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| Preface | |
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| What Does the Philosophy of Science | |
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| Have to Do with Economics? | |
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| The real relation between philosophy and science | |
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| The mutual constraints of goals, theories, and rules | |
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| The proximate goals of economics | |
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| Two Dead Ends in the Philosophy of Economics | |
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| Does philosophy constrain economics? | |
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| Economics without epistemology | |
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| The role of prediction in biology, physics, and economics | |
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| Is Economic Theory Predictively Successful? | |
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| Friedman on the predictive weakness of economic theory | |
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| Leontief on the same subject | |
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| Are generic predictions enough? | |
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| Generic predictions in Keynesian macroeconomics and rational expectations theory | |
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| Gibbard and Varian on economic models as caricatures | |
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| Neoclassical Economics as a Research Program | |
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| The methodology of scientific research programs | |
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| Lakatosian consolations for economists | |
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| Research programs and the demarcation problem | |
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| Down the slippery slope to McCloskey | |
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| Economics and Intentional Psychology | |
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| Expectations and preferences, beliefs and desires | |
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| The problem of improvability Economics and linguistics: Nelson's gambit | |
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| Are there expectations and preferences? | |
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| Conclusion | |
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| Could Economics Be a Biological Science? | |
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| The problem of exogenous tastes Becker's new theory of consumer choice | |
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| Stable preferences as human needs Can we "naturalize" information? | |
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| Generic predictions and the temptation of biology | |
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| Darwin, Friedman, and Alchain | |
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| Equilibrium and information in evolution and economics | |
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| Conclusion | |
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| Why General Equilibrium Theory? | |
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| "Economics just is general equilibrium analysis" | |
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| Can we have partial equilibrium without general equilibrium? | |
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| What needs explanation? | |
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| Can general equilibrium theory explain it? | |
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| General equilibrium and the social contract | |
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| Are generic predictions enough after all? | |
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| Is Economic Theory Mathematics? | |
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| Extremal theories and intentionality | |
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| Economics as applied mathematics | |
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| Microeconomics and Euclidean geometry | |
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| But is it science? | |
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| Bibliography | |
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| Index | |