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Neoclassical economics is a cult which ignores reality in favor of shared myths.
Economics professor Michael Hudson writes: [One Nobel prize winning economist stated,] "In pointing out the consequences of a set of abstract assumptions, one need not be committed unduly as to the relation between reality and these assumptions."
This attitude did not deter him from drawing policy conclusions affecting the material world in which real people live....
Typical of this now widespread attitude is the textbook Microeconomics by William Vickery, winner of the 1997 Nobel Economics Prize:
"Economic theory proper, indeed, is nothing more than a system of logical relations between certain sets of assumptions and the conclusions derived from them... The validity of a theory proper does not depend on the correspondence or lack of it between the assumptions of the theory or its conclusions and observations in the real world. A theory as an internally consistent system is valid if the conclusions follow logically from its premises, and the fact that neither the premises nor the conclusions correspond to reality may show that the theory is not very useful, but does not invalidate it. In any pure theory, all propositions are essentially tautological, in the sense that the results are implicit in the assumptions made."Such disdain for empirical verification is not found in the physical sciences.
Comment: The usual ridiculous fiction from 'unnamed' sources we've come to expect from the Murdoch empire. Continuing the 'everyone is a terrorist' illusion to justify civil liberty clampdowns and scaremongering to make the public believe their leaders will protect them by shooting down passenger air planes. Sadly predictable to see the Haaretz article end with Iran's nuclear program.
It becomes obvious this is complete propaganda when one considers the feasibility of hijacking a U.S air plane to fly it all the way over the Atlantic to crash into a table tennis match or archery competition. Complete nonsense designed to spread fear on both sides of the pond.