I distinguish several doctrines that economic methodologists have found attractive, all of which have a positivist flavour. One of these is the doctrine that preference assignments in economics are just shorthand descriptions of agents' choice behaviour. Although most of these doctrines are problematic, the latter doctrine about preference assignments is a respectable one, I argue. It doesn't entail any of the problematic doctrines, and indeed it is warranted independently of them.

Abstract:This paper explores the contrast between mentalistic and behaviouristic interpretations of decision theory. The former regards credences and utilities as psychologically real, while the latter regards them as mere representations of an agent's preferences. Philosophers typically adopt the former interpretation, economists the latter. It is argued that the mentalistic interpretation is preferable if our aim is to use decision theory for descriptive purposes, but if our aim is normative then the behaviouristic interpretation cannot be dispensed with.

À la fin des années 1990, plusieurs tendances convergentes en économie, psychologie et neuroscience ont préparé le terrain pour la naissance d’un nouveau champ scientifique qualifié de « neuroéconomie ». Comme pour toute discipline émergente – pensons par exemple à l’économie mathématique, l’économétrie ou l’économie expérimentale en d’autres temps – la neuroéconomie est plutôt controversée en économie. Elle soulève un grand nombre de questions d’ordre empirique, méthodologique et philosophiques donnant lieu à des débats et controverses que l’article identifie et discute (...) à travers trois questions majeures relatives aux connaissances produites : Sont-elles fiables? Sont-elles scientifiquement légitimes? Sont-elles utiles pour les économistes? Sans prétendre à l’exhaustivité, ce cadre analytique permet de comprendre l’essence des principales critiques adressées à la neuroéconomie. Dans le même temps, l’article éclaire la nature des réponses susceptibles d’être apportées à ces critiques au vu des progrès conceptuels et empiriques qu’a connus ce champ de recherche depuis son émergence et à la lumière du tournant apparu dans l’agenda de la neuroéconomie au cours de la dernière décennie. JEL Codes : A12, B41, C51, C81, C9, D03, D87. (shrink)

This paper deals with the evidential value of neuroeconomic experiments for the triangulation of economically relevant phenomena. We examine the case of social preferences, which involves bringing together evidence from behavioural experiments, neuroeconomic experiments, and observational studies from other social sciences. We present an account of triangulation and identify the conditions under which neuroeconomic evidence is diverse in the way required for successful triangulation. We also show that the successful triangulation of phenomena does not necessarily afford additional confirmation to general (...) theories about those phenomena. (shrink)

The article argues for the epistemic rationale of triangulation, namely, the use of multiple and independent sources of evidence. It claims that triangulation is to be understood as causal reasoning from data to phenomenon, and it rationalizes its epistemic value in terms of controlling for likely errors and biases of particular data-generating procedures. This perspective is employed to address objections against triangulation concerning the fallibility and scope of the inference, as well as problems of independence, incomparability, and discordance of evidence. (...) The debate on the existence of social preferences is used as an illustrative case. (shrink)