Talk:Invisible hand/Archive 2

Capitalism
A search of the The Wealth of Nations on PDF showed zero instances of the word Capitalism. I think it's a big assumption to use it in this article. Capitalism has never been practiced in the way Adam Smith would recommend so how could one attribute him with endorsing it? Will change instances of the word "capitalism" to "a free market" where applicable and "Capitalists" to "Entrepreneurs". —Preceding unsigned comment added by Roycerson (talk • contribs) 03:38, 2 October 2007 (UTC)


 * I think that's petty.--Jack Upland 08:48, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Smith was bitterly against Capitalism, at least in the form anywhere close to what we would identify it as today. One need only to actually, well, read 'Wealth Of Nations', as opposed to a few lines which are often quoted out of context, to know that. As such, it's not petty in the least to mention it, as the article is very misleading. For just one example, it's nice that Thatcher carried around a copy of his book, but it's worth mentioning that the economic system under her was pretty much diametrically opposed to anything Smith would have even dared to envision, much less recommend.

Islamic criticism
I would propose deleting this section: it shows a fundamental misunderstanding of how Adam Smith uses the metaphor of the invisible hand, and the suggestion that Smith called the hand "invisible" because of Islamic law on stealing is preposterous. While the metaphor of an invisible hand, which gives people licence to pursue their self-interest without any consideration for others, can indeed be considered a license for stealing, Smith would never consider this to be the case. The hand is invisible because it is supposed to be the hand of providence or God, which is hidden from individual actors. Interesting theological critiques of this idea can be made, also from the standpoint of Islamic economics, but this is not one of them. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Minke2008 (talk • contribs) 18:58, 26 November 2009 (UTC)

No good
Sorry, this article is no good. Especially the part on the 'abuse' and the rhetorical question at the end. No. Also very disorganized.. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.49.179.199 (talk) 10:06, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Invisible Hand
I think this invisible hand quotation should be either properly quoted, or removed from ALL wikipedia articles (expect for this one and Adam Smith) since it is really a minor part of his work. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lbertolotti (talk • contribs) 13:15, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

Broken Links
This entry needs to rely on a more stable set of links. I just tried to click through on "ALTMAN, Daniel. Managing Globalization. In: Q & Answers with Joseph E. Stiglitz, Columbia University and The International Herald Tribune, October 11, 2006 05:03AM." but I get to a page that isn't that interview, and seems to suggest that an article or entire blog is missing. Likewise, I clicked on the external link "The Theory of Moral Sentiments (full text)" and it gets a "Page not found" error within the Adam Smith Institute site. Neither is an outright 404, which is probably why some bot doesn't notice the problem. But they need fixing in any case. --Netsettler (talk) 09:04, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

Never proved, probably not provable
See https://hbr.org/2012/04/there-is-no-invisible-hand

-- John Broughton (♫♫) 00:48, 22 February 2016 (UTC)

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