The Mises Community

Forum members can join thelibertarianforum.com

C. Blake Barber — Tue, 14 May 2013 17:17:31 GMT

So it finally happened. We all knew it was coming at some point. But have no fear... This community still has a home. Come join us at TheLibertarianForum.com.

Forum members have gone here

gotlucky — Fri, 10 May 2013 18:25:25 GMT

LibertyHQ forum by forum member Wheylous

* May 2013 Low Content Thread *

Primetime — Wed, 01 May 2013 05:38:41 GMT

even good for nothing ass hats catch on every once in a while...

Bill Maher actually talks some sense...

(Please visit the site to view this media)

What Bitcoin is

AJ — Mon, 01 Oct 2012 15:24:51 GMT

Debate about Bitcoin has remained extremely murky, leading to a sort of gridlock with entrenched views, particularly as to whether bitcoins are money. With this post I hope to shed some light on Bitcoin with a view that I think transcends the central points of debate as it has so far transpired.

Step 1 in clarifying discussion about Bitcoin is to distinguish between Bitcoin (the protocol) and bitcoins (the token units). Bitcoin is a transaction system; bitcoins are the "things" that are being exchanged.

That brings us to Step 2 in clarifying discussion about Bitcoin: if we define money as a "physical object that serves as a medium of exchange," bitcoins are certainly not - and can never be - money. They are something different, yet they serve the same purpose. No, in fact it's more elucidating to say that the system (Bitcoin) serves the same purpose.

Step 3 is to discern this connotation that perhaps "money isn't needed anymore" from the leftist, Zeitgeister call for the elimination of money (really the elimination of transactions and hence the division of labor). Since transacting using the Bitcoin protocol, insofar as it is sound, would not in any way entail the destruction of the division of labor (in fact a great enrichment of it), this would only be a kneejerk response. Bitcoin - the system - simply obviates the need for money (and money substitutes) in many situations.

The following story illustrates a situation where a division of labor can function without money ("physical object that serves as a medium of exchange") or even money substitutes.

A bunch of college students decide to do a houseshare. They take turns making dinner. One day the dinner guy (A) is too busy, so he asks someone else (B) to fill in for him, with a promise to return the favor later.

Everyone in the house witnesses this, remembering that A owes B one.

There are many people in the house and this starts to happen a lot. People's memories get fuzzy, and some are not around to witness the transactions. So they decide to put a whiteboard on the fridge keeping track of who owes who how many dinners.

Some people start to rack up quite a tab. Eventually it is decided that no one can owe more than three dinners; if they skip three times they can skip no more.

To keep track of this, each person's name is written with a number underneath it. Everyone starts with a 3 underneath their name, like this:

Guy A Guy B Girl A etc...

3 3 3

Then if A skips because B agrees to fill in for him, the board now looks like this:

Guy A Guy B Girl A etc...

3 3 3

2 4

[signatures of every person in the house]

Everyone signs off that they witnessed the agreement for this transaction.

Cumbersome as it may be, this is now a working transaction system. We could call the units "housecoins." Later, for instance, Girl A can offer 2 of her housecoins in exchange for a DVD that Guy B owns. Everyone signs under the change to the ledger and it's a done deal.

What are these housecoins backed by? Nothing, in the usual monetary sense. However, they can be used reliably as long as the system remains popular with the house residents and people don't find a way to cheat the signature system.

I'm sure it's easy to see why this is so incredibly impractical that it has never been done before on a large scale. The existence of a ready medium of exchange makes this even more unnecessary for local commerce. Before the Internet and before public key cryptography, such a system would have been completely unworkable, and locally often unnecessary.

However, the Internet makes it possible for remote participants to sign off on transactions. With the Bitcoin protocol, the system is backed only by the willingness of people to participate, and the protocol prevents cheating by rewarding the transaction validators ("miners"). Technically anyone could change the protocol to benefit themselves, but that would result in a fork in the blockchain (two different public ledgers) and probably no one would use the rogue version.

Now there are a few more details that need to be seen in order to grasp how the system is able to function as it does, but the above should show that money (physical medium of exchange) and "backing" are not absolutely necessities for a division of labor; "housecoin"-type systems have failed to spring up so far simply because the technology known as "physical media of exchange" is a far easier one than the Internet, cryptography, "proof of work" systems, and the Bitcoin protocol that ties these together.

