Purely atomistic economic actors may only exist as software, not humans.

Evidence

One should not posit an unchanging human essence: morally atomistic markets are conceivable. We are not, however, convinced that any actually exist, and it is possible that if they are to be created it may need to be in silicon, perhaps as autonomous software agents or as more mundane algorithms, not out of flesh and blood. But such agents or algorithms might well not (Mirowski 2002 argues they could not) simulate the cognitive capacities of homo œconomicus as conceived by orthodox modern economics. A partially configured actor (in the case of humans, cognitively configured, at least to a degree, but not morally configured; in the case of software agents, entirely amoral but perhaps not cognitively configured) is a looser, more open construction than fully configured homo œconomicus or his classic apparent negation, homo sociologicus. An open construction of the actor, however, is precisely what is needed as the foundation for an adequate theoretical understanding of the “concrete organized markets” (Callon and Muniesa 2002) of high modernity, in all their diversity. — Donald MacKenzie & Yuval Millo, Constructing a Market, Performing Theory, 205

Categorization

• DEEPTHINKING: The claim that a fully configured homo œconomicus may only be realizable in silicon, while humans can only ever be partially configured actors, reframes the performativity debate around the material substrate of market actors.
• XREF: Connects to the performativity literature on how economic theory constitutes markets, and to the question of whether economic models describe or prescribe real behavior. — connects to: Markets can be performatively constructed by agents who are not atomistic homo economicus — Donald MacKenzie & Yuval Millo, Constructing a Market, Performing Theory, 25; Morally atomistic markets may be achievable only in silicon, not in humans — Donald MacKenzie & Yuval Millo, Constructing a Market, Performing Theory, 205

Related

• Morally atomistic markets may be achievable only in silicon, not in humans (similarity 0.93)
• Market actors are calculative without becoming amoral atomistic egotists (similarity 0.85)
• Markets can be performatively constructed by agents who are not atomistic homo economicus (similarity 0.83)
• Markets are human creations amenable to redesign, not natural forces (similarity 0.79)
• Ideal-type economic actor models are caricatures rarely found in pure form (similarity 0.78)
• Monetary and financial markets remain inseparable from the economy of regard (similarity 0.78)

Broader Connections

• Markets can be performatively constructed by agents who are not atomistic homo economicus #corroborates (0.85) — Donald MacKenzie & Yuval Millo, Constructing a Market, Performing Theory, 25