Fred Carstensen wrote:  
>Huh?  Economics is a theory of choice  
  
Well ...but  there two meanings of 'economic': the formal, neoclassical,   
a la Robbins, that springs from the logical character of the means -   
ends relationship, based on the concept of scarcity; and the material or   
substantive, heterodox meaning that is based on the relationship between   
men and the physical environment that sustains them.  
  
The distinction appeared for the first time in the second edition of   
Carl Menger's Grunds�tze (1923, chap. IV) and later explained by K. Polanyi.  
They have nothing in common (the second is not a subset of the former)   
and the inquiry into the scarcity definition is not the sole legitimate   
scientific way to study economics. Probably, nowadays, the teaching of   
both meanings is a really intellectual challenge, above all in an   
historical point of view.  
  
Giandomenica Becchio