Rats are, in some ways, very different from humans too. But if it&#x27;s impossible to run human trials, or there are severe deficiencies in the way we are able to execute them, studying rats is still the best argument.<p>If there is a convincing empirical economic study that widely contradicts a theoretical consensus---yes, that evidence should be preferred. But that is not often the case, and otherwise the theoretical argument is simply the best argument there is.<p>What drives me bonkers, though, is the people who dismiss the math and its conclusions as being &#x27;meaningless&#x27;, but then what they substitute is not superior empirical arguments of their own, but their own emotional sentiments and undisciplined intuitions (typically decorated by cherry-picked historical observations).