"Why should we, however, in economics, have to plead ignorance of the sort of facts on which, in the case of a physical theory, a scientist would certainly be expected to give precise information?"
About this Quote
Hayek is picking a fight with economics envy: the discipline’s recurring urge to borrow the swagger of physics, complete with hard measurements and clean predictions. The question is staged as common sense, but it’s a trap. He’s arguing that when economists shrug and say, in effect, "the data are too messy", they’re not being modest; they’re smuggling in a standard of precision that the subject matter can’t honestly meet.
The specific intent is methodological and political at once. Methodological, because Hayek is warning that economic life isn’t a lab system. The relevant "facts" are dispersed, context-bound, often tacit: local knowledge, shifting preferences, expectations that change precisely because people learn. Political, because the demand for “precise information” tends to justify centralized control: if you can measure it like mass or velocity, you can manage it like an engineer. Hayek wants to deny that premise. In his broader work on knowledge and planning, the economy is less a machine than an evolving coordination problem; the market’s price system is not a number generator for technocrats but a communication device.
The subtext is a rebuke to economists who hide behind scientific costume. Hayek’s rhetorical move is to flip "ignorance" from embarrassment to evidence: if you need physics-grade facts to run society, you’ve already chosen the wrong tool. His question lands because it frames precision not as virtue but as temptation, a seduction into false certainty. In the mid-20th century, as econometrics rose and planning gained prestige, Hayek’s line reads like an alarm: when economics pretends to be physics, it stops describing the world and starts giving cover to power.
The specific intent is methodological and political at once. Methodological, because Hayek is warning that economic life isn’t a lab system. The relevant "facts" are dispersed, context-bound, often tacit: local knowledge, shifting preferences, expectations that change precisely because people learn. Political, because the demand for “precise information” tends to justify centralized control: if you can measure it like mass or velocity, you can manage it like an engineer. Hayek wants to deny that premise. In his broader work on knowledge and planning, the economy is less a machine than an evolving coordination problem; the market’s price system is not a number generator for technocrats but a communication device.
The subtext is a rebuke to economists who hide behind scientific costume. Hayek’s rhetorical move is to flip "ignorance" from embarrassment to evidence: if you need physics-grade facts to run society, you’ve already chosen the wrong tool. His question lands because it frames precision not as virtue but as temptation, a seduction into false certainty. In the mid-20th century, as econometrics rose and planning gained prestige, Hayek’s line reads like an alarm: when economics pretends to be physics, it stops describing the world and starts giving cover to power.
Quote Details
| Topic | Science |
|---|---|
| Source | F. A. von Hayek, "The Pretence of Knowledge" (Nobel Prize lecture, Dec. 11, 1974) — critique of scientism in economics; full lecture text available from the Nobel Foundation. |
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