Ah, uh, it's a xkcd. Expanded by a reddit user, forever ago.

For this reason it seems closer to religion for me

Don't all scientific fields rest on fundamental assumptions? I mean, just to pull an example at random, astronomers were hung up on the geocentric model of the universe for a long time before we came up with the heliocentric model, which in turn was ditched for the "no true frame of reference" model we now use. Having flawed assumptions doesn't make it non-scientific, just incorrect.

classic economic theory

To be fair, that's like 150 years old, back when they believed in spontaneous generation, and the idea that continents move was absurd and crazy.

It's definitely just Maths with feelings sprinkled on top.

If you read a book by any investor they'll talk about the irrationality of the market. They'll say how daytrading should be mathematically impossible, but admit how some people do profit a lot from it.

I wouldn't call it pseudoscience, because it's like mixing maths with psychology.

Yes, we do run RCTs. There are entire branches of economics that can be entirely controlled for, double-blind and randomized. For example microeconomic theory and game theory.

Yes, there are fields that get unethical to experiment under as you scale things up (think macroeconomics), which is why we have famous papers like The Colonial Origins of Comparative Development: An Empirical Investigation - AJR.

Natural experiments are used all the time in many fields, especially the social sciences, for ethicality. That doesn't make them less valuable, as they test for things you would have never gotten to test for through RCTs, and don't serve as a "crutch" due to the lack of RCTs. They serve different purposes.

And that's just one aspect people get wrong, economics isn't all about straight lines like another (vehemently wrong) commenter was saying. It's also not about politics, even though the economics of politics are taught conceptually. At least in my European university, no one forced ideology with the study of the median voter theorem or Vickrey auctions, among many other topics.

Anyway, rant over. This whole post is a rage-bait and people engaging in it are either ignorant of the subject matter (totally fine if you're willing to learn and accept you're wrong) or simply rage-baiters themselves.

Of course it is! We’re just animals, after all. Is documenting the behavior of different species of beetles a science? The only difference is that we can replicate behavior through culture, not just genes.

Yeah but capitalist economics is all that they teach in the indoctrination system... Unless maybe you pay for it later in college.

And TBH the scientific credentials are pretty trash either way.

They're just contributing to perfect information, or, uh...

I think a mainstream way of seeing things is that there's rational agents and non-rational agents, and they behave differently.

I.e. a lot of economy discusses how a rational agent would behave. But economic schools also recognize that not every human is a rational agent, and that's what advertisement is for. Basically, advertisement is a way to part fools and their money, i.e. give the money to more rational people instead. This is also partially justified with the philosophy that the world would become a better place if all the money (and therefore power) was in the hand of rational people.

like, i know some people insist music is math, but in my opinion that music is always lacking emotion. i prefer my music more on the side of folk song: not much math but a lot of passion in it.

Music is entirely math though. Just arranged all pretty like.

Agriculture is only 12,000 years old. I suspect there are many more possible levels.

A distinction without a difference. Lobbying and propaganda are basically the prophesizing and scripture of politics.

Another way I often frame my perspective on this is:

Economics is the social control mechanism that filled the void vacated by religion after the Enlightenment.

Mythology was replaced with finance.
… Churches with banks.
… Clergy with economists.
… God with GDP.

I don’t see either as inherently problematic systems, but their lack of rigorous foundational attachment to reality informs my argument that they should be applied as subservient tools, as opposed to their current role as dominant, dictatorial weapons.

Yeah theology is "given these base assumptions and this text, interpret the will and nature of the divine." I can respect a person who studied theology at a respected university in all the ways I can't respect someone who studied preaching at a Bible college. That said I hold a weird amount of opinions on Christian theology for a pagan

Tell us you dont understand economics without telling us..

maybe pay attention to more than chicago

You — I like you.

I hated how statistics was taught in my university science course. I did a ton of extra advanced modules when I was doing my A levels before university, so I learned more stats than most people do in high school. This just made the poor statistics taught to biochemists all the more confusing. There were things that they taught that were straight up wrong, and it really made me doubt myself.

I ended up going away and learning statistics in a more thorough way, which ended up being a lot of fun. In a weird way, I'm glad for how grim the stats course was because it led me to a much deeper understanding than I'd have gotten otherwise

Yeah, half of my statistics learnding was awful. Actually using it to study genetics? Fuck. Yes.