Thanks for pointing this out, I was not aware of the connection. It’s important to have an understanding of the matrix of influence if at all possible.
Do you know of a resource that makes graphical connections between the worlds theories and philosophy? Something like muckety ‘Mapping connections of the rich, famous & influential’
Edit:
A quick search reveals this quote regarding Menger and maybe questions your assertion:
Menger’s brand of realism and individualism
According to Menger, there is no hierarchy between historical and theoretical research, nor between exact research and empirical-realist research, which lies at the heart of theoretical research. However, Menger’s emphasis on the importance of research of exact types clearly indicates that, for him, the aim of all science was to grasp the essence of phenomena. This stems from an Aristotelian form of realism which suggests that knowledge is acquired first and foremost by understanding the general and shared qualities of different phenomena.
It is interesting to note that Menger does not believe there to be any qualitative difference between natural and social sciences in this respect;
Menger was thus in opposition with neo-kantianism, which was the dominant philosophy in the German-speaking world. During that period, neo-kantianist philosophers attempted to base the scientific character of the ’culture sciences’ on an idiographic (particular, specific) type of knowledge, compared to the nomologic (based on general laws) nature of knowledge in the natural sciences. The German historical school, including Max Weber, based their ideas to a large degree on this notion.
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“The economics of the Austrian school has sought
to offer a methodological alternative to economic positivism and
empiricism, by taking as its starting point this heterogeneity of the
objects of natural and social science: Austrian economics acknowledges
in its fundamental axioms the methodological and ontological centrality
of the economic agent. Now there is one sense in which this centrality
is capable of being established empirically: the economic significance
of human action, deliberation and choice (and of such complementary
notions as gratuitous behaviour and forgetfulness) is repeatedly
verified in observation. But the proponent of Austrian economics goes
further in arguing that there is also a certain a priori or
essentialistic aspect to this empirically established fact.”
- AUSTRIAN ECONOMICS: HISTORICAL AND PHILOSOPHICAL BACKGROUND
I’m not an expert of this times, but I have studied neo-kantianism to some extent. I do believe that my assertion was incorrect, or too broad at least. I assumed a direct influence of neo-kantianism (I still do, yet I do not find any material grounding this connection). What could be said, perhaps nproblematically, is that neo-kantianism and austrian school of economy share its origins in the materialism contraversy and are determined by ideas popularized there. Menger’s subjective theory of value is built on Brentano’s ideas and his on Lotze’s, he is a kind of proto-neo-kantian, that influenced much of the philosophical currents of the late 19th century. Wieser’s claim (1889, p. x): ‘What needs to be given is a philosophy of value which requires words, not numbers’. is a consequence of the austrians’ acceptance of psychology as intuitiont as the basis of economy and at the same time opposing the science of psychology. This seems as a very neo-kantian stance in regard to subjectivity, a claim that practice or belief comes before knowledge and that this practice can’t be an object for knowledge. It is the same with the economists that propose subjective theory of value, and a special status of economic laws that are somehow the same as the laws of natural sciences and at the same time can’t be subjected to the empirical criteria. Sadly these ideas are not at all marginal in current economy, a lot of austrian ideas had become a part of mainstram economics.
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