Episode Ninety Six

Introduction

0:00Welcome to Smith and Mark's Walk into a Bar, a History of Economics podcast. Happy New Year to all of you, our dear listeners, and welcome back. I'm Jennifer John, one of your hosts, and I'm joined here today by my co-host, Francois Alisson, who is in Lausanne. Francois, Happy New Year to you. Thank you very much, Jennifer. Happy New Year to you and to all our listeners. I'm in Lausanne, that's true, and the snow is already gone, but the sun is back, so it's a good day.

Guest Introduction

0:39Oh, very lovely. More importantly, we are joined, rejoined by our guest today, who we've met on the show before on episode 21, I believe. This is our first guest who's come back to visit us again. Professor Catherine Herfeld is here. She is Professor of Philosophy and History of Economics at the Institute of Philosophy at Leibniz University, Hanover in Germany, and she's currently running a project entitled Model Transfer, which is running until 2029, funded by a starting grant from the European Research Council, which we'll be talking about that today.

1:12But we'll also talk about some of our work on rational choice theory, in particular, a book that's coming out this month called Conversations on Rational Choice with Cambridge University Press. Hi, Catherine. Happy New Year. Happy New Year, Jen.

1:29So, Francois, you've got the first couple of questions, so let's kick us, kick things off. Yes, and I suggest to start with a very simple question. Hi, Catherine. How would you define the field in which you work?

1:45Yeah.

1:47Thanks for the question, Francois. It's a hard one. And it's a hard one because I don't think too much about this. So, I'm not constantly sitting there thinking of how to box myself, but when I think about it in terms of, you know, where do I publish, what do I think is my audience and so forth, I feel like oftentimes I publish and work for two separate fields. So, there is work that I do in the history of economics where I do these, I at least think it's like the proper historical work, go into the archives, like write an article that takes a long time because, you know, you go, you dig deep into the history of something and then you publish it in some history journal.

2:37But then I also feel like I do work in philosophy and methodology of economics. And, yeah, oftentimes these are actually separate things. So, a separate kind of project, if you will, at least they have been in the past. But then, of course, you, you know, you do this kind of work and you think, how do these fields relate? And, of course, you know, especially methodology of economics has a tradition of how this is integrated somehow with, you know, historical, like methodological questions, integrated somehow with methodological.

3:13And so, you know, I feel that if you ask me, well, if this integration, you take seriously this integration, does this field exist for which you work, where you want to fuse both or put these together? It should be something like integrated history and philosophy of economics, I think. And that comes from, of course, this more general term of integrated history and philosophy of science, where the idea is, well, philosophy of science is informed by and draws upon the history of science or historical cases, case studies.

3:54And these historical case studies are at the same time informed by, you know, a conceptual framework, if you will, that is given by philosophy of science. Thank you very much. For someone who hasn't thought a lot about it, that's a very self-reflexive and made to answer, I would say. Let's now talk about your forthcoming book that Jennifer mentioned on rational choice theory.

4:27This book involved a long gestation period and required interviews with over 20 economists, including several Nobel Prize winners. How would you describe this whole adventure and, yeah, perhaps which interviews surprised you the most? Yeah, so this is the book, Conversations on Rational Choice, right? That's just to make this clear. So there are these two books. One is still in the making.

4:58The other one was also for a very long time in the making. The one is called Many Faces of Rational Choice. The other one is called Conversations on Rational Choice. And the one that's coming out is the conversation one. But they are related in the sense that the conversation book grew out of my dissertation research and the other one is about my dissertation. So, indeed, it took a very long time to finish this book. And it grew out of, you know, a general curiosity when I was doing my research for my dissertation work, the idea was or the goal was to actually write like an epistemologically informed history of rational choice theory, how rational choice theory has been used in economics throughout, you know, historical period.

5:51And there I started actually with Adam Smith and ended today, which was not a great idea, but I, you know, it took a huge historical time span. I did a lot of research there and I thought, OK, I should, you know, given that there was so much discussion in this debate about rational choice theory, that goes also back into its history, the history of economics, there was so much, there was always this debate going on about the homo economicos and why we should think about people as rational or as self-interested, depending on what kind of interpretation people gave.

