This file is part of IDEAS, which uses RePEc data


[ Papers | Articles | Software | Books | Chapters | Authors | Institutions | JEL Classification | NEP reports | Search | New papers by email | Author registration | Rankings | Volunteers | FAQ | Blog | Help! ]

In Quest of Truth: The War of Methods in Economics

Author info | Abstract | Publisher info | Download info | Related research | Statistics
Author Info
Pillai N., Vijayamohanan
Abstract

The present paper discusses the ‘battle of methods’ in economics in its epistemic pursuit in the framework of a dialectics between science and art. The traditional distinction between deduction and induction has come to be characterized as a ‘theory-data confrontation’; while the former a priori approach has flourished in terms of mathematical economics, the inductive approach has fulfilled its mission through econometrics and experimental economics. The paper outlines the recent trends in econometrics and experimental economics in the context of empirical pursuit. We conclude the study, reiterating the contemporary consensus on the complementary roles of the two approaches: a theory-data confluence, not in a static, but in a dialectical framework.

Download Info
To download:

If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. Information about this may be contained in the File-Format links below. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. Please be patient as the files may be large.

File URL: http://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/8866/
File Format:
File Function:
Download Restriction: no

Publisher Info
Paper provided by University Library of Munich, Germany in its series MPRA Paper with number 8866.

Download reference. The following formats are available: HTML (with abstract), plain text (with abstract), BibTeX, RIS (EndNote, RefMan, ProCite), ReDIF
Length:
Date of creation: 25 May 2008
Date of revision:
Handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:8866

Contact details of provider:
Postal: Schackstr. 4, D-80539 Munich, Germany
Phone: +49-(0)89-2180-2219
Fax: +49-(0)89-2180-3900
Web page: http://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de
More information through EDIRC

For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its listing, contact: (Ekkehart Schlicht).

Related research
Keywords: Economic Methodology; Deduction; Induction; Dialectics; Mathematics; Econometrics;

Other versions of this item:

Find related papers by JEL classification:
B23 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - History of Economic Thought since 1925 - - - Quantitative and Mathematical
B16 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - History of Economic Thought through 1925 - - - Quantitative and Mathematical
B00 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - General - - - History of Economic Thought, Methodology, and Heterodox Approaches
B41 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - Economic Methodology - - - Economic Methodology

