Shackle on economics

From the forward to the paperback edition of "The Years of High Theory: Invention and Tradition in Economic Thought 1926-1939".

Economics is one of the strangest items in mankind's intellectual cupboard. The styles of thought exemplified in its literature range from mathematics of a purity to which observational data are quite alien, through measurement-procedures which are culinary and gastronomic in their fascination, to the treatment of the subject as a branch of philosophy and, finally, to its use as the material of literary art. All these styles are expressions of humanity's untrammelled imagination and creative urge. Each in its own way is a form of art, and in each we may truly discover beauty.

I'm sure only an economist could write such a thing!