Epistemologia econômica

Zanotti and Cachanosky
THE EPISTEMOLOGICAL IMPLICATIONS OF MACHLUP’S INTERPRETATION OF MISES’S EPISTEMOLOGY

"... This is why Machlup (1955, p. 19) talks about "illustration", rather than "empirical testing" of a theory. The empirical illustration of a theory is not a deductive proof, but a non-disconfirmation.

This does not mean complete frustration of all attempts to verify our economic theories. But it does mean that the tests of most of our theories will be more nearly the character of illustrations than of verifications of the kind possible in relation with repeatable controlled experiments or with recurring fully identified situations. And this implies that our tests cannot be convincing enough to compel acceptance, even when majority of reasonable men in the field should be prepared to accept them as conclusive, and to approve the theories so tested as ‘non-disconfirmed,’ that is, as ‘O.K.’ ..."
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