Considering Taking Micro And Macro Econ..How Much Math Involved?

[RFayette]

In my experience, both Intermediate Micro and Macro didn't require Calculus. My knowledge of Calculus was helpful but I wouldn't say that it was necessary at that level.

Anyways, I agree with ag. I was pretty frightened by the prospects of taking Calculus, until I took my first Calculus class and took it seriously. Once I did this, I realized that the basics of Calculus are very easy to understand and that it should be a required class before college.

This is true.  For me, the best way to study math is to read and take notes on the chapter (and all the examples therein) before it is covered in class, and to try to finish the weekly problem set as soon as it is released.

Also, with respect to statistics, I suppose it depends on the institution, but the very introductory class offered by the statistics department, which I'm taking now, has linear algebra and multivariable calculus, on top of differential and integral single-variable calculus, as strict prerequisites.  I can't imagine someone going very far in statistics without also having taken calculus based on that. 

[136or142]

Okay, this is getting out of hand.

1.Economics is not a science.  I think your claiming otherwise (unless you just used the language sloppily yourself and did not mean to state that) is the very heart of our disagreement.

This is not "the very heart of our disagreement." I actually have done some reading on this; you can start with the first salvo, Friedman (1966). Whether economics "is a science" has to do with its predictive accuracy, or its standards for rejecting hypotheses, or at least its culture with interpreting new facts - the usage of mathematical tools is neither necessary nor sufficient for any of the above.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Let's stop for a moment and define "calculus" again. Calculus is simply the quantitative analysis of change. Go back to everything you have said and replace every usage of "the use of calculus" with "analyzing change." Do your statements sound as deep and insightful as you thought they were?

Yes, there are theorems that must be proved with calculus (e.g. proof via moment generating functions of the Central Limit Theorem, perhaps the most fundamental result in statistics). But your bone is not with the theorems here - it's with the models that abuse the theorems.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

As far as I know, string theory isn't criticized because it "makes no sense" but because it is unverifiable and unfalsifiable. This is a possible criticism to economics - but, again, it does not necessarily deal with the usage of math in econ.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

What are some examples of this?

You must be logged in to read this quote.

But doesn't that make it all the more important to understand the math clearly? You have this idea of economists in a shadowy room talking to each other by reading out loud hundreds of equations. That's not how they talk to each other; they use English all the time.

Keep in mind I don't even really buy the idea that math is "more precise" than English, which is something theorists like to say but doesn't jive with me as an empirical person. But you are not separating two effects here: the effect of using mathematics to model some phenomenon, and specific inaccurate mathematical models which stay beyond their shelf life.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Please look at any college curriculum and see what the prerequisites are for a probability theory or statistics course. You'll find calculus on there eventually.

1.I've done some reading as well. There are the hard sciences: physics, chemistry and biology (in some kind of descending order) and the soft sciences like political science, economics...  From my reference to 'physics envy' it should have been obvious I was referring to economics not being a hard science as much as some economists try and claim that it is.

It is not because
A.Economics is based on human behavior which do not produce the same results every time unlike a chemical reaction.  Therefore repeated economic experiments will not produce the same results which is critical in any hard science.
B.Economics can not examine broad real world situations and make universal claims, in can only do simplified modeling.  

Of course there are theories in economics like 'diminishing returns' 'network externalities' and a number of others that apply in many cases, but I'm referring to specific things like 'in real constant dollars, if the Federal Reserve lowered its interest rate by 'X' amount it will always result in 'Y' economic growth over 'Z' period of time.

Physics can do that, economics can't.

Economics is not a (hard) science and all the use of mathematics/calculus will not change that.  

2.We don't disagree.

3.You are wrong about 'string theory.' Many physicists first rejected it on a logical basis because every time a person made a decision, new universes had to be created that contained all of the alternative possible decisions.  So, this would have meant an infinite number of new universes constantly creating more infinite new universes which, even given the number of odd things in physics especially with quantum mechanics, struck many physicists as simply absurd.

And yet, according to the mathematical proofs, string theory is 'proven.'  Clearly mathematics by itself is not sufficient.

4.The program I provided a link to "It's the Economists Stupid" provides a number of examples of that.

Also, http://www.stat.columbia.edu/~gelman/stuff_for_blog/addiction.pdf

5.I never said that it doesn't make understanding the math more important, even though I'm far from convinced that alone would help.  I said that that isn't the world at present and it isn't likely to be the world in the near future anyway.  I can't predict out anything beyond that.  And, yet, we have, especially economists who work for lobby groups using mathematics/calculus to 'prove' false conclusions right now.