A physical medium-of-exchange system is only one type of transaction system. At a certain level of technology, others become feasible or even superior.

What have Austrians been wrong about?

Austen — Wed, 08 May 2013 02:36:55 GMT

1. What have Austrians been wrong about in general?

2. What have Austrians wrongly predicted?

3. What have Austrians wrongly predicted that Keynesians have correctly predicted?

(Semi-)Official Mises.org EPUB Release Topic

Tex2002ans — Tue, 02 Apr 2013 02:46:06 GMT

Over the past year, I have been converting EPUBs in my spare time for the Mises Institute. I started my EPUB journey initially, because of the poor state I noticed Mises EPUBs were in. There were many typos, and overall design decisions which made me quite frustrated (bloated images, bloated files, embedded fonts, HUGE margins, etc.). Coming from a coding background, I see all of these mistakes as bloat/bugs, which must be fixed.

I also wanted to get as many books as possible into EPUB format, because it is so much more enjoyable to read the books on ANY device, and in any font size and/or font you prefer. EPUB also has the advantage of being convertible into any other format easily (for example, if you have a Kindle).

Because of my continual EPUB output/emails (annoyances :) ), in ~October 2012, I was put in touch directly with Brandon Hill ((the Store Manager at LvMI), he is in charge of running the Mises store, Amazon sales, and many other important duties). Since October 2012, I have begun working extremely closely with LvMI, and started to get more and more of my EPUBs in the Literature section.

As of today, I will officially be working on EPUBs for LvMI. :)

I wanted to create this thread as a one stop shop for all of my WIP EPUBs, instead of me flooding many of the other EPUB topics with my posts.

All of the EPUBs in this topic will be posted when I complete everything on my end (covers/eISBNs are handled on LvMI's end, and I output things too quickly for them to keep up with. :) ). If you want beautiful fancy covers? Feel free to wait until they are on the Literature section, for all those who want to read the actual text? Read my versions. :)

Feel free to post requests in this topic as well, I take them into consideration, and can/will add them to my list to work on in my spare time.

All of my work can also be found at my site (link can be found in my signature).

If you find any typos in ANY of the books (PDF/EPUB/Physical), please report it in this topic, the "Book Typos" topic, or the "Book Typos" Wiki article:

https://mises.org/Community/forums/p/29982/479290.aspx#479290

http://wiki.mises.org/wiki/MisesWiki:Typos

Every single typo that can be caught/fixed is a HUGE help.

As a side note, if anyone wants to help with hosting these elsewhere, I would be very grateful. As of now, I rely on filesharing sites (Mediafire was my favorite), but these are extremely unreliable due to the DMCA (my Mediafire account became suspended, and all of my links have been deleted). Please get in contact with me privately through email, Mises PMs, or leave me contact information as a comment on my site.

There is also the case of some gray area copyrights on some PDFs on Mises.org. If I do work on these books, they are in no way sanctioned by LvMI, and I work on these in my spare time to make more enjoyable versions for everyone to read.

New Friends

Neodoxy — Sat, 04 May 2013 01:36:09 GMT

I have no idea what's happened over the past week, but we've obviously got a sudden influx in new members, which is pretty exciting since we've only gotten a handful of new people this year.

So welcome! You can use this thread to introduce yourselves, and I hope that we'll enjoy what you all have to contribute in the coming months.

Also, this thread might help you

Edit

Also something that I'm curious about, how did you guys find the forum? I'm just surprised that we've gotten so many new people so fast.

Quick Question

Gavin23 — Thu, 09 May 2013 18:25:58 GMT

Hello all got a really quick question hope you can help me out with.

As I understand it many Anarcho Capitalists and even many Minarchists do not support the concept of Intellectual Property. I tend to agree with that.

What is there view then on other intangible forms of property such as various finacial instruments and securities like stocks etc? Would this not count as real property under this line of thinking?

Thanks!

Top Torrent sites Used Most often

limitgov — Fri, 10 May 2013 13:01:28 GMT

What are the top torrent sites that you or others use most often?

ka.ph - kickass torrents

isohunt.com

piratebay.org - pirate bay, of course

And of course, utorrent is the software that seems to be the best.

The more people that use these sites, the better for all of us.

