Comment on Lars Syll on ‘Mainstream economists dissing people that want to rethink economics’
Blog-Reference and Blog-Reference on Oct 29
Pontus Rendahl argued: “... it would be wrong to teach heterodox theories as though they had equal validity. ‘In the same way, I don’t think heterodox engineering or alternative medicine should be taught’.”
Pontus Rendahl hit the nerve. Traditional Heterodoxy has one big point, viz. that orthodox economics has failed, but until now it has not replaced proto-scientific garbage with science but produced just another variant of proto-scientific garbage.
Science is well-defined: “Research is, in fact, a continuous discussion of the consistency of theories: formal consistency insofar as the discussion relates to the logical cohesion of what is asserted in joint theories; material consistency insofar as the agreement of observations with theories is concerned.” (Klant, 1994). It is pretty obvious that Heterodoxy does NOT satisfy the criteria of material/formal consistency. In its current state, it cannot be admitted to science.#1
Pontus Rendahl’s critique of traditional Heterodoxy as snake oil is accurate except for the fact that Orthodoxy is nothing else but snake oil. Orthodoxy does NOT satisfy scientific criteria either, but the representative economist has not realized it to this day. It is a remarkable fact that each student generation has swallowed the utterly silly supply-demand-equilibrium core model without turning an eyelid for 150+ years.#2
So, while Heterodoxy cannot be admitted to science, Orthodoxy has to be thrown out of it. This is the situation: there is NO such thing as scientifically valid economics. Both, orthodox and heterodox economists are selling snake oil.#3 That they are dissing each other has no scientific relevance at all.
Egmont Kakarot-Handtke
#1 When proto-scientific Heterodoxy calls Orthodoxy pseudo-scientific
#2 How to Get Rid of Supply-Demand-Equilibrium
#3 Nothing to choose between Orthodoxy and traditional Heterodoxy
Related 'Economics: 200+ years of scientific incompetence and fraud' and 'Economists: “a bevy of camp-following whores”'. For details of the big picture see cross-references Proto-Science/Cargo Cult Science/Science and cross-references Heterodoxy.