Thanks Ben!
I suspect that between this post and my comment about the DCCC I now come across as an overly trusting person.
Probably an accurate impression.
For me, the best part of the film was the emphasis on how deeply corrupt the economics/business school profession is. Watching Glenn Hubbard squirm under an extremely mild examination was terrific.
For me, the best part of the film was the emphasis on how deeply corrupt the economics/business school profession is.
That was one of the surprises of the film for me as well -- to hear just how much money is going to academic economists for consulting work or board memberships.
I was also startled that the chair of the Harvard economics department seemed like he hadn't even thought about potential conflict of interest concerns. I thought part of the Harvard brand is that the faculty have significant connections to government and industry.
I thought part of the Harvard brand is that the faculty have significant connections to government and industry.
Doesn't mean they've thought about it, though.
One of the "how could this have ever happened" journalists in the movie is Allan Sloan:
Allan Sloan, 2004
"Greenspan's central banker calculus concludes that the risks Fannie and Freddie pose to the system outweigh the benefits. But the benefits are widespread, accruing largely to borrowers of relatively modest means; the risks are theoretical."
Allan Sloan, 2008
"There's no such thing as a free lunch."
I suppose the technical term is "hoocoodanode."
The fact that economics/finance faculty have been corrupted surprises me as well (I haven't seen the movie). Is it just top schools, like Harvard?
Watching Glenn Hubbard squirm under an extremely mild examination
Hubbard doesn't just squirm. He gets positively indignant that anybody would dare question his judgment (or integrity). It really is something to see.
For the first two paragraphs and a bit, I thought this was all about the Spike Lee movie starring Clive Owen.
And Denzel. Don't forget Denzel. That movie makes smooth feel goose-pimply.
Normally I'd be quite frustrated by this post, as my publications's blogging policy would prohibit me from saying much. But, luckily, I haven't seen the film, so I have nothing to say anyway.
Normally I'd be quite frustrated by this post, as my publications's blogging policy would prohibit me from saying much. But, luckily, I haven't seen the film, so I have nothing to say anyway.
But it's worth saying twice, dammit.
does glenn hubbard come across as:
(a) worse than;
(b) better than; or
(c) equivalently bad but for different reasons
as frederick mishkin?
i dunno, i had a really heated argument with a friend about this after seeing the movie.
I'm starting to think that only three members of the unfoggedetariat have seen the movie.
15 posted before seeing 14.
That's tough. Personally I found Mishkin much more annoying, but I think Hubbard did more damage.
I'll go with my first response and say that Hubbard comes across better, but don't hold me to that.
chair of the Harvard economics department seemed like he hadn't even thought about potential conflict of interest concerns
<cough>shlei<cough>fer
Actually, the guy probably wasn't chair back during the whole Russia scandal, but I would think that a certain kind of willful blindness maximizes your utility in that position.
I haven't seen the movie yet, though.
10, Enver Hoxha gave a great speech, too.
For me the one message that the film repeats and manages to viscerally communicate is that we shouldn't be overly respectful of the cleverness of smart and powerful people. They aren't necessarily playing a deeper or more complicated game, they may just be lying to our faces.
I hesitate to type this, but didn't progressives spend roughly the years 2000-2008 pleading the case of expertise and education -- and, not incidentally, the good faith implicit therein -- over the passing fancies and subterranean fetishes of America's dumb white trash peckerwoods* ideological enthusiasm, whether the expertise and education in question belonged to Stephen Hawking or Paul Krugman? Isn't the above rather close to what one might tease out of somebody in a "Sarah Palin for Warrior-Priest-King**" t-shirt, if one had a sort of warm, tactful, Bill Moyers-esque way with America's dumb white trash peckerwoods heroes of workers' paradise the simple people of the land?
* Thank you, Randolph Scott in Ride the High Country.
** See, it's funny because her supporters pretend to the most committed Christian devotion but cling to the comforting specifics of the Old Testament prescriptions, prohibitions and predictions, which in turn encourages them in a heterodox, at best, characterization of oh forget it.
Isn't the above rather close to what one might tease out of somebody in a "Sarah Palin for Warrior-Priest-King**" t-shirt
Yes. In theory, this is why one needs a vigilant and informed/educated journalistic (as opposed to steadfastly he/she said) media, to diligently question and fact-check said experts, who, of course, must not be allowed to dodge and hedge.
