Courageous?

There's something I really like about not writing a popular blog - that's that I don't get zillions of comments from people.  Reading these comments always raises my blood pressure ever so slightly, especially if the content strays even slightly towards the Christian.  Organisations and Markets a little while back posted about what they described as the most courageous man in academia, who has written a paper purporting to prove that heterosexuality is superior to homosexuality.

I think the title of this blog makes posting on this paper somewhat necessary.  I think it's a pointless and wrong exercise, and a waste of an economist's time to be writing something like this.  Why does it matter?  What is the point to be proved?  The economist clearly has some odd Christian ideas in his head, and maybe I'm being a little harsh, but I don't see how this kind of writing is going to leave anyone more predisposed towards Christianity - and at the end of the day, for the Christian this is the ultimate aim - to bring honour and praise to Jesus.

Furthermore, as I think many have pointed out in other places (I know New Deal 2.0 commented on this too), even if we stick to biblical principles, a very narrow heterosexuality is superior in that it is not sinful - that is heterosexual sex within marriage.  Then, the teachings of Jesus ratcheted this up about a million notches by saying anyone who even looks at a women lustfully has committed adultery with her.

The point is, none of us are without sin, especially this economist who wrote this bizarre paper.  So it's hypocritical as well as being wrong.  Jesus didn't tell Christians to moralise - that's been proven to be about the best way, over the years, to turn people off Chrisitanity.

That can be well seen by the various comments on this paper.  Firstly, people interpret it as homophobia and thus dub all Christians homophobic - which is not true.  As said, there are many things that are sinful, and nobody managed to avoid sinning.  It's not PC to say homosexuality is a sin, but so are all my lustful glances.  The Christian abides by a moral code (and fails by it too) given in the Bible.  Others take other sources to base their morals on - neither can be claimed to be superior, although liberals of course claim theirs is vastly superior.

The Christian believes that despite his or her sin, that Jesus's death on the cross took the punishment for that, and hence the Christian is forgiven and can know God.  So there's nothing there to start acting superior to others over, no room for complacency, boasting or anything.  Certainly no room for this academic paper.

Instead Christians should be loving, and telling people about the good news - about what Jesus' death can do for them.

Render unto Caeser

There's an article in today's Economist, 'Render unto Caeser', (sadly a subscription article) that I fully disagree with, perhaps unsurprisingly. It relates to the furore about Catholic adoption agencies standing up and saying that these rules will force them to do something Scripture forbids, and hence the agencies will be forced to close, lest they break the law in continuing to not put kids into the care of gay couples.

For once a good example of Christians standing up for Scripture, and not capitulating into our "anything goes" liberal-minded culture. There are limits, we are made in certain ways. If we start thinking it's ok to do these kind of things, what comes next? This is a tired argument liberals always despair over, but it is true. Once society becomes used to one thing that used to be taboo becoming normal, they look to the next thing they can attack.

However, God made the world, and made us in particular ways. Even if you don't believe that, you have to believe men and women are different; they just are. There are absolutes, and there always will be, and at times we have to discriminate based on them. For Christians, this is one.

So well done to the Catholic church. It's worth emphasising that despite the strong words used by Paul in 1 Corinthians, cited below, the Christian church does not shut out homosexuals, just as (thankfully) it doesn't shut out those that have sex outside marriage, those that do the many other things that make them sinful. Else I'd have no chance of getting right with God, and no-one would. Thankfully Jesus did engage and accept these people, and even died on the Cross for them (us) - though not without warning them what following Him meant.

Here's my letter I just whacked out to send to the Economist, for whatever it's worth:


Dear Sir/Madam,


I am writing in response to the article ‘Render unto Caeser’ in the Economist, 27th January 2007. It goes without saying that the use of the title is quite inappropriate, in that Jesus was referring to paying taxes and not whether or not a Christian should submit to the law when the law is openly contradictory to Scripture. For example, 1 Peter says ‘Submit yourselves for the Lord's sake to every authority instituted among men’. Now if that same New Testament also says in 1 Corinthians 6:10: ‘Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? ‘Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God,’’ then how can the Bible believing Christian abide by a policy forcing him or her to put children in the care of any of the people described in this verse?

To argue that views will change in time is a very weak argument to attempt to coerce Catholic organisations to put children in the case of gay couples, not least because the areas listed are irrelevant. The Christian is not compelled to lend without interest. While the Old Testament did prohibit it, Jesus came to fulfil the law, and hence particular parts of it have been superceded. In contrast to homosexuality, there are no New Testament commands relating to the taking of interest. With black people, this is not a policy that was ever supported by Scripture. If Christians went along with societal prejudices against black people, this was plain wrong, not least from James 2, which says in verse 1: ‘My brothers, as believers in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ, don't show favoritism’.

