The implication of these observations is that economic theory is unending, because we are confronted with an open system. The idea we could have a [closed] ‘system of economic theory,’ say, of the Walrasian type, is a futile one. We may never reach this stage. For the present, this is useless speculation at any rate. The idea at any rate runs afoul of the fact that there can be no formalization of society. Any attempt to formalize will either be self-contradictory or incomplete. But to pursue this observation further would lead us too far into some difficult areas of logic and the philosophy of science and this matter shall therefore only be noted at this occasion.
The consequences for education follow very quickly: we should never pretend as I fear we do too often, especially in the introductory textbooks, that we can give systematic knowledge to our students. In a wider context, this has been well stated by Paul Valéry when he said that educating means ‘to prepare the young for situations that have never been.’
—Oskar Morgenstern, “Descriptive, Predictive and Normative Theory,” Kyklos: International Review for Social Sciences 25, no. 4 (November 1972): 709.
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