Practitioners resisted finance theory partly because they felt academically ridiculed

Evidence

James Vertin of the Wells Fargo Bank, a leading member of the Financial Analysts Federation, wrote: “You just don’t win friends … by appearing to tell sincere, dedicated, intelligent people that they are useless dolts who could and should be replaced by computers… Rightly or wrong, most practitioners feel themselves to be objects of academic ridicule, and most feel bound to resist this assault.” — Donald MacKenzie, An Engine, Not a Camera, 355

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the broader social studies of finance claim that models are performative but encounter practitioner resistance — echoes the status/credibility conflicts in Milgrom’s law merchant work where new institutions faced adoption resistance. — connects to: Finance was long deemed unworthy of serious academic mathematics. — Donald MacKenzie, An Engine, Not a Camera: How Financial…, 266; Finance was institutionally relegated to business schools and dismissed by academic economists as unscientific — Donald MacKenzie, An Engine, Not a Camera: How Financial…, 319; Finance theory met smooth reception in academia but hostility from market practitioners. — Donald MacKenzie, An Engine, Not a Camera: How Financial…, 333 (+1 more)