6:35And that I was curious about this debate and I thought, OK, if this debate is not only going on today, you know, for instance, manifesting in the research that grew out of, you know, this early work of behavioural economists, but it was there for a very long time, how is it possible that the smart, you know, scientific community like economics doesn't pick up on this and change, you know, the way in which they think about human agents? And so I thought, well, maybe I should ask them. And so the person that I asked first, because I started to study his rational choice theory first or his approach to to human behaviour was Gary Becker.

7:16So I went and visited him when he was still alive and I talked with him and I was so surprised by how much I could learn from him in, I don't know, 30 minutes or so about what he thought was justified criticism against his approach, but also what he thought his approach was about, what his approach can do and cannot do. And so I got curious and I thought maybe I should ask more and more people and I should not only ask those who actually defend theories of rational decision making or use them in their own work,

7:54but also I should ask people who criticise, what do I think they criticise, what exactly is there to criticise? And maybe I can, you know, confront them with each other's viewpoint in these conversations. And so at the beginning, it was really just this curiosity. And then I went and visited other people like, I don't know, Kenneth Arrow or Thomas Schelling, like people who really had made fundamental contributions or had thought deeply about, you know, theories of rational decision making economics.

8:29And then I showed this interview, this first interview of Becker to Bruce Caldwell. He should get some credit and he said, you should really do something, publish this. And so this is how, you know, after a while, after a couple of years, the idea grew that I might want to just do, you know, this more systematically, transcribe them and then publish them in an interview book.

8:59And this whole thing took nine years or so. And several people have already passed that I've interviewed. But it was also a very long time in terms of the production process of this book. This took several years to actually finish it once I submitted the manuscript, because it's very difficult if people pass to get the rights to publish these, you know, these interviews that they have given.

9:32So copyright issues were a thing and what the format was and so forth.

Interview Process

9:38Yeah.

Interview Process

9:39Wow. Wow. Thank you. Nine years. That's impressive. Can we just dive into the making of the interviews a bit more? Especially, did you send the question in advance or did you post them on the spot? And how did you handle reading the scholars' work, editing the interview? And did you send it back to interviewees? And how did it work with those who are still alive?

10:10Yeah, maybe just quickly to your comment before, it's like, it's a long period. And maybe I should say that, of course, you don't have money for these kinds of projects. It's rather unconventional, right? And it also doesn't fit into a box. So I was for a long time also worried to put a lot of effort in this kind of work because it might not give you a job, right? Because it's not necessarily helpful to classify you. And that's what counts when you want to have a permanent position.

10:41And it's not a clear genre. So there were very few, you know, books of that sort. And I've learned about them. There were one in moral philosophy and the other one in aesthetics by Alex Forhove and the other one that escapes my name, the author of that book. But so there was not really a role model. And this goes also to how to proceed with, you know, methodologically with these interviews. And the process was such that I actually didn't send the questions in advance.

11:21What I did in advance was I read through a lot of the work that these people have been done. And then I started to have a red line for every interview by defining certain blocks, topical blocks that I would want to talk about with them. And some of these blocks were shared across interview partners. But some of not all interviewees had the same like topical blocks, so to say.

11:55Of course not, because they were working in very different fields sometimes. I started off always with the same question and ended with the same question. That was the only thing that was, you know, always there in the interviews. And then we had the interview. And I would have to make a lot up on the spot because. And that is why it was very important to read the work beforehand, because the interview would almost never go as I had planned.

12:31So, you know, the whole point was to get stuff out of them that they wouldn't want to talk about necessarily in publication outlets. And also sometimes play the devil's advocate, right? To say, well, but here, maybe that's, you know, you should rethink this. And so if you send these questions in advance and have a very, very clear cut idea of how it works, you might not get this out of the interview. So they didn't know what the questions were, but then what happened was I transcribed everything and I send it.

13:06I had a minimal round of editing myself just to, you know, clean the transcript up a little bit so that it was readable. And then they got the transcript and here there were very different experiences of how people handled this. Some people can very well live with their, you know, the fact that your spoken word is very different from your written word.

