C. Rational money system and market measurement.

Chapter 8. Mercometrics and mercologics.

1. This chapter's goals.

The suggested monetary reform has very important consequences from the point of view of a scientific knowledge of the market.

In this chapter we will see how it is possible to definetly transform the monetary market in «a subject of scientific study» through the use of telematic cheque invoices as the only legal monetary instrument.

2. Present economics as an experimental science.

The scientific character of what today we call economics is certainly very debatable. Economists themselves have not been able to agree if economics is to be considered a scientific matter.

Positions are diverse; but the fundamental question is the principle chosen to establish what is science and what is not. On the one hand, those who apply a rigorous criterion, who consider that scientific matters must be submitted to a severe experimental treatment, admit that economics in the present situation is not at all scientific. On the other hand, those who have broader views say that economics is a science.

From a strict point of view, which is the one defended here, science can be defined as the empiric-phenomenologic pro-experimental knowledge. This mean that all scientific matter implies at least that following conditions should be fulfilled:

If we follow this principle, the first problem to be solved is why economics is not a scientific matter.

This problem of course is to be situated in a wider context of the scientificity of «social sciences» (as it was already said in the introduction. The two main reasons of the present lack of scientific rigour in this field are the two following facts:

In the following pages we will explain how this situation can be overcome.

3. Conceptualization and delimitation of the subject being studied.

«Economics» includes at present a group of approximate notions and of little studied hypotheses, without any rigorous scientific definition to unite them, and without a duly limited field of application.

The division of economics in several different branches, besides their relative importance, is a clearly ideologic matter, since it changes according to different authors and different schools. The same is applicable to the definition of elemental ideas.

To face this situation, we must define exactly and without a possibility of doubt, some basic ideas of a purely phenomenic range, without using ideologies which mix up phenomena with ideals. This is what we have tried to do in the first chapter of this essay. As we have seen, we mention there utilitarianism instead of «economics», meaning a «system for the production and distribution of utilitarian goods in the frame of a community whatsoever», and instead of dealing with an «economic» matter, we deal with utilitarian anthropobiophysics.

In the case of the utilitarian systems in force in the «civilised world», anthropobiophysics is limited to mercologics, and more specifically to «monetary mercologics», since such systems are characterized by the presence of a market conditioned by a money system.

Therefore, the subject of the mercologic science are the monetary markets, defined as «an ensemble of elemental money exchanges in a given time-space». Around this central phenomenic axis can take place the many specialized branches -sectorial, applied, institutional, macro/micro -mercantile, etc- of the matter at study.

With respect to the word «economics», which has so many meanings, here it is used especially to define a given strategy of market equilibrium, in accordance with its original meaning, that is a mercantile technology which will be dealt with in chapters 10 and 12.

4. Experimental confirmation.

The other condition necessary to any matter which aspires to be a science, is the experimental confirmation of the expressed hypotheses.

In spite of its high theoretical value, a deductivist pure reasoning -as that which has been in use for a long time and still is in mercologics- can only produce fully arbitrary explanations, if there is not an exhaustive and permanent contact with the reality of the actual phenomena it is trying to explain.

On the contrary, every matter which wants to obtain effective results and not purely speculative ones, must be realist, that is it must make reference to actual phenomena easy to observe and evaluate in their elements. The applied ideas must be operative, that is they must be easy to identify with the phenomenic reality.

Besides this matter must be able to find out if its principles correspond to actual facts: it must go back to the «battlefield» of the phenomena from where it started, to overcome experimental confirmation.

If all the above is applied to our field of study -the monetary market- we can immediately confirm that the telematic cheque invoice is at present a necessary element to make mercologics an experimental scientific matter.

As a matter of fact the money system is, as we said before, the metric system of the market. Only with an exact metric system is it possible to establish and evaluate the elemental phenomena for the experimental confirmation of any given hypothesis. Thanks to the telematic cheque invoice, the elemental market phenomena (the elemental monetary changes) can be exactly measured and documented, introducing therefore a real mercometrics, which is the necessary basis of any further experimental mercologics.

5. Statistic and statistics.

Many of the models produced to-day by economists on the market or on real trends of utilitarian life, have a quantitative form. But the lack of an adequate metric system makes their experimental confirmation impossible, therefore these models remain a simple theory.

One of the most usual instruments in present day mercologic investigation is made up by statistics¹. Statistics is a mathematic science which allows to deduct, with a given probability degree, the value of some parameters considered in a population, starting from the deep knowledge of parameters in a reduced chosen sample of this population. Therefore statistics allows to apply sample-data to population data, within a chosen degree of probability.

Statistics are used with very good results in many sciences. But in mercologics a problem appears which must be solved. The problem does not concern the legitimity of statistics: the fact is not if a used statistics is applicable or not -since its usefulness has been demonstrated- but to find out if the sample-data used are trustworthy or not.

When we talk about monetary phenomena it must be pointed out that as long as the money system is not rationalized and transformed into a real scientific metric system, the trustworthiness of the sample values will be very doubtful and therefore the application of statistics will fail in its own basis.

The telematic cheque-invoice is therefore a necessary instrument to grant the exact recording of the monetary-merchant phenomena observed and which are to be used later for a statistic generalization.

But it must be pointed out that the existence of mercometrics -a global accountancy, such as the one obtainable by the centralization, according to appropriate programmes, of the telematic monetary network- will cause that in many cases the statistic-deductive treatment will be reserved to new problems, since the values of the monetary parameters considered in the population will become exactly known, and very trustworthy (being the only source of error the telematic system itself).

This accounting centralization of the merchant-monetary activity will be analysed with more detail in the next chapter.

Note:

¹We must clearly distinguish statistics (a mathematical technique) from statistics (a collection of evaluated data).