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| Issue 05 | June 2005 | ||||
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The Mises
Experience |
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Last year I had the honour of attending Mises University - a seven-day marathon series of lectures on various aspects of Austrian economics – and I didn’t wasted the opportunity. Skipping a long intermediary story, I reached Auburn (the very boring city where the very exciting Mises Institute is situated) in the morning of 1st August, 2004. I reached The Commons first, where the participants were accommodated and then went for a walk in the town (to the nearest Subway™ actually), finally heading for the famed Ludwig von Mises Institute, which is the heart of the present world of Austrian scholarship. The building that houses the Institute is a marvelous one (see the picture below), though with a little architectural fault – the front door knob is a bit temperamental and never answered to the caressing touch of my hand. The first two days I was rescued by some kind person who from inside saw me trying without any result to open the door, and opened the door for me. The rest of the days I used the backdoor instead, which was far more considerate to my pleading. The people First I person I met at Mises Institute was Pat Barnett, a very sweet woman who is the vice-president of the Institute and the person in-charge of the University. She rescued me from that dreaded front door and showed me into the building. Next person was the legendary Lew Rockwell, himself! Lew is the creator and the president of the Institute – perhaps, the most important entrepreneur in the history of Austrian economics. Then many people poured in and I lost myself in a sea of anonymity, not knowing anyone around (except Lew and Pat who have vanished by then). What added to the problem is the realization is that almost everyone knows somebody or another, or at least they were with their teachers who know some of the faculties. This time I was rescued by another very sweet woman – Linda Schrock Taylor. Linda, is a columnist at LewRockwell.com and recently (then) has shifted to Auburn to stay close to the Institute. She introduced me to many of the faculty members and soothed the unease. Some of the most interesting people I met there includes Block, the hugely funny scholar who joked all the way to glory during his lectures, Long, another very humorous person, professor of philosophy, Garrison, perhaps the most clear and thought-provoking speaker among all the faculty members, Hoppe, another wonderful speaker, Klein, with whom I had great informal chats and Guido Hulsmann, a superb speaker and a very handsome person. Within seven days, three gorgeous female participants questioned me about Hulsmann’s marital status. Since I was talking with Hulsmann a lot, they somehow got the idea that I might answer them, which I couldn’t. Much to my disappointment, that was the only bit of conversation they had with me. As for the participants, I didn’t have much of discussion/conversation with any of my fellow participants who were mostly engaged in Hayek and Commie bashing. Both the sports disgusted me. I used to talk with Linda most of the times or with the faculties, since I had lots of questions unanswered in the lectures. Only with two participants I grew quite friendly – Tom Datny, a second year economics student and Justin Ptak, a PG scholar at Harvard, in economics too. Another very notable participant was Jeffery Zhang. He played protagonist to the discovery of the first aprior truth about human behaviour: “Jeffery Zhang hath an extended pointless question/comment.” And then there was my proverbial roommate – Prem forgot-his-surname. Learning that he is a third year student of philosophy, I was quite excited about getting to know from him the philosophical underpinnings of the Austrian school, about which I knew less than zilch. But most of the times he was with his girlfriend, even during lectures. And virtually exchanged no-words with me during the seven-day stay. I can even now visualize the scene, me sitting on my bed trying to penetrate through books on Austrian school, not understanding any part of it, meanwhile my dear roommate is sitting across the room on his bed with his girlfriend exchanging sweet nothings. To say the least, it was a bit distracting, especially when somebody is trying to understand Praxeology. After a while Prem grew considerate and went out with his girlfriend (perhaps to exchange something more substantial) leaving me alone in the darkness of the tunnel of Austrian soul, I mean school. The days As depicted above, all the seven days (except the first) I used to study at night, trying to go through the topics to be covered the next day. This translated into very late waking ups, doing the ‘morning musts’ faster than superman doing the same in a hurry, missing the bus to the Institute from The Commons, grabbing a sandwich and an apple and running around a kilometer to the Institute. I literally ‘ran’ to the Institute at least in three mornings, drawing superior-looking grins from regular joggers on the way. Obviously, considering my not-that-athletic physical form, they thought that I must be new in the business and shared their insufferable grins. The sessions used to start half an hour after breakfast at Commons and to go on till the dinner, while the lunch and the dinner were served at the Institute itself. Food was particularly good. Some Northerners hated the food, saying it is too Southern. I couldn’t understand what the fuss was all about. Now the people of USA take their dinners absurdly early, before the sun sets! So I used to save a couple of dishes (desert and fruit usually) for eating later. This must be a nugget of wisdom for any of you who will be going to USA in near future. And one day, the whole group went out for dinner to a local restaurant. That was quite a nice experience. All of us dining together and laughing out loud for no precise reason just to demoralize the non-Mises people in the restaurant. I had an exhaustive lesson on All American Liquor Games and on various other factors of All American College Life, mostly concerning how to make girls drunk and the consequential events. We had great time exchanging stories of puking in all sorts of place after consuming too much liquor in too little time, of course putting up our unnamed friends as protagonists. The bad part was they served root beer for some obscure reason. Now I never tasted root beer before so I took a sip of it. Believe me, it tastes like liquid mint toothpaste, with lots of ice in it, and that means very bad. The Institute houses a fantastic library, along with a noteworthy collection of music by Wagner. So when not talking to anybody, I used to go through the vast collection of books, taking some notes, or to listen to Wagner using my CD player. After the dinner, there used to be a movie screening, or an informal talk by some faculty member. The movie screenings were not very impressive, There was A Bug’s Life, Enemy within the Gates (if I remember correctly) and there was an East European sci-fi flick with indecipherable sub-titles. The reason of screening of which nobody could figure out and emerged as the next great mystery blocking the Austrian path. And there used to be copious amount of alcohol to be drained. This proved to be another area of disappointment as explained below: PIC 1 I was a few days below 20 when I attended the University!