13:37And the spoken word is sometimes written down, but it's nevertheless not what you usually read, right? Because it is more messy, it might ramble more, you know, things like that. And some people were very keen on getting this into, like, the written word that they used from, are used from, or they are used. So some people were very much, you know, interested in getting this edited in a very clean way so that it was comparable to what they usually would write and publish.

14:19And others were much, much looser, right? They would accept this and would be fine with it. And others just saw this and said, I've never said, you know, I've never said this. This is impossible that these are my words, so you're not going to publish this. I had all sorts of experiences here. Yeah, that was the basic process. I wanted to ask about, it seems like the motivation for the book was, I mean, it feels very interdisciplinary from the start.

14:52Was that something quite, I mean, was that quite intentional?

14:59Well, I mean, it's hard, of course. Now the book turns out to be very, you know, has a very interdisciplinary approach and so forth. It was not quite intentional because it wasn't this project where you say, well, now I'm going to do this interview project and now this is going to look like this. I really had no vision of that at the beginning at all. It was just as I went, you know, and went along doing my PhD research and given that I never had money for this project or that it was not something that I felt was, it was always a side project.

15:32It was never like at the center of my research. And so, you know, I met people when I happened to be there because of a conference or because of research visit. And so, eventually, after a few of these conversations, you know, particularly with people like Arrow or Thomas Schelling, I mean, these were very exciting people to talk to. I felt like, well, you know, some of the things they would say were so surprising. Then I thought, okay, let's, let's get up, get the critics in, right?

16:05Let's talk about behavioral economics with behavioral economists about this or with newer economists like have a camera and other people.

16:14So it's, I think it's not, it wasn't intentional in that sense. It just grew and turned out to be this thing that it now is. Maybe I should go back also to Francois' question of what I thought was very surprising because I think I missed this out, you know, this question that you had. What were the surprising actually things that I've learned? And I think this is, these are things you learn because you maybe implicitly take an interdisciplinary approach in that you do yourself some history and some philosophy and you have, I don't know, some basic knowledge of economics.

16:54So, for instance, what was very surprising was the Thomas Schelling interview where he suddenly said, you know, game theory had never any role to play in any political process or decision making. So no one would ever talk about game theory in the political realm at, you know, at the time where the Rand Cooperation was very active in terms of research. And, you know, he has this whole, if you look at the book, he has this whole, you know, explanation for him and rationalization of this whole, of this historical period.

17:29And this is opposed to a lot of research, historical research on game theory. And so this was extremely surprising to me. And here, of course, trying to contrast this in the, in the moment with some, you know, of the historical research that has been done on this particular period to see what he, how he responds, you know, was the kind of approach that I tried to take. And I was also very surprised that Becker knew about all of this criticism quite well.

18:01He had thought about all of these issues. Right. But he had ways to, I mean, justify himself in a very clear and thought through way. So that was very surprising and very, very impressive as well. And or meeting Kenneth Arrow, it was extremely impressive of how he, how much he knew about the history of economics, how much he read about the history of economics. He cut this, he cut, his son actually cut this out later on in the book.

18:31But then, and, and, but he knew the details of, of, you know, historical work that has been recently done on, for instance, game theory and the Cold War and things like that. So these were very surprising results, actually, or surprising moments in these interviews. That's great. That's great. I'm really happy that this book exists to be really, to be really, it's a really lovely product. And it touches on a lot of, touches on a lot of things that, that, that I've also been concerned about.

19:07There's a, there's a question I want to ask about how philosophers and economists think about rational, rationality and rational choice. How, how, and this is, this is one of the things that does come out in, in the book. How should we understand this difference, the disconnect between the way philosophers and economists think? And can it be reconciled? Does it clarify the economist usage? How do you compare these theories that are produced by economists, philosophers, and even psychologists?

19:42Are there concepts, the logic, the analogies, their visions of rationality the same or very different, complementary, or mutually exclusive? I guess it's hard to think about this question along the lines of disciplines. I think it's more, I mean, at least to me, it's easier to think about the difference between them or this diversity of theories of rational decision making along the lines of the projects that the scientists are engaged in.

20:14So sometimes, so there are two ways in which philosophers of science are interested in theories of rational decision making or philosophers of economics, if you will. On the one hand, they're using them themselves, right? So they apply, expect utility theory or game theoretic models in their own work to think about, I don't know, the social organization of science or, you know, model certain community structures and things like that.

