Philosophy and Economics

\u27Much has changed in the latest incarnation of this dictionary...More than 1,500 economists contributed almost 1,900 signed entries; more than 1,000 of the entries are new or \u27heavily revised\u27 and expanded. Along with the descriptions of economic method from earlier editions, this edition includes much information on \u27what those methods have found.\u27 It also offers new emphasis on advances that have occurred in microeconomics, Bayesian theory, game theory, and behavioral, international, and experimental economics...A regularly updated online version of the dictionary is available www.dictionaryofeconomics.com, with site license pricing based on institution type and FTE. Summing Up: Highly recommended.\u27 - Choice Winner of the 2008 Prose award for the Best Multi-Volume Reference Work in the Humanities and Social Sciences. The Dictionary was also a finalist and received an honourable mention in the Best eProduct category. Reviews of the 1987 edition: \u27The New Palgrave is in a class of its own...The dictionary does everything which one would hope of a successor to the original Palgrave dictionary. There will be no competitor for many decades.\u27 - The Guardian \u27This will be the standard reference work on economics until well into the next century.\u27 - The World Economy \u27The list of contributors reads like a who\u27s who in economics. The range of topics is breathtaking. The choice of topics is excellent...It is overwhelmingly impressive...a very high quality product that is also unique.\u27 - Martin L. Weitzman, Massachusetts Institute of Technology \u27To attempt such an undertaking was audacious, to have carried it out is astonishing, and to have done so with so remarkable a list of authors is a tribute to the intelligence and diligence of the editors.\u27 - Alan S. Blinder, Princeton University \u27The New Palgrave will be an indispensable reference tool for both junior and senior scholars in economics and perhaps even more for the journalist or business executive. The topics are exhaustive.\u27 - Kenneth J. Arrow, Nobel Prize Winner in Economic

Mark Blaug on the Normativity of Welfare Economics

Abstract: This paper examines Mark Blaug's position on the normative character of Paretian welfare economics: in general, and specifically with respect to his debate with Pieter Hennipman over this question during the 1990s. The paper also clarifies some of the confusions that emerged within the context of this debate, and closes by providing some additional arguments supporting Blaug's position that he himself did not provide

Review of: Rationality, Allocation, and Reproduction by Vivian Walsh

This article is a review of the book Rationality, Allocation, and Reproduction by Vivian Walsh

2006 HES Presidential Address: A Tale of Two Mainstreams: Economics and Philosophy of Natural Science in the mid-Twentieth Century

Abstract: The paper argues that mainstream economics and mainstream philosophy of natural science had much in common during the period 1945-1965. It examines seven common features of the two fields and suggests a number of historical developments that might help explain these similarities. The historical developments include: the Vienna Circle connection, the Samuelson-Harvard-Foundations connection, and the Cold War operations research connection

Caveat emptor: Economics and contemporary philosophy of science

The relationship between economics and the philosophy of natural science has changed substantially during the last few years. What was once exclusively a one-way relationship from philosophy to economics now seems to be much closer to bilateral exchange. The purpose of this paper is to examine this new relationship. First, I document the change. Second, I examine the situation within contemporary philosophy of science in order to explain why economics might have its current appeal. Third, I consider some of the issues that might jeopardize the success of this philosophical project

