Re: Relevant is Pragmatism not Physics

["Gunnar Tomasson" <tomasson@xxxxxxxx>]

Dear John:

We agree on the purpose of economics as do most of our colleagues. If that
purpose could be served by good intentions, then all would be well.

Yes, "economics is art not science" but, absent that aspect thereof which
Keynes called "an apparatus of the mind, a technique of thinking," the noble
purpose of economics will ever be ill served by mindless "art" rooted in
muddled "thinking".

With kind regards,

Gunnar


----- Original Message -----
From: John Gelles <jjgelles@xxxxxxxx>
To: Gunnar Tomasson <tomasson@xxxxxxxx>
Cc: 1944 <1944@xxxxxxxx>; Post Keynesian Thought <pkt@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Wednesday, May 31, 2000 3:06 AM
Subject: Re: Relevant is Pragmatism not Physics


>         Dear Gunnar,
>
>         Economics is art not science. Einstein was no economist.
>         Keynes is dead -- I and you cannot bring him to chose
>         between us. Were he alive, he might be just as wrong
>         as you or Einstein.  He might be as right as I am.
>
>         We are not in agreement on the logic of the logical-
>         empirical problem.  How about the empirical and
>         values end of things?  Are we in agreement on the
>         purpose of modern economics?  Is it to end poverty
>         and pollution, etc.?  Or is to discover purpose in
>         humans as though they were ants or dumb animals?
>
>         Best to you,
>
>             John
>
>     ====================================
>
>     You wrote:
>
> John:
>
> Absent clarity on first principles, "pragmatism" in economics, as in
> physics, is PR for muddled thinking.
>
> For, as Einstein wrote in 1949:
>
> "Science without epistemology is - insofar as it is thinkable at all -
> primitive and muddled."
>
> Keynes never suggested otherwise.
>
> Gunnar
>
>
>
>