20:44And then there are, on the other hand, also interested in appraising or criticizing theories of rational decision making as they are used in economics. And so, of course, economists are also in some way engaged in both businesses, if you will, right? There is methodological discussion within economics about these approaches to human behavior, which are comparable to these appraisals that are criticisms that philosophers of science or philosophers of economics offer.

21:24And then economists themselves use those theories. So I think it really depends on more on the way in which they are used, as opposed to the way in which disciplines are or people with different disciplinary backgrounds engage in in these two projects, if that makes sense. And I mean, but then it becomes complicated, of course, right?

21:56Because then there are all these different research projects, if you will, or problems that you want to, that you're engaged in as a philosopher or scientist or psychologist. I mean, there are also psychologists who use decision theory or rational choice theories. It's not only that they are criticizing them. So there is more this overlap of usages, if you will, that doesn't necessarily map onto disciplinary boundaries.

22:31I think that's what I'm saying. But the problem, the general problem that I saw, and the reason for why I thought we should think about this some way, and the reason for why I thought it would be helpful to have these different views in one book, is because for a long time, if you read into the history of these criticisms as well, against the homo economicos and some variant of it, I felt that economists were very well aware of this, but they also had very good justifications for doing the things that they did with these theories of rational decision making.

23:22And that I, at the same time, felt that these criticisms were not necessarily helpful or constructive. There were oftentimes these all-round criticisms, like the kind of criticisms that Philip Kitscher calls stake-in-the-heart arguments. So what you do is, the opponent gets just like the knife into the heart and is dead. That's the goal. But that's not constructive, right? It is really unproductive. And it also relieves you from the actual engagement with your, if you will, opponent or, you know, sometimes these criticisms get so drastic that you might want to talk about an enemy, right?

24:07And so I think my motivation here was to say, well, let's hear each other. Let's talk to each other. Sometimes you might think as a psychologist or philosopher, you are very distant from what the economists are doing, but you're actually not. And sometimes you think within economics, oh, sure, there's my fellow economists, we agree on, you know, when it comes to theories of rational decision making, but we actually don't.

24:38We don't even have a clear cut and shared understanding of what they are. We have very different understandings and we use them in very different ways. And it turns out, we think that in different ways about their limitations as well. So as a PhD student, I was too humbled to say, I tell you as philosopher or, you know, where the limitations and the boundaries of those theories are. But I was very curious to hear what all the people who have really thought deeply about this think these boundaries are.

25:13And so revealing this diversity that doesn't necessarily overlap with disciplinary affiliation was fascinating to me.

25:23Excellent. Perhaps the last question on this book before we move on to other researchers of you, because your book contains a lot of information about how rational choice theory was initially motivated and about the criticism that you just mentioned. And perhaps my question now is, what is one lesson you want readers to take away from your book? Yeah, that's also a hard thing to answer, right?

25:55Because, of course, in the moment where it's out, people do whatever they do with it. And maybe one way to answer this is to think about it in terms of readership. So the main readership that I had in mind was me as a PhD student, actually. So I feel like maybe it's an interesting and good resource for a PhD student or, you know, even a master's or bachelor's student who have, you know, have a first encounter with these ideas

26:30and are puzzled and are puzzled as I was and want to learn more about what scientists think what they are doing. And the fascinating thing about theories of rational decision making is that they connect so, if you ask questions about them, they connect so closely to other issues that are relevant for doing either work in economics, for instance, for instance, you know, mathematical modeling, empirical testing, you know, how does theory model relate to data?

27:06I mean, all these kinds of questions that you might have as an up and coming economist, if you will, practicing economist. But they also relate a lot to what philosophers of economists are, economics are asking themselves, such as, okay, what is, you know, how is this a model? How does it relate to the world?

27:30And so forth. So I think for economist students and philosopher students might be interesting. And then the book content, I mean, each interview contains like a short summary where I try to give an introduction into the work of the scholar and how this view that we are now learning about in the interview connects to this work. Because a lot of confusion, I think, about rational choice theories comes from the fact that we don't take into account how they are actually used.

