[Michael Chui]

Originally Posted by Acting Like Godot

Perhaps for the same reasons that religion is still in use, even though it "regularly trips up".

(For that matter, the same could be said for science).

Correct. Religion works. It works too well, in many cases, but it works.

Originally Posted by Acting Like Godot

I did not say that economics is ineffective.

I was merely pointing out your error, where you said that economics is a great predictor of human behaviour. You are incorrect because economics does not predict that man is a rational actor - it assumes that man is a rational actor. All economists know this. It's just an assumption that they work with.

I'm sorry... let's hand-wave that you're right. What exactly do they do with this assumption? Do they sit in lecture halls and federal halls and talk about how brilliantly rational people are? Or do they actually act and, oh, I don't know... predict human motivation?

Originally Posted by Acting Like Godot

In fact, there is a niche area of economics (quite outside mainstream economics, of course) where researchers are trying to study the implications of the irrationality of human beings, on economic systems. I'm referring to the fields of behavioural economics and behavioural finance. in these fields, economists do not make the assumption that human beings are rational, and instead take it that human beings will from time to time behave irrationally.

In any case, I feel you are correct overall. I am more experienced, it seems, with behavioural economics and the edges of economics than I am with mainstream economics. How odd.

Originally Posted by Acting Like Godot

Economics is not a science. Generally speaking, hypotheses in economics are not capable of being subject to the scientific method.

Wrong. We're working on this. See Edward Castronova.

Originally Posted by Acting Like Godot

If you like, you could say that economics is a pseudoscience. The word need not have derogatory implications (although I suspect that it does, for you). If you prefer, you may regard economics as a social science, in the same sphere as history or geography or psychology. But definitely not science, as in physics or chemistry.

It has always ridden the line.