Kokesh plans loaded open carry rally in DC, where it's illegal

Wheylous — Tue, 07 May 2013 19:00:18 GMT

http://www.salon.com/2013/05/03/a_march_on_washington_with_loaded_rifles/

Come ON Kokesh. Really? That's not the message we need to be sending.

What is the definition of "Keynesian"?

No2statism — Thu, 09 May 2013 00:45:59 GMT

I was told that monetarism isn't keynesian, but I had thought it was because I believed that Keynesians wanted to create demand to generate wealth and that monetarists thought that govt controlling the money supply would regulate demand.

Any answers would be appreciated.

Freedom Images...

Conza88 — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 10:18:05 GMT

The saying goes "A picture's worth a thousand words"... well let's do some writing. Just looking for images that articulate the freedom / liberty agenda. What you got? [:)]

Mises and Rorty quote, Aristotle tidbit, AE confession

vive la insurrection — Wed, 24 Apr 2013 17:35:24 GMT

I was looking through my old laptop and I found these three scraps of thoughts that were by themselves and saved:

‘The endeavors of psychology to dissolve the Ego and to unmask it as an illusion are idle"

-Mises

"hermeneutics, ‘as a polemical term in contemporary philosophy’, is a name for the attempt to set aside epistemologically centred philosophy."

-Richard Rorty

Aristotle in Nicomachean Ethics said that every science should adapt its method to its object, that the object under study should determine the method of studying it.

- Source unkown (maybe my own)

I have no clue where these thoughts and quote came from, but they are almost undoubtably from the same source (be it a book, article, or interview). What they do is show an "ontological irreducability" that tends to get ignored in the onslaught of formalism and positivsm that people seem to take a sadistic pleasure in applying where it need not be applied.

There is no need to study Human Action (or history or psychology) as "man-apes": the category of "human" , "conscience", economic transaction, or "I" are irreducible unique human entities and self-justifing - and are (like it or not) based off of intersubjective relations of intelligibility and understanding - not formalistic causal approaches. This may sound like a crazy-ass Stirnerite / Husserl / Scholastic type of ontology, and it is, but the fact that it gets ignored or written off baffles the shit out of me.

In the sense that the words "objective", "naturalistic", or if they are really stupid "mechanistic" are used (there are obviously many ways to use the words) by "scientism" type of people in the social science - they are merely flavors, and appeals to no authority greater than themsleves and the institutions that support them. Of course, that they have such an appeal: that is, that they are so popular is their biggest strength - but that is the only point they have (and it is a legit and strong point).

Even still, and this is something I realized quite early in my life, whatever statistics or graph a social scientist uses to call a fact - is not a fact: it is a specific orientation with an interpretation of facts that is presented: this leads to the obvious question: why is it done in such a way, and why is it supposed to be my concern?

What I realize:

I am almost certainly not a "Rothbardian-Misean" in the way people of Mises.org are, and I think this post just declared that fact. While I obviously started with Mises.org type of reading for heterodox economics, even early on I noticed certain tensions in my thought (chiefly on the nature of applications of subjectivity, determinism, equilibrium, institutions: basically my inherent Aristotelianism and Lachmannia). EIther way, in total sum over the past 2 - 3 years, I have read "Mises.org" types less than other Austrians, Lachmannites, Post-Keynesians. Not that that means much, because I'm not a professional social scientist or philosopher - and I am still prone to forgetting and even misreading basic basic concepts some times (as I am not utilizing this info for anything other than long term personal amusment).

Other than Lachmann and Weber: in so much as I can gauge and grasp things I have an underdeveloped appreciation for: aspects of the "historical school, Keynes (gasp!), Hayek, Institutional Economics, Post Keynesianism, and certainly George Shackle.

Some rambling thoughts on Keynesian Concepts.

Smiling Dave — Wed, 08 May 2013 11:43:51 GMT

In Skousen's Dissent on Keynes, Chapter 2, John Egger writes:

A five-percent reduction in workers' wage demands
would not stimulate employment, he [=Keynes] argued, because employers would anticipate
a resulting five-percent reduction in the demands for their products and would
simultaneously reduce their demand for labor. As Peter Clarke puts it, "If prices
and wages simply chased each other down a spiral—since 'one man's expenditure
is another man's income'—then in theory there was no means of effecting the
necessary cut in real wages".

