Abstract
Contributions of mathematics to economical methodology. The use of mathematics in economics can be already found one century ago. Since then, the debates about the contributions of mathematics to the science of economy have been very usual. This debate has fostered the publication of many papers and books on economy in which mathematics play a central role. Mathematics helps economy in several ways: makes the assumptions more explicit, theories are more precise, and permits the economists to evaluate multidimensional facts. The utility of mathematics in economy is well proved, helping the economist to simplify, clarify and verify the theories, as well as model building and data analysis. Now days, computers combined with powerful statistic techniques allow the economist to analyze data that were unthinkable just a few years ago. Some economists in favor of using mathematics in economy argue that a truly scientific economical science only will be possible when mathematical and statistical tools will be used regularly to analyze the economical data. The classical position against this rigorous view is that economy, as the rest of social sciences, never will be able to strictly use scientific tools, such as mathematics and statistics. These positions are analyzed in the paper, and pros and cons discussed.
