“Recent incoming data, taken as a whole, have affected the outlook for economic activity and employment modestly” [Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke addressing a Fed conference (Vindicator (Youngstown, Ohio), 11 June 2008, p. A10).Well. Mr. Bernanke’s testimony would be eminently worthy of Allan Greenspan’s (his predecessor) style of speaking gobbledegook: he speaks as if his statements represent sound economic reasoning. They don’t.
Once again, “data” are statistical abstractions, and they cannot “affect” anything, particularly an “outlook.” That “outlook,” an opinion held by others about the future, is also an abstraction. So, what Mr. Bernanke is really saying is this: “An abstraction affected an abstraction modestly.” Of course, you and I recognize that last statement as utter nonsense.
When one abstracts a particular case, the resulting mental construct can be used as a means of dealing with the external world. If I say, for example, that there are “seventeen chickens sitting on the roost,” I am no longer referring to anything (chickens) in the real world. “Seventeen chickens sitting on the roost” is my mentally convenient way of sorting out the flock of chickens that I see before me. “Seventeen chickens” is my way of talking about the birds I see on the roost. As soon as I utter the words, “seventeen chickens,” I am no longer speaking about something out “there;” instead, I am speaking about my personal means of assessing the characteristics of the flock I see before me. There is no such thing, per se, as “seventeen chickens.” But we need to understand that my abstraction about the chickens, being an abstraction, becomes frighteningly similar to the “data” of our friend, Mr. Bernanke. Can any reasonable person say, then, that “data are sitting on the roost” or “abstractions are sitting on the roost?” Would it even make any sense to attempt to speak in those terms?
Once again, “data” are statistical abstractions, and they cannot “affect” anything, particularly an “outlook.” That “outlook,” an opinion held by others about the future, is also an abstraction. So, what Mr. Bernanke is really saying is this: “An abstraction affected an abstraction modestly.” Of course, you and I recognize that last statement as utter nonsense.
When one abstracts a particular case, the resulting mental construct can be used as a means of dealing with the external world. If I say, for example, that there are “seventeen chickens sitting on the roost,” I am no longer referring to anything (chickens) in the real world. “Seventeen chickens sitting on the roost” is my mentally convenient way of sorting out the flock of chickens that I see before me. “Seventeen chickens” is my way of talking about the birds I see on the roost. As soon as I utter the words, “seventeen chickens,” I am no longer speaking about something out “there;” instead, I am speaking about my personal means of assessing the characteristics of the flock I see before me. There is no such thing, per se, as “seventeen chickens.” But we need to understand that my abstraction about the chickens, being an abstraction, becomes frighteningly similar to the “data” of our friend, Mr. Bernanke. Can any reasonable person say, then, that “data are sitting on the roost” or “abstractions are sitting on the roost?” Would it even make any sense to attempt to speak in those terms?
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