A small point, if I may: Having carried out at least a little research on Keynes, I have not come across any evidence of personal contact between him and Samuelson. The same applies, I think, to Keynes and Coase. I am happy to be corrected. Friedman had one contact with Keynes. See here for details: https://mostlyeconomics.wordpress.com/2010/08/16/when-keynes-rejected-friedmans-paper/ As ever Bob On Thu, May 29, 2014 21:03, Rosser, John Barkley - rosserjb wrote: > Mason, > Please reread my post carefully. What you attribute to me was a quote > from a paper mostly about "Friedrich von Hayek" by Paul Samuelson that > was published in the Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization in its > January 2009 issue, of which I was the editor at the time. I noted that > the quote appeared near the end of a long final footnote. I do believe > that you are aware that Samuelson was much more favorably disposed to the > economic views of Keynes than he was to those of Hayek (many of which he > criticized in the paper, but I have not repeated any of that). Therefore > the "I" in this quotation is Samuelson, someone sympathetic to Keynes's > economic views and not at all out to knock down those views based on his > personal prejudices, not me. I commented that I thought repeating > Samuelson's judgment of this paper by Reder was important in that a) > Samuelson essentially agrees with Reder, and b) Samuelson was at the time > the last living person who had not only known all three of them > personally: Hayek, Schumpeter, and Keynes (Coase probably knew all of > them also), but had himself been the victim of anti-Semitism at Harvard > when they failed to hire him, although it has long been reported that > Schumpeter claimed it was because the faculty was jealous of him. I did > not spell this last point out in my previous post on this matter. > > ________________________________________ > From: Societies for the History of Economics [[log in to unmask]] on behalf of > mason gaffney [[log in to unmask]] Sent: Thursday, May 29, 2014 > 10:42 AM > To: [log in to unmask] > Subject: Re: [SHOE] "von" Hayek's "very well-deserved" 1974 Nobel Prize in > Economic Sciences > > > Rosser writes: " Reder (2000) has provided a useful exploration of such > unpleasantries. Central to his expositions were appraisals of the triad > John Maynard Keynes, Joseph A. Schumpeter and Friedrich Hayek, on the > subject of anti-semitism. Unexpectedly, I was forced to in the end to > conclude that Keynes's lifetime profile was the worst of the three. In > the record of his letters to wife and other Bloomsburg buddies, Keynes > apparently remained in viewpoint much the same as in his Eton essay on > the subject as a callow seventeen-year-old." > > I claim no insight into Keynes, except that there are other kinds of > religious bigotry than anti-Semitism. Keynes "Economic Consequences of > the Peace", however prescient it may have been otherwise, attacked > Woodrow Wilson repeatedly for his Presbyterianism. > Others who have researched the following point (I have not) may want to > comment on frequent allegations by anti-Keynesians that leading Nazis > thought highly of The General Theory, and accepted Keynes into their > circles. > > Mason Gaffney > > > -----Original Message----- > From: Societies for the History of Economics [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On > Behalf Of Robert Leeson > Sent: Thursday, May 22, 2014 3:52 AM > To: [log in to unmask] > Subject: [SHOE] "von" Hayek's "very well-deserved" 1974 Nobel Prize in > Economic Sciences > > > A legitimate noble title requires a legitimate royal source. Coats of > arms and titles (“von,” “Archduke”, “Count” etc) were abolished on 3 > April 1919 by the Adelsaufhebungsgesetz, the Law on the Abolition of > Nobility, by a "republic of peasants and workers" (von Hayek 1978). > Violators face fines or six months jail. > > > Hayek (1994, 37) referred to “the minor title of nobility (the ‘von’) > which the family still bears”. The Times (17 December 1931) reported that > “von Hayek” had been appointed to the Tooke Professorship; The Times (19 > October 1932) published a letter from “von" Hayek on ‘Spending and Saving > Public Works from Rates’; in a letter to The Times, Hayek (14 November > 1981) professed deep indignation that “von” had been attached to his > name: perhaps even Labour MPs could be “shamed” into not answering > arguments by reference to “descent.” > > Hayek repeatedly attached the illegal “von" to his publications: > including, symbolically, his 1935 Economica essay on ‘The Maintenance of > Capital’. > > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "John Barkley Rosser - rosserjb" <[log in to unmask]> > To: [log in to unmask] > Sent: Thursday, 22 May, 2014 4:24:15 AM > Subject: Re: [SHOE] The "very well-deserved" 1974 Nobel Prize in Economic > Sciences > > > I really should stay out of this distasteful set of threads,but as the > then-editor who published Paul Samuelson's "A few remembrances of > Friedrich von Hayek (1899-1992)" in JEBO in 2009, I think I should add a > few remarks largely drawn on that paper, which I had correspondence with > the late Samuelson regarding prior to its publication. Four points. > > 1) The first is not tied to that article and is simply to state that I > support the editors of this list in their efforts to provide an open > forum for free discussion, despite ensuing difficulties. > > 2) On the matter of Hayek's Nobel, Samuelson supported it, although for > his role in introducing "information economics," not for his role in > business cycle theory regarding which Samuelson was fairly critical (and > much of the paper comes down pretty hard on Hayek on various matters, > with many Austrians not pleased with this paper by Samuelson). Anyway, > the paper opens with the following: > > "Hayek was the seventh to receive the Bank of Sweden's new Nobel Prize in > economics. In my judgment his was a worthy choice. And yet in the 1974 > senior commons rooms of Harvard and MIT, the majority of the inhabitants > there seemed not to even know the name of this new laureate." > > And later in the paper: > > > "In the 1940s Friedrich Hayek in an invited Harvard lecture introduced a > new dynamic element into the debate [the socialist calculation debate]. > Call it "information economics." The broad competitive markets, Hayek > proclaimed, were the recipients of heterogeneous idiosyncratic bits of > individual' information. Playing for matches rather than for real money > or blood was as different an economic dynamics as night is from day. I was > not at all the only one to be converted to the view that, as between Abba > Lerner, Oskar Lange and Ludwig von mises, Friedrich Hayek was actually > the debate's winner."