In my opinion, there is a better way to protect scientific method than the one Popper suggests. All we need to do is declare that the social sciences are not entitled to the status that we accord the natural sciences. This would stop pseudoscientific social theories from masquerading in a borrowed suit of armor; it would also discourage the slavish imitation of natural science in areas where that is not appropriate. It would not prohibit the scientific study of human behavior, but it would help scale down our expectations about the results. My suggestion would also constitute a major loss of status for social scientists, so it is unlikely to be very popular among them.
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Economists such as Robert Solow reject my interpretation because it does not provide any determinate explanation or prediction of market behavior. They are right, of course. My contention is that reflexivity injects an element of uncertainty that renders financial markets inherently unpredictable. I claim that recognizing this fact puts us in a better position to anticipate and react to market moves than does a supposedly scientific theory; but I have not produced a scientific theory.
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