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Jude, The big question of independence is independent of what? If being subservient to financial masters prevents free thought, does having independent means allow you to think freely about the problems of some people having independent means while the rest of the world cannot? Back in about 1975, I was part of a group of people talking to jazz guitarist Joe Pass. Pass was saying that a good musician should be able to play anything he could think. Someone asked him if he could play anything he could think or if he could only think what he could play. Pass clearly thought it was college boy sophistry. I didn't bother mentioning that he could think but couldn't play a note four octaves below middle C or that I played pedal steel so could play a chord, bend two notes up, then seamlessly slide up a fifth, ending up in an inversion of the first chord; I was reasonably certain that he couldn't do that but the fact that everyone who played steel could meant that it was thinkable. Joe Pass was a great guitarist but was limited to what you can do with a guitar. Fred Hayek's thoughts were limited by his circumstances, too and would have been no matter what his circumstances were. As you indicated by positing his reaction to an end of private property, he couldn't suddenly turn his guitar into a trombone. But it's also not clear that Hayek could be fully captured by his own circumstances (or his own view of his own circumstances): http://www.thenation.com/article/163672/charles-koch-friedrich-hayek-use-social-security# Gunnar Gunnar Swanson East Carolina University graphic design program http://www.ecu.edu/cs-cfac/soad/graphic/index.cfm [log in to unmask] Gunnar Swanson Design Office 1901 East 6th Street Greenville NC 27858 USA http://www.gunnarswanson.com [log in to unmask] +1 252 258-7006 On Aug 10, 2013, at 3:57 AM, "CHUA Soo Meng Jude (PLS)" <[log in to unmask]> wrote: > Dear Gunnar > > HAhaa, I like your sunburn metaphor very much! > > Yes, there will be problems if one thinks that simply being independent one is free to general original ideas, or convention. One could say that financial independence affords good and bad ideas, original or convential ideas indifferently. But I've been thinking about Hayek, and I wonder if he's working out the basic sine qua non conditions of original ideation. In other words, the argument is not (very crudely put): > > A1: if q: one is financially independent, then p: there will be original ideas > > Rather, it appears to me (and I don't mean to say this is my own settle position either) > > A2: If p: there are original ideas, then q: there must have been independence. > > Looking at this A2, we see that it does not say A1. if A1 is derived from A2, that would be a derivation that commits the fallacy of affirming the consequent. > > Rather what is valid is: since, p implies q, then not q implies not p (modus tollens) > > Hence, if there is no independence (not q), then there will be no original ideas (not p). > > SO hayek admits that indepedence does not always lead to good, but if you are to give good / (actually not necessarily good, but at least original) ideas a chance, then you must have indepedence. > > I think for this reason Hayek says that sometimes we should pay some mavericks to come up with crazy ideas. > > I''m not against the University! I am a university man! But I am thinking, how can we design university institutions so that mad ideaas get some protection, perhaps this is what Hayek says to us. > The tenure system must protect, to borrow James MArch, catechists of heresy - perhaps? > Still, whatever I think Mavericks should try not to be rude to administrators, or else it makes it hard to look after these... > > > > Jude > > > ________________________________________ > From: PhD-Design - This list is for discussion of PhD studies and related research in Design [[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Gunnar Swanson [[log in to unmask]] > Sent: Thursday, August 08, 2013 11:16 PM > To: [log in to unmask] > Subject: Hayek; was: Universities and Research > > On Aug 6, 2013, at 9:18 PM, CHUA Soo Meng Jude (PLS) <[log in to unmask]> wrote: >> I wondered if there is something worth looking at in F A Hayek here, in his notion of the gentleman scholar, or man of indepednent means, with ownership of property and hence indepedence, and not under coercive duress: here there is room for originality and ideas that dare to contradict paymasters, and convention. > > One doesn't need to be a full-on economic determinist to get a bad sunburn through the holes in that particular Hayek assumption (which is not to say that universities don't manage to impose their own assumed interests on scholarship.) > > National Institute of Education (Singapore) http://www.nie.edu.sg > > DISCLAIMER : The information contained in this email, including any attachments, may contain confidential information. > This email is intended only for the use of the addressee(s) listed above. Unauthorised sight, dissemination or any other > use of the information contained in this email is strictly prohibited. If you have received this email by fault, please > notify the sender and delete it immediately. > > > ----------------------------------------------------------------- > PhD-Design mailing list <[log in to unmask]> > Discussion of PhD studies and related research in Design > Subscribe or Unsubscribe at https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/phd-design > ----------------------------------------------------------------- ----------------------------------------------------------------- PhD-Design mailing list <[log in to unmask]> Discussion of PhD studies and related research in Design Subscribe or Unsubscribe at https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/phd-design -----------------------------------------------------------------