This book argues that the phenomena discussed within economics can be approached fruitfully, arguably more fruitfully than with traditional ideas and methods, by employing the concepts and methodologies of the natural sciences. In the present chapter we will describe the background to this claim, and some aspects of the contemporary situation in economics.

A scientific approach

What is the approach of the natural sciences, and why is it so powerful?

Descartes, of course, characterised science as the process of making ourselves free from any prejudice and dogma when seeking truth. Certainly, our capacity for thought is limited or distorted by the influence of religion, politics or, indeed, the received wisdom of established academic disciplines.

However, the fundamental principles of natural science warn us against these traps and require us to face natural phenomena without bias, and to resist the temptation to truncate our inquiries prematurely. Instead, we must ceaselessly root out error and improve our understanding. It was this attitude that enabled Galileo and his predecessors to overturn the prevailing Ptolemaic theory, and to provide a vastly improved model of the truth. Centuries of cumulative endeavour later we have a set of scientific views stretching from the imperceptible world of elementary particles right through to cosmology, the science of the universe as a whole. In between there is chemistry, biology and much else besides.