Robert Vienneau — On Mainstream Economists' Ignorance Of Real Analysis

Mainstream economists these days seem unwilling to accept claims about economics that are not backed up by mathematical models. (I think that views on mathematical formalism are pluralistic among non-mainstream economists. Mathematical models are just one of several approaches to acceptable claims about economics, and some non-mainstream economists are quite good at producing mathematical models.) Generally speaking, mainstream economists seem to me to reject norms common among mathematicians....

A point that Bill Mitchell has often made.

Robert Vienneau follows up by looking at real analysis and how it is taught.

The refusal I have seen of economists to accept their own logic may be the manifestation of anti-intellectualism and boundary-patrolling that I think is so common among properly socialized economists. The general public must not come to understand how vulnerable the conclusions of mainstream economists are to slight perturbations in model assumptions. Demonstrations of the failure of the logic in the teaching and public pronouncements of economists must be distracted in blather about credentials or (false?) irrelevancies about empirical results.

Thoughts On Economics

On Mainstream Economists' Ignorance Of Real Analysis
Robert Vienneau