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Hello, 
 
My name is Manoel and I am from Brazil. I am an undergraduate in economics. 
 
What I can tell you about this kind of anti-intellectualism? Just look at the Post-
autistic movement launched by the French students of economics three years ago.  Students
-- including graduate students -- of several
places have supported these kind of claims (post-autistic movement). 
 
However, I think the big problem of contemporary economics is what a Brazilian economist
(Persio Arida) called Superao positiva (in English is something like "positive
overcoming") which means present science keeps only the right concepts, ideas and
rationale of original theories, making history of thought irrelevant to understand
economic phenomena. More than this, history of economic thought is merely the study of
anticipations and errors of the present theory by the older economists. In this point of
view, it
makes no sense to study this subject. This idea brings to us, also, the presumption that
the true always emerges from controversies, because if this doesn't happen the idea of
"positive overcoming" is a fallacy.
 
The dialogue in "The making of an economist" with Chicago students shows exactly this kind
of idea (pp. 162-163):
 
 
BILL: In a workshop a guy from Michigan State made the comment that no grad student reads
things that were written before he went to graduate school.
 
Rosen was sitting at the table, Becker was. These guys did not argue with that. 
 
What happens is that the past is embodied in what we are learning now. So we are looking
forward, not backward. That's not necessarily a bad thing. There is a direct progression
from Smith to Ricardo and from Marshall to
Knight, which we already have picked up. It's not necessary that we read what came before.
 
CARLOS: Schumpeter made the point in his book. He claims that without a perspective you
are at a loss. Even though I studied history of thought, I do not agree with that. It is
useful, it's interesting to read. It's useful to find out that even the great ones screw
up. But if you pick up any
current microeconomic textbook, anything that was relevant in the past is probably
contained in there. I regret that Adam Smith is now made into a caricature as the prophet
of laissez-faire. But I don't think that going on without having read him is a critical
loss. It's nice if you did it.
 
HAROLD: Yes, we learned what Marshall knew. 
 
KAREEM: I don't think you can be that categorical. I think it is a good idea to learn some
old things.
 
BILL: But given scarce resources, I am not sure it is the optimal thing to read. [Someone
argues that they had done some economic history, but it is pointed out to him to the
history of economic thought is something different.]
 
Best regards, 
 
Manoel Galdino 
Universidade de Sao Paulo 
 
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