This is a misleading comment. You're saying you disagree with the author and stopped reading here:
> In fact, Hanson believes that “well over 90 percent” of human behavior can be explained by signaling. Whether or not you agree with that exact number, I think it’s an interesting thought experiment to look at a specific behavior and think about what the hidden signaling subtext of that behavior might be.
You do realize the author is citing someone else making the assertion you disagree with? The next sentence validates this interpretation. Your comment is a textbook straw man against the author.
Also, your bit about economists sounds incredibly inaccurate. No, economists didn't randomly realize human behavior needed to be taken into account one day. Since the beginning, the people studying economics already knew that it emerged out of the intricacies of human behavior. Simplifying a phenomenon for the purposes of modeling it is how we study things initially. We iterate on those solutions as we go.
> In fact, Hanson believes that “well over 90 percent” of human behavior can be explained by signaling. Whether or not you agree with that exact number, I think it’s an interesting thought experiment to look at a specific behavior and think about what the hidden signaling subtext of that behavior might be.
You do realize the author is citing someone else making the assertion you disagree with? The next sentence validates this interpretation. Your comment is a textbook straw man against the author.
Also, your bit about economists sounds incredibly inaccurate. No, economists didn't randomly realize human behavior needed to be taken into account one day. Since the beginning, the people studying economics already knew that it emerged out of the intricacies of human behavior. Simplifying a phenomenon for the purposes of modeling it is how we study things initially. We iterate on those solutions as we go.