教育经济学中的数学应用:现实、争论与前景

Mathematical Application in Economics of Education:Reality,Debates and Prospects

教育经济学的方法论进化深受其母学科经济学的影响,这使得数学方法在教育经济学中也得到广泛应用。对于数学在经济学及其分支学科应用的必要性和有效性,一直存在激烈的争论。本文首先梳理了数学在教育经济学中应用的现状,进而简要介绍了经济学中数学应用的发展历程和成就,以及经济学中关于数学应用的有效性与合理性的争论。我们认为数学的功用在于保证教育经济研究推演的形式逻辑具有合理性,但是数学不能替代教育经济学的思想。通过数学模型做漂亮的教育经济学研究比做教育经济学里漂亮的数学模型更值得鼓励和推崇。

The evolution of methodology for educational economics was influenced deeply by its parent discipline economics,which resulted in the extensive use of mathematical methods in educational economics. There has been heated debates regarding the necessity and effectiveness of mathematical application in economics and its sub-disciplines. This paper first reviews the status of mathematical application in educational economics,and then briefly describes the developments and achievements of mathematical application in economics,as well as the debates about the effectiveness and rationality of the mathematical application in economics. We believe that the function of mathematics is to ensure the rationality of the formal logic used in the research and deduction of educational economics,but mathematics is not a substitute for the ideas of educational economics.To conduct beautiful research in educational economics through mathematical modeling worth much more admiration and encouragement than to make beautiful mathematical models in educational economics.