Before we get more mathematics taught in school, it would be far easier to simply tell people 'just because an economics argument is based on a lot of mathematics and ends up providing a precise number does not mean that it isn't a load of nonsense.'  

6.I think all most people need to become more numerate is a basic statistics course of two.  They don't need a degree in probability and statistics.  There are a number of cognitive biases and logical fallacies that seem ingrained in pretty much everybody (including me) so I have no illusions that even if everybody had doctorates in calculus, statistics and logic that there would be no more illogical arguments made.

[Gustaf]

I don't understand the discussion here. Or more precisely I don't get Adam T's points.

Anyway, understanding calculus is super useful to make sense of life, IMO. I learnt the basics in early high school and I think that was good.

[ag]

I don't understand the discussion here. Or more precisely I don't get Adam T's points.

Formally, his point is that vowels are more useful than consonants (or the other way around), so it is absolutely unintelligible. Nst hrrd clcls.

Of course, what he has in mind, I guess - or, more specifically, he read it somewhere - is that people sometimes take certain "numbers" a bit "too literally", forgetting that many econ models are better viewed as mathematical parables, designed to elucidate a point, not as literal descriptions of reality (there are circumstances when it is not the case: in parts of market design literature - auctions, matching algorithms, etc. - economists have achieved almost engineering-like precision; but these are, of course, exceptions). Now, that point is, in fact, quite valid in my view: I myself like to pull the leg of my macro colleagues on this Unfortunately, that point is almost unrecognisable in his attempt at formulating it. An attack on vowels calculus is as bizarre as it looks.

BTW, if you insist on blaming some math toolkit, blame numerical methods, not calculus. I mean, if the model has a closed-form solution, chances are it is simple and elegant precisely because nobody has tried to make it as ugly and complex as the actual world around us, so its metaphorical meaning is clear It is when people get into "calibrating" things to the "real" economy that they become too literal in their meanings. But that you almost never can do just with your calculus toolkit. Big nasty computers are to blame  
 

[136or142]

I don't understand the discussion here. Or more precisely I don't get Adam T's points.

Formally, his point is that vowels are more useful than consonants (or the other way around), so it is absolutely unintelligible. Nst hrrd clcls.

Of course, what he has in mind, I guess - or, more specifically, he read it somewhere - is that people sometimes take certain "numbers" a bit "too literally", forgetting that many econ models are better viewed as mathematical parables, designed to elucidate a point, not as literal descriptions of reality (there are circumstances when it is not the case: in parts of market design literature - auctions, matching algorithms, etc. - economists have achieved almost engineering-like precision; but these are, of course, exceptions). Now, that point is, in fact, quite valid in my view: I myself like to pull the leg of my macro colleagues on this Unfortunately, that point is almost unrecognisable in his attempt at formulating it. An attack on vowels calculus is as bizarre as it looks.

BTW, if you insist on blaming some math toolkit, blame numerical methods, not calculus. I mean, if the model has a closed-form solution, chances are it is simple and elegant precisely because nobody has tried to make it as ugly and complex as the actual world around us, so its metaphorical meaning is clear It is when people get into "calibrating" things to the "real" economy that they become too literal in their meanings. But that you almost never can do just with your calculus toolkit. Big nasty computers are to blame  
 

I've both read it and I've seen multiple cases myself of the dishonest use of mathematics/calculus in economics.

1.http://michael-hudson.com/1999/09/the-use-and-abuse-of-mathematical-economics-2/
The use and abuse of mathematical economics.

2.http://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/technology/article/1737875/what-proper-role-mathematics-economics
The proper role of maths in economics.  Written by a physicist.

3.http://www.faiez.co/wp-content/uploads/Role-of-Mathematics-in-Economics.pdf
Historical article discussing when mathematics started to dominate economics.

Gustaf, I think the reason you could be having a problem with understanding my points is because you seem to think I'm a 'anti calculus.'  I am not.  I previously wrote that calculus makes calculations much simpler than with algebra and that it is useful for everybody to learn as best they can.

My specific complaints with mathematical economics (or as I previously referred to it "as the use of mathematics/calculus in economics") are what I previously wrote:

1.Economics ideas that can't be easily quantified or quantified at all are overlooked in favor of those that can be.  This is what the economists who are unhappy with this refer to as 'physics envy' and it pretty much is solely about the use of calculus in economics to do equations that supposedly 'prove' an economics argument and could not be easily done, if done at all, with any other type of math.