In other words, your and, not incidentally, the good faith implicit therein doesn't quite parse for me. Did progressives argue for the inherent good faith testimony of experts?
It is true that the essential fact-checking and questioning of experts kind of got lost: I blame the media, chiefly in the interests of concluding this comment!
I still believe in expertise and education in general. Its just economists that I think are full of shit.
One of the better interdisciplinary talks I've seen compared the predictive success of climatology and economics. And really there was hardly a comparison to make. No economic models make predictions at the level of climate models, let along make successful predictions.
And yet the economists routinely tell us to ignore what the climate models say, because the economic models say that growth will solve everything.
This post and comment thread has John Emerson written all over it. As a shout-out, that is.
...manages to viscerally communicate is that we shouldn't be overly respectful of the cleverness of smart and powerful people.
Had it right in one.
The problem is not abandoning reason and letting the instincts and passions run wild and rule. This is always the solution.
The only important question is whose instincts shall rule.
Those who rule by instinct, like to tell those they rule to calm down and think about it all for a while cause it's really complicated. They are lying.
(There is of course also the enlightenment tradition of not trusting yor instincts)
20: 40 years after The Best and the Brightest this is even the slightest bit controversial? Sure it's a balancing act, and the chasm on the "know nothing" side is deep and tragically well-explored in human history, but constant vigilance against the clever is one of the key requirements of procedural liberalism.
In theory, this is why one needs a vigilant and informed/educated journalistic (as opposed to steadfastly he/she said) media....
How does one reconcile that need with the much-maligned trade-to-profession transformation in the journalism sector (in the U.S., at least), circa mid-20th century? Less off-topic, how does one get a vigilant and informed/educated media without a vigilant and informed/educated populace, with which, ah, er, best of luck?
Did progressives argue for the inherent good faith testimony of experts?
Maybe "implicit therein" was off. Perhaps "credited thereto" would have conveyed better my sense that progressives gave our preferred experts a little confirmation bias bump in credibility because they had the qualifications that we so readily deride when things go wrong.
I haven't seen IJ though I think it's available on ON DEMAND. But then I am daily immersed in the swamp of economists of varying muckitude and foetor.
I like some of them a lot, and I like the ones I like a little more every day, as they abandon their models and rational expectations and diffy qs and join me in the cult of marginal Cthulhuism.
Krugman is like this far away from BSDaTTS
25: There's a Doonesbury strip in which Mike Doonesbury and some friends attend a '60s-themed party dressed as "the best and the brightest":
"Lay some hubris on me, fellas."
[In unison:] "We can win the war in Vietnam!"
OT: Do people still think highly of Inception? Why?
On this general topic, Paul Krugman's latest op-ed in the NYT had me wondering: what's up with Austan Goolsbee's apparent intention to leave the Obama administration shortly?
This Krugman passage struck me:
People have asked me why the president's economic advisers aren't telling him not to believe in the confidence fairy -- that is, not to believe the assertion, popular on the right but overwhelmingly refuted by the evidence, that slashing spending in the face of a depressed economy will magically create jobs. My answer is, what economic advisers? Almost all the high-profile economists who joined the Obama administration early on have either left or are leaving.
I had tended to think that Goolsbee was sound, a man of integrity. Talking about this with a friend today, I speculated that he'd increasingly found himself called upon to support the administration line, to his discomfort, and finally said, You know what? I'm not willing to do this any more.
26: How does one reconcile that need with the much-maligned trade-to-profession transformation in the journalism sector (in the U.S., at least), circa mid-20th century?
We should all talk about this further some time. Ginger Yellow had some things to say in the NMM to NoTW thread. I think there are a couple of other people here who work, or have worked, professionally in journalism.
Then the rest of us can jump in with remarks about the media's reliance on advertising revenues, and stuff like that.
Less off-topic, how does one get a vigilant and informed/educated media without a vigilant and informed/educated populace, with which, ah, er, best of luck?
Uh.
Krugman, Stieglitz have dined with the Obummer and know it is pointless to talk to him.
30:It should be pretty obvious by now, even discounting some self-serving accounts by the likes of Summers and Romer, that the fucking problem is and always has been Obama. He embraces the freshwater Chicago psycho evil to the very core of his heart and soul, and no amount of suffering, horror, and catastrophe will ever move him.
