Since you quoted me, I will write a bit more.
I think a subject like economics is beyond a young child no matter how gifted this child is. I am not talking about the Freakonomics type of cutesy economics, which I think it is both more accessible and not parcicularly important.
Most of the economists actually believe very similar things. Supply and demand, free market, and so on. Mostly, economists disagree about the degree of something. For exampole, how important is market failure in a certain market? If you think it is very important in health care, then you would support national health insurance. Not too important, then you would be against the Affordable Care Act. Much of these arguments are not based on theory but on how you read the evidence, which requires understanding of statistics and institutional knowlegde. This is before you bring in things like efficiency versu equality and how do you put a price on human life and suffering. Two very well respected economists could disagree and this seperates social science from science.
I am not saying there no gifted children who can handle ambiguity. I just simply don't see this kind of subject as a good use of their time. High school will be the earliest. But from what I see, there aren't many high school econ courses that are worth the time. Might as well wait for Econ 101 in college.
With all due respect, I think that it depends (strongly) upon the child.
Ambiguity is what makes problems
interesting to my daughter. She has always been like this. Ambiguity slows her down enough to promote retention of what she's doing/thinking, honestly. At least that is how it seems to me.
Perhaps this is so in STEM. I'm not
sure that I completely buy into it even there-- because I think that it promotes a rigidity in thinking that (probably) doesn't serve them so well in the long term.
But in the humanities, certainly, a fluent level of comfort with ambiguity is essential for any authentic study at all.
I think that schools fail children like my DD
profoundly in this regard. She is much like her +3y classmates who are HG/EG otherwise, but in terms of her ZEAL for dissection and exploration of topics without "right" answers, she stands out among them even now. She also stands out among STEM undergraduates for her ability to take multiple perspectives, often simultaneously.
It's a valuable skill, and it is one that I think is well worth cultivating in those that have the innate gift for it.