2.Mathematics/calculus are frequently used by economists who work for lobbying organizations to present dishonest arguments that many people, including the politicians themselves, believe must be correct because those arguments use numbers that are mathematically (scientifically) derived and end up with a precise number or a precise set of numbers, but hidden in the work are all sorts of numbers that are nothing more than estimates or in some cases simply made up.  Garbage in, garbage out.  

That is more to Ag's point that I should be blaming numerical methods and not specifically calculus.

Ag can blame the education system, the politicians or the public in general for falling for this, but when it's economists who are using the tools of their trade for deceptive purposes, it's those economists who are to blame.

I think Ag should have become a professor of calculus and not a professor of economics.

The three journal articles I linked to above go into further detail on my arguments and provide examples.

Of course I'm sure there are many economists who disagree, not with my claims, since I didn't make any independent claims, but with those three journal articles.

[Clarko95 📚💰📈]

I'm not nearly as intelligent as the others posting in this thread, so maybe I can help explain at a non-intimidating level.


I'm in my 3rd year of accounting, which is hilarious because I hate math, and usually get B's or C's in math classes. We were required to take introductory micro and macro, and I didn't have calculus for either one.

Intro classes are extremely simple in terms of math: it is merely basic algebra, and they spoon-feed you the formulas. What is most important at the intro level is understanding the graphs and what it is saying, and as long as you pay attention and ask questions about what you are unsure of, you should be fine. Towards the end of macro, you will most likely have to understand what happens when an event on one graph changes things on one or two additional, related graphs. This is the hardest part, but as long as you study this last part well, you should be fine.

Those were the only economics courses I've taken so far for undergrad. I intend to do a Masters in management & economics of government & business relations, and just finished taking a Masters-level course on the Economics of the EU at Bocconi University in Italy. Out of 22 students, only 4 of us were not already economics students, and there were a series of graphs regarding world trade that I had never encountered. However, after just asking the others to explain them, I understood them with minimal effort.

Introductory micro and macro are nothing to worry about if you are already a student who goes to class, studies, takes notes, pays attention, and gets at least decent grades. There is very little math beyond basic algebra.

Calculus was also the most useless and confusing class I have ever taken, but that may have been because my professor was a total idiot (we started out with 30 students in the course. After the drop date, 16 remained. Only 9 of us passed. The other calc teacher had significantly better student performance; almost everyone passed with few dropouts).

I have an interest in economics, but I've found that economics is more about if you can understand and explain the "story" that is occuring in various scenarios. As long as you remember the formulas, there's very little math.

[136or142]

I'm not nearly as intelligent as the others posting in this thread, so maybe I can help explain at a non-intimidating level.

Hey! I also posted in this thread.

[136or142]

I'm not nearly as intelligent as the others posting in this thread, so maybe I can help explain at a non-intimidating level.


I'm in my 3rd year of accounting, which is hilarious because I hate math, and usually get B's or C's in math classes. We were required to take introductory micro and macro, and I didn't have calculus for either one.

Intro classes are extremely simple in terms of math: it is merely basic algebra, and they spoon-feed you the formulas. What is most important at the intro level is understanding the graphs and what it is saying, and as long as you pay attention and ask questions about what you are unsure of, you should be fine. Towards the end of macro, you will most likely have to understand what happens when an event on one graph changes things on one or two additional, related graphs. This is the hardest part, but as long as you study this last part well, you should be fine.

Those were the only economics courses I've taken so far for undergrad. I intend to do a Masters in management & economics of government & business relations, and just finished taking a Masters-level course on the Economics of the EU at Bocconi University in Italy. Out of 22 students, only 4 of us were not already economics students, and there were a series of graphs regarding world trade that I had never encountered. However, after just asking the others to explain them, I understood them with minimal effort.

Introductory micro and macro are nothing to worry about if you are already a student who goes to class, studies, takes notes, pays attention, and gets at least decent grades. There is very little math beyond basic algebra.

Calculus was also the most useless and confusing class I have ever taken, but that may have been because my professor was a total idiot (we started out with 30 students in the course. After the drop date, 16 remained. Only 9 of us passed. The other calc teacher had significantly better student performance; almost everyone passed with few dropouts).

