Some of you will have seen Dan Ariely's post on what google searches can reveal : very clever.
http://www.predictablyirrational.com/?page_id=17
Rather than pursuing the romantic angle, I put into Google "Economists are"
The three 3 top results are:
economists are split on inflation 907,000 results
economists are useless 793,000 "
economists are wrong 3,740,000 "
So there you have it. Most people think we are wrong. I'll get my coat.
You mean get your cloak, Kevin :)
ReplyDeleteas in cloak & dagger?
ReplyDeleteKevin, put the dagger down and try "i would give my right arm "
ReplyDelete"..to be ambidextrous"? Yeah thats an old one. I think I may have given a seminar with the title. Wen Zhang and I have shown in recent work that the ambidextrous behave better & I have shown there are also some cognitive advantages in a Neuropsychologia paper a couple of years back.
ReplyDeleteIt could be worse - try "political science is"
ReplyDeleteHere's some consolation: just put "economics" into the search. A number of results appear such as economics notes, economics help, economics definitions etc. Only one institution appears: "economics ucd", with 669,000 results. Type in "economics tcd" and Google asks "did you mean economics ucd?". :)
ReplyDeleteExcellent! LMAO
ReplyDeleteI think that deserves a news spot on ucd.ie Martin!
ReplyDeleteThere are
websites devoted just to this.
Excellent Martin!
ReplyDeleteThe wit and wisdom of Google
I think the fact that economics ucd appears is due to google engine being tailored to the ip address of the country.
ReplyDeletethe fact that 'did you mean economics ucd" appears is fantastic.
Rob, Sociology doesn't come out too well either ("Sociology is....). It looks like people seek information to prove that Economists are wrong, that they seek information to prove that Sociology is basically bullshit and that they dont seek any information specifically about political scientists.
ReplyDeletePsychology doesn't do too bad
ReplyDeletetry "psychologists are"
ReplyDeleteAnd the winner for most hated science on the internet is... evolution (shocker). Try "evolution is"
ReplyDeleteSlight side point, but relevant because of the current discussion on Google/China, etc. Try the various religions:
ReplyDeleteChristianity is...
Judaism is...
Buddhism is...
For them all you get a list of the worst sort of criticisms a religion can imagine. (Don't tell the Gardai, though, you could be done for blasphemy, I'm sure.)
Now try Islam is.
Intersting, n'est-ce pas?
Ronan: curiouser & curiouser...
ReplyDelete