BSDaTTS
What? I'm about to have dinner.
Bob, remember your steps, buddy. One day at a time.
22
One of the better interdisciplinary talks I've seen compared the predictive success of climatology and economics. And really there was hardly a comparison to make. No economic models make predictions at the level of climate models, let along make successful predictions.
I don't know what this means exactly but I doubt it is true in any meaningful way. What exactly are the predictive successes of climatology? Backtesting doesn't count for obvious reasons.
One of the better interdisciplinary talks I've seen compared the predictive success of climatology and economics.
Slightly apropos, the other evening I happened upon a man who was standing on the sidewalk, unostentatiously but unmistakably dowsing with a little gilt pendulum on a chain. As always, chance encounters with the enthusiasts of the occult tend to leave one a little disappointed (no Eye of Agamotto! No Crimson Bands of Cittorak! No emancipated flappers Charlestoning to a grubby wax cylinder of Tibetan prayers!), but in this case I found myself plagued by a simple question: What the hell could the man -- anyone, really -- have been dowsing for on the Upper West Side of Manhattan? Apart from the building where Lady Gaga's parents live, which I could have told him was on the other side of the street.
34: I thought it was a "Best and Brightest" thing, but that doesn't make any sense now that I look closer.
38: The Best and the Brightest could decipher it though. Let me know when you do.
"Big Swinging Dicks at Tony's Taco Shack"
37: which I could have told him was on the other side of the street.
You've done the celebrities' parents tour!
"Take Their Stuff"
Here goes the House and Senate, with even bigger majorities, to Republicans in 2012
Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee
"We can't recruit candidates if Medicare cut in Debt Limit Deal"
Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chair Steve Israel warned lawmakers on Friday that he would have trouble recruiting candidates for office if the party caved on Medicare during the debt ceiling negotiations.The comments came during a closed-door caucus meeting. Multiple sources confirmed the remarks, describing them as "impassioned."
"He said recruits would not consider running if Democrats did not stand up for Medicare," one attendee told The Huffington Post. "He added that national polling showed a seismic shift against House Republicans after the [Paul] Ryan budget because of Medicare."
When are y'all gonna admit that Obama is doing this intentionally?
Bob, can we wait, please, to see what happens? I'm as annoyed with the "Obama is playing 11th dimensional chess" narrative as anyone, but can we wait to see? A major freakout by Dems counts as pushback; Obama has to know that it would happen.
Bob, can we wait, please, to see what happens?
Well, no; the only thing that would stop it from happening is not waiting, not giving him credit, but immediately and vociferously pushing back--at the very least, by calling congressthings, senators, etc. The DCCC chair guy is doing his part to push back, but it only works if people like you and me flood the phone lines, mail departments, etc., with evidence that he's right to draw a line like that.
All of which is to say that Bob's comments do nothing, by themselves, to help; but if his doomsaying gets 5 Mineshaft-dwellers to call their congresspeople, that's actually something. "Waiting and seeing" doesn't merely accomplish nothing, it actively helps Republicans, insofar as the absence of evidence of outrage will be treated as evidence of its absence.
OT: I know people who have great respect for the primitive survival skills of the hippie guy on Discovery's Dual Survival, but I really don't think one can train one's mitochondria to raise their mitochondrial game in cold weather.
at the very least, by calling congressthings, senators, etc.
Very good point.
OKAY THEN PEOPLE. Let's get cracking. Orange post time.
god this shit about 'oh, what the bankers did was ILLEGAL!'
Anyway, the problem with economists is that they have no faith in their ideas. i'm not including freshwaters as economists; they are flimflam artists.
47: Hm, exercise, drug, or diet protocols might increase brown adiposoe tissue, though probably not that much. i never paid much attention since up until like a year ago the consensus was that adult primates have no brown fat
49
Anyway, the problem with economists is that they have no faith in their ideas. ...
No, the problem is they don't know what they are doing. Given that it is best that they are aware that they are clueless (about macroeconomics).
51: I checked and mine is yellowish.
Also, I now need some tissue and duct tape.
OT: does the phrase "if you don't stand for something, you'll fall for anything" predate Public Enemy? It must, right? Was amused to see it used by that FAMiLY LEADER guy (here).