28:10So some people use them, you know, in experiments, other people use them in mathematical modeling, and they use them as an actual scientific theory of individual behavior, or they plug them into their market theory as a set of assumptions. So here I try to show how, you know, the different kinds of frameworks or practices, if you will, that are undertaken in economics, how they relate to the view that they then have in the interview.

28:43And so these, and sometimes these are very technical topics, I mean, people like Supers or Aero or Becker, they have technically very sophisticated, you know, contributions that they made. And so students might not always be able to access this easily. I think what I also would like to achieve with this book is that people just sometimes take more risks and just do interesting stuff in science and philosophy.

29:26I feel sometimes, or I feel sometimes, or I felt for a long time, very constrained by disciplinary boundaries and what were to publish and what to do and how things are done in a good way. And so maybe it can be also an example of doing something interesting that might not fit any genre or, you know, any of these kinds of constraints. And then lastly, I might want to say that, of course, it can serve as a source of inspiration for historians as well, given that a lot of these economists are, you know, at the time of the interview, very old, going to their own historical roots and so forth.

30:18But I would appreciate if people see that it is okay that there is disagreement in science, it's okay that, you know, economists, they are sometimes confused, there is a lot of misunderstanding, but they sometimes also disagree in a meaningful way. And so I think this book shows this disagreement, and where they disagree, I hope at least, and that's fine, that's science, that's how it should be, and people should see it.

31:00Thank you for this insightful answer, and I hope that the call for courageous works will be heard.

Model Transfer

31:07Thank you for that.

31:37Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for that question. So this is a new project. And this is a project, indeed, on model transfer, and so it's called model transfer and its challenges in science, the case of economics. And I'm saying this, because there's a lot of stuff already in the title that I think the project is about.

32:10So model transfer is just this very simple phenomenon in science, or like this very straightforward phenomenon that, you know, there are models that are used in some what we call source domain. And then it has been established there, it has been used there in a productive way. And then these models or the model gets transferred into a different domain, in a new target domain, if you will.

32:42And domains can be thought of as, of course, subfields. So model can be transferred within a discipline such as economics, for instance, but it's more interesting if it's transferred across disciplines. And the reason for why this is interesting is more interesting, maybe, or in a different way, interesting is that it is surprising if you find that a model that is used in economics suddenly can also be, you know, used in medicine.

33:17And because medicine has these very different subject matter that it deals with than economics. So this different set of target systems that it deals with. And so this is why, and it raises a host of philosophical questions. And this is why this topic is interesting. So a classic example of model transfer is, for instance, the Lotka-Volterra model.

33:47So the Lotka-Volterra model is this, you know, basically two equations that most people know about or have seen somewhere that are used or originate in population biology to study predator-prey interactions. But then it has been transferred into medicine to, for instance, study the growth of cancer cells or transferred into economics, macroeconomics to study the business cycle or interaction on the labor market and things like that.

34:22So that the Lotka-Volterra model is one, I would say, showcase example that has been studied quite a bit in the literature. Other examples are game theoretic models, of course, that have been transferred into almost every discipline that we now know of. So game theoretic models are used in all of science, but other models that we know less well in other fields that have been, however, been transferred from one discipline to another are physical models that have been transferred into economics or have at least been, there has been an attempt to transfer those into economics.

35:10Economists not always agreed on that. This is why we now have, I think, this is part of the reason for why we now have a separate field that's called econophysics that neither belongs to economics nor to physics. But then another very prominent examples, but then another very prominent example is network models, of course, that have been that originating computer science and then through computational social science now spread to a lot of different fields.

35:42So what are open questions? Because as Francois, you asked, the literature is still at an early stage, I would say, although people are getting more and more interested in that. So one of one set of questions is or circulates around this idea of the unit of transfer. So one big issue is what actually is transferred if we talk about model transfer? Is it the full fledged model? Is it part of a full fledged model?

36:14Is it only, you know, a set of in the Lotka Volterra case, the set of mathematical equations or is it just a piece of mathematics that's transferred? And so people have come up with different concepts to think about the unit of transfer. And one such important concept has been proposed by Paul Humphries and it's called, you know, and he talks about the unit of transfer being a template, a template for model construction.