The LecturesLectures used to be around one hour long, with around ten minutes of discussion at the end. The lecturers, being absolute experts in respective fields, used to cram in a lot of theoretical discussions in that short time. They were a lot more academic, and hence lot more difficult to follow than the LSS/LACS/ALSS lectures. But kudos to the lecturers, they used to make the complex topics sound so much easier, when they are speaking. In no seven days, I have learned so much as I did in those seven days. One problematic thing was certain disagreements between some of the lecturers, regarding ideas like Hayekian triangle, entrepreneurship, knowledge/judgment etc. Many a times it happened that I learned something new at one lecture, only to found that challenged in the next. Initially this made me quite confused. Another very unnerving thing was the discussions. Once the lecture is over, it was time to ask the speaker about what he has spoken. Now there were some very brainy, at least very well-read in Austrian economics, people around. During the discussions these people used to ask questions that used to go flying high over my head, leaving me only to exclaim: “Is that a bird? Is that a plane? No, it’s a question by Dan!” This was hugely unnerving. And this gave rise to my dream that one day I will go to Mises University and will ask similar highly-un-understandable questions during the discussions. But on a second thought, I think that won’t be a nice thing, because that will alienate me from others as it happened earlier, while me being in the receiving end. Most of the speakers around were great with some exceptions. David Gordon, the wonderful writer, is a very boring speaker, only to beaten by Joe Stromberg. I attended a lecture by Stromberg on international economic relations, which turned out to be a history lesson of USA foreign policies, without much trace of what the Austrians wants to say about it. And this was a pain to listen through. Something I missed heavily in the lectures is a concern for the countries where the property rights are not well-developed. This disregard was also prevailing among the participants. Commie bashing was rampant but not much thought on how to make free-market operations possible in the sunken East-European economies. I hate to admit this but perhaps Marx was right in his criticism when he said that Capitalism sees private property as the genesis of the market system but not as an institution historically evolved along with that of market. I hoped Austrians will throw some light into this matter but was disheartened. Even in Praxeology, the Austrian methodology, there is clear reason why private property should be favored over other forms of property rights but I am yet to find explanation for the evolution of the sense of private property. Another thing that I found problematic is the Austrian definition of economics as a study of implications of human actions but not of the motivations fueling human action. It is true that this definition helps economists to focus much clearly to their objects of study. But it also asks for highly inter-disciplinary works for further progress of the understanding of the economy. Presently, such work seemed not very enthusiastically undertaken by the people of Mises Institute. PIC 2 Hoppe giving the ending speech in the dinner area
The Experience
It was not perhaps the best seven days of my life but definitely the most academically challenging and stimulating seven. While I was there, I used to mail a lot to my friends (and to other people, misfortunate enough to have their mail addresses in my address book), writing on and on about how much I hated Mises Institute. Yes, how much I hated Mises Institute. Parth wrote me a mail, asking me to try to take the best of it and chuck the rest. And I tried to follow that, succeeding more or less. So when you are reading this account of mine, do not think for a second that I am this hip dude who went all the way to the famed Mises Institute before turning twenty and stole all the show with his obvious wit and charm. I was nothing more than a lost soul, floating around, not able to connect with anybody. I was a first year student of economics, so didn’t knew much of economics and even less of Austrian economic thought. Among Austrian literature what I have read before going was mostly Hayek’s philosophical writings and Kirzner on entrepreneurship. Going to Mises Institute, I had to face the rule of the land as both Hayek’s and Kirzner’s ideas got completely blasted away during the first days. So first had to unlearn what I knew and then start learning. The learning curve was made even steeper by the fact that I didn’t had a basic understanding of the alternative to Hayek and Kirzner, who are as I come to know – Mises and Rothbard. So I had to face the advanced lectures without knowing the fundamentals. But the experience was unique and exciting nonetheless, and very, very challenging. The whole ambience intimidated me so much that I returned with a stash of books on Austrian thought and a vow to read them through and thorough. Still a long way to go on that work though. So most of the interest that I have now for Austrian school is really an aftermath of this experience. While staying there, I hated it. But now it seems so wonderful. To confront one’s worst fears of being utterly academically insignificant in such a small time, can only bring one to introspection about what one has done and what remains to be done. Mises experience facilitated this very necessary introspection and perhaps it wouldn’t have been possible had it been less academically draining. What interests me most is the vast quantity of areas of analysis yet to be touched by the Austrian methodology. Thus allowing a huge playground for an exploring and dabbling child like me. PIC 3 The participants and the faculty of Mises University 2004 (Second Session)
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