52: to a first approximation, the economist knows that the economy needs keynsian stimulus. we would all be better off if this idea was shared.
56
to a first approximation, the economist knows that the economy needs keynsian stimulus. we would all be better off if this idea was shared.
"knows" is way too definite. In fact economists as a group basically have no idea what to do.
In fact economists as a group basically have no idea what to do.
Something about assuming a can opener?
1) Haven't read the thread.
2) I just saw it two days ago and really especially felt the critique of economics professors was stellar.
3) Para 3 it's s/b its goddamn it. Jesus Christ, Benjamin.
I know a guy who works on climate modeling, and he says the biggest problem they in making predictions is that they have no idea how to predict what the economy will do.
55: does the phrase "if you don't stand for something, you'll fall for anything" predate Public Enemy?
This one was fun. Best documented claim seems to be Peter Marshall, Chaplain to the US Senate in 1947. Here is a near-contemporary reference. It has also been attributed to Malcolm X, Alexander Hamilton (due to name confusion with British journalist Alex Hamilton, who is cited in Oxford Dictionary of Quotations), Martin Luther King, Ginger Rogers, Rosa Parks, John Cougar Mellencamp and my favorite, Gil Scott Heron's grandmother. I suspect it was something in currency in sermons and would not be surprised if an earlier cite turns up at some point.
The phrase was actually the subject of a lawsuit in 1997 (Acuff-Rose Music Inc. v. Jostens Inc. United States District Court, Southern District of New York) with the plaintiff claiming Jostens' use of the phrase to sell school rings violated copyright of an Aaron Tippin** song "You've Got to Stand for Something" (popular during the Gulf War).
*It's a good smackdown, including the fact that Mellencamp featured the lyric in a song five year earlier than Tippin did: The complaint is dismissed with prejudice. The Clerk of the Court shall enter judgment in favor of defendant with costs and with attorneys' fees.
**Who seems to specialize in music for asshats. For instance "Drill Here, Drill Now" (give it a listen for 15 seconds to properly calibrate the level of hate it deserves).
Drill here, drill now
How 'bout some oil from our own soil that belongs to us anyhow
No more debatin' we're tired of waitin' everybody shout out loud
Drill here, drill now
3) Para 3 it's s/b its goddamn it. Jesus Christ, Benjamin.
I didn't write para 3.
Chesterton: "Once a man stops believing in God, he doesn't believe in nothing -- he believes in anything."
As written there, it's a bit too stylistically bumpy for GK, though it catches his playful sense of paradox. In fact no one seems to know where it comes from, and the consensus is currently that he never said it. Even so the accreditation -- and hence the phrase -- predates PE.
|?
Since I don't comment at Yggles, who says Mark Halperin's "...including part of the part where Obama was able to take off the table the single most damaging issue that could be used against him in 2012." is full of shit, that jobs and the economy are the key to re-election.
Well. David Plouffe said jobs don't matter. The fact is, what the Village, and their masters and servants, want may actually be much more important than jobs, or Iraq, or anything the voters care about. And the Village and media may be able to determine the elections to a degree the people can only dream about. And of course, paying homage to scandal de jour only empowers them.
|>
63: I apologize. It wasn't blockquoted, so I got confused.
Well. David Plouffe said jobs don't matter.
No he did not. Read it in context you hysterical, simpering quotidiac. Jeez, you'd've been fun to have along on the Long March.
65. The Village is arguably going to be very important in the 2012 presidential election: willingness to ridicule the Republican nominee will be a big deal. On the other hand, pandering to the Village won't do shit for the Senate races.
67
I don't see the distinction Plouffe is trying to draw. Unless you think the reported unemployment rate is somehow wrong and things are actually much better, how people on average think about their personal economic situation is going to be strongly correlated with how the job market in general is doing. Which is reflected in the unemployment rate.
Well, at least the Senate Democrats aren't giving away from the store while sitting down. Though the Village might help the Republicans, and maybe Obama, keep this plan from anchoring anything.
70: He is saying the average person is not as analytical as you. He is right.
The average person is also not as analytical as he is, which is why he does know better than to just shut the fuck up. A rhetorical rather than a substantive error, but try telling that to bob wetty-pants mcmanus.
Unfortunately I find myself siding with Shearer here: the context doesn't help a lot. People's personal situations affect how they vote, but the unemployment rate affects people's personal situations.
