Whimsical Streak in an Introductory Econ.

I am reading the Accidental Theorist by Krugman again. The following (original published in Slate Jan 23 1997)caught my eye and I will use it in my first lecture. Not the whole thing but the following section:

"You can not do serious economics unless you are willing to be playful. Economics is not a collection of dictums laid down by pompous authority figures. Mainly it is a menageries of thought experiments-parables, if you like-that are intended to capture the logic of economics processes in a simplified way. In the end, of course, ideas must be tested against the facts. But even to know what facts are relevant, you must play with those ideas in a hypothetical settings. "

I would have to reword this but the idea of playfulness is important for student to learn and develop critical thinking versus just memorizing various laws of economics.