Umbrellas Don't Cause Rain...

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and as Nick Rowe explains, pushing on the speedometer won't make you go faster. (Rowe does the best metaphors, doesn't he?)

And in his back-and-forth with Rowe, Stephen Williamson lets the cat out of the bag on what drives a lot of the mathematization of economics:

"...we're doing economics, and we want to be treated seriously by other scientists."

Yep. I am not anti-math, but too often math is introduced not because the subject demands it, but in order to not feel inferior when the physicists show up at a faculty meeting.

Comments

  1. Bob Murphy10:26 PM

    Good catch on Williamson and physics envy, Gene.

    ReplyDelete

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