The most charitable interpretation is that the question was "what's the Obama narrative about that?", horribly insider-y, and possibly he correctly understood it to mean "how are you going to talk about the unemployment rate," as opposed to the unemployment problem. But it's still a grasping-at-straws response, implying a continuing cowlike resignation on the part of the inner circle. He could have at least gotten all Question Time on their asses: "Whatever our shortcomings, everything the Republicans have proposed would make things far worse, and we plan to get the voters to understand that."
willingness to ridicule the Republican nominee will be a big deal
Yep. I also think that the Beltway crowd will treat Romney with kid gloves and great deference, but will gleefully savage Bachmann. So I very much hope she can ride the crazy wave to the nomination.
72
He is saying the average person is not as analytical as you. He is right.
So what? An employment rate of 9% instead of 5% (assuming a labor force of 150 million) means 6 million additional average people are out of work and many millions more average people know a relative, neighbor or former co-worker who is out of work. This will affect their perception of how the economy is doing and perhaps their vote.
What he seems to be saying to me is that neither he nor any of the other big shots he associates with in DC are worried about their prospects and hence the unemployment rate won't affect their vote.
||
I often come across John Emerson commenting in the most interesting places
That doesn't explain Obama, though. Mirowski's "Road from Mont Pelerin" is not fun reading, but according to Mirowski an international group of free-market liberals met during and after WWII to plan the future, and basically they decided that freedom, the welfare state, and democracy were impediments to capitalism. Old 19th c. liberals believed in limited government, freedom, democracy, and a free market, but the neoliberals decided that an authoritarian government was required to protect the free market, which to them was the most important thing.
But I am afraid I now like Bruce Wilder a little better
Until we fully recognize that we have lost, and lost pretty completely, we will not be able to organize realistically to oppose what has won.Obama is the greater evil [ed. than McCain], because so many will simply not recognize his role in destroying what little remains of the New Deal state, and the associated ideals of political and economic conduct. A complete and final right-wing takeover is coming.
We will be asked, whether we want the Red Pill or the Blue Pill.
|>
Obama is the greater evil [ed. than McCain], because so many will simply not recognize his role in destroying what little remains of the New Deal state
Q: What did the German communist potato chip maker say when asked if he felt threatened by the rise of Nazi-manufactured Mexican snack food?
A: Nacho Hitler, Unz!
72.2: What he seems to be saying to me is that neither he nor any of the other big shots he associates with in DC are worried about their prospects and hence the unemployment rate won't affect their vote.
That is what the Terrorist-Americans in the Republican party and their intellectually bankrupt minions would have everyone think he "seems to be saying". Also the Hysterical Righteous Left. Certainly a stupid statement by Plouffe and the unemployment/economy is their vulnerability and one they cannot fix now and which they do not have a good story on. I do see that I seem to be alone on this one. They fucked up big time, sure, but it does not mean everyone should go out of their way to read right-wing spin into every pronouncement.
I can see that I should avoid political discussion for the next 1. 5 years.
I apparently "see" lots of things.
Yeah, well you know where to put the cork.
They fucked up big time, sure
Plouffe fucked up big time, you mean? If that is what you mean, I'm pretty sure the vast majority of Americans hasn't even heard about this. I guess I'll see via tomorrow's talking head shows what the Village thinks is worth remarking -- I'm kind of hoping the Paul Ryan $350 bottle of wine crops up, but that's mostly because I think it's hilarious.
83: No I meant the Obama team and the economy overall. Half-measures.
I don't see the distinction Plouffe is trying to draw.
I have, at times, agreed with James, and I have agreed with bob. Before this moment, I have never agreed with both simultaneously.
In the most charitable intepretation I can come up with, Plouffe was saying that despite the high unemployment rate, we can trick people into thinking the economy is fine.
Yes, the Republicans are worse than Obama, but I'll vote for pretty much anybody who primaries Obama from the left.
Semi-OT:
5 Things Nobody Tells You About Being Poor (from Cracked.com--so avoid if you hate that kind of shit. If you had told me in 1972 that Mad and NatLamp would go to shit and Cracked would manage to transform and stay somewhat relevant ...)
Well, well, well if it isn't Mr. "Too good to be fucked like the rest of the poor people" Smith.
Ah. Right.