When Christians are forced, as this law will introduce, to choose between obeying the law and obeying the Bible, their clear instruction is to do the latter. Is it discrimination? It is, in the world’s eyes, but then those eyes have large planks in them. Our world discriminates on the basis of nationality every single day as just one example, and discrimination will continue to be a huge part of this fallen world until the day Christ returns.

Econometricians dabbling with Christianity...

As I wrote my response to Ed Glaeser yesterday, I came across a number of interestingly titled papers, and before I knew it I was on a trail back to Ed Leamer, who Ed Glaeser is a colleague of, and whom Glaeser recommends all should follow when doing econometrics. It so happens I disagree with this on econometric terms, as my response should point out (if it doesn't, I'll be working on that!), and I also have bones to pick about Ed Leamer's understanding of God and Christianity, comments that spawned papers titled "Sinning in the Basement: What are the Rules? The Ten Commandments of Applied Econometrics " by Peter Kennedy, and "Applied Econometrics without Sinning" by my supervisor, David Hendry.

Kennedy's use of Christian language is an outpouring of a work by Edward Leamer in 1978, which described econometrics along the lines of the building where he was apparently taught it - on the bottom floor were the applied guys churning out econometric models, and on the third floor were the econometric theorists, teaching students about the ideals of the subject, without getting their hands dirty. He was intrigued by how both camps used the same language, but described the former as "sinners in the basement", and the latter as High Priests.

I'm quite unsure of where Leamer got this idea from. Perhaps it could be from the perception of that Christians, well Christian leaders, are somehow perfect, or at least should be (witness the consternation when they're found not to be, and found to be child abuses etc). Hence they occupy this third floor, pure and clean, not getting dirty with the world. Yet this is not the view of Christianity put forward by the inventor of the faith, Jesus Christ. Not only did he (described as our High Priest) get his hands dirty in the world by healing, dining with the masses etc, but he also remained sinless (where sin is defined, as it is in the Bible, as disobeying God). As a result, when Jesus died on the Cross, a death deserved for those who disobey God, he took that punishment, meaning that all who disobey God can avoid punishment, if they believe and trust in Jesus as their Lord and Saviour.

So Jesus knew that, in fact, all occupy the basement, to use Leamer's language. What does this mean for Leamer's model? Well it means not least that even econometric theorists get their hands dirty, and in Glaeser's words, behave opportunistically. Those, such as Leeb and Poetscher, in their 2005 paper, who claim model selection can never deliver consistent regression estimates and make strong claims about it, when their model set-up precludes consistent estimation by any methodology, be it simple regression, model selection or model averaging, are very guilty in this respect.

Only Jesus, and the Father and Holy Spirit, occupy the third floor for the time being. Thankfully, through Jesus heading down the stairs to the basement for a time, we can enter the third floor in time, though not yet - either when we die, or Jesus returns.

Turning to another aspect of Edward Leamer's theology, he writes:
"As you wander through the thicket of models, you may come to question the meaning of the Econometric Scripture that presumes the model is given to you at birth by a wise and beneficient Holy Spirit."
Such blatant use again of Biblical language suggests that this quote is motivated by some understanding of Christianity. However, again it is not the view of Christianity Jesus talked about, and if we're really interested in Christianity enough to write in econometrics papers, we should consider what its founder had to say.

Many of the words of Jesus recorded in the Bible could be used to show that Christianity is not something bestowed upon some people at birth, but not others. For example, in John 3:16 Jesus says "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son [Jesus], that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life". Further John 20:30-1 says "Jesus did many other miraculous signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not recorded in this book. But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name." So being a Christian is about taking the decision to believe in Jesus and what He did, listen to Jesus and work out what believing and following Him means (through the Bible and Jesus' miracles), and doing it.

So just as econometrics isn't about having a particular model provided to you by some divine revelation, neither is Christianity, and in both one must be very careful to learn and to understand exactly what is going on, not what one thinks is going on, from one's childhood memories (econometrics = that undergrad class you had to take, Christianity = primary school).

Econometricians behaving badly...

Edward Glaeser has written a paper about econometricians behaving opportunistically, and how they violate all the assumptions economic theorists have been making for years now about the behaviour of individuals when faced with a set of incentives.

Basically, it's a fallen world, and as a result, people will present bad stuff and cover it up. But it's given me a chance to try and link together my faith and my work a bit, and I've written a response to Glaeser's work, hopefully outlining an alternative method of carrying out econometric analysis which, while not free from opportunism, provides a method for exposing it elsewhere, and providing a transparent way of doing econometrics, if carried out properly. In a lot of respects, econometricians attempting to behave themselves mirror Christians attempting to live in the fallen world before Jesus Christ returns. It's a tentative link, and I'm encouraged that Paul mixed his metaphors quite a bit in his letters to the Corinthians, as I think I've managed that. Have a read, see what you think. Do get back to me with your comments.