'Alwash isn't afraid of dreaming. And when he glides through his beloved marshlands in a boat during the evening, his dream seems within reach. "I see floating reed hotels and camping sites," he says. "I see glass-bottomed kayaks, hikers, paragliders and hot-air balloons." His minders listen to him, their weapons lowered.'
- Samiha Shafy,
Restoring the Paradise that Saddam Destroyed, 08/03/2010
'Subjectivism ... At higher levels, on the other hand, the individual decision may be recognized as incorporating in an essential way the discovery of what that environment is or is likely to be. Or again, it may be held as creating that environment in devising feasible courses of action that were hitherto nonexistent.''The Misesian notion of purposeful human action bears resemblance in many respects, of course, to the concept of the individual decision in standard neoclassical microeconomic theory. But it is by now fairly well recognized that for Mises human action embraced far more than the simple economizing decision of neoclassical theory.
The difference between the two concepts draws attention, in turn, to different levels of subjectivism identified in chapters of this book. Methodological individualism, although insisting on tracing market phenomena back to their roots in individual action, is consistent, in principle, with a variety of levels at which the subjectivity of action may be recognized.
At the lowest level, perhaps, the individual is viewed as merely reacting in programmed, maximizing fashion to the environment that confronts him. Subjectivism is here confined to recognizing the given configuration of tastes and expectations with which the individual is somehow viewed as being endowed.
At higher levels, on the other hand, the individual decision may be recognized as incorporating in an essential way the
discovery of what that environment is or is likely to be. Or again, it may be held as
creating that environment in devising feasible courses of action that were hitherto nonexistent.'
- Israel M. Kirzner, (
Method, Process and Austrian Economics. page(s) 3, 4)