,
10 tweets,
3 min read
Read on Twitter
1/10 Results are in.
Behavioral Economics (BE) was wrong.
My naive intuition was right.
Behavioral Economics (BE) was wrong.
My naive intuition was right.
2/10 The reason I asked is the tweet below.
According to BE, people typically choose to pay $10.
That seemed strange to me, but BE has multiple Nobel Prizes, hundreds of thousands of papers, its own government departments etc, so I doubted my intuition.
According to BE, people typically choose to pay $10.
That seemed strange to me, but BE has multiple Nobel Prizes, hundreds of thousands of papers, its own government departments etc, so I doubted my intuition.
3/10 I checked if the original findings were due to the options being unclear, and the answer was no.
So in principle I could have answered questions during the polling, but I didn't because I didn't want to skew the results.
So in principle I could have answered questions during the polling, but I didn't because I didn't want to skew the results.
4/10 There was even a story about why people choose the $10 option. It's because we've evolved in a different environment, and we have hard-wired behavioral patterns that are no good for the modern world.
5/10 Possibly plausible, but is it true?
No.
The Copenhagen experiment seems closer to the truth: we did evolve in a different environment, and we can't grow an extra leg. But our brains can learn to operate in new environments. And really fast!
No.
The Copenhagen experiment seems closer to the truth: we did evolve in a different environment, and we can't grow an extra leg. But our brains can learn to operate in new environments. And really fast!
6/10 I have little faith in academic economics. I think it's gone down a rabbit hole and lost its connection to the real world. My distrust reflects my experience. I have tried to publish corrections to simple mathematical errors. It can't be done if you're not part of the club.
7/10 Let alone outline a fresh perspective, like our redevelopment of the foundations of economic theory. There's little interest in new thinking, in developing alternative paths, in double-checking old assumptions.
Knowledge and understanding cannot be generated this way.
Knowledge and understanding cannot be generated this way.
8/10 It's mentally difficult to operate in this space. I'm reminded of Orwell's Ministry of Truth. Nobel Prizes and professorships are handed out for repeating falsehoods -- innocent, in both senses of the word, but still falsehoods.
9/10 Thank @Twitter for social media!
With the internet, we no longer rely on the blessings of journal editors and reviewers. We can publish at the click of a button, and the community -- anyone with an internet connection -- can judge what's closer to the truth or more useful.
With the internet, we no longer rely on the blessings of journal editors and reviewers. We can publish at the click of a button, and the community -- anyone with an internet connection -- can judge what's closer to the truth or more useful.
10/10 Thank @God for those who've supported me. What I needed to hear was "you're not crazy." I heard this from people who had witnessed social change and scientific revolutions. Ken Arrow, Murray Gell-Mann, Reuben Hersh -- I wouldn't have got this far without them.