I have an interest in economics, but I've found that economics is more about if you can understand and explain the "story" that is occuring in various scenarios. As long as you remember the formulas, there's very little math.

I have a diploma in accounting.  I found it helpful for some things in micro economics.

Calculus shouldn't be confusing, the basic concepts are quite clear and it actually simplifies algebra equations a great deal.

I passed differential calculus with no difficulty but could never pass integral calculus.  I suppose some might argue my dislike of the emphasis on mathematics/calculus in economics is just sour grapes, but I don't think I behave that way.

Anybody who can pass algebra should have no trouble with differential calculus, but integral calculus is where mathematics starts to change from being about addition, subtraction, multiplication and division to being about manipulation of mathematical symbols (I was told this by an integral calculus instructor.)  I find most people get lower marks taking integral calculus than differential calculus, but people who are good at computer programming would probably like both integral calculus and all the higher math after that.

I didn't have any trouble understanding what integral calculus does: measuring the area under a curve, I didn't even have any trouble following the explanations of the instructors, I just couldn't manipulate the math symbols myself.  I also can't figure out computer programming in the slightest.  BASIC was too complex for me, and I got an F in C++.

[136or142]

I don't understand the discussion here. Or more precisely I don't get Adam T's points.

Anyway, understanding calculus is super useful to make sense of life, IMO. I learnt the basics in early high school and I think that was good.

I think I figured out the cause of your confusion. 

It is, of course, a logical fallacy to blame all of the use of mathematics in economics for some economists misusing that mathematics/calculus.  The problem is, as Richard Denniss explained in that radio program that many economists like the idea or being regarded as some kind of scientist or some kind of guru and don't want to inform the public that a great deal of economic forecasts, and not just the deliberately dishonest ones from lobbying groups, are, if not outright garbage in and garbage out, are based on all sorts of assumptions that render the specificity of the forecast as essentially meaningless.

He says that these things annoyed him so much he along with a number of his fellow academic economists started up an economics association in his native Australia with the goal of educating the public and the politicians of both the deliberate misuse of mathematics/calculus by lobbyists and the limitations of the more honest use of mathematics/calculus in forecasting.   He said his biggest success came when the Australian civil service said that it would no longer accept claims of job creation figures  made  by  companies that included second order effects of job creation or, more specifically in this case, the claims of the number of spin-off jobs that would allegedly be created.

Sorry for not explaining myself clearly previously and, again, I'm sure some economists will disagree that they like to be regarded by the general public as scientists or gurus.  But, if they don't, then why have so few economists in Canada or the United States informed the public about the limitations of economic forecasting.  There are the occasional op-eds in newspapers from the odd economist, but I've never seen any sort of sustained effort that Richard Denniss and his friends pursued in Australia.

[ag]

math.

2.Mathematics/calculus are frequently used by economists who work for lobbying organizations to present dishonest arguments

Well, English is used for these purposes much more frequently and in much more obscure ways. For this reason, I strongly suggest strict prohibition on using English for any sort of argument related to economics

[ag]

One of the funny misconceptions in all these posts above is the confusion between "mathematical" and "quantitative". Most fancy math usage in econ has nothing to do with quantification of anything: "math" does not mean "numbers". Math is simply the formal language in which this profession expresses itself. In any case, if your objection is to "numbers" please object to things that, actually, produce "numbers." Calculus - and its usage in economics - is, at worst, a very minor culprit here Frankly, if I had to give a very unscientific estimate here, I would say that the quantity of numbers in the output of an econ study and math usage in the process of conducting it are very much inversely correlated

And, of course - and this is very much a separate issue - I strenuously object to economics "not being a science". Saying that is like saying that economics is not dealing with empirical facts about this world. If that were the case, it would have been a useless field. In fact, even (good) history is a science. Science is the way we understand the world around us. We study what happens, we pose hypothesis about the underlying mechanisms, we test them, using empirical data (both observational and experimental). That is what makes it science. This process is made easier by math, but good historians sometimes do it without using math explicitly. Their data is, generally, pretty bad, so they do not have to build very precise models: makes sense not to take position on things one never can test (in contrast, they spend the bulk of their time collecting the data - what for an economist is a data point, for a historian is 3 years of archival work). Our data is somewhat better, so we do a more careful job. Physicists have even better data, so they try to understand even more. Standards might vary by field, but the fundamental approach is very much the same, math or no math. If economics (or history) is not a science, than what is it? Religion?

