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There seems to be some confusion as to what I was getting at in my remarks on the possible
important purposes to which the literature on reswitching might be put (re postings by Roy
& Bruce).  What I was bringing attention to was a standard purpose found in the
economic/history literature -- and one shared by workers in the wider literature of
science studies more generally.  Economists like Steve Keen in his book _Debunking
Economics_ presents "reswitching" as one aspect in the history of a theoretical endeavor &
an academic discipline which is performing sub-obtimally or "pathologically".  Deirdre
McCloskey uses the contemporary history of significance testing in the journals to a
similar purpose.  Keen is not the only economist who uses the historical episode of the
"reswitching" finding to discuss theoretical and institutional problems in economics.  The
topic of "pathology" is a wider one than mere theory, as I aimed to suggest in my earlier
posting.  David Colander and a committee of the AEA have written on this topic as an
institutional or cultural issue, as have a number of others.  Historians of economic
thought have examined particular economists and groups of economists to see if they have
lived up to their own standards of "good science".  In cases where they have not, the
direction of "pathology" can be aimed to point in one direction or the other -- targeting
either at the "official" standards of good science advocated, or at the economic practice
of the economists who fail to live up to their own norms of scientific practice.
 
In the wider field of science studies you can find folks like Karl Popper advocating a
sociology of knowledge which focuses on pathology in science.  Others have advocated or
pursued similar projects, looking for "unscientific"
science and scientific institutions, often in part as efforts in the history of science &
ideas.
 
"Pathology" can be localized or systematic, catastrophic or minor.  Folks have viewed the
"reswitching" result and the history of that result all over the scale here.
 
Greg Ransom 
 
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