Putnam has argued against a strict fact-value dichotomy in "
The Collapse of the Fact-Value Dichotomy" and in a recently published book of essays edited by Putnam entitled, "
The End of Value-Free Economics (Routledge INEM Advances in Economic Methodology)."
Economic justice,
theft and
fraud are not strictly questions of moral values--this presupposes a spurious fact-value dichotomy. These notions have both normative and positive aspects; the positive aspects of these notions (and others, related to class dominance) can be captured in game theoretic terms--and should be.
In the Preface to Game Theory Evolving, economist Herbert Gintis suggested that the mathematical methods of non-cooperative (and cooperative) game theory developed by von Neumann and Morgenstern, Nash and their successors–Gintis among them–have the potential to elevate social and political discourse above ideological debate.
Gintis does not take the step of applying game theory to the topics under discussion--but neither have most of the comments here, with the expected result.