[ag]

To sum up. It makes no sense to read "heterodox economics" unless you happen to know what "orthodox economics" is about and what it does. Now, there are many things you can object to: a lot of it with great reason. But objecting to usage of a - very basic and easy - math toolkit is ridiculous. Using calculus is no different from using, I do not know, a present tense. And, of course, it is infinitely easier to lie in English, without any usage of math. If you cannot translate a simple spoken argument into baby math, it is, probably, a lie - or, at best, has flaws/unclear things in it. That concerns not merely math, but any kind of human conversation. This forum would have been a lot clearer if we used LaTex and wrote using notation. And that, by itself, would have made it not at all "more scientific". I mean, I have been in seminars that could be best described as standup comedy - all using beautiful mathematical modelling and reasoning. It was as funny - and as scathing - as anything produced by John Stewart. You just needed to know a little math :)

[ag]

I don't understand the discussion here. Or more precisely I don't get Adam T's points.

Anyway, understanding calculus is super useful to make sense of life, IMO. I learnt the basics in early high school and I think that was good.

I think I figured out the cause of your confusion.  

It is, of course, a logical fallacy to blame all of the use of mathematics in economics for some economists misusing that mathematics/calculus.  The problem is, as Richard Denniss explained in that radio program that many economists like the idea or being regarded as some kind of scientist or some kind of guru and don't want to inform the public that a great deal of economic forecasts, and not just the deliberately dishonest ones from lobbying groups, are, if not outright garbage in and garbage out, are based on all sorts of assumptions that render the specificity of the forecast as essentially meaningless.

Garbage in/garbage out is a general rule, applicable to all endeavours. This has nothing to do specifically with economics, math, or interaction of the two: though, of course, it is the rule very much applicable to us as well About 99.9% of the time an economist is trying to use mathematical reasoning s/he is not producing a macroeconomic forecast (frankly, as an economist, I have no clue how these are done - from what little I understand, it has very little to do with economics, as science). And most of the time lying happens in conversation about economics, it is the English verbiage that is used to do the trick. At least, if math is used, than if you know the math you can understand what is going on. I am pretty sure that without math I could get you a reasonably plausibly looking argument why you should be killing your grandma in such a way that you will never see where I got you sold on it. Plato's dialogues are much harder to unravel than Arrow's theorems

Of course, people who have a religious faith in some mysterious and esoteric "math" that magically makes things into "science" are not the intended audience of an academic paper. If one of these happens to be your congressman, I fully agree that presenting him with a bunch of mathematically-looking pages is fraud. Pretty much everything of interest we say with math can be explained in words - and should be, if the task is to explain. Unfortunately, it would take a very smart person to figure out whether that explanation is correct or flawed. It is exactly what happens to me when I go to a medical office for a procedure. I ask the doctor to explain me what is going on, and the doctor, generally, does. But I have no clue whether his explanation makes sense - I know little biology or chemistry and pretty much no pharmacology or medicine. I haven't written a chemical formula in a quarter century and have no clue what happens in my body. If a doctor starts writing formulas for me, I will gain nothing from this. But that does not mean that medical students should not learn chemistry.

[ag]

2.http://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/technology/article/1737875/what-proper-role-mathematics-economics
The proper role of maths in economics.  Written by a physicist.

Unfortunately, it does not discuss the actual proper (or improper) use of math in economics. In fact, it suffers from the same problem it describes: there is a theory (of math usage in econ) not grounded in data. And, notice, it is done entirely without math

Now, I happen to understand some of the things he is trying to allude to. And some of the issues are quite serious indeed (I myself firmly believe that much of what we are doing is best described as building "mathematical parables" and object to overinterpretation of many results). But he most definitely is not saying that intermediate micro should be taught without calculus

[TheDeadFlagBlues]

To my knowledge, it's nearly impossible to be a proficient statistician/econometrician without understanding the theoretical basis of statistics (probability theory and mathematical statistics) and this requires calculus. Even one was to advance the critique of economics, a critique that I'm sympathetic towards, that it's insufficiently empirical and overly obsessed with the perfect forms of mathematical models that rarely approximate reality, there could be no claim that calculus isn't...integral to economic science.

