Poll: Is Economics a science?
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The best economists are not those with the best formulas. The best economists are the ones with the best intuition. When intuition trumps data crunching, it becomes more of a general study than a strictly-defined 'science'.
Even the sciences you call "the hard sciences" all come down to probability in the end, and modern theories claim that it's impossible to predict anything with 100% certainty. In that case, how is economics any different to any of the other sciences? It is however much less well understood than physics or chemistry, but economic predictions are improving all the time.RAKtheUndead said:
Reason I'm asking you guys' opinion is after watching Zeitgeist Moving Forward (and before you start replying furiously how the first Zeitgeist was full of shit: Moving Forward is completely different from that), and I agree with the film.
Economics is a system created by people to solve the problem of distribution of life-supporting goods. It's not a science at all. People often think it must be at least SOME sort of science since it's so complicated and you have to learn formulas of economic laws and shit.
It's not grounded in nature, like for example the study of genes would be. There is no absolute truth to it, it's all made up shit by humans. Sorry if I hurt anybody's feelings.
Civilized criticism is welcome!
Economics is a system created by people to solve the problem of distribution of life-supporting goods. It's not a science at all. People often think it must be at least SOME sort of science since it's so complicated and you have to learn formulas of economic laws and shit.
It's not grounded in nature, like for example the study of genes would be. There is no absolute truth to it, it's all made up shit by humans. Sorry if I hurt anybody's feelings.
Civilized criticism is welcome!
Actually, there are a quite a number of parallels between natural phenomena and economics. Charles Darwin's theory of natural selection was heavily inspired by Malthusian principles, for example [Alfred Russell Wallace also drew inspiration from it, to give him his due]. Maybe that's a bad example..um.dolgion said:
Ecological economics. Wikipedia will explain this better than I ever could. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecological_economics
In short, I think economics can be considered a science. Think of it as a higher level of organisation, I guess. It's probably less suited to the scientific method, but computer modelling should reach the level of tangible experimentation very soon anyway.
I don't think it is as much as Physics, Chemistry, and Biology are, as Economics is a system entirely developed by people, whereas the three aforementioned sciences are based on studying what is around us. We know pretty much everything there is to know about economics. However, Economics is based heavily in science, as I understand it, so I'd lump it in with the rest of the 'social sciences'.
@similar.squirrel
yeah i see the parallels to darwinian theory/evolution. But that comes from the capitalist system being as punishing and ruthless in nature as nature itself...
If you can't pay for your health insurance, you will die. If you can't find food, you will die.
The only difference is that with nature, we can't blame anybody. We can't make nature be nice to us. But we can change the economic system to actually serve the people instead of setting them against each other. Sorry I drifted off there a bit...but yeah. I still don't buy into economics being a science.
yeah i see the parallels to darwinian theory/evolution. But that comes from the capitalist system being as punishing and ruthless in nature as nature itself...
If you can't pay for your health insurance, you will die. If you can't find food, you will die.
The only difference is that with nature, we can't blame anybody. We can't make nature be nice to us. But we can change the economic system to actually serve the people instead of setting them against each other. Sorry I drifted off there a bit...but yeah. I still don't buy into economics being a science.
Yes it's a science. Much like stats and calculus.
For people saying it's about intuition and such... you clearly are only referring to a very specific aspect - most likely stock market. Which certainly there are unknowns that you can't predict and have to use intuition at times for picking stocks to buy/sell. But that isn't the whole of economics. Figuring out the best price to sell movie tickets for is a direct mathematical derivation - pretty much the cost of any good or service is. Determining if a new product can be profitable is also purely math there's no intuition there (ok, depends on the product - I mean manufactured goods)
For people saying it's about intuition and such... you clearly are only referring to a very specific aspect - most likely stock market. Which certainly there are unknowns that you can't predict and have to use intuition at times for picking stocks to buy/sell. But that isn't the whole of economics. Figuring out the best price to sell movie tickets for is a direct mathematical derivation - pretty much the cost of any good or service is. Determining if a new product can be profitable is also purely math there's no intuition there (ok, depends on the product - I mean manufactured goods)
Officially yes, but how it fares when compared to "hard sciences" like Physics, Mathematics or Chemistry is an entirely different matter and a tiresome discussion that will never ever amount to anything.
Much like the ever so idotic question "What is the hardest major?" it'll only result in a dick-waving contest.
Much like the ever so idotic question "What is the hardest major?" it'll only result in a dick-waving contest.