The Economist reviews Diane Coyle’s book, The Soulful Science: What Economists Really Do and Why It Matters – doesn’t seem very impressed by the book;
"The third part of the book is the least satisfying. It assays what economics has borrowed from Darwin, and how much it now shares with sociology. As throughout, these chapters offer finely etched portraits of the main characters—Joseph Schumpeter, to take one, was an “irritating man”, who “boasted about his brilliance as an economist and as a lover”. He would show up at faculty meetings sporting jodhpurs and a hunting jacket. Douglass North, to take another, once worked as a photographer under Dorothea Lange, and had to choose between a career documenting the poor and one explaining their fate. But Ms Coyle's depiction of their intellectual contributions is smudged and indistinct—perhaps because the ideas themselves lack great clarity...
She believes the dismal economics of popular disdain—“Pangloss plus Gradgrind”, according to one caricature—has been superseded by an open and humane field of inquiry. This is not because economists have discovered their souls, but because they have availed themselves of richer numbers, faster computers and niftier techniques. Economists, she stresses, clung to their cold assumptions about rational individuals and efficient markets largely out of analytical habit, not ideological conviction. Teach them a new technique and they will be open to whatever principles are smuggled in with it.
Unfortunately, Ms Coyle is preaching to the nerdy choir. Hers is the kind of book—stripped of equations and sprinkled with jokes—that economists hope will appeal outside the church. But Ms Coyle is a patchy writer and an impatient teacher. In trying to cover so much ground, she often lets go of the reader's hand.
Other popularisers have shown more pedagogical magic. On several occasions, Paul Krugman, for example, has explained the logic of a recession through the parable of a baby-sitting circle. William Easterly in “The Elusive Quest for Growth” has illustrated the limits of accumulation through an analogy with pancake-making. And then, of course, there is “Freakonomics” (described by Ms Coyle as an overrated “freak show”), which transformed Steven Levitt from a passionate nerd into a popular celebrity."
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Things to read -recommendations from Diane Coyle
Economics, the soulful science
Diane Coyle interview at Radio Economics (podcast)
An effort to make economics likeable
Economist Class;
“We do not really know what causes economic growth,” admits François Bourguignon, the chief economist at the World Bank. “We do have a good sense of what are the main obstacles to growth and what are the conditions without which an economy can’t grow. But we are far less sure about what are the other ingredients needed to create and sustain growth.”...
Surveying which economies had the best prospects for success, Harvard professor Richard B. Freeman concluded that in predicting superior performance, “luck seems as key as economic policies.”
A science that relies on luck to explain the fate of billions of people is a dismal science indeed. True, other social sciences aren’t in much better shape, but economists would still be well advised to trade in their intellectual haughtiness for a more humble disposition. Albert O. Hirschman, a superbly original economist, borrowed freely from other disciplines and aptly titled one of his books Essays in Trespassing. We need more trespassers. Fortunately, a few of today’s economists are beginning to hurdle professional fences and mine neurology, psychology, sociology, and political science to enrich their analysis.
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