by Summary:
Jason Smith calls out Dirk Bezemer (who now identifies as an MMT economist). Again the difference among 1) scientific prediction based on generating testable hypotheses from a theory, 2) forecasting probabilities of outcomes from data, and 3) foreseeing and forewarning based on contingencies.Information Transfer EconomicsNo one saw this coming: Bezemer's misleading paper Jason SmithSee also On occasion when I mention things about econ twitter or my blog, my wife responds sarcastically with "Oh no. Are you making friends again?" with the obvious connotation (because she knows me well) that I am starting fights. I'm not sure what sets me off, but one ingredient is usually some reference to physics in the context of economics. The latest version got a response from the subject David
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Mike Norman considers the following as important: Dirk Bezemer
This could be interesting, too:
Jason Smith calls out Dirk Bezemer (who now identifies as an MMT economist). Again the difference among 1) scientific prediction based on generating testable hypotheses from a theory, 2) forecasting probabilities of outcomes from data, and 3) foreseeing and forewarning based on contingencies.Information Transfer EconomicsNo one saw this coming: Bezemer's misleading paper Jason SmithSee also On occasion when I mention things about econ twitter or my blog, my wife responds sarcastically with "Oh no. Are you making friends again?" with the obvious connotation (because she knows me well) that I am starting fights. I'm not sure what sets me off, but one ingredient is usually some reference to physics in the context of economics. The latest version got a response from the subject David
Topics:
Mike Norman considers the following as important: Dirk Bezemer
This could be interesting, too:
Mike Norman writes Jason Smith — Letter to Dirk Bezemer
Again the difference among 1) scientific prediction based on generating testable hypotheses from a theory, 2) forecasting probabilities of outcomes from data, and 3) foreseeing and forewarning based on contingencies.
Information Transfer Economics
No one saw this coming: Bezemer's misleading paper
Jason Smith
See also
On occasion when I mention things about econ twitter or my blog, my wife responds sarcastically with "Oh no. Are you making friends again?" with the obvious connotation (because she knows me well) that I am starting fights. I'm not sure what sets me off, but one ingredient is usually some reference to physics in the context of economics. The latest version got a response from the subject David Orrell in comments. This is actually a two-part blog post, the other having been scheduled earlier and contains much more detail about the numerous fabricated and out of context quotes in an article by Dirk Bezemer about claims to have predicted the global financial crisis or global recession.Making friends: David Orrell
Below, I have responded to David Orrell's comments on my post. Given how blunt I was, David was relatively nice. But this is exactly the kind of discussion I'd like to be having: What does it mean to make macro- or micro-economics more scientific? My general feeling is that what comes under the broad heading of alternative or "heterodox" approaches is strangely exactly like "mainstream" economics, just with different jargon or mathematical decorations. Neither appear to value empirical data. Neither appear to make accurate forecasts. Neither appear to reject models or give up models that so complicated relative to the data they can never be rejected.
Here is my response: