The Unbearable Lightness of the Economics-Made-Fun Genre

Several commentators have argued that the Economics-Made-Fun (“EMF”) genre contains very little actual economics. As such, it would seem that criticisms of EMF do not apply economics more broadly. In this paper I take a contrary view, arguing that, in fact, at a deep conceptual level, the engine of EMF analyses is precisely the engine of mainstream economics. Specifically, I argue that both EMF and mainstream economics rest on a conceptual foundation known as the Principal of the Substitution of Similars (“PSS”). Understanding how PSS leads EMF practitioners to make claims well beyond what is warranted by their analysis also offers insight into how PSS leaves mainstream economists in danger of overestimating the power and scope of their analyses. I explore the consequences of such problems through an example of economic analysis of the U.S. housing market in the lead-up to the recent financial crisis.Methodology, Popular Economics, William Stanley Jevons, Ontology, Anthropology of Finance

The Unbearable Lightness of the Economics-Made-Fun Genre

Several commentators have argued that the Economics-Made-Fun (“EMF”) genre contains very little actual economics. As such, it would seem that criticisms of EMF do not apply economics more broadly. In this paper I take a contrary view, arguing that, in fact, at a deep conceptual level, the engine of EMF analyses is precisely the engine of mainstream economics. Specifically, I argue that both EMF and mainstream economics rest on a conceptual foundation known as the Principal of the Substitution of Similars (“PSS”). Understanding how PSS leads EMF practitioners to make claims well beyond what is warranted by their analysis also offers insight into how PSS leaves mainstream economists in danger of overestimating the power and scope of their analyses. I explore the consequences of such problems through an example of economic analysis of the U.S. housing market in the lead-up to the recent financial crisis

William Stanley Jevons: a Lógica e a Economia na Revolução Marginalista

Ao se estudar História do Pensamento Econômico (HPE) nos livros-textos de graduação, percebe-se que o tratamento dado ao triunvirato formado por William Stanley Jevons, Léon Walras e Carl Menger mostra que suas ideias eram homogêneas. Entretanto, na leitura dos principais livros de Jevons, percebe-se que há um distanciamento de ideias e de definições bastante grande entre ele e, por exemplo, Walras, tal como ambos também concluíram em suas correspondências. A intenção desse trabalho é de revisitar as obras de William Stanley Jevons a fim de desomogeneizá-lo dos outros dois marginalistas. Para isso, na primeira parte desse trabalho, serão analisadas as principais obras de lógica de Jevons e de sua obra em metodologia The Principles of Science, uma vez que, segundo Mosselmans (1998), Stanley Jevons tentou aplicar seu conhecimento em lógica na Economia. No segundo capítulo, de posse dos argumentos lógicos e metodológicos de Jevons, será feita uma análise histórica e econômica da obra The Coal Question e suas consequências na vida acadêmica de Jevons. Neste mesmo capítulo serão analisadas as Teorias da Utilidade, da Troca e do Trabalho de modo que se evidenciem os principais conceitos e métodos matemáticos utilizados pro Jevons no livro The Theory of Political Economy. Também será analisada a Teoria do Sun-spot considerada o primeiro passo na Manchester Statistical Society em analisar os ciclos econômicos. Por fim, no último capítulo, será exposta a tese de William Jaffé sobre a desomogeneização do triunvirato marginalista e, nas seções subsequentes, haverá a tese levantada por Sandra Peart sobre a re-homogeneizaçao de Jevons e Menger

The Algebra of Logic Tradition

The algebra of logic, as an explicit algebraic system showing the underlying mathematical structure of logic, was introduced by George Boole (1815-1864) in his book The Mathematical Analysis of Logic (1847). The methodology initiated by Boole was successfully continued in the 19th century in the work of William Stanley Jevons (1835-1882), Charles Sanders Peirce (1839-1914), Ernst Schröder (1841-1902), among many others, thereby establishing a tradition in (mathematical) logic. From Boole's first book until the influence after WWI of the monumental work Principia Mathematica (1910 1913) by Alfred North Whitehead (1861-1947) and Bertrand Russell (1872-1970), versions of thealgebra of logic were the most developed form of mathematical above allthrough Schröder's three volumes Vorlesungen über die Algebra der Logik(1890-1905). Furthermore, this tradition motivated the investigations of Leopold Löwenheim (1878-1957) that eventually gave rise to model theory. Inaddition, in 1941, Alfred Tarski (1901-1983) in his paper On the calculus of relations returned to Peirce's relation algebra as presented in Schröder's Algebra der Logik. The tradition of the algebra of logic played a key role in thenotion of Logic as Calculus as opposed to the notion of Logic as Universal Language . Beyond Tarski's algebra of relations, the influence of the algebraic tradition in logic can be found in other mathematical theories, such as category theory. However this influence lies outside the scope of this entry, which is divided into 10 sections.Fil: Burris, Stanley. University of Waterloo; CanadáFil: Legris, Javier. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Saavedra 15. Instituto Interdisciplinario de Economía Politica de Buenos Aires. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Económicas. Instituto Interdisciplinario de Economía Politica de Buenos Aires; Argentin

Proofs of valid categorical syllogisms in one diagrammatic and two symbolic axiomatic systems

Gottfried Leibniz embarked on a research program to prove all the Aristotelic categorical syllogisms by diagrammatic and algebraic methods. He succeeded in proving them by means of Euler diagrams, but didn't produce a manuscript with their algebraic proofs. We demonstrate how key excerpts scattered across various Leibniz's drafts on logic contained sufficient ingredients to prove them by an algebraic method -- which we call the Leibniz-Cayley (LC) system -- without having to make use of the more expressive and complex machinery of first-order quantificational logic. In addition, we prove the classic categorical syllogisms again by a relational method -- which we call the McColl-Ladd (ML) system -- employing categorical relations studied by Hugh McColl and Christine Ladd. Finally, we show the connection of ML and LC with Boolean algebra, proving that ML is a consequence of LC, and that LC is a consequence of the Boolean lattice axioms, thus establishing Leibniz's historical priority over George Boole in characterizing and applying (a sufficient fragment of) Boolean algebra to effectively tackle categorical syllogistic.Comment: 66 pages, 9 figures (some of which include subfigures), 5 tables (one of which includes 2 subtables). A cut-down version of this article, which removes the discussion on diagrammatic logic with Euler diagrams, was submitted to the "History and Philosophy of Logic" journal with a different titl

A Victorian Polymath: An Analysis of William Stanley Jevons's Thought

This work is a study of William Stanley Jevons’s thought. My thesis is: Jevons’s thought needs to be seen in the light of its anthropological foundations to enhance the understating of his works. The study of the anthropological foundations of his thought puts emphasis on some aspects of his thought which have been neglected, such as his religious views. Particular stress is also devoted to historical contextualisation, enabling us to understand how a number of Jevons’s concerns are rooted in his cultural background. In the first chapter of my thesis, I focus on Jevons’s epistemology and religious thought. Here I argue that his account of probability and natural laws had a theological foundation. I go on to further analyse Jevons’s logic and ontology by comparing his work with the tradition of the ars combinatoria. In the second chapter, I present Jevons’s moral and political thought. In the first part I again consider Jevons’s religious beliefs, focusing on his allegiance to Unitarianism. I then consider Jevons’s political thought in the light of a fundamental question: how could a society composed of selfish individuals be conceived? In the last part of the second chapter, I argue that Jevons appealed to Herbert Spencer’s theory of evolution to reconcile individuals and society. In the third chapter I address Jevons’s economic theory, arguing that it was strongly influenced by the other spheres of his thought. In the first part of the third chapter, I link Jevons’s economic thought to his moral and political philosophy. In the second part of this chapter, I focus on the role of mathematics in Jevons’s economic works. In the last part of the third chapter, I investigate Jevons’s representation of the economic subject

Forms of Naturalism in Seminal Neoclassical Texts: An Analysis and Comparison of Léon Walras, John Bates Clark, and William Stanley Jevons

At issue here is the role of “naturalism” in certain seminal neoclassical texts. I outline both a positive and normative dimension to the term “naturalism.” Along its positive dimension, I use the term to mean that the social sciences ought to follow the method of the natural sciences. Along its normative dimension, I use it to mean that the natural order of things can provide for justice. I examine the role these concepts play in the works of Léon Walras, John Bates Clark, and William Stanley Jevons. The question I raise, through this examination, is whether the positive conception of naturalism eclipses possibilities of economic transformation, thereby undermining any coherent normative evaluation of whether a purportedly natural (i.e. unchangeable) set of economic facts or laws is “just.” Walras argues that “economics” should be modelled on the natural sciences, and that value-in-exchange is natural. Simultaneously, Walras claims that economic institutions are “artificial.” He arrives at the former claim, I argue, because he believes that only by seeing economic laws and facts as “natural” can he demonstrate that they necessarily obtain; the latter claim is motivated by a desire to evaluate economic institutions normatively. This leads Walras into a contradiction, I argue, insofar as the former claim undermines the latter. Clark, initially, seems to avoid Walras’ contradiction, insofar as he refers to economic laws as social, not natural. However, Clark’s distinction between the social and natural is superficial, insofar as the social is conceptualized purely as a function of the natural. Clark does not imagine that the specifically social character of economic laws might transform the “natural.” Further, for Clark, the natural not only shapes the social (economic) in a positive sense, it also renders economic laws just. But, like Walras, Clark’s normative evaluation is undermined by his insistence on a fundamentally natural predicate for his economic laws. For Jevons, like Walras, economics is properly modelled on the natural sciences, and, in particular, on the science of mechanics. Jevons then chooses to mechanize the economic agent itself, which, I argue, undermines any conception of human transformation of the surrounding “economy.

Eficiència energètica i consum de recursos : una estimació de l'efecte rebot a Catalunya

L'efecte rebot és aquell mecanisme a través del qual una millora de l'eficiència energètica no produeix el potencial estalvi d'energia esperat, o inclús pot fer que n'augmenti el consum. Això és degut a que una millora de l'eficiència energètica produeix un abaratiment del cost de proveir el servei energètic, que n'impulsa la demanda. Aquest treball realitza una revisió de la literatura existent sobre efecte rebot directe; analitza els principals aspectes teòrics i metodològics; i finalment estima, a partir de tècniques economètriques, la magnitud de l'efecte rebot directe per als serveis energètics que utilitzen energia elèctrica a les llars a Catalunya