Subjectivism and Economic Analysis: Essays in memory of Ludwig ...

SUBJECTIVISM AND IDEAL TYPESto his conversation and comparing his performances withthose of others. Nor does it make any important differenceif I happen myself to be that pupil. I can indeed listen tomore of his conversations, as I am the addressee of hisunspoken soliloquies; I notice more of his excuses, as I amnever absent, when they are made. On the other hand, mycomparison of his performances with those of others ismore difficult, since the examiner is himself taking theexamination, which makes neutrality hard to preserve andprecludes the demeanour of the candidate, when underinterrogation, from being in good view.(Ryle 1966:169)By getting rid of the myth of the epistemological inevitability ofanalogical inference in the social sciences, rejecting the fantasy ofthe absolute certainty of introspective knowledge, and realising thatcausal explanations do not necessarily tarnish the vibrant andirrational reality of human action, we can get a more adequatepicture of the methodological discrepancies between the social andnatural sciences. The alleged extreme methodological dualism of thesocial and natural sciences turns out to be a misconception of theirtrue relationship, since in fact neither the natural sciences are able tooffer detailed explanations as Hayek seems to assume, nor are theexplanations of principle in the social sciences ‘something of an art’(Hayek 1967:18). The logical structure of explanations claimingempirical validity shows far-reaching similarities in both groups ofsciences.If we reject the tenets of methodological solipsism, we can alsodismiss the case against attempts at constructing theories withexplanatory power and informative content in the social sciences ingeneral, and in economics in particular. Similarly, the arguments putforward against methodological solipsism raise serious doubtsabout the legitimacy of stripping much of modern economic theoryof any connection to reality, of shielding it from the control ofempirical tests and of interpreting it as a pure logic of choice, servingsolely heuristic and classificatory purposes. To avoid a possiblemisunderstanding, let me emphasise that I do not want to banish thelogic of choice from economic theory. What I have been trying toargue against in this chapter is simply the fallacious characterisationof the methodological foundations of the social sciences offered byeminent researchers who, unfortunately enough, happen to beadvocates of the tenets of methodological solipsism.91