jetpack domain was triggered too early. This is usually an indicator for some code in the plugin or theme running too early. Translations should be loaded at the init action or later. Please see Debugging in WordPress for more information. (This message was added in version 6.7.0.) in /mnt/stor08-wc1-ord1/694335/916773/www.tvhe.co.nz/web/content/wp-includes/functions.php on line 6131updraftplus domain was triggered too early. This is usually an indicator for some code in the plugin or theme running too early. Translations should be loaded at the init action or later. Please see Debugging in WordPress for more information. (This message was added in version 6.7.0.) in /mnt/stor08-wc1-ord1/694335/916773/www.tvhe.co.nz/web/content/wp-includes/functions.php on line 6131avia_framework domain was triggered too early. This is usually an indicator for some code in the plugin or theme running too early. Translations should be loaded at the init action or later. Please see Debugging in WordPress for more information. (This message was added in version 6.7.0.) in /mnt/stor08-wc1-ord1/694335/916773/www.tvhe.co.nz/web/content/wp-includes/functions.php on line 6131Indeed, I would go even further than you and say that the “policy engineering view based on prediction” is naive and thoughtless – in truth we need explanation to set policy.
As mentioned at the bottom of the post unobservability, reflexivity, and the fact that many explanations can map to the same set of data make any analysis non-nonsensical without answering “why”.
What makes me most nervous is the number of people out there who truly believe naive data analysis, and models with the best “predictive power”, are really the be all and end all of the social sciences …
]]>Matt, as someone who is also in the business of selling predictions, a byproduct of economic theory and econometrics, I see the role of economics as being very much focussed on point 2, explaining how things work. This knowledge can help to make some predictions and help us make policies. Like some of the cool stuff they mentioned in Nudge: http://www.amazon.com/Nudge-Improving-Decisions-Health-Happiness/dp/014311526X
Users of forecasts are really interested in the risks around this forecast. It is a narrative of likely future environment with plenty of explanation of what the drivers and risks are. So, the reader is easily able to see when something changes.
What economist fail at is usually communication…
]]>Applied practitioners are usually a bad guide towards whether the research involved with a discipline is scientific – although it can be a hard line! That is part of the reason that Greg Mankiw used the “economic engineer vs economic scientist” description to try to show the split a bit! And it likely holds in a bunch of other disciplines as well, such as the ones you name!
For example, I am loath to put myself in the “economist” camp here at all – as I am not an economic scientist in the ways we’d see it, not at all! I sell a business service that relies on the empirical and theoretical evidence/products produced by economic scientists (along with using an applied economics skill set to try and fill gaps by analysing data that is available), and my comparative advantage is (hopefully) the way I can communicate those things to a non-economist audience.
I am very interested on the ideas about economic science, and trying to understand the argument for that – as it feeds into how I understand what economic scientists make so that I can use it. In that way I hope my perspective on it is relatively impartial 😛
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