*** The official market and government thread ***

[a500lbgorilla]

The foundations of every science is tautology and assumption.

Just like every science on the face of the planet, economics starts with a handful of unfalsifiable assumptions, and then works in the falsifiable in all the details. You are using "rational" in a non-economic sense, using this straw man to argue against rational choice theory.

Your line about JV says it all. Economists do not call the irrationality of behavior rational. Economists establish the assumption of rationality and what it means, and then work everything else imaginable in. Every science does this, without exception.

Holy fuck no.

The foundation of every science is the scientific method. A method of guessing at a robust description of reality and testing that description against reality. For a long time, science has been built upon the idea of falsifiablility. If nothing can ever prove your theory wrong, you don't have a theory.

What are the tautological and un-falsifiable thoughts in Evolution? That the survivors survive? Not even that counts because the theory can describe why a brother might sacrifice for a sister. And evolution could be falsified if ever there was found an irreducibly complex organ.

Your beliefs of what consistutes science are way off.

[wufwugy]

Holy fuck no.

The foundation of every science is the scientific method. A method of guessing at a robust description of reality and testing that description against reality. For a long time, science has been built upon the idea of falsifiablility. If nothing can ever prove your theory wrong, you don't have a theory.

What are the tautological and un-falsifiable thoughts in Evolution? That the survivors survive? Not even that counts because the theory can describe why a brother might sacrifice for a sister. And evolution could be falsified if ever there was found an irreducibly complex organ.

Your beliefs of what consistutes science are way off.

I'm happy you said this, because I think it cuts into the disconnect.

The scientific method is an assumption. When we strip away as many layers as we can get, we are left with something we cannot examine any deeper.

I am not educated enough on this to say exactly what and why, but one of the times I got the most schooled in an argument was against somebody who was. So I'll just pull some examples somebody gave from google search.

Mathematics is based on a number of assumptions. These are so simple that everybody agrees they have to be true. Some of the assumptions are things like 'if two things are each equal to a third thing, then they are equal to each other' and 'it is possible to draw a line between two points'.

Rational choice theory is an assumption at its core just like what every other branch of science has at their core assumptions. Just like how in math we assume it is possible to draw a line between two points, in economics, we assume the statement of rational choice theory: "wanting more rather than less of a good".

The overwhelming majority of economics deals with irrationality and behavior. "Rationality" is an assumption that best provides the starting point from which to apply the scientific method to everything else. It's just like how every science has at its core the assumption that numbers are things.