I still basically agree with ag though. Most economic practices and outcomes are quantifiable/measurable. As such, they can be modeled easily using math and, for this reason, models have value because they give us a depiction of a hypothetical reality that's easy to understand and reason with. The problems of modeling occur when economists become overly infatuated with particular models, mistaking them for reality, or attempt to apply models to situations that do not call for those models. As an example, a simple model of the labor market might be not be an appropriate tool for understanding the employment effects of a minimum wage increase if one believes that firms have some degree of monopsony power. Do this mean that the simple model of the labor market is wrong? No, it simply means that it isn't an explanatory model in particular situations where its assumptions do not apply. The arguments that underlie this post are detailed quite nicely in a book written by Dani Rodrik (Economics Rules) that I'd recommend. Because I'm an undergraduate, I wouldn't take my post that seriously though...

[136or142]

One of the funny misconceptions in all these posts above is the confusion between "mathematical" and "quantitative". Most fancy math usage in econ has nothing to do with quantification of anything: "math" does not mean "numbers". Math is simply the formal language in which this profession expresses itself. In any case, if your objection is to "numbers" please object to things that, actually, produce "numbers." Calculus - and its usage in economics - is, at worst, a very minor culprit here Frankly, if I had to give a very unscientific estimate here, I would say that the quantity of numbers in the output of an econ study and math usage in the process of conducting it are very much inversely correlated

And, of course - and this is very much a separate issue - I strenuously object to economics "not being a science". Saying that is like saying that economics is not dealing with empirical facts about this world. If that were the case, it would have been a useless field. In fact, even (good) history is a science. Science is the way we understand the world around us. We study what happens, we pose hypothesis about the underlying mechanisms, we test them, using empirical data (both observational and experimental). That is what makes it science. This process is made easier by math, but good historians sometimes do it without using math explicitly. Their data is, generally, pretty bad, so they do not have to build very precise models: makes sense not to take position on things one never can test (in contrast, they spend the bulk of their time collecting the data - what for an economist is a data point, for a historian is 3 years of archival work). Our data is somewhat better, so we do a more careful job. Physicists have even better data, so they try to understand even more. Standards might vary by field, but the fundamental approach is very much the same, math or no math. If economics (or history) is not a science, than what is it? Religion?

Paragraph one. I will take your word on that (to the degree that I understand it.) This is above my education in economics.

Paragraph two.  Yes, I already wrote that economics could be considered a soft science, but, it seems many economists clearly including you want economics to be considered a hard science like physics, which it clearly is not, for the two reasons that I detailed above.  

1.I don't know what heterodox economics I'm supposedly using.

2.Whether economics should be considered a (hard) science or not is not at all a separate debate/discussion.  It's pretty obvious that you think one of the major reasons economics should be considered a (hard) science like physics is due to the use of mathematics/calculus in economics.  Do you seriously believe that economics is a hard science like physics?  If so how do you address those two issues I previously mentioned that physicists themselves believe is needed for something to be considered a hard science: repeatability of experimentation, and the ability to apply laws universally?    

Economics could also be called an 'art.'  As a professor you obviously know that universities have science schools and art schools, so I don't know why you are playing games like that.

3.With garbage in/garbage out I was specifically referring to the use of estimates or essentially made up numbers being used in economic forecasts, especially those used by lobby groups.

4.Economic forecasts made and/or used by lobby groups are rarely attended for an academic audience, not strictly for an academic audience anyway.

BTW, I admit that I don't really know the details of economics forecasting myself, and I certainly can't do the mathematics/calculus myself.  But, I have read the details of where the numbers used in the equations are derived from in these studies on a few occasions, and I completely concur with what Richard Denniss claims: a fair amount of these numbers are nothing more than estimates or are essentially made up.  As a mathematician yourself, you would clearly know that if you plug a '5' into a multiplication equation but the real number turns out to be a '4', the end calculaton  would be a 20% higher figure in whatever estimate was being calculated than what really occurred (all else being equal.)

Since you say you don't know about forecasting, and you make no claim that you've even looked into it, why are you then disputing what I and especially what Richard Denniss say about forecasting?

5.My guess is, and I admit that this is strictly a guess myself, is that were it not for economists claiming to be scientists and producing economic forecasts with precise numbers, that most ordinary people would not take the 'english language' claims made by economists as 'gospel' either.

Of course, there is also the other side: since so many economic forecasts so frequently turn out to be so wrong, an increasing number of people are dismissing even language based arguments that nearly all economists believe.

