To an economist, the question sounds like a joke. It's no laughing matter, however, for physicists seeking to plant their flag in the field of economics. In the past few years, these trespassers have borrowed from quantum mechanics, string theory, and other accomplishments of physics in an attempt to divine undiscovered laws of finance. They're already tallying what they say are important gains. Inside the halls of economics, the whoops of physicists outside barely stir the air.
Economists occasionally gaze out the windows, but are unimpressed by what they see.
Boston University physicist H. Eugene Stanley specializes in the behavior of molecules and particles en masse a discipline that, he says, provides an ideal background for approaching problems in economics. It's not the case that one needs to master the field of economics to study this. Physics training, he says, gives a person powerful mathematical tools, computer savvy, a facility in manipulating large sets of data, and an intuition for modeling and simplification. Such skills, he says, could bring new order into economics. Geophysics, astrophysics, and biophysics testify to the success of physicists at fertilizing new fields.