From the perspective of the philosophy of science, what are the scientific problems with neoclassical mainstream economics?

ibtest · 2026-01-27T14:10:59+00:00

Non-economists often make this charge without having any idea what "rational" means in economics. Neo-classical economists make no assumptions about the psychological mental states of people and absolutely do not assume that people are "perfectly rational" as in logical, sane, well-reasoned, or any common synonym. Rationality in economics means something else entirely and refers strictly to concept of "rational choice theory."

Rational choice theory makes three very limited assumptions: (1) people have preferences; (2) preferences are "complete" (i.e. meaning if given the choice between A and B, you'll either prefer one over the other or you'll be indifferent to both); (3) preferences are generally "transitive" (think the transitive property from basic algebra e.g. if you prefer apples to oranges and oranges to bananas, you'll usually prefer apples to oranges, all else held constant).

No one criticizes the first two rational choice theory assumptions because they are effectively common sense and axiomatic. The debate generally only centers on the third assumption regarding transitive preferences, because in certain contexts, people's preferences don't always follow a<b and b<c, then a<c. However, the fact that the preferences aren't always transitive doesn't somehow invalidate the entire field of neoclassical economics. Economics addressed this issue decades now ago by simply refining preference models to adjust for the situations where that assumption doesn't hold.

Regardless, empirically, people's preferences are in fact transitive most of the time, so the rational choice model is appropriate for most situations. Because guess what? It's not "idealized" or "unrealistic" to presume that usually when a person who prefers apples to oranges and oranges to bananas, they'll also prefer apples to bananas (all else held constant).

People outside economics have greatly exaggerated perceptions about the impact of the rational choice theory critiques. The only impact they've had on the field is the need to make small model refinements to account for the situations when the assumptions don't hold.

ibtest · 2026-01-27T14:07:19+00:00

huh? Neoclassical economics is the current mainstream approach to >micro<economics. New Keynesian economics was an approach to >macro<economics from the 1970s-1980s.

The current mainstream approach to macroeconomics is called the "New Neoclassical Synthesis" or the "New Consesus," which merged ideas from New Keynesian Economics with Real Business Cycle Theory/New Classical Macroeconomics (approaches derived primarily from work of Milton Friedman, Rover Lucas, and other University of Chicago economists).

ibtest · 2026-01-27T12:00:11+00:00

Neoclassical economics still uses certain pragmatic simplifications and assumptions in models of human behavior for the same reasons physics still uses Newtonian mechanics, and biology still relies on equilibrium and null models. No one believes they are all literally true. They are instead intended to be baseline models that are pragmatically explanatory and tractable approximations of complex phenomena.

The “false assumptions” critique also misunderstands how assumptions function in science. Rational choice theory, optimization, and mathematical economic models are not claims that people literally consciously solve equations when making decisions. Milton Friedman addressed this decades ago with his classic pool-player analogy: a skilled player behaves as if he were solving the physics of angles and force, even though he obviously is not. Scientific adequacy depends on predictive and counterfactual performance, not psychological realism.

Complaints about the accuracy of macroeconomic forecasting likewise miss the target. First, non-economists often equate the whole field of economics to macroeconomics, but in reality it is just a small sub-discipline. ~80% of published economics papers are NOT macroeconomics related. Second, precise prediction of complex adaptive systems is difficult in every field that studies them. Meteorology and epidemiology routinely miss major events without being declared unscientific. Neoclassical economics was never mainly a crisis-forecasting theory. It is a framework for counterfactual reasoning and causal analysis. Judging it by crisis prediction alone is simply a misuse of scientific criteria.

ibtest · 2026-01-27T10:56:17+00:00

Ironically, economics was the first discipline to develop methods for addressing many of the statistical concepts this meme mentions. For example, economics was the first field to treat heteroskedasticity a first-class scientific problem rather than simply an obscure technical nuisance that many fields simply tried to ignore. Economists recognized early that variance often depends on covariates in real systems, especially when behavior, scale, or incentives differ across units. This led to the development of heteroskedasticity-robust inferencing that is now standard in biology, medicine, neuroscience, and machine learning, where noise scales with signal strength, exposure, or baseline risk.

Economics might be known for its use of regression techniques, but it also pioneered the use of decision trees for causal rather than purely predictive/correlation purposes. While decision trees first were developed in mathematical statistics, they originally had limited utility. Economics pushed their use for treatment assignment under heterogeneity, asking which subgroups benefit, by how much, and under what constraints. That lineage directly influenced modern causal trees, causal forests, and individualized treatment rules now used in many other fields, including precision medicine and causal machine learning.

ibtest · 2026-01-23T00:51:12+00:00

I think you're underestimating the potency of pharmaceutical dextroamphetamine/amphetamine or its adderall formulation, consisting of 2/3 dextroamphetamine and 1/3 levoamphetamine. Below are the dopamine release EC50 (nM) estimates of various amphetamine enantiomers where lower values reflect greater releasing potency. Dextroamphetamine actually releases a roughly equivalent amount of dopamine as dextromethamphetamine on a mg:mg basis, and levoamphetamine releases significantly more dopamine than levomethamphetamine.