I'll be honest: I can't even remember now what factors were in play in the decision to ask for a smaller stimulus package than seemed called for. It seemed impossible to pass anything larger? Or was it just inexplicably lame not to have played harder ball for a larger stimulus bill?
I'm not making excuses for Obama here; I also, though, don't think it's completely clear that he could have fixed everything if only he'd stamped his foot and insisted. There were, and are, an awful lot of influential people in both industry (including the corporate world) and politics throwing up roadblocks. Even before the 2010 midterms.
85.last: Have fun storming the castle.
87 to 85.
I'm not terribly comfortable with what sounds like an apologist tone in 87, but eh, I'm just not willing yet to go all the way to: It's all Obama's (Obama's people's) fault now.
88: one of the best Arrested Development episodes, actually.
86: I never read Cracked directly, but every time I follow a link there, I read something brilliant. That was terrific.
That was terrific.
Like Barbara Ehrenreich. Only funny.
That last bit in the Cracked piece, about moving, really drives home the stupidity of some of the analyses I remember reading on some political blogs a few years back that implied that moving for a new job was a simple matter. It's been so long, I can't even remember the context, just the lack of perspective.
Also, it makes me think that using this summer to try to get to the point where I can finish my once-dead dissertation within a year and a half or so is a huge mistake, relative to the work experience I could be getting (subject to actually getting something applied for). At least it's not an art history study.
95: I didn't know you were trying to finish! That's great (despite your doom and gloom)! If you ever have something you'd like me to read, just let me know.
Somehow the Cracked piece isn't really funny.
96: It's been revived for almost a year, but I hadn't said much about it except to people in person. But I'm finally getting to archives so it seems more "real" now. I still have another year of coursework left in the other program so I have to make the most of my summer. I doubt I'll be an academic afterwards, so this is essentially the last period of time I'll have to do this kind of thing. Although, as Cracked piece emphasizes, unemployment means a free schedule. It won't help with the loans.
Also, thanks for the offer. I might take you up on it. I'm hoping to have a chapter and some kind of intro done by the end of the year.
91: Any episode with Liza Minelli as Lucille 2 is well worth watching.
What exactly are the predictive successes of climatology? Backtesting doesn't count for obvious reasons.
Probably no one care about this anymore, but it is important to distinguish two things that could go by the name "backtesting." You could be talking about the ability of a model to fit events in the past, or you could be talking about the ability of a model to fit information already known at the time the model was developed
Climate models aren't often tested against information about events in the future, but they are often tested against information about events in the past that was not available at the time the model was developed.
So people can develop a model, which then predicts certain carbon levels in ice taken from drills holes that go down to a certain strata. They make these predictions because they make claims about what the earth was like 500,000 years ago, or whatever. But the data itself is new.
Economics, at least of the libertarian Chicago school, doesn't engage in this kind of modeling of the past, and are really quite indifferent to history.
Also, even when you are looking exclusively at information that was available at the time the model was developed, one model can be better than another, because it captures more of the information already available. This idea, though, is a live issue in the philosophy of science. ttaM might know more about it than I.
102
This didn't really answer the question. What are the predictive successes of climatology? I don't believe there is a very impressive list.
Note for something to be a predictive success for climatology as a whole (instead of for some individual climatologist) it must be a prediction that was accepted before the event as reliable by most climatologists.
And plenty of economists engage in modeling of things like stock and commodity prices.
87
I'll be honest: I can't even remember now what factors were in play in the decision to ask for a smaller stimulus package than seemed called for. It seemed impossible to pass anything larger? Or was it just inexplicably lame not to have played harder ball for a larger stimulus bill?
Perhaps the thinking was that this was a normal cyclic recession from which the economy would recover just fine on its own but which would provide the perfect excuse for funding a lot of Democratic boondoggles like high speed trains. If the adminstration didn't actually believe in the Keynesian rationale for the stimulus there was obviously no particular need to make it as large as Keynesian economists wanted.
Also, at a very coarse-grained level, there's the simple fact that climate scientists predicted global warming before it had emerged from the noise, which it now clearly has.
Anyway, it's silly to compare economics and climate science. Climate science is grounded in physics and chemistry and well-understood processes; economics is more a set of empirical rules of thumb and heuristics grounded in observation, not derivable from anything else.
