Monday, October 12, 2015

Noah is stealing my material

Noah Smith:
And where is this law of the Universe that says that the human world can't be modeled like the world of particles or the world of cells and DNA? Does anyone have evidence to back up that contention? How the heck do you know that human behavior doesn't lend itself to modeling? If humans are so unpredictable, tell me why Google auctions get so much money from advertisers, or how economists can predict how many people will ride a train before the train is built. If you think social science can never be science, explain to me why these successes were possible.
So you know for a fact that the complexities of human decision-making matter? How? Did you already model an economic system as complex human beings and discover this? Why not just show us that research?
Also this from a couple days later:
If you haven't demonstrated that dimensional reduction does not happen, then the statement [that human behavior is too complex to model] is just an assumption that dimensional reduction does not happen. I'd say the onus is on you to tell us what the millions of additional relevant macroeconomic aggregates that must exist are [i.e.present some evidence].
There are probably lots of other places I've said similar things, but I'm just too lazy to look it up right now.

1 comment:

  1. Well, I'm glad he's putting the message out there at least.

    ReplyDelete

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