Sounds convincing. Is there a response? I think Egger hints at one in the next paragraph, where he writes:

The claim that the market is incapable of achieving a pattern of prices consistent
with demands is Keynes's rejection of Say's law.

In other words, if we accept Say's Law, that products are what pay for other products, then even if wages go down, there is no reason for employers to anticipate a resulting five-percent reduction in the demands for their products, since lower wages does not mean less production. The apples to pay for the oranges Mr X is making are still out there, even if Mr X and everyone else pays lower wages.

Egger later writes:

General economic malaise results from inappropriate patterns of money prices,
which reduce incomes and production and produce unemployment. The total
amount of money that people want to, or actually do, spend is completely
irrelevant. Aggregate demand is an unintended result of individuals' actions and
has no causal role in determining them. But if aggregate demand is irrelevant
to action and has no meaning in an analysis of the functioning of a market
system, there can be no standard for determining that it falls short of some ideal,
and there can be no such thing as unemployment caused specifically by this
shortfall. All unemployment is caused by mispricing, and none by insufficient
aggregate demand. This, in turn, implies that a policy designed to reduce un-
employment by bringing aggregate demand closer to its ideal is fundamentally
misconceived from the start. The result is typical of well-intentioned efforts to
solve problems that do not exist: the problems that do exist are made worse.

I was blown away by this paragraph. He's saying that AD is like the spent shells after a gun fight. The amount of spent shells is never a cause for gunfights one way or another, it is an irrelevant variable, a meaningless byproduct, and should be ignored when we study gunfights. Similarly, AD is irrelevent to economic actions.

And why is AD irrelevant? Because what counts is whether prices match what the market [=supply and demand] would like them to be. The prices are what determine economic action. If they are aligned with supply and demand, the economy will thrive. If not, it will stagnate. What effect has AD on prices? It certainly did not determine past prices, because on the contrary, they determined it. As for future prices, AD might determine what the market would like them to be, but it has no say in whether prices will actually match what the market wants them to be. That happens by itself in a free market, or is hampered by govt interventions in an unfree market. But AD is indeed irrelevant.

If we assume Say's law is false, how does that change the picture? Because then we can claim that it's not supply that gives one ability to demand, but demand that magically determines supply. This makes AD very inportant indeed. Reduce it and you magically reduce production, which means poverty.

Now a Keynesian might argue like this: Forget about prices. They are fixed. Set in stone, they cannot ever change. [Ridiculous as it sounds, there are actually people who claim this]. So if prices do not match what they should be, given the current supply and demand, we have to increase demand. Doing so will raise what the laws of supply and demand indicate the price should be to equate with what they are fixed at.

Stated so baldly, we see some problems.

First, there is not one price for everything. The market, if left to itself, will adjust every single price of every single item. But how can a politician take an action that will set every last price to what will clear every last market? It's like throwing a bottle of ink on a canvas and hoping that out comes the Mona Lisa. You can't possibly fine tune your toss to do that.

Second, there is a morality argument here. If peope have chosen not to buy, what right have we to force them to buy, or what is worse, pay for what the govt buys for itself and its pals?

Ramble is long already. Would be glad to see comments.

should the government decide who is legal to employ?

cab21 — Thu, 09 May 2013 06:02:13 GMT

should the government decide who is legal to employ?

i hear conservatives call for a police state that calls for strict legal labor laws and enforcement, is this good or bad for freedom?

Tort Reform Documentary?

Willy Truth — Mon, 10 Sep 2012 00:22:36 GMT

I was subjected to the disgusting documentary "Hot Coffee", which blithely depicts personal injury lawyers as the selfless, tireless defenders of the downtrodden (usually wronged by those mean ol' corporations), and I was wondering if anyone knows any good rebuttals from a non-retarded angle? For *some* reason only leftist documentaries seem to be easily accessible...

IRS Employees Outraged over Budget Cuts, Threaten Fewer Audits

The Firewall — Wed, 08 May 2013 21:34:37 GMT

The National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU), which represents workers for the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), organized nationwide protests Tuesday arguing that the sequestration would eliminate approximately $600 million from the IRS budget this year. Due to the reduction in the rate of spending increases, 100,000 employees will be furloughed starting May 24.

According to protest organizers, the IRS garners 93 percent of the revenue used to fund the federal government. Demonstrators said each $1 invested in the tax collection agency brings in a $7 return, which they say will mean diminished revenues and a heightened deficit because operations will not reach maximum capacity for five days between May 24 and Aug. 30 – an additional two days are being discussed for sometime in August or September.

One of the protests took place in downtown Manhattan, where IRS workers yelled out chants and held neon-colored placards. Some of the talking points included taxpayers experiencing the impacts due to longer wait times for assistance and fewer audits. Workers say they will also take a financial hit because they will miss a week’s worth of pay.

via IRS workers protest over sequestration, agency claims furloughs will hurt taxpayers | Economic Collapse News.

How can anarchy sustain itself?

RumblyElk — Fri, 03 May 2013 16:10:09 GMT

Hey guys,

I'm studying economics right now as a hobby, focusing specifically on the Austrian school. Currently I'm reading Human Action.

I have a question about anarchy that I have never heard addressed. How can an anarchical society sustain itself? I understand the whole roads thing. I understand the privatization of law. I understand how it could all work. But it seems it would only last for a relativley short time, maybe 25-50 years.

In an anarchical society, the most likely scenario would be that there would exist buisnesses that own communities. In these communities, members would pay a rate, like a tax, but voluntary, for basic utilities and law enforcement. This is where I see problems arising.

Let's assume there is one such buisness, call it 'CommuniCorp', that is extremly popular. They have low rates, good service, the whole bit. Due to their popularity in the market, they soon start buying up other buisnesses and expanding their corporate empire. Before long, they own hundreds of square miles. After a few decades, they are the WalMart of the community buisness, owning thousands of square miles. At this time, there are only a few community buisnesses left, all equalling CommuniCorp in size and power. Switching between community providers is now much more dificult, as you would have to move literally thousands of miles to switch buisnesses.

At this point, CommuniCorp launches its own law enforcement branch. They start making their communities 'safer' by implementing all sorts of social and economic laws. They start to offer 'complimentary healthcare', although soon start to make it mandatory, saying that they need to keep the populace healthy in order to attract customers.

At this point, we would be back at square one; we would have states again. The only difference would be that they might be called buisnesses, and they are probably worse than the states we started out with.

As far as I know, this may have been addressed already in a book or other discussion. If so, could you please tell me where?

Thanks!

Hello everyone. :D What is the biggest anarcho-capitalist/voluntaryist site online?

Treverend — Tue, 07 May 2013 22:15:21 GMT

I'd like to join the one with the biggest community. I heard a lot about Mises.org so I thought I'd go here first.

Minarchy vs Anarchy

Gavin23 — Sat, 04 May 2013 01:12:04 GMT

Hi new member here. Been lurking for awhile finally got around to registering.

Anyway in my time reading these forums I noticed a very Anarchist viewpoint espoused frequently.

Few questions.

Does being a Austrian economists mean you have to be an Anarchist? This site is named after Mises who I believe was a Minarchist not an Anarchist (Right?) Further many notable Austrian economists such as Hayek, Peter Schiff and others are also Minarchists. So whats the relationship?

Many on these forums seem to be Ron paul Fans. Do Anarchists support him or denounce him as some sort of traitor for his Minarchist views?

I tend to view myself as a Minarchist. Government restricted simply to Judicial System/Police and Defense. Im starting to read up on Anarchist ideology but regardless my question is are there Minarchists on this forum or is this a Anarchist majority forum?

Do Anarchists Reject the political process or middle ground pragmatic solutions? For example school vouchers? Not perfect I know but arguably a step up regardless so would Anarchists support this or denounce it?

If anarchists do reject the political process how do they plan to go about achieving their ideal society? Do they reject slowly working towards atleast a Limited Minarchist state or is it the abolition of the state or nothing at all?

Thanks!

Go HAM Images

Student — Mon, 08 Apr 2013 02:53:05 GMT

Alright, y'all. It is April. We are talking a matter of weeks until finals. Not to mention the papers you should be writing. It is time to GO HAM!

Here is some appropriate imagry.

Which Jobs Actually Require a Degree?

Physiocrat — Wed, 08 May 2013 11:22:32 GMT

Apart from teaching, engineering and medical industries which jobs actually require a degree? In the UK accountancy and law have seperate exams to become professionally qualified.

