In the English county of Cornwall the annual invading army of tourists which are its biggest source of income are referred to unkindly as 'emmets', an ancient word for 'ants'. Yet the observed behaviour of real life ants suggests that the locals have instinctively hit on a model which has enormous implications for any industry or business trying to understand how its consumer market works. By Paul Ormerod, chairman, Post-Orthodox Economics.
Scientific research can often seem obscure and even pointless to outsiders.
This is not so much due to the intellectual difficulty involved in understanding such activity, for it is widely accepted that this will inevitably be the case. It is rather that many of the topics which are examined seem to be almost designed to incur the scorn and wrath of the lay person. Before sitting down to write these very words, for example, my eye fell on a report in a serious British newspaper. An American psychologist had been visiting the country to carry out a study of rams in the English Lake District. Readers no doubt took consolation from the fact that this finding was obtained at the expense of the American taxpayer and not themselves.