More light and less heat Mirowski on economics and the energy metaphor

I initially approached More Heat than Light with some apprehension. This is not because I suspected that I would disagree with its main thesis but because I feared that I would find the book anticlimactic. Over the past few years, Phil Mirowski has served us a number of delightful appetizers’-so many in fact that I suspected I might tire of the taste before the main entrée appeared. These concerns were wholly unfounded. The main entrée has finally arrived and is of such depth and complexity that it makes the appetizers, well, just appetizers. Mirowski’s central thesis is that neoclassical economics-initially developed during the 1870s and currently the dominant paradigm in economic theory-amounts to little more than a &dquo;brazen daylight robbery&dquo; (p. 4)2 of nineteenth-century energy physics. Motivated by the desire to achieve the status and prestige of the physical sciences, early neoclassical economists created their &dquo;revolution&dquo; by simply substituting &dquo;utility&dquo; for &dquo;energy&dquo; in the physics of their day. In a limited respect, this project was successful-the mathematical formalism of energy physics did (and does) contribute to the scientific respectability of the neoclassical research program-but this status was achieved at substantial cost. Mirowski argues that there were (and are) deep problems associated with the economic appropriation of the energy metaphor; physical systems have properties that make the mathematics appropriate, but these properties are not shared by economic systems. For example, the physical requirement that potential energy and kinetic energy sum to a constant translates into the economic requirement that utility and income sum to a constant. This is a problem because utility and income are measured in entirely different units. Mirowski argues that such difficulties were exacerbated by the scientific naivete of the early neoclassical economists who were trained in science and engineering-they had been exposed to the basic ideas of energy physics-but their knowledge was relatively rudimentary (p. 250). The result was energy physics appropriated in a &dquo;shoddy and slipshod manner&dquo; (p. 108). Mirowski provides a detailed discussion of how this misappropriation of the energy metaphor has surreptitiously influenced the development of modern economic thought. He reconstructs and explains certain generally accepted facts of theoretical life in economics (such as the problems of neoclassical production theory) and exposes some of the fundamental weaknesses of neoclassical theory (such as its inability to explain preference changes). Mirowski also argues that the dominance of the energy metaphor from nineteenth-century physics has prevented economists from taking advantage of more recent developments in physical theory, such as quantum mechanics and the theory of relativity. The result, according to Mirowski, is a tale reminiscent of Dorian Gray .... Neoclassicals, by imbibing some mystical elixir of modern mathematical techniques, have maintained the figure of vibrant youth, while hidden away somewhere in the attic is the real portrait, the original metaphor of a conserved preference field in an independently constituted commodity space, growing progressively desiccated and decrepit. (p. 374) My overall evaluation of Mirowski’s thesis is quite positive. I believe that he is entirely correct about the role of the energy metaphor in early neoclassical economics (probably reaching an apogee in Irving Fisher), and he is also correct that the metaphor has been lurking ever since in the background of neoclassical economics. The energy metaphor and its mathematics have been actively influential in the development of modem neoclassical theory, although I would probably weaken its impact from Mirowski’s story by saying &dquo;influenced&dquo; whereas Mirowski would say &dquo;dominated.&dquo; Where I mainly differ from Mirowski is on the implications of his thesis. For Mirowski, uncovering this hidden influence amounts to a scathing critique of modern neoclassical economics (and given the neoclassical dominance of the profession, this means most of modem economics). For him, the metaphor and its mathematics have been both dominant and pernicious. I disagree. While I am convinced that Mirowski has uncovered something important that can be used to further our understanding of the development of modem economic theory, I am not convinced that his thesis entails the kind of critical bite that he would like it to have. Given this overall evaluation of More Heat than Light, I will divide my comments into two sections. The first-more light-lends additional support to Mirowski’s general historical thesis by using it to illuminate two areas of modem neoclassical economics that Mirowski does not emphasize. The second-less heat-offers some arguments against Mirowski’s critical interpretation of his general thesis

Niclosamide Prevents the Formation of Large Ubiquitin-Containing Aggregates Caused by Proteasome Inhibition

Protein aggregation is a hallmark of many neurodegenerative diseases and has been linked to the failure to degrade misfolded and damaged proteins. In the cell, aberrant proteins are degraded by the ubiquitin proteasome system that mainly targets short-lived proteins, or by the lysosomes that mostly clear long-lived and poorly soluble proteins. Both systems are interconnected and, in some instances, autophagy can redirect proteasome substrates to the lysosomes.To better understand the interplay between these two systems, we established a neuroblastoma cell population stably expressing the GFP-ubiquitin fusion protein. We show that inhibition of the proteasome leads to the formation of large ubiquitin-containing inclusions accompanied by lower solubility of the ubiquitin conjugates. Strikingly, the formation of the ubiquitin-containing aggregates does not require ectopic expression of disease-specific proteins. Moreover, formation of these focused inclusions caused by proteasome inhibition requires the lysine 63 (K63) of ubiquitin. We then assessed selected compounds that stimulate autophagy and found that the antihelmintic chemical niclosamide prevents large aggregate formation induced by proteasome inhibition, while the prototypical mTORC1 inhibitor rapamycin had no apparent effect. Niclosamide also precludes the accumulation of poly-ubiquitinated proteins and of p62 upon proteasome inhibition. Moreover, niclosamide induces a change in lysosome distribution in the cell that, in the absence of proteasome activity, may favor the uptake into lysosomes of ubiquitinated proteins before they form large aggregates.Our results indicate that proteasome inhibition provokes the formation of large ubiquitin containing aggregates in tissue culture cells, even in the absence of disease specific proteins. Furthermore our study suggests that the autophagy-inducing compound niclosamide may promote the selective clearance of ubiquitinated proteins in the absence of proteasome activity