EDIT: to give more context I'm the equivalent of a high school teacher and occasionally advise students on their career path. Thinking back over my past, if I know what I know now most likely I would have left school as early as legally possible, got a job and worked my way up in the labour force; I would have studied economics and philosophy in my own time- I take a similar position to Gary North on these matters. However I'd like to be able to back up my tentative position with some stats. So if any of you have an links that would be useful or any comments on the value of achieveing a degree I'd like to hear them?

This was prompted by the go HAM thread,

Mathematical expectation and rational decision taking [split from "Defense in anarchy" thread]

ToxicAssets — Mon, 06 May 2013 09:05:38 GMT

malachi:
do you even know what mathematical expectation is?

Haha.. cute.

The problem though is that I'm not a chick and I'm no homo. So you should save your "negs" and cute little lines for someone else…

Anyways, I was trying to show you that even though the concept of mathematical expectation is at the heart of every decision under uncertainty, things are little bit more complicated than that.

It is not the mathematical expectation of the monetary return of a gamble that determines whether that gamble is worthwhile or not.

It is the mathematical expectation of the UTILITY FUNCTION of the returns.

Under normal conditions, we assume that people have concave utility functions, which can be interpreted as "risk-aversion".

It means that facing the alternatives of a gamble and an opportunity to get the average return of that gamble, they will generally choose the sure thing.

But on occasion the utility function of a certain individual might get convex, meaning that he's a "risk-taker".

Given a certain gamble, he'll prefer the small probability of earning a larger sum (and the risk of losing) than the sure thing of getting the average.

A reason why someone would have such a convex utility function with respect to a given gamble is that he's facing convex (non-diminishing) opportunities of investment for the returns he'll extract from that particular gamble.

Things like owing mobsters money and or facing some unique investment opportunity that will shut down soon may "convexify" your otherwise concave utility function, so the roulette game might be a rational decision for people in such a situation.

Individuals take decisions based on private and public information, and the shape of their utility functions takes both in considerartion.

Since most individuals face diminishing returns for their investments, we generally observe concave profiles for their utility functions.

That's why I was talking about pot-odds and implied pot-odds, assuming perhaps that you understood the fundamentals about poker.

You calculate your pot-odds by comparing how much you need to bet to take part in a given pot, but that's what everybody else knows. What other people don't know is what cards you have in the hole and how things are likely to turn out in your advantage (or against you) if certain scenarios unfold. And you use this information to estimate your implied pot-odds, which is going to serve as the basis of your decision.

The mathematical expectation of a gamble is the public information everybody has, but it is not enough to corroborate a fully informed decision about taking or not taking the gamble.

Django Unchained.

Friedmanite — Sun, 28 Apr 2013 20:44:22 GMT

Just saw it. What do you all think of it? Did Tarantino portray slavery accurately?

Thoughts on Gender?

Neodoxy — Tue, 05 Mar 2013 03:44:23 GMT

Does anyone here have thoughts on gender roles and identity?

Yeah blah blah "I support people to live how they want libertarianism", but what do you think the reality of gender roles in terms of nuture/nature and their positive/negative aspects in society are?

This is something that I've been thinking about lately, and it's something that's helped me realize exactly how radical my own position really is on social matters like this.

Thoughts?

The Mises Community

Forum members can join thelibertarianforum.com

Forum members have gone here

*** May 2013 Low Content Thread ***

What Bitcoin is

What have Austrians been wrong about?

(Semi-)Official Mises.org EPUB Release Topic

New Friends

Quick Question

Top Torrent sites Used Most often

Kokesh plans loaded open carry rally in DC, where it's illegal

What is the definition of "Keynesian"?

Freedom Images...

Mises and Rorty quote, Aristotle tidbit, AE confession

Some rambling thoughts on Keynesian Concepts.

should the government decide who is legal to employ?

Tort Reform Documentary?

IRS Employees Outraged over Budget Cuts, Threaten Fewer Audits

How can anarchy sustain itself?

Hello everyone. :D What is the biggest anarcho-capitalist/voluntaryist site online?

Minarchy vs Anarchy

Go HAM Images

Which Jobs Actually Require a Degree?

Mathematical expectation and rational decision taking [split from "Defense in anarchy" thread]

Django Unchained.

Thoughts on Gender?

* May 2013 Low Content Thread *