this post was submitted on 20 Aug 2023
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[–] [email protected] 54 points 1 year ago (2 children)

is this a controversial opinion? i think pretty much every economist would tell you it's a social science

[–] Fandangalo 21 points 1 year ago (3 children)

I think the internet thinks economics is a hard science. I think it’s mostly due to the math involved.

[–] Mistic 15 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

It isn't a difficult science from a learner's PoV.

It is, however, difficult in a sense of trying to figure out why in the world what happened happened, and most importantly, making it possible to do again.

That's because not only can you not experiment, you only gather data from observations, but once you share the product of your studies the reality changes in reacton to it.

In same Physics the object of your studies doesn't simultaniously study you.

Math gets involved to get a result that is somewhat reproducable. But even then since we can't factor everything we use degrees of probability/certainty.

Theoretically speaking if we managed to fully understand human behaviour then we coult predict the outcome of everything. As you can imagine, we're nowhere close to being able to do that.

Back to original post, yes, economics is closer to psychology than it is to physics. At least for the fact that we study human behaviour, but on a different scale. So sociology and political science are the closest, then psychology, next all of biological sciences, and chemistry, physics and everything related come last pretty much.

Math doesn't fit anywhere here, since it's a tool for measuring reality and not a study of reality itself.

[–] SCB 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

You literally need a doctor's in mathematics to be an actual economist.

[–] Aceticon -1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Doctors of Mathematics know enough about modelling and the Garbage-in-Garbage-Out effect that they would quit the discipline of Economics within a few days of entering it.

In the areas were Economics deals with things with high Political Relevance you need the a salesman mindset - vague and self-decieving - which is almost the diametrical opposite of how Matematicians think.

[–] SCB 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Lmao what? Economists are dorks man, not salespeople. Do you actually know any economists or is this just an "I'm mad because economists don't push communism" kind of thing

[–] Aceticon -1 points 1 year ago

I worked a decade in Investment Banking.

[–] [email protected] -5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

There is no math involved in economics. Every equation in the field is a definition.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

No one who has even the faintest idea of what physics is would be able to conflate it with economics. About the only way the two are related is that they’re both studied by people to the point that you can get a degree that focuses on either.

[–] CthulhuDreamer 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I think you would be surprised how much math used in physics is used in economics and then there is statistics which is heavily used in both.

[–] [email protected] -2 points 1 year ago

Meh, math and statistics are (ab)used pretty much anywhere in science. Carpenters and blacksmiths both use hammers, but so do roofers and geologists.