Mises's radically fundamental opposition to econometrics now
becomes clear. Econometrics not only attempts to ape the natural
sciences by using complex heterogeneous historical facts as if they were
repeatable homogeneous laboratory facts; it also squeezes the qualitative
complexity of each event into a quantitative number and then compounds
the fallacy by acting as if these quantitative relations remain constant in
human history. In striking contrast to the physical sciences, which rest on
the empirical discovery of quantitative constants, econometrics, as Mises
repeatedly emphasized, has failed to discover a single constant in human
history. And given the ever-changing conditions of human will,
knowledge, and values and the differences among men, it is
inconceivable that econometrics can ever do so.
Far from being opposed to history, the praxeologist, and not the
supposed admirers of history, has profound respect for the irreducible
and unique facts of human history. Furthermore, it is the praxeologist
who acknowledges that individual human beings cannot legitimately be
treated by the social scientist as if they were not men who have minds
and act upon their values and expectations, but stones or molecules
whose course can be scientifically tracked in alleged constants or
quantitative laws. Moreover, as the crowning irony, it is the praxeologist
who is truly empirical because he recognizes the unique and
heterogeneous nature of historical facts; it is the self-proclaimed
"empiricist" who grossly violates the facts of history by attempting to
reduce them to quantitative laws."
Praxeology: The Methodology of Austrian Economics by Murray Rothbard
Sem comentários:
Enviar um comentário