Jack Vromen

Conjectural Revisionary Economic Ontology: Outline of an Ambitious Research Agenda for Evolutionary Economics

Although it is laudable that evolutionary economists have a greater concern for ontological issues than many of their brethren, considerations concerning ontology cannot play a decisive role in adjudicating theoretical disputes. Attempts to formulate an appropriate ontology for evolutionary economics, different from the one prevailing in standard economic theory, are better viewed as exercises in conjectural revisionary ontology. Ideally they offer useful heuristics for fruitful further theorizing. Furthermore, issues raised in connection with ontology that previously were treated as if they are one and the same are here categorized into three clusters. The categorization is used to dispel worries that have haunted evolutionary economics right from its inception. It is shown in particular that the belief that there are significant Darwinian evolutionary processes going on in present‐day capitalist economies does not imply the denial of genuine agency or the endorsement of dubious doctrines such as biological reductionism.

The Human Agent in Evolutionary Economics

Darwinism and Evolutionary Economics brings together contributions from eminent authors who, building on Darwin’s own insights and on developments in evolutionary theory, offer challenging views on how economics can use evolutionary ideas effectively.

Routines as multilevel mechanisms

It is argued that routines can be fruitfully conceived of as multilevel mechanisms. The merits of viewing routines as multilevel mechanisms are that it helps in putting together a coherent picture of what routines are, what routines do, and how they do it. In particular, it helps in getting a clearer picture of how skills and routines are ontologically (rather than metaphorically) related to each other. It allows us to see that while routines are generative mechanisms producing recurrent patterns of firm behavior, as multilevel mechanisms they themselves are at the same time recurrent patterns of interaction within firms. Because of its ‘behavioral’ spirit, viewing routines as multilevel mechanisms (rather than as, for example, unobservable dispositions of firms to energize patterns of behavior in firms) greatly facilitates further empirical research on crucial, as yet unresolved issues, such as how stable and robust routines are and to what extent firm behavior is routine.

Ontological Issues in Evolutionary Economics: The Debate between Generalized Darwinism and the Continuity Hypothesis

Hodgson and Knudsen’s Generalized Darwinism (GD) and the Continuity Hypothesis (CH) put forward by Witt are currently vying for hegemony in the ontology of evolutionary economics. GD and the CH allegedly advance rivaling Darwinian foundations for the development of full-fledged causal evolutionary economic theories. Yet upon closer inspection it is not clear that GD and the CH are mutually exclusive rivals. For one thing, GD and the CH address different sorts of issues. Whereas GD aims at identifying general features that evolutionary processes in different domains (notably the biological and economic domain) have in common, the CH takes as its starting point the causal relations that obtain between antecedent biological evolution and ongoing economic evolution. It seems the one does not exclude the other. This impression is strengthened by the fact that Hodgson endorses rather than opposes something similar to the CH. The paper argues that the critical issue in settling whether or not GD and the CH are mutually exclusive is how much substantive content is given to GD and the CH respectively. Pushed by the critique of Witt (and some of his Evolutionary Economics Group members, Cordes and Buenstorf) that GD has not fully shaken off features that are specific for the biological domain, Hodgson and Knudsen seem to take recourse to a version of GD that is so abstract and general that it is rendered virtually vacuous. As such GD can not contribute much to the development of a full-fledged domain-specific causal economic theory of processes of economic change. It seems the CH fares better in this respect. The CH does offer building blocks for evolutionary theories of consumption and of production. But the problem with the GD is that it is unclear what constructive role (if any) Darwinian evolutionary theory has played in specifying the building blocks. The paper concludes with suggesting two other ways in which Darwinian evolutionary theory might be useful for studying economic evolution.

A Case for Theoretical Pluralism

From the contents of the preceding chapters in this volume, it follows that it is perhaps no exaggeration to conclude that TCE is on the verge of establishing itself as the new orthodoxy in the new theory of the firm, that is to say, in the group of theories in which the firm is considered more than a production function. TCE can be considered the new orthodoxy, because compared to the other theories, the approach is well-established, its theoretical framework is well-developed, with hypotheses in many areas of economics and with positive results of empirical testing. From the preceding chapters, it has also become clear that many critics are arguing that the analysis should go beyond TCE and indicating how that should be done. In these conclusions, we want to address the intricate question: if the current state of the art is thus cursorily but correctly characterized, then what is the best way to proceed?