... "Hayek's 1974 Stockholm Nobel Prize was > importantly won for him by his notions about decentralized information > economics discussed that day in Cambridge, Massachusetts." > > 3) Given that the unpleasant matter of anti-Semitism and the famous > article by Reder (2000) has been raised, I shall also provide Samuelson's > comment on this, which occurred near the end of a long final footnote to > the paper, and which I think is particularly relevant given that he was > arguably at the time the last living person directly affected by the > issue at hand. > > "Most of my gifted mentors, born in the nineteenth century, lacked > today's "political (and ethnic) correctness." There were of course some > honorable exceptions among both my Yankee and European teachers. Reder > (2000) has provided a useful exploration of such unpleasantries. Central > to his expositions were appraisals of the triad John Maynard Keynes, > Joseph A. Schumpeter and Friedrich Hayek, on the subject of > anti-semitism. Unexpectedly, I was forced to in the end to conclude that > Keynes's lifetime profile was the worst of the three. In the record of > his letters to wife and other Bloomsburg buddies, Keynes apparently > remained in viewpoint much the same as in his Eton essay on the subject > as a callow seventeen-year-old. Hayek, I came to realize, seemed to the > one of the three who at leat tried to grow beyond his early conditioning. > The full record suggests that he did not succeed fully in cleansing those > Augean Stables. Still, a B grade for effort does trump a C- grade." > > > 4) And finally a trivial note on his using "von Hayek" in the title of > the paper while referring to "Friedrich Hayek" regularly in the text. I > urged him to do the latter, but he would not bend on the former, arguing > that this was the name used by the Nobel Prize committee when it awarded > him the prize, and if Hayek did not object to them doing so, then he > would use it in that location. > > My own view on this is that people should be called what they choose to > be called. While Hayek used the "von" on publications in German in the > 20s, after then he used "F.A. Hayek" for his later work, particularly in > English, although I am aware that for some time afterwards he still used > the "von" in private social correspondence. OTOH, his mentor always used > "Ludwig von Mises" on all his publications, which makes me somewhat > amused by how so many Austrians seem to violate his wishes by referring > to him as just "Mises," although Samuelson did so at one point in this > paper as well. As far as I am concerned, they should be "Hayek" and "von > Mises" respectively, but this really is a trivial matter more of interest > to overly anal journal editors. > > ________________________________________ > From: Societies for the History of Economics [[log in to unmask]] on behalf of > Robert Leeson [[log in to unmask]] > Sent: Wednesday, May 21, 2014 7:10 AM > To: [log in to unmask] > Subject: [SHOE] The "very well-deserved" 1974 Nobel Prize in Economic > Sciences > > > "von Hayek's contributions in the field of economic theory are both > profound and original ... He tried to penetrate more deeply into the > business cycle mechanism than was usual at that time. Perhaps, partly due > to this more profound analysis, he was one of the few economists who gave > warning of the possibility of a major economic crisis before the great > crash came in the autumn of 1929." > > http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/economic-sciences/laureates/1974/p > ress.html > > Could Alan provide the evidence? > > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Alan G Isaac" <[log in to unmask]> > To: [log in to unmask] > Sent: Tuesday, 20 May, 2014 8:53:44 PM > Subject: Re: [SHOE] The Hayek question > > > On 5/20/2014 7:07 AM, Robert Leeson quoted: > >> Austrians have framed Friedman ("fascist"), Pigou >> ("communist spy"), Phillips ("underground communist") and >> Keynes (a “Godhating, principle-hating, State-loving >> homosexual pervert”; Keynesians have “pushed the world into evil, and >> therefore toward God’s righteous judgment”). > > > Are you proposing Gary North as a representative "Austrian"? > I don't think his association with the Ludwig von Mises > Institute, however regrettable it might be, earns him that > honor. > > I largely agree with Eloy: the posted project outline struck > my ears as a near-comical call for the promotion of ad hominem and guilt by > association, not like a proposal for historical investigation. Of course > that may not be the project's intent; it may just reflect a desire to > present it in a provocative and combative way. > > I would like to stress that I am not suggesting that a project > that asks why cranks are attracted to certain kinds of ideas need be > without merit, as long as there is no presumption that the attraction of > cranks to an idea implies that it is a crank idea. I also think that it > can be reasonable to document the moral failings of a writer, especially > one who seems to attract hagiography. So I would not suggest that Hayek's > involvement with Pinochet or von Mises brief praise of fascism are not > fair topics for discussion, as long as the discussion acknowledges that > lapses in moral judgment do not immediately translate into general > theoretical error. > > Although I was mostly amused, I did find offensive the > apparent suggestion that historians of economics might be qualified to > diagnose mental disease, and the apparent implication that such diagnoses > could shed light on the quality of theory produced by a mind. It may be > worth recalling that a very well-deserved "Nobel Prize in Economics" was > awarded to a man whose struggles with serious mental illness are a matter > of record. > > Cheers, > Alan Isaac