-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- While I know nothing of Bionomics, Professor Krugman's ill-tempered essay intrigues me. Robert Hettinga wrote that VitaminB@bionomics.org wrote that Paul Krugman wrote in Slate:
Take, for starters, his assertion that "orthodox economics describes the 'economy as a machine.' " You might presume from his use of quotation marks that this is something an actual economist said, or at least that it was the sort of thing that economists routinely say. But no economist I know thinks of the economy as being anything like a machine--or believes, as Rothschild asserts a bit later, that because the economy is like a machine, it is possible to make precise predictions.
"Methinks the lady doth protest too much." While hard core economists may not describe the economy as a machine, the popular literature, such as that found in news stories on "the economy", almost always uses machine metaphors. "The economy was in danger of becoming overheated, so the Fed raised interest rates." The metaphors which people choose often have powerful political implications. After all, if the economy is sort of like a machine, then it makes sense to have trained professionals who tune that machine to operate with optimal efficiency. It is not hard to figure out why the ruling elite prefers this metaphor to some others that could be chosen. For instance, you could say the economy is an elaborate network of relationships based on trust. You could say that employment occurs when two or more people agree to exchange goods or services. Let's say unemployment figures are up. If you believe the economy is like a machine, then you will believe that there should be a central planning organization like the Fed that should lower interest rates. If you believe that the unemployment goes down when people form employment relationships, you may think about ways to remove obstacles to the formation of these relationships. Note that the second more reasonable approach does not promote the interests of a national ruling elite.
In just the last two years, I've learned that I believe that gross domestic product is the sole measure of economic welfare...
In popular economics GDP is used almost exclusively as a measure of success. I strongly suspect that when Krugman says he himself does not believe this, that he has some other set of statistical measures which he considers to be better measures of success. If this is the case, then he has completely missed the point. Such statistical measures are sensible when one accepts that the purpose of economics is to best instruct the rulers of a society in their economic policy decisions. In such a framework, the rulers decide what is good and then decide how to cause that good to increase. The only problem with this is that it neglects to consider the preferences of individual people. It is highly unlikely that their economic behavior is dictated by the authorities for their own best interest because the authorities have no way of knowing what that best interest might be. People have their own beliefs and preferences on that subject. For example, a small island nation in the Pacific is highly regarded as an "economic success". One of the features of this society is that government provided or subsidized housing is widely available. People who wish to spend their money on having a nice apartment like this. But, many people may prefer to live in less expensive surroundings and spend the money they save on other things, or to simply work less. Krugman supports my theory about his beliefs later when he says:
But it does not deify the market system, and it even offers a number of fairly well-defined ways in which markets can fail, or at least could be helped with government intervention. And that, for some conservatives, is just not good enough.
We do not see any examples of "market failures" and, indeed, the people Krugman refers to would probably not see them as failure at all. It seems highly likely that Krugman has committed the sin he accuses the Bionomicists of committing: he doesn't truly understand the philosophy he is criticizing. Also interesting is Krugman's obvious discomfiture with people who would explore the ideas of the Bionomicists. It may be the case that the Bionomics crowd does not thoroughly understand classical economics or evolutionary biology. This would not be the first time that people on the fringes of several disciplines came up with new ideas which transformed the field. (Take J. Kepler, the professional astrologer. Kepler had many totally wacked out theories. He believed completely in astrology. He believed the Earth was a living organism and the tides were related to its breathing. He believed the orbits of the planets were distributed in relationship to the Platonic solids. And, get this, he believed that the area a planetary radius swept out in time was constant.) Obviously, Bionomics might be fraught with errors, oversimplifications, and misrepresentations. In spite of this, there may be ideas that would interest an open minded professional. Even Marxists occasionally come up with an interesting observation, after all. So, Krugman's hostility to the exploration of ideas strikes me as a little odd for a professor. Take his final paragraph for an example:
Anyway, I guess I won't attend the conference. I would have liked to meet Benford; but I couldn't stand to watch the author of _Great Sky River_ demeaning himself by consorting with such disreputable company.
Somehow I can hear an upper class Victorian mother telling her son: "You should not be seen with that girl. She's much too common." Monty Cantsin Editor in Chief Smile Magazine http://www.neoism.org/squares/smile_index.html http://www.neoism.org/squares/cantsin_10.htm -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQEVAwUBNFebtJaWtjSmRH/5AQEKUQf7B0XnUn1xwIbIcLFMDUDpL8HEaDb3bclO syR2QJCvMa4BsjPKHWGRa5pEDNLdXfiQt0bXYZ+9WzVrr18VlAFJ2pqWoxv3PW76 YqDbfhGCwmseo8EzoRen5PEnxkZuNN+KKN92dEaEfj8NJMwBVZ2V5443HlPXxTWA TXxZIeFYgldndpgIdqFxIc4qnVtrJbsGI1YrzbCNeeTgTKg8d1oZlDVDMbLDGeyx wyb3hwzTB2wiLiLsTjhlcONEdbu0bwGUu7F3l60+C9JZjn3DWgl/+y562kejfcKP LgdSplUSc8gFrR3bCFufpyOOGFDgp0keV3SRWOaO8i/N2N+l/XhI3w== =iy9O -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----