Praxgirl/episode 2

Retrieval

• Link: Praxeology - Episode 2 - Methodology
• Length: 4:42
• Notes: As of 2013-03-09, the video is prefaced by a 90-second advertisement which can be skipped after 15 seconds. The content starts with a brief recap of the previous episode; new information starts around the 20-second mark.

Synopsis

"Unlike chemistry or physics, when approaching human beings, praxeology has to employ a method of acquiring knowledge that does not rely on observation but on discursive reasoning -- or we may say 'logical deduction'. The laws that Praxeology arrives at are necessarily true and universal because they're logically implied by simple and undeniable facts."

"A fact is undeniable when any attempt to deny it must prove it to be true. Once we state one of these undeniable facts, we're able to discover further implied truths that hold at all times and to all individuals, regardless of sex, race, creed, or color. As long as the implied arguments are valid and their premises based on the initial undeniable truth, the soundness in every step of the logical chain is incontestable."

The starting point of Praxeology is one of these "undeniable truths": "Human action is purposeful behavior."

(Just in case there's any doubt, she reiterates that all of Praxeology is based on this statement.)

This axiom is undeniable because in order to deny it, you have to act purposefully. ...therefore "logical deduction is the only necessary and fitting method to come to this conclusion." (eh wut?)

"...you might be asking yourself 'Is it appropriate to study human action through observation, or what scientists like to call induction?' To answer this we need only to consider the separation between the objects that sciences like chemistry or physics like to study and the unique characteristic of human beings that we stated before in our axiom. These sciences can plot out the courses of stones, atoms, or planets through cause and effect, but humans differ categorically in one key way: human being act! They have goals and purposes, and they try to achieve those goals. Stones, atoms, planets have no goals or preferences; hence, they either move or are moved. They cannot choose, select paths of action, or change their minds. [...] People cannot be quantified. People cannot be slotted and predicted as can objects without minds or without the capacity to learn and choose. The Action Axiom shows that the uniqueness of all individuals is the logically necessary starting point for studying human behavior."

Scientists have tried to disprove this, "but we can easily see how silly and futile their attempts are."

(There is a brief interlude at Grand Central Station, where we're apparently supposed to be impressed yet again with how silly her straw-man is.)

"To try and box humans into the type of predictable data and statistics that work in sciences like biology, astronomy, or geology is not only completely inappropriate, but is essentially a denial of the Action Axiom, a contradiction."

She concludes with:

"Logically, the search for complete predictability in the realm of human action is the search for the impossible, and is therefore PROFOUNDLY UNSCIENTIFIC."

Analysis

This sounds suspiciously like pseudoscience, since a key element of science is reliance on observation to test hypotheses. If an hypothesis can't be falsified, then it has no scientific value.