life of frustration. No religion teaches it. No ethical system teaches it. Only a handful of university graduates teach it to their children. It is the argument of a fool. "The fool says in his heart, 'There is no God'" (Psalm 14:1a).
In contrast, polytheism has had lots of supporters in history. This is the product of their rebellion.
For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things (Romans 1:18--22).
Atheists are operational polytheists. If God is not God, then man is. But man is plural, not just a single species. One person's opinions are as good as any other person's views, defenders of democracy insist. Each person imputes meaning and coherence to the world around him. Who is to say any of these imputed realities is incorrect? Problem: there is no way to use logic and persuasion to shape these rival imputations into a coherent unity. The competing worldviews of men have proven to be irreconcilable. So, he who wants to attain unity must use coercive force. Every political system operates on the basis of a book and guns to enforce it. There is no agreement on which book possesses autonomous authority.
With many gods there are many hierarchies, many legal systems, many sanctions, and many futures. Systems come, but most of them fade away. A few persist. Christianity, Judaism, and Islam deny polytheism. Hinduism affirms it. Buddhism is either polytheistic or atheistic, depending on the variety. Confucianism doesn't care. Marxism is atheistic. That experiment went belly-up in 1991. Darwinism is atheistic. Few people believe it. But most economists do.
If the universe is autonomous but without purpose apart from mankind, then man must impose order. But there is a problem. Man evolved out of autonomous nature, Darwinists tell us. Mankind is therefore under the laws of nature. Some scientists say that they understand these laws. Conclusion: these elite planners must be the ones to bring social order and scientific progress. They shout: Man must take control of man! That means that a few men must take control of all the others, a point made by a power-seeking atheist in a 1946 novel by Christian theologian C. S. Lewis, That Hideous Strength. This is operational polytheism: lots of competing scientific gods, each seeking to impose his order on the rest of humanity. Sometimes the gods cooperate, as the Olympian gods did occasionally. Usually, the gods of Olympus were at war with each other, by way of men and women in history.
Point two of the biblical covenant is hierarchical authority. It asks: "To whom do I report?" How does this apply to autonomy?
In a world of competing sovereignties, different people will report to different sovereigns. This is the problem of polytheism. A person may seek to remain faithful to one sovereign, but he will be regarded as irresponsible by participants in rival hierarchies.
Some systems of belief produce centralized, top-down social systems. Marxism did. Fascism did. These do not last for long. They create great resistance. They run out of resources to fund the control system. They break apart or else are defeated in a war.
Socialism is a top-down system of state ownership and central planning. All socialist systems of state ownership of the means of production are inherently irrational, a point made by Ludwig von Mises in his classic 1920 essay, "Economic Calculation in the Socialist Commonwealth." Without capital markets based on private ownership, open entry, and competition, no socialist planning board can gain access to prices within its borders. Without prices, central planners are blind. Socialism is therefore self-defeating.
The free market is a bottom-up system of private economic planning. It is based on private property, open entry, and competition. Its problem is its institutional polytheism. How can confrontations be settled peacefully? To whom do all participants report? Who imposes negative sanctions on criminals? If the state can impose sanctions on evil-doers, who defines evil? On what basis? What factors limit the domain of each state? A state powerful enough to settle disputes by force is powerful enough to interfere with the operations of the market. The market is not autonomous.
Point three of the biblical covenant is law. It asks: "What are the rules?" How does this apply to autonomy?
If man is autonomous in an autonomous universe, and mankind is also plural, then which god's laws are authoritative? On what basis?
There are theories of natural law. They have these problems in common: hardly anyone believes in them, and among the few who do, there is no agreement on what they are or how they are discovered. Natural law theory was a product of the Roman Empire. Stoic philosophers attempted to provide a philosophical foundation to hold the empire's many gods together. The Jews never accepted this. The Christians didn't, either. Christianity adopted natural law theory in the late Middle Ages. Aquinas was the model. Luther also accepted it. Today, a few Christian ethical theorists accept it, but in the age of Kant, it is obsolete. Austrian School economist Murray Rothbard accepted it, but his mentor Mises was a Kantian. Mises rejected natural law theory. So did Mises' other major disciple, F. A. Hayek. Both of them were Darwinists.
So, on what ethical basis can economists defend economic theory? None. Most of the major economists have acknowledged this openly. They deny that economic theory has anything to do with ethics. They say that economics is value-free. Rothbard held this position, following Mises.
This assertion is undermined by the policy recommendations of economists.
Point four of the biblical covenant is sanctions. It asks: "What do I get if I obey? Disobey?" How does this apply to autonomy?
Governments rely on economists for recommendations. No other group of social scientists has this degree of authority. The high priests of social science are economists.
Economists claim to be able to apply economic theory to real-world situations. This is the art of casuistry: applying general laws to specific situations. It was a major area of Christian theology prior to 1700. It has faded since then. It barely exists today. Similarly, Jews have had private courts that have handed down decisions for 1700 years. These decisions are called responsa. No other religion has anything like these collections of court cases: hundreds of thousands.
