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Ideas for a Alternative Monetary Future,
2016, 6 pgs.
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Reviewer Comment: This is a rejoinder
attacking Graeber's response to Selgin's earlier article, The Myth of the Myth
of Barter, in The Alt-M. org publication.
Apparently this 'discussion' has been conducted via 'tweets'. These 'worthys'
attack each other but do not provide specific historical factual examples to
analyze with each other. Graeber relies (as he did in his book - Debt)
on anthropology (his speciality) rather than documentary history. Selgin relies
on theories expounded by Adam Smith, Menger, Jevons and similar economist
theoreticians. But those well known economists did not and could not know
anything about ancient Mesopotamia or Egypt because the documentary sources
were not even found, let alone translated, for a century and more.
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The result is that Graeber and Selgin are
writing about different fundamental issues but arguing about tangential
subjects. In neither comment did Selgin discuss the central Graeber theory -
the role of debt in society - actually what is debt. Graeber's book is about
the phylosophical and psychological meaning of 'debt' and how that meaning has
resonated throughout history. Selgin chooses to ignore that topic and instead
denounce Graeber's narrow discussion of the role or lack of role of barter
exchange as a predecessor to the ' invention' of money. For Selgin that is
significant as it, in turn, is the basis for libertarian theory on money and
banking
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