36:47Maybe we can go into the details a little later on. The other thing that is interesting and, you know, raises a host of questions or concerns the model transfer process. So what is going on in that process where a model gets transferred? And the reason for why this is interesting is because there are different kinds of model transfers, if you will. And economics is a prime example where this comes to the fore.

37:17So economics is a curious case of to study model transfer because for a long time we had this preconception of economics as an isolated field. Right. That economics thinks of itself as a little bit, you know, on a different level than the other social sciences. And by doing so isolating itself from other social sciences and not engaging too much in interdisciplinary work, which is, however, which is, of course, not the case if we study the history more deeply.

38:00And, you know, historians like Philippe Fontaine and Roger Backhaus and others, they have shown us how that has actually never been the case. Right. Economics was not that isolated. But there is this preconception also among the other social sciences. And at the same time, there is this idea of economics imperialism. So the idea that economics as an isolated field, however, you know, goes into other fields and, you know, studies all their problems with some kind of rational choice approach or model based upon a rational choice approach.

38:41And so exports quite a lot of modeling techniques to other fields, even in an imperialistic way. So I think that makes it interesting to study economics as a case for model transfer. Now, coming back to this point about why we should study the model transfer process. And so imperializing a field is, of course, very different from in terms of what is going on in the model transfer process might be very different from saying actual attempt to integrate modeling techniques from two fields, say, psychology and economics.

39:30So how can we think about, on the one hand, you know, imperializing as opposed to integrate integration as opposed to other people have come up with this term of migration. So the different ways in which the model transfer process unfolds is a novel thing to study and is interesting for those reasons.

40:00The third open issue is the question of the challenges to model transfer. So, OK, there are a lot of cases where transferring a model, and I think econophysics, as Jennifer has shown a little bit in her work, would be a prominent, would be a promising, you know, transfer. There are certain challenges that come in the way of such potentially promising transfers.

40:36And there have been a lot of attempts from physics to transfer, you know, to transfer their modeling techniques into economics. But economists, for various reasons, were opposing this. And so studying these challenges that can come in the way allows us to talk maybe a little bit about how we can ensure that model transfer can not only be done in the case where it's promising, epistemically speaking,

41:10it promises some epistemic benefits, but also to learn when economics is progressing. And that's the last, you know, set of open issues that we try to tackle also in this project is to better understand in fields like economics where progress happens not anymore by coming up with alternative general theories, but rather by coming up all the time with new models and modeling techniques.

41:46How can we think about progress in that, in those kinds of fields, particularly if we take the idea seriously that these modeling techniques that are developed are almost always nowadays also drawing on modeling techniques from other fields. I have a couple of specific questions about what you've written concerning model transfer. One thing I was curious about was about a distinction that you make between template based and analogy based ways of thinking about model transfer across different fields.

42:24What's the difference between them? So I think this distinction between the template based account and the analogy based account is not new. It's not mine. It arises from the literature and how the literature on model transfer has, I think, evolved in philosophy of science. And what happened was that the idea that we focus on model transfer as a phenomenon arises from this more general idea that science and its structure, the way it is organized, has changed.

43:06And this was an idea that was first pointed out by Paul Humphreys in his books, in his book, Extending Ourselves, where he said, well, science nowadays is really more organized around these, you know, we use computation models. Computation models and computation models and are best thought of as being the result of a model construction process that is based upon what he called a computational template, which is a general mathematical, you know, structure.

43:46That is when you add a structure that is when you add a set of construction assumptions, say, idealizations, abstractions and whatnot, that is made tractable. And then once you give this whole thing an interpretation, it becomes an applicable tractable computational model. And the specific thing about these templates, these computational templates, is that they are actually, because they are separate from an interpretation, they can be transferred.

44:26They are also transferable and very flexible in that respect. And so he came up with this account of models, actually, not so much about not so much thinking about model transfer at the time, but more with this idea of how we should think about models nowadays. That people took this up and said, yeah, this is a way in which we can think about models in model transfer to address this question about what the unit of transfer is, namely templates, computational templates.

45:03So since then, people have taken up this idea, most prominently, and they, you know, have come up with an alternative template notion that also stresses the idea of, or the role of analogies to some degree. But indeed, this template based account is motivated in the first instance by refraining from giving analogies a big role in explaining model transfer.