There is no escape from casuistry, but it can be concealed. Consider this. Free market economists officially hold to methodological individualism. They do not think about these issues often. They may acknowledge that there is no way to tabulate economic value, which is imputed subjectively. This acknowledgment has been common ever since 1932, with the publication of Lionel Robbins' book, An Inquiry into the Nature and Significance of Economic Science. Chapter VI argued that there is no way scientifically to make interpersonal comparisons of subjective utility. There is no common scale of values. But he surrendered on this point in 1938 when Keynesian economist Roy Harrod pointed out that if Robbins were correct, then there would be no legitimate way for economists to make policy recommendations of any kind. Conclusion: there is no way that a methodological individualist can know scientifically whether any policy would produce results consistent with increased collective social value. There can be no such thing as collective social value if methodological individualism is correct. Robbins admitted that Harrod was correct, and he retracted his position. He did not explain why he had been wrong in 1932. This academic debate is long forgotten. Yet it took place in the influential scholarly journal that Harrod edited, The Economic Journal. (Note: this was an old debate in 1938. It began with the medieval debates between realists and nominalists. Robbins in 1932 was a pure nominalist.)
So, if men are autonomous, then there can be no way for them to come to policy decisions that can satisfy all of the mini-gods. The state must impose policies on protesting citizens. If it outlaws sticking pins in people, it will reduce the liberty of many sadists and even some masochists. Will this reduce aggregate social value? There is no way for a consistent methodological individualist economist to determine this scientifically.
If economic science is value-free, and if all value is subjective, then economists are engaged in a self-interested deception. They claim to be able to do what their own principles say is impossible: offer advice based on science.
Point five of the biblical covenant is succession. It asks: "Does this outfit have a future?" How does this apply to autonomy? In economics, succession is the issue of economic growth. Most economists agree on this: the benefits of economic growth. They advocate policies they believe will produce economic growth. They always include limiting factors, such as non-polluting growth or growth that promotes greater economic equality. But they favor economic growth in general.
The problem is this: there is no agreement about how to achieve economic growth. Keynesians favor government deficits, at least in recessions. Austrians favor stable money, preferably gold coins, and low taxes. Monetarists favor a slow but steady expansion of the central bank's monetary base. Rational expectations economists favor changing nothing. Behavioral economists don't have any theory of economic growth. In short, there is a lot of noise. The realm of policy-making has a low signal-to-noise ratio. There are lots of conflicting signals and too much noise.
If there were agreement among economists, there would be less noise. But these aphorisms are common. Where there are five economists, there will be six opinions. If you laid all the economists end to end, they would never reach a conclusion. President Harry Truman's comment was appropriate sometime around 1948: "Give me a one-handed economist. All my economists say 'on the one hand...', then 'but on the other...'" The autonomy of man has produced an army of economists. There is no unity within the camp of the economists. This has led to conflicting advice.
There has been economic growth, but economists are not agreed on why. There are at least two dozen different explanations about how, sometime around 1800, economic growth began to compound at about 2% per capita per annum in Great Britain and North America's British colonies. Prof. D. McCloskey devoted chapters 16 to 40 of Bourgeois Dignity (2010) to a refutation of all of them. But McCloskey's book, Bourgeois Equality (2016), does not offer an explanation that I find persuasive. There is no historical or theological explanation of how and why Dutch theologians adopted a new casuistry favoring wealth. There is also no explanation of how and why they adopted a new view of the future, one in which compound long-term economic growth is possible. There is no discussion of postmillennialism vs. amillennialism in Dutch theology in the seventeenth century, or Scottish theology, or Puritan theology. McCloskey says that rhetoric changed. Fair enough. But whose rhetoric? Pastors? Theologians? Calvinists? Arminians? On what theological basis did they change? Rhetoric is persuasion, but persuasion needs ethical content. The book offers no evidence from primary sources of any shift in ethical content regarding the legitimacy of riches. What was it that changed in Dutch, Scottish, and Puritan theology--a break from Calvin's theology? This is the crucial historical issue in McCloskey's theory of what changed rhetorically. But there is not a paragraph in these books that answers this question, or even asks it.
If economists cannot specify what caused this change, which was the most profound change in man's economic history since Noah's flood, then on what basis will compound growth continue? Is it autonomous? If so, then this is incorrect:
You may say to yourself, My power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me. But remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you the ability to produce wealth, and so confirms his covenant, which he swore to your ancestors, as it is today (Deuteronomy 8:17--18).If economic growth is autonomous, then advice from economists is irrelevant. If it is autonomous, then there is no science of economics that connects with the real world.
Covenant-breaking man began with an assumption: God is not sovereign. This was followed by another assumption: There are many gods. This was followed by a third assumption: Man must test which self-professed god is sovereign. This led to a conclusion: Man is sovereign, since his tests are authoritative. This led to the final conclusion: Man is autonomous. This created an immediate problem: there are many men and many views of truth. Cain and Abel divided over this issue (Genesis 4). How can men come to agreed-upon solutions to this problem, which is the problem of noise? There has been no solution offered so far that has begun to bring theoretical unity out of theoretical diversity in any area of life.
The assumption of men's autonomy has shattered theoretical unity. This has affected the science of economics as profoundly as it has affected every other social science. There is no agreement regarding economic theory. There has been no agreement on economic policy. If methodological individualism is true, there can never be any agreement on policy. This is because it is impossible to make scientific interpersonal comparisons of subjective utility. It is impossible to add up gains and losses. Value is subjective. It cannot be measured. Humanistic economic theory has reached a dead end.
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