On 27 Jul 2005 at 13:37, Sumitra Shah wrote: in all its majesty as a study of how mankind goes about satisfying its material wants. Huh? Economics is a theory of choice, i.e., of how individuals (and organizations) make choices, material and non-material. "Satisfying its material wants" is only a subset, and, IMHO, when economics is taught as only that it loses much of what makes it a social science and the ability to address questions that make it intellectually challenging. Fred Carstensen