Re: Article in the Chronicle of Higher Education

["Gunnar Tomasson" <gunnar.tomasson@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Re. the following:

> I also would like to ask how accurate it is to reduce the differences
> between mainstream and non-mainstream economics to the
> number of axioms they employ in their models.

Comment:

Good point.

An "axiom" is a metaphysical concept - it denotes what we take as "given"
for some particular piece of deductive reasoning, be it A, B, or C.

And, provided our reasoning is sound, it is meaningless to compare A, B, and
C with one another.

For A, B, and C are non-overlapping - they are to one another as, say, the
rules/games of (a) Chess, (b) Contract Bridge, and (c) Gin Rummy.

As for Economic Theorems X, Y, and Z, they can be checked for (a) logical
consistency with the underlying sets x, y, and z of axiomatic premises,
and - if found to be logically coherent - (b) applicability to real-world
economic conditions.

Hence Samuelson's "attempt" in 'Foundations of Economic Analysis' to "show
that there do exist meaningful theorems in diverse fields of economic
affairs", where by "meaningful theorem" is "mean[t] simply a hypothesis
about empirical data which could conceivably be refuted, if only under ideal
conditions." (pp. 4-5)

An Economic Theorem is Good/Useful if it passes the test of real-world
applicability - it is Bad/Useless if it does not.

The number of axioms is immaterial in either case.

Gunnar


----- Original Message -----
From: "Erdogan Bakir" <erdogan.bakir@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <pkt@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Monday, January 27, 2003 6:30 PM
Subject: Re: Article in the Chronicle of Higher Education


> Yes, really WOW. Could you please point me to the references
> frow which you draw your conlusion about marxian economics so
> that I can figure out how I could not pick up this point of yours
> among thousands of pages written by Marx, not to mention second
> hand sources.
> Is this the same logic as the one you used before in your
> "international money and real world" when you announced the
> failure of radical school in explaining the economic reality, which
> was brought about by the demise of the soviet system, or
> something to that effect.
> I also would like to ask how accurate it is to reduce the differences
> between mainstream and non-mainstream economics to the
> number of axioms they employ in their models. Some mainstream
> economists such as Turnovsky, Bernanke, Coleman, to name but
> few, relaxed some of those restrictive assumptions in their recent
> papers, so does this mean that differences will disappear in the
> near future?
> erdogan
>
> From:           Michael Perelman <michael@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
>
> Wow. You learn something new each day.  I must have been reading a
> different edition.
>
> On Mon, Jan 27, 2003 at 03:38:47PM -0500, pdavidso wrote:
> >
> > Thus, for example, Marxian economics becomes a special case of the
special
> > case classical theory---where axioms about power (instead of
competition) are
> > added to the classical ergodic assumption and the long-run neutrality of
money
> > axiom.
> >
>
>
>