Table of Contents

Preface

Some Preliminary Observations Concerning Praxeology Instead of an Introduction

1. The Permanent Substratum of Epistemology

2. On Action

3. On Economics

4. The Starting Point of Praxeological Thinking

5. The Reality of the External World

6. Causality and Teleology

7. The Category of Action

8. The Sciences of Human Action

Chapter 1 — THE HUMAN MIND

1. The Logical Structure of the Human Mind

2. A Hypothesis about the Origin of the A Priori Categories

3. The A Priori

4. The A Priori Representation of Reality

5. Induction

6. The Paradox of Probability Empiricism

7. Materialism

8. The Absurdity of Any Materialistic Philosophy

Chapter 2 — THE ACTIVISTIC BASIS OF KNOWLEDGE

1. Man and Action

2. Finality

3. Valuation

4. The Chimera of Unified Science

5. The Two Branches of the Sciences of Human Action

6. The Logical Character of Praxeology

7. The Logical Character of History

8. The Thymological Method

Chapter 3 — NECESSITY AND VOLITION

1. The Infinite

2. The Ultimate Given

3. Statistics

4. Free Will

5. Inevitability

Chapter 4 — CERTAINTY AND UNCERTAINTY

1. The Problem of Quantitative Definiteness

2. Certain Knowledge

3. The Uncertainty of the Future

4. Quantification and Understanding in Acting and in History

5. The Precariousness of Forecasting in Human Affairs

6. Economic Prediction and the Trend Doctrine

7. Decision-Making

8. Confirmation and Refutability

9. The Examination of Praxeological Theorems

Chapter 5 — ON SOME POPULAR ERRORS CONCERNING THE SCOPE AND METHOD OF ECONOMICS

1. The Research Fable

2. The Study of Motives

3. Theory and Practice

4. The Pitfalls of Hypostatization

5. On the Rejection of Methodological Individualism

6. The Approach of Macroeconomics

7. Reality and Play

8. Misinterpretation of the Climate of Opinion

9. The Belief in the Omnipotence of Thought

10. The Concept of a Perfect System of Government

11. The Behavioral Sciences

Chapter 6 — FURTHER IMPLICATIONS OF THE NEGLECT OF ECONOMIC THINKING

1. The Zoological Approach to Human Problems

2. The Approach of the “Social Sciences”

3. The Approach of Economics

4. A Remark about Legal Terminology

5. The Sovereignty of the Consumers

Chapter 7 — THE EPISTEMOLOGICAL ROOTS OF MONISM

1. The Nonexperimental Character of Monism

2. The Historical Setting of Positivism

3. The Case of the Natural Sciences

4. The Case of the Sciences of Human Action

5. The Fallacies of Positivism

Chapter 8 — POSITIVISM AND THE CRISIS OF WESTERN CIVILIZATION

1. The Misinterpretation of the Universe

2. The Misinterpretation of the Human Condition

3. The Cult of Science

4. The Epistemological Support of Totalitarianism

5. The Consequences

NOTES

INDEX