Re: Hume and constraint based theories

[paul cockshott <clyder@xxxxxxxxxx>]

 Ian wrote:

Hello Ajit,

>If you are referring to Sraffa's book, then, of
>course, Sraffa is not developing any causal theory
>there.

In its typical form it's a constraint-based theory,
in the sense that it defines a set of logically possible
configurations of an economy given the assumption of
reproduction and information regarding technical constraints
between commodity types. I agree it is not a causal theory.
The fact that mathematically it is expressed as
solutions to a set of simultaneous equations (i.e,
constraints on possible values of variables) is a sign
of that.
 ---------------------------------------------------------

Paul Comments

Such constraints based theories are also commonplace in
physics. Both quantum and classical mechanics have the
same structure at the level of abstraction you define.

One has to be careful when one suggests that cause is
something other than constraints plus boundary conditions.