This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
  1. Edward C. Prescott, 1986. "Theory ahead of business cycle measurement," Quarterly Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, issue Fall, pages 9-22. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  2. Robert B. Litterman, 1985. "Forecasting with Bayesian vector autoregressions five years of experience," Working Papers 274, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  3. Richard Clarida & Jordi Gali & Mark Gertler, 1999. "The Science of Monetary Policy: A New Keynesian Perspective," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 37(4), pages 1661-1707, December. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  4. Canova, Fabio, 1993. "Modelling and forecasting exchange rates with a Bayesian time-varying coefficient model," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 17(1-2), pages 233-261. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  5. Krolzig, Hans-Martin & Hendry, David F., 2001. "Computer automation of general-to-specific model selection procedures," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 25(6-7), pages 831-866, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  6. Richard M. Todd, 1984. "Improving economic forecasting with Bayesian vector autoregression," Quarterly Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, issue Fall. [Downloadable!]
  7. Basu, Susanto & Fernald, John G, 1997. "Returns to Scale in U.S. Production: Estimates and Implications," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 105(2), pages 249-83, April.
    Other versions:
  8. John G. Fernald & Susanto Basu, 1999. "Why is productivity procyclical? Why do we care?," International Finance Discussion Papers 638, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.). [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  9. Johansen, Soren & Juselius, Katarina, 1990. "Maximum Likelihood Estimation and Inference on Cointegration--With Applications to the Demand for Money," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 52(2), pages 169-210, May.
  10. Arango, Luis E & Gonzalez, Andres, 2001. "Some Evidence of Smooth Transition Non-linearity in Colombian Inflation," Applied Economics, Taylor and Francis Journals, vol. 33(2), pages 155-62, February. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  11. Lovell, Michael C, 1983. "Data Mining," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 65(1), pages 1-12, February. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  12. Minford, Patrick & Marwaha, Satwant & Matthews, Kent & Sprague, Alison, 1984. "The Liverpool macroeconomic model of the United Kingdom," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 1(1), pages 24-62, January. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  13. Hartley, James E & Hoover, Kevin D & Salyer, Kevin D, 1997. "The Limits of Business Cycle Research: Assessing the Real Business Cycle Model," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press, vol. 13(3), pages 34-54, Autumn.
  14. Hamilton, James D, 1989. "A New Approach to the Economic Analysis of Nonstationary Time Series and the Business Cycle," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 57(2), pages 357-84, March. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  15. Gregory, Allan W & Smith, Gregor W, 1991. "Calibration as Testing: Inference in Simulated Macroeconomic Models," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 9(3), pages 297-303, July.
  16. Granger, C. W. J., 1981. "Some properties of time series data and their use in econometric model specification," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 16(1), pages 121-130, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  17. Sargent, Thomas J., 1979. "A note on maximum likelihood estimation of the rational expectations model of the term structure," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 5(1), pages 133-143, January. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  18. Kydland, Finn E & Prescott, Edward C, 1991. " The Econometrics of the General Equilibrium Approach to Business Cycles," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 93(2), pages 161-78.
    Other versions:
  19. repec:att:wimass:199520 is not listed on IDEAS
  20. Kydland, Finn E & Prescott, Edward C, 1982. "Time to Build and Aggregate Fluctuations," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 50(6), pages 1345-70, November. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  21. Cooley, Thomas F. & Leroy, Stephen F., 1985. "Atheoretical macroeconometrics: A critique," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 16(3), pages 283-308, November. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  22. Baumol, William J & Benhabib, Jess, 1989. "Chaos: Significance, Mechanism, and Economic Applications," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 3(1), pages 77-105, Winter. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  23. Michael Dotsey & Robert G. King & Alexander L. Wolman, 1999. "State-Dependent Pricing And The General Equilibrium Dynamics Of Money And Output," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 114(2), pages 655-690, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  24. Hatanaka, Michio, 1975. "On the Global Identification of the Dynamic Simultaneous Equations Model with Stationary Disturbances," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 16(3), pages 545-54, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  25. Frederick Mosteller & Philip Nogee, 1951. "An Experimental Measurement of Utility," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 59, pages 371. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  26. Kahneman, Daniel & Tversky, Amos, 1979. "Prospect Theory: An Analysis of Decision under Risk," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 47(2), pages 263-91, March. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  27. Frank Smets & Raf Wouters, 2003. "An Estimated Dynamic Stochastic General Equilibrium Model of the Euro Area," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 1(5), pages 1123-1175, 09. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  28. Richard Clarida & Jordi Galí & Mark Gertler, 2000. "Monetary Policy Rules And Macroeconomic Stability: Evidence And Some Theory," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 115(1), pages 147-180, February. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  29. Hsiao, Cheng, 1981. "Autoregressive modelling and money-income causality detection," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 7(1), pages 85-106. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  30. Kevin D. Hoover & Stephen J. Perez, 2004. "Truth and Robustness in Cross-country Growth Regressions," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 66(5), pages 765-798, December. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  31. Zellner, Arnold, 1979. "Causality and econometrics," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 10(1), pages 9-54, January. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  32. Ellen R. McGrattan, 1991. "The macroeconomic effects of distortionary taxation," Discussion Paper / Institute for Empirical Macroeconomics 37, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  33. Sargent, Thomas J, 1978. "Estimation of Dynamic Labor Demand Schedules under Rational Expectations," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 86(6), pages 1009-44, December. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  34. Robert B. Litterman, 1984. "Above-average national growth in 1985 and 1986," Quarterly Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, issue Fall. [Downloadable!]
  35. Canova, Fabio & Dellas, Harris, 1993. "Trade interdependence and the international business cycle," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 34(1-2), pages 23-47, February. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  36. Dawkins, Christina & Srinivasan, T.N. & Whalley, John, 2001. "Calibration," Handbook of Econometrics, in: J.J. Heckman & E.E. Leamer (ed.), Handbook of Econometrics, edition 1, volume 5, chapter 58, pages 3653-3703 Elsevier. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  37. Sargent, Thomas J, 1977. "The Demand for Money During Hyperinflations under Rational Expectations: I," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 18(1), pages 59-82, February. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  38. repec:att:wimass:19902 is not listed on IDEAS
  39. Robert B. Litterman, 1984. "Specifying vector autoregressions for macroeconomic forecasting," Staff Report 92, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. [Downloadable!]
  40. Lawrence J. Christiano & Martin Eichenbaum, 1990. "Current real business cycle theories and aggregate labor market fluctuations," Discussion Paper / Institute for Empirical Macroeconomics 24, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  41. Allan W. Gregory & Gregor W. Smith, 1991. "Calibration in Macroeconomics," Working Papers 826, Queen's University, Department of Economics.
  42. Bernanke, Ben S., 1986. "Alternative explanations of the money-income correlation," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 25(1), pages 49-99, January. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  43. Sumru Altug, 1986. "Time to build and aggregate fluctuations: some new evidence," Working Papers 277, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  44. Granger, C. W. J. & Newbold, P., 1974. "Spurious regressions in econometrics," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 2(2), pages 111-120, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  45. Kevin D. Hoover & Stephen J. Perez, . "Data Mining Reconsidered: Encompassing And The General-To-Specific Approach To Specification Search," Department of Economics 97-27, California Davis - Department of Economics. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  46. David F. Hendry & Hans-Martin Krolzig, 1999. "Improving on 'Data mining reconsidered' by K.D. Hoover and S.J. Perez," Econometrics Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 2(2), pages 202-219.
  47. Clements, Michael P. & Mizon, Grayham E., 1991. "Empirical analysis of macroeconomic time series : VAR and structural models," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 35(4), pages 887-917, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  48. Julio Rotemberg & Michael Woodford, 1997. "An Optimization-Based Econometric Framework for the Evaluation of Monetary Policy," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 1997, Volume 12, pages 297-361 National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!]
  49. Backhouse, Roger E, 1998. "If Mathematics Is Informal, Then Perhaps We Should Accept That Economics Must Be Informal Too," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 108(451), pages 1848-58, November. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  50. Johansen, Soren, 1988. "Statistical analysis of cointegration vectors," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 12(2-3), pages 231-254. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
Full references

Statistics
Access and download statistics

Did you know? The yearly budget of IDEAS is exactly $0: it relies entirely on volunteer work.

This page was last updated on 2009-11-27.

This information is provided to you by IDEAS at the Department of Economics, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, University of Connecticut using RePEc data on a server sponsored by the Society for Economic Dynamics.