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Roy Weintraub writes: 
 
>Gunning asks us to restrict our attention to those matters which he 
>considers important. Henderson is inclusive, Gunning is exclusive, 
>drawing a fence around a small set of questions in intellectual 
>history, and telling us to garden only within the fenced area. I 
>would suggest that there is much fertile land beyond his quite 
>mineral-depleted soil, and many flowers are a-blooming there. 
 
As a gardener, to use Professor Weintraub's metaphor, I seek fertile soil 
anywhere. However, when I set out, I have a clear idea of the crops I want 
to harvest. 
 
We should be careful with this metaphor. Weintraub's gardener aims to plant 
flowers that he/she likes. Like all wise consumers, he/she recognizes that 
he/she does not fully know his/her preferences. So he/she happily 
experiments, his/her only goal being to expand his/her consumption benefits 
or range of experiences. 
 
The historian of economics does not aim to plant a consumption good. 
His/Her business is the discovery and elucidation of cases in which 
knowledge has been produced -- cases in which less adequate ideas have been 
replaced by more adequate ideas. To him/her a "soil is fertile" only if it 
promises help in this goal. 
 
Of course, the historian of economics must select the class of knowledge 
that he/she aims to study. My posting sought to enclose that class. 
 
-- 
 
Pat Gunning 
http://stsvr.showtower.com.tw/~gunning/welcome 
 
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