Speaking of Smith Archives

People - Not Pieces in a Politician's Plan

March 3, 2022

Smith does not only think it’s necessary to accept individuals as imperfect, but he also warns against the desire to try to perfect humankind. A view of people as chess pieces on a board, acting by rules which are known and easy to understand takes away individual autonomy and liberty. It is to expect them to act according to one’s own desires rather than accepting that they follow their own interests and passions.

I Was Saved by Division of Labor

March 1, 2022

No one in the “republic of science” foresaw the set of spontaneous orders that would be elaborated and constantly updated when the foundational discoveries were being made. Nevertheless, this procedure, “catheter ablation for A-fib,” is now performed 80,000 times each year in the U.S., and many times that number around the world.

What Would We Do Without Division of Labor?

February 24, 2022

By doing tasks in a predictable manner, one becomes a master of his own craft and starts to enjoy the fruits of his work, becoming more and more satisfied as time goes by. He or she starts to seek ways to achieve greater efficiency and in doing so, innovation happens, and sometimes new discoveries occur.

What Adam Smith Ate: Tea (& maybe Breakfast Scones)

February 23, 2022

Tea in Scotland during Smith’s time was a critical component of breakfast (along with coffee, which was more common at home in Scotland than in England). A classic breakfast during Smith’s time was tea and toast – or rolls. (And for Smith, sometimes even strawberries) It was also an important social ritual during the day.

Great Minds Think Alike: Adam Smith & Confucius on Morality

February 22, 2022

Studying TMS and The Analects comparatively shows that Smith’s rendering of prudence and self-command is among the virtues of a junzi. Although Confucius would not consider a Smithian prudent man as a junzi, he would appreciate many of the properties that a Smithian prudent man possesses.

Smith and Individualism

February 17, 2022

Individualism is about personal freedom but more than that – it’s about taking each other’s humanity, including our own agency, seriously. When we desire to be loved by other persons, we thereby presume all others are valid sources of worth and recognition. When we desire to be lovely, we thereby consider ourselves responsible for treating all other persons as valid sources of worth and recognition in our interactions with them, while expecting the same responsibility by them toward ourselves.

Adam Smith Suggests You Read a Romance Novel (And Have a Laugh At Yourself)

February 14, 2022

Smith answers in advance a certain criticism that people often start leveling at him around Valentine’s Day: that he thinks love is “ridiculous.” Nope. No more than he finds studies or professions ridiculous. It’s just that they don’t and can’t have the same value to everyone. If they did, the whole world would be in love with one thing or person.

Freedom is Different People: Cities & Inclusive Freedom

February 10, 2022

Cities, and the diverse others that we find there, help fuel cultural, social, and political innovations as well. What we can do, and who we can be expands when there are other people around. This is especially true when those other people bring different ideas, different values, and different skills to the systems of social cooperation that we are embedded in. Those differences fuel the expansion of our capacities.

A Mother’s Suffering through the Eyes of Adam Smith

February 9, 2022

The connections forged by sympathy among human beings can be life enhancing, as in the case of a mother’s feelings for a sick child. The mother’s fellow-feelings and experiences of the world motivates her to do something to lessen the child’s suffering which helps the child. There is a downside as well.

If Bernard Mandeville is Larry David, who's Jerry Seinfeld? Adam Smith, of course.

February 8, 2022

Smith's review on Mandeville’s has an interesting presentation: In ‘The Theory of Moral Sentiments,’ Smith reviews the great systems of moral philosophy and devotes a long chapter to Mandeville, who he judges as "licentious" and "wholly pernicious," in the sense that he takes away altogether the distinction between vice and virtue.

Adam Smith peeks in at the new series The Gilded Age

February 3, 2022

The perceived discontinuity between Adam Smith’s Theory of Moral Sentiments and the Wealth of Nations is so famous as to have been dubbed, “Das Adam Smith Problem.” But as individuals we weave in and out of the situations he’s describing in both works all the time, often within minutes of each other. I was reminded of this thought watching the premier of Julian Fellowes’ The Gilded Age on HBO... What comes next reveals an understanding of how impersonal markets work right next to personal human sympathy.

Adam Smith, Madame Geneva, and the Consequences of Liquor Prohibition

February 1, 2022

When it came to using government to stem the tide of drunkenness, Smith wasn’t necessarily convinced it was the right answer. As he notes in 1762 in his Lectures on Jurisprudence “It is said indeed that taxes on those liquors prevent drunkenness, but the conterary [sic] is probably the case. By raising their price, they make them an object of their desire … We see accordingly that in Spain and France, where all liquors are very cheap, there is less drunkenness than in this country.”