[136or142]

To sum up. It makes no sense to read "heterodox economics" unless you happen to know what "orthodox economics" is about and what it does. Now, there are many things you can object to: a lot of it with great reason. But objecting to usage of a - very basic and easy - math toolkit is ridiculous. Using calculus is no different from using, I do not know, a present tense. And, of course, it is infinitely easier to lie in English, without any usage of math. If you cannot translate a simple spoken argument into baby math, it is, probably, a lie - or, at best, has flaws/unclear things in it. That concerns not merely math, but any kind of human conversation. This forum would have been a lot clearer if we used LaTex and wrote using notation. And that, by itself, would have made it not at all "more scientific". I mean, I have been in seminars that could be best described as standup comedy - all using beautiful mathematical modelling and reasoning. It was as funny - and as scathing - as anything produced by John Stewart. You just needed to know a little math :)

Jon Stewart.  There was a John Stewart who was a folk/rock singer in the 1970s and early 1980s who had a hit single called "Gold" ("people out there are turning music into gold") that he recorded with a couple members of Fleetwood Mac (I believe Lindsay Buckingham played guitar and Stevie Nicks clearly provides the backing vocals.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xVUtpUdY3Uo

[ag]

To my knowledge, it's nearly impossible to be a proficient statistician/econometrician without understanding the theoretical basis of statistics (probability theory and mathematical statistics) and this requires calculus.

I did not even touch on that for lack of time

[ag]

2.Whether economics should be considered a (hard) science or not is not at all a separate debate/discussion.  It's pretty obvious that you think one of the major reasons economics should be considered a (hard) science like physics is due to the use of mathematics/calculus in economics.

This pretty much directly contradicts everything that I have written over multiple posts. Have you bothered reading them?

I do not know what a "hard science" is. It is either science, or it is not. But the scientific approach means formulating hypothesis and testing them with data. I have several times mentioned that, in general, one can do this using English: it is just much harder to do so. Economics uses math because that makes it easier and more transparent. Overwhelmingly, those who oppose math usage in economics, are doing so for the purposes of obfuscation, to cover up bad and imprecise reasoning.

[136or142]

2.Whether economics should be considered a (hard) science or not is not at all a separate debate/discussion.  It's pretty obvious that you think one of the major reasons economics should be considered a (hard) science like physics is due to the use of mathematics/calculus in economics.

This pretty much directly contradicts everything that I have written over multiple posts. Have you bothered reading them?

I do not know what a "hard science" is. It is either science, or it is not. But the scientific approach means formulating hypothesis and testing them with data. I have several times mentioned that, in general, one can do this using English: it is just much harder to do so. Economics uses math because that makes it easier and more transparent. Overwhelmingly, those who oppose math usage in economics, are doing so for the purposes of obfuscation, to cover up bad and imprecise reasoning.

1.I've read everything you've written. If I've misunderstood anything you've written, I'm sure the fault is mine.

2.Hard science vs. soft science: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_and_soft_science
The scientific method also requires repeatability of experimentation and the ability to produce laws or theories that can be applied universally.  Physics and chemistry and most of the time biology can do that, economics can't.  You can call economics a science if you want, but it is not a science in the same way that physics, chemistry and biology are, though, for some reason that I can't understand, you seem to either wish it were or believe it is.

[ag]

2.Whether economics should be considered a (hard) science or not is not at all a separate debate/discussion.  It's pretty obvious that you think one of the major reasons economics should be considered a (hard) science like physics is due to the use of mathematics/calculus in economics.

This pretty much directly contradicts everything that I have written over multiple posts. Have you bothered reading them?

I do not know what a "hard science" is. It is either science, or it is not. But the scientific approach means formulating hypothesis and testing them with data. I have several times mentioned that, in general, one can do this using English: it is just much harder to do so. Economics uses math because that makes it easier and more transparent. Overwhelmingly, those who oppose math usage in economics, are doing so for the purposes of obfuscation, to cover up bad and imprecise reasoning.

1.I've read everything you've written. If I've misunderstood anything you've written, I'm sure the fault is mine.

2.Hard science vs. soft science: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_and_soft_science
The scientific method also requires repeatability of experimentation and the ability to produce laws or theories that can be applied universally.  Physics and chemistry and most of the time biology can do that, economics can't.  You can call economics a science if you want, but it is not a science in the same way that physics, chemistry and biology are, though, for some reason that I can't understand, you seem to either wish it were or believe it is.

What do ou mean we "can't"? We have a large body of repeated experiments (both lab, field, and natural) and we have established regularities that are pretty damn repeated across the world.

