Economics and literature: the problem of defining human needs

Abstract

The article revisits perspectives on what would be the objects of study of economic sciences, from economic rationality to socioeconomic relations in unstable social systems. Taking philosophy as the source of human and applied social sciences, it brings subsidies from disciplines such as literature (asceticism and abjection) and psychology (behaviorism) to the theoretical debate. As results, it was identified: a) a tendency to consider as causes of consumer choices what, in truth, would be consequences; b) disregard for the learning of self-regulation and management of environmental contingencies by the subject himself for his economic decisions; c) the effect of arbitrariness, utopia and abjection on decisions. We conclude that: a) literature functions to describe human behaviors and hierarchies of values ​​that make the subject make his rational decision; b) the supposed limited rationality of the subject is a problem of limited knowledge of the observer about the contingencies that affect the observed subject.