Action-based jurisprudence
- Highlight Loc. 1130-36 | Added on Wednesday, September 21, 2011, 12:53 AM
Huerta de Soto likens the role of ethical principles to “automatic pilots” (173) that provide ex ante guides for action. He contrasts this with attempts to weigh each and every action in terms of perceived costs and benefits. He demonstrates how such an attempted pragmatic approach is actually a largely hopeless and ill-conceived task from the point of view of economic theory (170). Covey (1989) similarly reformulates traditional ethical principles in contemporary terms as “habits” or “practices.” Such habits have various degrees of likelihood of creating long-term patterns of individual and group success, patterns that are demonstrably superior to the results of attempts to weigh the “costs and benefits” of each action in advance in the absence of such guidelines.
- Highlight Loc. 1130-36 | Added on Wednesday, September 21, 2011, 12:53 AM
Huerta de Soto likens the role of ethical principles to “automatic pilots” (173) that provide ex ante guides for action. He contrasts this with attempts to weigh each and every action in terms of perceived costs and benefits. He demonstrates how such an attempted pragmatic approach is actually a largely hopeless and ill-conceived task from the point of view of economic theory (170). Covey (1989) similarly reformulates traditional ethical principles in contemporary terms as “habits” or “practices.” Such habits have various degrees of likelihood of creating long-term patterns of individual and group success, patterns that are demonstrably superior to the results of attempts to weigh the “costs and benefits” of each action in advance in the absence of such guidelines.