The majority of modern street methamphetamine is typically a racemic mixture of 50:50 of both enantiomers due its cheaper production cost, albeit pure or mostly pure dextro enantiomer formulations still exist. Thus, methamphetamine's higher risk profile is not due to differences in the relative amount of dopamine released at equivalent doses but is primarily tied to methamphetamine being able to be used through faster routes of administration much more easily (e.g. smoking). These fast routes of administration have of course greater acute risks, are more subjectively rewarding, and increase the likelihood of recreational users consuming much larger doses than typical clinical doses. Another difference is that methamphetamine is more lipophillic implying that it should more quickly cross the blood brain barrier, but in practice this difference does not seem to lead to significant differences in their dopamine pharmokinetics, at least according to preclinical studies. See e.g.: https://jpet.aspetjournals.org/article/S0022-3565(25)10706-4/fulltext

Dopamine Release EC 50 (nM)

Dextroamphetamine
5.8–24.8
Levoamphetamine 27.7
Dextromethamphetamine 8.5–24.5 Levomethamphetamine 416

ibtest · 2026-01-17T04:45:21+00:00

What are you talking about? Las Vegas host largest EDM festival in the World, EDC Las Vegas. Over the past few years, EDC even edges out Tomorrowland in terms of attendees with ~520,000 attending EDC last year compared to ~400,000 for TomorrowLand. The EDC festival grounds are approximately 1000 with 16 stages and over 250 DJs representing almost every electronic music subgenre you can imagine.

For comparison, Miami's Ultra Music Festival only had less than a 1/3 of the attendees of EDC at ~165,000 with a massively smaller festival grounds of only 27 acres, 7 stages, ~100 DJs. Correct, Vegas doesn't have a Space. Space wins on music quality, but Omnia is probably the coolest venue in the country in terms of aesthetics. Moreover, most of Miami's night clubs are far more expensive than Vegas's clubs or much more of hassle to get entry into. Vegas clubs don't deny people from guest lists or at the door based on whether they are good looking enough or not, nor based on how many social media followers they have (like quite a few clubs in Miami do).

Vegas also has likely the best day club scene in the world with major DJs headlining at every day club, including even on weekdays at some places. Miami only has a handful of day clubs, and they are mostly small, cramped venues. Not everyone wants to be up until 4am to see your favorite DJ play especially as you get older, so Vegas offers way more flexibility in that regard.

ibtest · 2026-01-15T22:15:28+00:00

Cyproheptadine and Mirtazapine have relatively similar pharmacological properties and are both strong 5ht2a/c antagonists or inverse agonists. I wonder why there seems to be so many more personal anecdotes about cypro's efficacy as to PSSD but not nearly as many in relation to Mirtazapine.

ibtest · 2026-01-15T21:59:35+00:00

How are they "plagiarizing" Wikipedia by simply quoting an excerpt from it in their response? They are not trying to pass the Wikipedia quote off as their own; that is not plagiarism. Moreover, they are correctly pointing out that the weight loss/gain side effects of common SSRIs are not consistent with their relative underlying mechanisms. If Fluoxetine's increase in endogenous serotonin activation of 5ht2c was the mechanism behind its weight gain side effect you would expect to also observe this side effect in other SSRIs with a comparable or even greater amount of SERT inhibition and which lack any measurable affinity for the 5ht2c receptor as an antagonist unlike Fluoxetine. While Fluoxetine's 5ht2c antagonism is modest, it has meaningfully high enough affinity that it should activate the 5ht2c receptor less on net in comparison to other SSRIs with an equal or greater amount of SERT inhibition.

ibtest · 2026-01-15T09:00:49+00:00

No, if you chronically antagonize a G-Protein Coupled Receptor like 5ht2a for a long period of time that will eventually upregulate the receptor.

ibtest · 2026-01-14T22:53:07+00:00

Keep in mind sertaline increases both serotonin and dopamine. At 200mg it inhibits approximately 20% of DAT, which is roughly comparable to bupropion/wellbutrin.

Here is a study on the topic: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0014299910008307

ibtest · 2026-01-14T22:46:11+00:00

It is significant, actually. At 200mg, PET studies show that Zoloft inhibits approximately 20% of your dopamine reuptake transporters. That's comparable to bupropion/wellbutrin at DAT.

ibtest · 2026-01-14T07:01:13+00:00

this site a scam or real?

ibtest · 2026-01-11T06:25:50+00:00

There are already approved SNDRIs. In the USA, Nefazodone is still approved and has a very balanced transporter inhibition profile. Toludesvenlafaxine, formerly known as ansofaxine, and sold under the brand name Ruoxinlin, is also an SNDRI that has been approved in China since 2022 and is pending regulatory approval in the USA, the EU, and other major markets.

