Altug, Ramzi,

AY  > This suggests that the scholarly world is a world of positive
epistemic costs in which negative externalities are not always and perfectly
self-corrective. Perfect solutions do not come about so easily because
scholarly mechanisms, such as refereeing and reviewing as well as the ethics
of scholarly behaviour and certain codes of act, including the issue of
liability, that help increase the productivity of scientific processes,
cannot fully correct or cure the harmful consequences of individual
scholarship. The problem of epistemic cost is that we do NOT “update old
beliefs” in the face of counter-evidence and errors frequently remain
uncorrected.

>  Reminding the SHOE-List Ramzi Mabsout’s original question: would anybody
suggest any cases in which old habits of thought prevent scholars from
changing their minds despite the fact that there is sufficient evidence to
abandon a refuted paradigm?

1)  The paradigm that the historical coinage denomination structures (in
gold, silver copper….) delivered by mints to the population were primarily
determined by accidents of the productivity of mines, rather than say,
motives to do with class interest and profit.  

This paradigm was followed by such as Braudel, Day and Spufford (the latter
with caveats) despite the contrary evidenced of Watson (EHR 1967). 
Especially thought provoking, IMO, is the fact that Braudel was heavily
funded by Ford Foundation for the value of his political influence, and the
critic, Watson, was also funded by FF, immediately after 1967, but rather to
go study a different topic.  My fear is that the conceptual framework of
non-specialist funding administrators was a crucial (bad) “old habit” here
which, coupled with certain political prejudices, (those of one of Popper’s
LSE philosophical opponents, Oakeshott, to do with not rocking the boat,
spring to mind) might have influenced the course of scholarly events
fundamentally.

2)  The paradigm that in the good old days, a pound of silver actually
weighed a pound

I suppose everyone does want to believe this, but the problem arises when we
start to tie down when and where these good old days actually were?  In a
recent study, which is being widely promoted, especially by fellow
associates of the Federal Reserve Banks, Thomas Sargent (The Big Problem of
Small Change) cites Charlemagne, and his successors, as following such a
practice.  This seems to be carried forward entirely upon the hope that
readers will share the author’s ‘bad habit’ in this regard, as no evidence
is put up for it.  Evidence that it is wrong, and Charlemagne (c. 780 AD)
charged a seigniorage on coin, came from say Grierson’s study of coins and
medieval documents back in the 1960s.  That it would be wrong for earlier
Pagan Anglo Saxons comes from Scull’s study of 7th century AD weight sets. 
Evidence that it was wrong for the first coiners, Lydians, in the 7th
century BC came long since from Sture Bolin and it ever accumulates.  All
this evidence, coming from individual researchers, seems to have made little
dent in this paradigm “bad habit” which is centuries old, and is preferred
and often times stoutly defended by what seems to be majority, a majority
however who have not researched the matter

3)  The paradigm that a metrological grain derives in practice from the
weight of a physical grain of barley or wheat, at any time within recorded
history, seems to go from strength to strength, generation after generation,
within and without academia, no matter how many knowledgeable individuals
try to stem its flow (I will spare the details, though can supply)

I just checked my copy of Quine's “Word and Object”, it is the 1970 edition.
 Thus it seems that my decision to ground my own rudimentary work upon
physical Objects (old coins) rather than Words (historical sources and
theoretical constructs) has passed its 40th birthday.   I would have to say
that on the basis of my own experiences the suggestion that “negative
externalities are not always and perfectly self-corrective” is a
misrepresentation of what goes on in studies of monetary history.  The
fundamental dominant theories seem to remain precisely what you call the bad
habits, and it is in practice a mistake to try correct these habits using
mere facts, since any such efforts will almost always be brushed aside, on
whatever flimsy pretext comes most easily to hand.  

My own efforts at correcting such theories using “negative externalities”
seem to me akin to those of Lilliputians shooting their arrows at Gulliver.
 At most all you achieve is to the rile the guy a little.

Rob Tye, York, UK