New Economy: Love and Non-Love

What is the use of economy if it doesn't help us get what we want. Am currently in middle completing simple models to see which economy does this best. But in meantime the central problem of life is getting what we want.

There are things we want like a meal. But in particular the issue is what we light call "love". Despite the Greeks having 7 works for love (viz. Eros, Philia, Storge, Agape, Ludus, Pragma, Philautia) none quite fit what I mean here. The Indians have 5 (viz. Kama, Shringara, Maitri, Bhakti, Atma-Prema). I think I mean closest to प्रेम or prema of which the highest form is Atma-Prema.

Prema as I mean here (probably not its correct sanskrit usage) is a deep connection with the object. It is when we have an experience and that feels to say something to use very deeply. We feel grounded, and peaceful and wanting for nothing more. We feel more profoundly that we have found what we are searching for, but we feel that we too have been found. We are finally still inside and no longer craving. If this experience is with someone then we can attribute the sense of being found to their "gaze" and point-of-view but if we find it in nature then it is less easy to explain "who" has found us. Never-the-less the experience is the same.

In Indian thought the "being found" is double sides. Finding what we want "in the world" is the same as "finding our self" because "self is world" or "Tat tvam asi." But we need to love more deeply than the usual confused "hunter" form where we believe that "we are seeking something." It is seeking us too! The deer may find this hard to explain, but when the hunter finds the deer the deer also finds the hunter. They are intimately connected. This goes back to the San people in the first post on economics. The world always obeys Newtons 2nd Law. It is made of nothing more or less than equal interactions. In contemporary economics consumers (inspired by Adam Smith's "Invisible Hand") believe that they need only hunt, and the producers only need to provide. This is in a way true. But consumers and producers have a more profound place in the world: they can both see that they form an inseparable bond. The waitress is not just the deer being hunted by the customer. While the waitress may do her job well, and the customer may pay and tip correctly this is not the whole transaction. These are people, and part of world. There is a whole universe not accounted for in contemporary economics. Whether this unaccounted for universe has a bearing on transactions is what I intend to find out.

But returning to Prema does not last long. Tho it can last many years or decades, and full enlightenment goes above the ocean of the impermanent world all together. But for lesser prema we can become obsessed about the experience because we want to hold onto this peace. The world outside this experience or person now seems unwelcoming and of no interest to us, because here is where we belong and here is where we can be peaceful.

A few things more. Prema is extremely important. I have this problem with women. You may experience prema with a woman, but she does not have the same level. She may be involved in non-prema relationships that are not so profound. In fact I now believe you should pursue prema because it is important, and if it means obstructing non-prema relationships then so be it.

Another example might be the natural world, and this captures probably the biggest conflict been contemporary economics and conservation. As Joni Mitchell sings "paved paradise and put up a parking lot" though I've always heard "pay paradise and put up a parking lot" because payment cannot replace what is lost. A parking lot we might say is expedient, it enables people to drive into town and park nearby so they can easily go out socialising and shopping. But no-one has any love for a parking lot itself. Meanwhile an area of woods and open fields can be prema to many people. For this reason just like the lover feeling that they are being insulted by their partners causal behaviour, so people who experience areas of nature with prema feel they are being insulted by market forces.

This is not a simple matter of economics, and this ends up being mediated in the political, legal and spiritual realms. The question is whether a more inclusive economics exists that can mediate more deeply between people. I note here how inappropriate it is when politicians base their decisions on economics, when so many people look to politics to overcome the injustices of economics! Any politicians quoting economics is ignoring their responsibility and a mediator of power in themselves.

But we can't blame economics or the world. The experience of Prema while important is up to us ultimately. In Buddhism the experience that the world is like a badly fitting suit is called Dhukka. Prema as I'm using it here are those fleeting experiences where suddenly the world seems to fit.

What Buddha warns us is that experience is always dhukka at some level. No suit can ever fit right all the time because both it and us are always changing. It may have fitted perfectly when the tailor made the last adjustments. But there after every time we go to the wardrobe we have gained or lost weight and nothing fits quite right again. What fits now, won't fit for long. The only way for it to fit all the time is to change with it. But that is easier said than done. At its root economics is not that important to life, and much of the macro-economics like growth and micro-economics like rational agents is built on extremely weak foundations.

So I conclude here just to note the importance of what I will call Prema. This is not casual getting what you want like a new pair of shoes, or a meal. It is when you have that deep connection with something or someone that stops you and gives you a moments peace. It is the support of these experiences that a good economics will promote, and discourage the robotic satisfaction of wishes that is characterised by fast food, bingeing and window shopping. I'll call this for now Aprema.

If Capitalism has one deep criticism it is that it promotes aprema over prema.