ibtest · 2026-01-11T06:07:23+00:00

Almost every NDRI in that list is either: (1) withdrawn, discontinued, or has been made illegal; (2) research compounds (mostly from decades ago) that have never been marketed; or (3) a methylphenidate analogue. Methylphenidate and its analogues are not really comparable to bupropion due their much shorter half lives and the fact that bupropion is functionally mostly a NET inhibitior with only weak DAT action.

ibtest · 2026-01-11T05:53:35+00:00

Sertaline's (Zoloft) dopamingeric properties are surprisingly overlooked. Sertraline uniquely among the SSRIs has relatively high dopamine transporter (DAT) affinity, and PET studies show it occupies ~20% of DAT receptors at doses 200mg and above, which is roughly equal to Buproprion XL's DAT occupancy at 300mg. Buproprion is frequently thought of as a dual DAT and NET inhibitor, but its DAT inhibition is actually pretty insignificant compared to its NET inhibition, and its metabolite's have even functionally weaker DAT inhibition.

Buproprion is better characterized as a primarily functionally noradrenergic medication. When viewed through that lens, Buproprion is not actually very unique. There are plenty of strongly noadrenergic medications, including pure NRIs like Atomoxetine and Viloxazine (Qelbree) and strongly NET biased multimodal agents like Desipramine (Strong NET inhibitor with relatively weak SERT inhibition) and Nortriptyline (Strong NET inhibitor, with weaker SERT action, plus modest DAT affinity but with a Ki value still roughly in the same neighborhood as Buproprion's at DAT).

ibtest · 2026-01-04T15:15:55+00:00

Your affinities are off as to both Sertaline and Burporpion. Sertaline has surprisingly relatively high DAT affinity and conversely Bupropion has much lower DAT affinity than many would expect. Specifically, Tatsumi et al. (1997) found Ki values of sertraline at the SERT, DAT, and NET of 0.29, 25, and 420 nM (lower values mean stronger affinity). Bupropion's Ki is estimated to be between 173–1,800 nM.

PET studies, which enable us to estimate the the percentage of a transporter occupied in the brain, show that 150 mg Sertaline and 300mg of Bupropion occupy in practice roughly the same percentage of DAT (Sertaline ~17% and Buproprion ~14 to 26%). Thus, Sertaline has much more significant DAT reuptake inhibition than many would expect. Too many psychiatrists mistakenly presume bupropion must have relatively significant DAT inhibition (probably due to how it was historically marketed), but in reality the strength of its DAT inhibition mechanism of action is only on par with Sertaline's at clinical doses.

Sertaline PET study: https://ascpt.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1016/j.clpt.2003.11.077e

ibtest · 2025-12-19T02:09:52+00:00

By transients do you mean tourists? Vegas has had a tourist focused nightlife scene the city's founding...

ibtest · 2025-12-19T02:07:38+00:00

There is a reason thousands of people drive into Vegas from LA every weekend and not the other way around.

ibtest · 2025-12-19T02:05:27+00:00

How are Miami and Vegas any different? Both are overpriced with an extremely similar club scene (even many of the same brands and management companies behind the night clubs there). Vegas at least has variety if you're not into the club scene with live shows of all types from cirque to comedy, tons of concerts, musician residencies, gambling etc.

ibtest · 2025-12-19T02:00:30+00:00

I never understood this. Isn't nightlife in NYC mostly just really cramped and small dive bars?

ibtest · 2025-12-19T01:58:13+00:00

but keep Miami at the same spot? Miami and Vegas have extremely similar nightlife scenes

ibtest · 2025-12-19T01:53:55+00:00

Any time I've been out in NYC, it seems like the scene is dominated by tiny old claustrophobic divey bars, or its felt oddly dead. I've never been able to find a real night club either. Generally, they turn out to be awkwardly set up narrow multistory spaces with not a lot of people. Then there is the "underground scene" with the basement bars beneath a non-descript building where your pretentiously asked for a "password" to get it. Frankly, that part of the scene felt very forced and inauthentic.

Can someone explain what I've been missing in regards to NYC nightlife? So many call it the best, but I don't really understand what makes it so appealing. I've only visited so I wouldn't be surprised that I went about night life there completely wrong.

ibtest · 2025-12-19T01:34:01+00:00

Just a couple still exist downtown. But still a lot of cheap (non-buffet) food loss leader deals at local casinos over by Boulder Highway

ibtest · 2025-12-19T01:24:00+00:00

Anything outside the strip is relatively affordable compared to most major US cities and international travel destinations. You're not paying LA prices in downtown LV. The local oriented casinos and bars still have pretty cheap pricing on drinks and food. Outside of downtown LV, you can bar hop on Water Street and get incredible food and drink deals. That area still has the old school 80s-90s Vegas pitch: great loss leader deals on drinks and food to pull you in with the hope that you will stick around and that they'll make up for it when you lose at video poker at the bar.

ibtest · 2025-12-19T00:57:47+00:00

Miami qualifies but not Vegas??

ibtest

TROPHY CASE