The main problem with you argument is that you do not know what economists are doing. You come back to (macro) economic forecasting - something generally not done by academic economists and viewed very sceptical in the academic community. I will fully agree that much of that is not science. But neither it is economics, really I mean, doctors in the field routinely do unscientific things, but you are not going claim that biology is not a science because of that

[ag]

I think Ag should have become a professor of calculus and not a professor of economics.

A student newspaper has once quoted me saying "calculus is not a religion: do not differentiate everything that moves" If anything, I am the sort of an econ prof who likes asking questions where calculus will not help. This is why students hate me

[ag]

3.With garbage in/garbage out I was specifically referring to the use of estimates or essentially made up numbers being used in economic forecasts, especially those used by lobby groups.

4.Economic forecasts made and/or used by lobby groups are rarely attended for an academic audience, not strictly for an academic audience anyway.

If anything, that is the argument against using English: 99.9% of lying there happens in English. You do not need calculus to produce made-up numbers.

[ag]

5.My guess is, and I admit that this is strictly a guess myself, is that were it not for economists claiming to be scientists and producing economic forecasts with precise numbers, that most ordinary people would not take the 'english language' claims made by economists as 'gospel' either.

People doing forecasts and people who do economic science tend to be very different people. Doctors also tend to be pretty crappy scientists in my experience. The reason you trust doctors is not because they are good biologists.

[136or142]

2.Whether economics should be considered a (hard) science or not is not at all a separate debate/discussion.  It's pretty obvious that you think one of the major reasons economics should be considered a (hard) science like physics is due to the use of mathematics/calculus in economics.

This pretty much directly contradicts everything that I have written over multiple posts. Have you bothered reading them?

I do not know what a "hard science" is. It is either science, or it is not. But the scientific approach means formulating hypothesis and testing them with data. I have several times mentioned that, in general, one can do this using English: it is just much harder to do so. Economics uses math because that makes it easier and more transparent. Overwhelmingly, those who oppose math usage in economics, are doing so for the purposes of obfuscation, to cover up bad and imprecise reasoning.

1.I've read everything you've written. If I've misunderstood anything you've written, I'm sure the fault is mine.

2.Hard science vs. soft science: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_and_soft_science
The scientific method also requires repeatability of experimentation and the ability to produce laws or theories that can be applied universally.  Physics and chemistry and most of the time biology can do that, economics can't.  You can call economics a science if you want, but it is not a science in the same way that physics, chemistry and biology are, though, for some reason that I can't understand, you seem to either wish it were or believe it is.

What do you mean we "can't"? We have a large body of repeated experiments (both lab, field, and natural) and we have established regularities that are pretty damn repeated across the world.

The main problem with you argument is that you do not know what economists are doing. You come back to (macro) economic forecasting - something generally not done by academic economists and viewed very skeptically (sic) in the academic community. I will fully agree that much of that is not science. But neither is it economics, really I mean, doctors in the field routinely do unscientific things, but you are not going claim that biology is not a science because of that

1.I'm not aware of this.  I would be very interested in seeing the findings of these experiments.  The example I gave previously was that economics can not make a universal claim that if the Federal Reserve cut its interest rate by X percent, that it would result in Y percent economic growth over Z period of time all the time.

2.Well, it seems we don't disagree then You must be aware though that many people, if not most people, believe that all economists do is make forecasts.  So, maybe you and your academic colleagues should inform the public over and over again that economic forecasts aren't regarded as serious economics by academic economists.  I would suggest flooding newspapers with letters to the editors that every time an academic forecast is used in the op-ed section or every time an article appears in the newspaper repeating a claim by some economist who works for a lobby group that 'if we do this it will create this many jobs."

And do the same thing with the comments section on news websites. You might say that you and your colleagues don't have time to do this, but I think it is absolutely true that
1.most of the public think that pretty much all economists due is make economic forecasts

2.an increasing number of the public is getting increasingly skeptical of economists due to the failure of most of these forecasts to make accurate predictions.

I think many people don't believe when economists say that free trade agreements are not responsible for the vast majority of the loss of manufacturing jobs and that free trade agreements aren't even the same as globalization due to skepticism many people have with economists over the failure of economic forecasting.  As we see in this election, this is already having real world consequences.

I suppose this leads to the question: is economics what economists say it is, or is it what (I think) most people think it is? 

I think in this case that perception Trumps reality.