Economic Philosophy of Wealth and Ignorance An Essay in Economic Social Ontology

ムチ　ト　トミ　ノ　ケイザイ　テツガツ　ケイザイ　ノ　シャカイ　ソンザイロン　シロン

カツラギ, マサアキ

Katsuragi, Masaaki

The Economic Society of Osaka University　and　Graduate School of Economics, Osaka University

オオサカ　ダイガク　ケイザイ　ガッカイ オオサカ　ダイガク　ダインガクイン　ケイザイガク　ケンキュウカ

経済哲学

社会存在論

The essence of Tony Lawson’s critique of economic methodology is ontological. He argues the scope of modern economics is severely restricted because of the discipline’s lack of explicit ontology. It is the nature of the object of enquiry that determines the methodology of a discipline. Then, what is the nature of the economic being? This may be considered to have been answered already, that is, scarcity and rationality. Lawson questions noneconomic properties such as atomicity of social being and ubiquity of constant conjunction of social events instead, which are typical implicit presumptions of economic modelling. Surely these presumptions are often inappropriate for explaining social reality. Lawson advocates Social Ontology as a solution for the methodological problems of modern economics. This paper also argues for his solution, however, starts with questions about fundamental properties of economic beings, scarcity and rationality. Georges Bataille, who espouses économie générale and is completely ignored by main stream economics, insists that the fundamental problem of all economy is not how to utilise scarce resources but how to squander l'énergie (la richesse) excédante. His argument seems to be completely opposite of the fundamental problems of mainstream economics. In order to make sense of his argument, the scope of this paper is confined to the historical example of the sacrificial ritual of Aztecs and analyses it in the light of Fernand Braudel, an idea‘wealth’ in economic thought, Antonio Damasio, Steven Mithen and John Searle. The conclusion is that Searle’s type social ontology has a hidden economic dimension that is the real source of creation, including false beliefs in a social world and an economy.