Where economics and neuroscience might meet

Contrary to what is claimed by Gul and Pesendorfer (2008), in this paper I argue that neuroscience and economics can meet in ways that speak to the interests of economists. As Bernheim (2009) argues, economists seem to be primarily interested in novel models that link ‘traditional’ environmental variables (such as prices and taxes) to choice behavior in a more accurate way than existing models. Neuroscience might be helpful here, since especially computational neuroscience is also in the business of mapping environmental variables on to behavior. Given that experimental findings seem to show that choice behavior displays great context-sensitivity, I discuss two tentative ways in which neuroscience might be helpful. Neuroscience might be able to identify a multitude of environmental variables and the choice algorithms in the brain that they activate. Going this way might lead to novel models that differ markedly from standard economic models. Alternatively, neuroscience might be able to provide more theoretical guidance as to how individuals model the situations they are in. In principle, this route might leave standard economic models largely intact while improving their predictive record.

On the Surprising Finding that Expected Utility is Literally Computed in the Brain

Advocates of neuroeconomics sometimes argue that one of the most surprising findings in neuroeconomic studies is that expected utilities are literally computed in the brain. This claim is scrutinized closely in the paper. Not surprisingly, the tenability of the claim is shown to depend critically on what is meant by ‘literal computation’ and ‘surprising’. It is argued that the findings do not show that expected utilities are literally computed, if by ‘literal computation’ we mean a particular kind of mental activity (namely, deliberate choice). It is also argued that the findings do not lend empirical support to expected utility theory, if that theory is taken to be a theory about individual and aggregate behavior. Findings that in some particular tasks expected utility theory predicts neural activity fairly accurately do not imply that expected utility theory also yields accurate predictions of behavior at ‘higher levels’, individual behavior and aggregate behavior. What the findings do suggest, it is argued, is that expected utility theory is useful for understanding decision-making at the neural level. Once one accepts that expected utility theory provides a potentially fruitful tool for predicting neural activity in neurobiology, the findings cease to be surprising.

Stone Age Minds and Group Selection – What difference do they make?

The paper sets out to identify main tenets of evolutionary psychology (EP) - with its characteristic slogan that ‘our present skulls still house a stone age mind’ - and Sober and Wilsons multi-level selection theory (MST) - that seeks to rehabilitate group selection in evolutionary theorising - that could be of interest to economic theorising. Four different types of altruism are distinguished. It is further investigated what implications EP and MST have for the study of the psychic mechanisms underlying human behaviour, of the co-evolution of intra group and intergroup processes, and for methodological individualism.

The economics of economists: Institutional setting, individual incentives, and future prospects

The profession of academic economics has been widely criticized for being excessively dependent on technical models based on unrealistic assumptions about rationality and individual behavior, and yet it remains a sparsely studied area. This volume presents a series of background readings on the profession by leading scholars in the history of economic thought and economic methodology. Adopting a fresh critique, the contributors investigate the individual incentives prevalent in academic economics, describing economists as rational actors who react to their intellectual environment and the incentives for economic research. Timely topics are addressed, including the financial crisis and the consequences for the discipline, as well as more traditional themes such as pluralism in research, academic organizations, teaching methodology, gender issues and professional ethics. This collection will appeal to scholars working on topics related to economic methodology and the teaching of economics.

Collective Intentionality, Evolutionary Biology and Social Reality1

Abstract The paper aims to clarify and scrutinize Searle”s somewhat puzzling statement that collective intentionality is a biologically primitive phenomenon. It is argued that the statement is not only meant to bring out that “collective intentionality” is not further analyzable in terms of individual intentionality. It also is meant to convey that we have a biologically evolved innate capacity for collective intentionality.The paper points out that Searle”s dedication to a strong notion of collective intentionality considerably delimits the scope of his endeavor. Furthermore, evolutionary theory does not vindicate that an innate capacity for collective intentionality is a necessary precondition for cooperative behavior. 1 1Useful comments made by the participants of the Amsterdam seminar in Philosophy and History of Economics (11 November 2002), by the participants of the Third Workshop in Collective Intentionality (Rotterdam, 12-14 December 2002), and by the editors of this special issue are gratefully acknowledged. I also want to thank an anonymous referee for making helpful suggestions.