Could it be that economics is more of a social science than a physical one, and therefore its “laws” cannot be expected to have the same level of stringency and consistency as the laws of physics?
No, it’s economics that’s wrong.
Whats even funnier is that physics is also vibes based in some areas. The laws of thermodynamics are not real laws, they are based on statistic likelihood but can in theory be broken.
Newtons equations for gravity are still widely used despite being disproven for better part of a century.
Sometimes, accurate enough approximations are more useful than the complicated reality.
Spooky action at a distance
cough quantum physics cough
I studied quantum mechanics for half a year and I can’t even prove quantum mechanics are not Lasagna spilled on paper let alone prove whether they are vibe based…
Physical reality has a lot of little exceptions like that too. Compression is really strong until it buckles - totally different formula. Most materials compress when they freeze - but water expands. Forget turbulence, man. What’s the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter? That’s right, a silly nonsense number.
And another silly nonsense number we decided to call “E” keeps popping up all over the place in nature/ the universe, for no discernable reason.
Devs got lazy
iirc, e and pi are actually somewhat related
edit: was curious about this so I went looking and found a stackexchange thread on the topic. It was Euler’s identity and the gaussian integral I was thinking of that relates those two numbers.
That’s
eto you!
Economics is a social science (and often a political tool) pretending to be a physical science. If they don’t want to be treated the way they are, they should drop the act.
I studied econ as a minor and I don’t recall any of my professors ever making the pretense that it was some sort of ultimate or incontrovertible truth. In fact, I’m fairly certain that’s where I learned the expression “all models are wrong, but some are useful”.
I remember cracking open a textbook, learning about rational market actors, realizing that a lot of economics is based on the assumption that people act rationally, and decided the whole thing was bullshit.
5 years later, I realized that despite deeply flawed premises, economics as a science still has a lot of helpful models and theories and is a good thing to learn.
That’s a good point, and kinda reminds me of the Efficient Market Paradox, which basically says an efficient market is impossible since there would be no profit to be made, and hence, no point in participating. But if people drop out because of that, inefficiencies will invariably pop again, thus presenting an opportunity for those seeking to profit, which of course only ends up restoring the efficiency.
So in essence, the market is always just teetering on the edge of efficiency, never fully getting there yet never straying too far either. Perhaps there’s a corollary here (or a similar paradox) that explains why the assumption of rationality, as ridiculous as it seems at face value, is in fact also valid and reasonable.
Sometimes, independent central banks feel like a secular version of a theocratic council of elders.
Yes
And yes
Ugh. I feel dirty for defending economists, but…
Laws are just commonly observed relationships, and observed relationships always exist within a given set of boundaries and assumptions.
Change the boundaries or the context, and the law may no longer apply.
Consider Newton’s Law of Universal Gravitation:
F ~ Mm/r^2
This observed relationship doesn’t hold under very large M or very small r. In those contexts, a different relationship is required. That doesn’t invalidate this one, though. It just maks it situationally useful.
Which all of these laws are.
He has a point in that economics should be more humble. It’s a social science, not a hard science, and it should treat itself with the same level of introspection and humility as sociology or psychology.
Astronaut with a gun, floating behind comic “always has been”
There’s a lot of tactical thinking and gamesmanship that goes into pricing.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pricing
As for economic theory, the value of economists, and the semantics of the word “law”… yeah…I’m not getting in to all that.
The textbook intro examples of the law of supply and demand aren’t even true in practice.
They’re all like “prices on ice cream will rise when it’s hotter out so there is more demand for it!” and I have never found that to be true at fucking all.
That and I’ve never seen prices ever go down for any reason whatsoever unless it’s some already volatile thing like oil/gas.
Coke invented a vending machine that would automatically raise prices as the temp went up, but there was outcry after its announcement so it was never released
It’s pretty simple. You don’t care about a particular grain of rice unless it’s special in some way (maybe something is drawn on it). Prices are always dependent on what people believe about the object. The “law” just defines the general parameters.
Also, there are many “exceptions” to the theory of gravity and apples do not always fall. Is an apple on a table falling? What about if you lift it? Oh my God, it’s doing the opposite of falling! How is that possible?!?
Also, there are many “exceptions” to the theory of gravity and apples do not always fall. Is an apple on a table falling? What about if you lift it? Oh my God, it’s doing the opposite of falling! How is that possible?!?
The theory of gravity says that mass exerts gravitational force, whether that force is sufficient to cause motion depends on other forces being exerted on a given object. An apple sitting on a table is not an exception to the law of gravity, gravity is still happening, but the force of the table counter-balances it.
Yeah, that’s my point.