Grounded in observation, huh? That's the death knell for any science!
Eh. You know what I mean, don't you? If climate science were like economics, it would be reduced to staring at measurements of temperature and CO2 and whatnot and telling stories about how they're correlated. That sort of thing can be good science, but climate science is in much better shape, since the microscopic details that lead to these correlations are fairly well-understood.
64: Chesterton: "Once a man stops believing in God, he doesn't believe in nothing -- he believes in anything."
A footnote to the court case I link to in 62 suggests, The idiom may have its origins in the Bible, 1 Corinthians 10:12: ``Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall.'' Not sure I see it, but could be.
104
First Hansen's prediction wasn't actually all that accurate. It was too high. See here for an explanation by a pro climate change site.
Second this is the sort of thing I was objecting to. The field of climatology as a whole as instantiated by the IPCC reports believes the climate sensitivity likely lies in the range 2-4.5. This is a wide range and will generate a wide range of predictions. Hansen used a value of 4.2. Presumeably other climatologists have their own favorite values. In hindsight one value may give particularly accurate predictions but this is misleading as there is no way of identifying the correct value in advance.
Similarly lots of economic predictions are quite accurate in hindsight. But this is little help without a means of identifying in advance which predictions will prove accurate.
106
Anyway, it's silly to compare economics and climate science. Climate science is grounded in physics and chemistry and well-understood processes; economics is more a set of empirical rules of thumb and heuristics grounded in observation, not derivable from anything else.
I think is wrong, some climate processes are well understood but others are just rules of thumb. So the equations in large complex climate codes often contain empirical fudge factors. Without which the models can't get the current climate right.
So the equations in large complex climate codes often contain empirical fudge factors. Without which the models can't get the current climate right.
This is also true in every field I'm familiar with, including collider physics and dark matter detection. That's just the way science works: some things are too complicated to compute in detail, so you parametrize them.
112
So why is economics any worse?
And plenty of economists engage in modeling of things like stock and commodity prices.
As Essear said in 108, this is by and large atheoretical time series stuff, akin to predicting the temperature today using a series of past temperatures. Macro GE models are theoretically informed in their decisions about what variables are supposed to influence what, but A) that is still not a very deep theoretical understanding, B) the models do terribly predicting any sort of sharp break or change in trend.
Is Shearer's "I don't know anything about the world other than what I googled five minutes ago" schtick for real? What is the difference between physics and economics? It's a mystery that only an Internet comment box can solve.
I think it's more of a McMegan threefer: "Who can know anything about anything." combined with: "Everything except complete precision is equally wrong." with a bit of
; "Sure those people might of been right about global warming killing us all(Iraq), but really, what's important is to acknowledge that the people spending 20 years screaming about how wrong the science was(supported the war) can't be blamed."
Is Shearer's...schtick for real?
Nope. Or at least I hope not.
Similarly lots of economic predictions are quite accurate in hindsight. But this is little help without a means of identifying in advance which predictions will prove accurate.
When discussing economics, you have to distinguish between the thing that Krugman does, and the thing that they do at George Mason. Krugman does science, and he told us a couple of years ago how this recession was going to play out.
How could you know at the time that Krugman was going to be right? I'm not sure that laypeople like ourselves could have known, but you could easily see that he was trying to be right. Unlike the Chicago types, you could see that his epistemology wasn't completely fucked.
115
Is Shearer's "I don't know anything about the world other than what I googled five minutes ago" schtick for real? ...
If the suggestion is that I hadn't thought about climatology vrs economics before, it is wrong. See here .
||
This reporter did an okay job of being skeptical, but I wish she'd done even more. Shorter this article: "Chris Whittle couldn't make a go of education even with massive public subsidies. Now he's got another glossy sales pitch, but he's learned something: Market to upper-middle-class parents' anxieties and throw in a little modern-day xenophobia.* Anybody think he can pull it off this time?"
*All the kids in China are already learning English! OMG scary China is going to win!!!11!!
||>
Svante Arrhenius did a pretty good job estimating the climate sensitivity way back 100 years ago.
Whether it's truly science or not, I do think that there are areas of microeconomics where prediction is pretty good.
My brain is mush today from a bad cold, and I don't understand climate science well enough to make a comparison. Basically, I shouldn't be commenting at all, but I do think that there's more fudging in macro than in micro.
