--- Robin Hanson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Social science > would be vastly easier than economists make it out to be if we could > usually just ask people why they do things. But economists are generally > skeptical of this approach,
Social science does have a great advantage over biological-behavior science in that we can ask our subjects of study what they are thinking and feeling. This makes up for not being able to do as extensive experiments on them as do those who study animals and plants. More of this should be done, taking into account the fact that of course people lie to pollsters and also, many folks don't really know why they do many things, at least beneath the superficial reasons. Economists can also figure much behavior out from common observation and introspection. But perhaps a major reason why we don't rely so much on asking, is that economics is more concerned with the means towards goals than on why folks have the goals that they do. We presume the means involve economizing, and then there is really no need to inquire personally beyond that; Max(U) given constraints C does the job, perhaps too abstractly. Fred Foldvary ===== [EMAIL PROTECTED] __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Send FREE video emails in Yahoo! Mail! http://promo.yahoo.com/videomail/