45:39And the reason for why that is, is because, at least this is how I read Humphreys, is because it is indeed the case that, you know, the presence of analogies that you can identify as a scientist between, say, two systems, they might have similar properties in domain A and domain B. And then you see, well, the model that worked for this target system in domain B, domain A with that property with these or this set of properties works also in, for that system in domain B with that, these very similar properties because of these analogies, right?

46:27Because, but he said, but he said, well, this is a psychological, you know, notion, and we want to, for justificatory purposes, we don't want to have that.

46:40So this is why the template based account, I think, came into being and was taken up. So the analogy based account, in contrast, is an account where the idea is scientists reason analogically, and this is a cognitive strategy that they apply when they transfer tools, models, techniques that have been successful in one domain to another domain,

47:10because of the analogies they identify, or the similarities they identify between two systems in these two different domains.

47:22The kinds of questions that you're asking really pull together philosophy and science in a way that I find, like, really, really impressive, and something that I wish I saw more of, and so this is a question that I think about a lot, and it's a general question about what the relationship between philosophy of science and science should be. So how should these two different fields interface with each other, in your opinion? I think that's an extremely hard question, and I think it's partly hard to answer because I think many philosophers would answer this question very differently,

48:07depending on what they are engaged in, and I think the answer to that question actually depends on what kind of questions you are interested in yourself, right? And so, I mean, of course, traditionally, the idea of philosophy of science was to, you know, formulate, like, normative standards, if you will, for science, like, and thereby engaging in some kind of external evaluation of science.

48:39And I think this project still has, you know, is still to some degree justified, but it's not so effective. I think I mentioned this earlier with that book, is that the best criticism, you know, that makes you stumble and takes all of the ground that you're staying away, even if it's, you know, even if it's, you know, very well articulated and it goes right to the point, if it's not constructive and effective, it is, I think, useless.

49:23And what do I mean by that is that science needs to function. Science has certain roles, I think, to play. If you take economics, it is a policy science. And I think that's not under, to be underappreciated. It needs to, it needs to produce results.

49:41And it is one thing to say, well, you know, the results should be taken with a grain of salt. We should be careful with what we can actually say in light of these and recommend in light of these results that we generate in economics. But it needs to somehow go on. And so, like, these very idealistic normative standards might somehow go, somehow, sometimes beside the point.

50:18So, coming up with a set of necessary and sufficient conditions for what a good explanation is might be valuable, but not useful. And so, I guess, I feel, I think very strongly about philosophy being useful. Although I don't, you know, always live up to the standard myself, because it's always a trade-off between your work being useful versus you do whatever you think is interesting. But in general, I think one should make an attempt to engage, you know, and make the work that you're doing useful for someone or something.

50:58So, by generating these norms and principles that philosophers use to appraise, say, economics, It is very important to understand, you know, on the one hand, what does science want to achieve? What do we, you know, what do economists themselves want?

51:28And in light of that, assess whether they achieve their own goal, own set goal, but then also the question of, or, but also take into consideration, what is science able to achieve? So, we need to have this continuous dialogue to understand what's feasible. And so, ideally, and this is very complicated, of course, it gets very messy, but ideally, I would like to, for the two, the philosophy of economics and history of economics,

52:06to be related in this kind of iterative cycle that Chan's model, or Haseok Chang proposes when he talks about the relationship between philosophy of science and historical case studies. Namely, that it is a continuous, you know, iteration where philosophers can come up with new concepts, new theories, new claims about science. In light of cases, in light of cases, in order to refine these concepts, and, you know, theories, and claims, as they go along.

52:47But then also that these cases show philosophers how science changes continuously, and that leads to, again, another change in the philosophy. So, it's this, I think it's this, I think it's this continuous iteration, which in one way I see implemented in, in a continuous conversation.

53:12Fantastic. Thank you so much for that answer. I'm super sympathetic to that, and I'll keep thinking about what you just said after our interview is over. We've gone through all my questions. Catherine, thank you so much for joining us once again on the show. It's nice to see you again. And until next time. Thanks so much, Jennifer and Francois. Thank you, Catherine.