Download or read book Mechanism and Causality in Biology and Economics written by Hsiang-Ke Chao and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2013-07-31 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume addresses fundamental issues in the philosophy of science in the context of two most intriguing fields: biology and economics. Written by authorities and experts in the philosophy of biology and economics, Mechanism and Causality in Biology and Economics provides a structured study of the concepts of mechanism and causality in these disciplines and draws careful juxtapositions between philosophical apparatus and scientific practice. By exploring the issues that are most salient to the contemporary philosophies of biology and economics and by presenting comparative analyses, the book serves as a platform not only for gaining mutual understanding between scientists and philosophers of the life sciences and those of the social sciences, but also for sharing interdisciplinary research that combines both philosophical concepts in both fields. The book begins by defining the concepts of mechanism and causality in biology and economics, respectively. The second and third parts investigate philosophical perspectives of various causal and mechanistic issues in scientific practice in the two fields. These two sections include chapters on causal issues in the theory of evolution; experiments and scientific discovery; representation of causal relations and mechanism by models in economics. The concluding section presents interdisciplinary studies of various topics concerning extrapolation of life sciences and social sciences, including chapters on the philosophical investigation of conjoining biological and economic analyses with, respectively, demography, medicine and sociology.
Download or read book The Oxford Handbook of Economics and Human Biology written by John Komlos and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2016 with total page 849 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Oxford Handbook of Economics and Human Biology provides an extensive and insightful overview of how economic conditions affect human well-being and how human health influences economic outcomes. The book addresses both macro and micro factors, as well as their interaction, providing new understanding of complex relationships and developments in economic history and economic dynamics. Among the topics explored is how variation in height, whether over time, among different socioeconomic groups, or in different locations, is an important indicator of changes in economic growth and economic development, levels of economic inequality, and economic opportunities for individuals.
Download or read book Economics and Biology written by Geoffrey Martin Hodgson and published by Edward Elgar Publishing. This book was released on 1995 with total page 648 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is a collection of essays on the relationship between economics and biology. As the limitations of the mechanistic metaphor in economics are increasingly recognized, this volume explores the potential for the use of evolutionary and other ideas from the science of biology.
Download or read book Foundations of Complex system Theories written by Sunny Y. Auyang and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1998 with total page 422 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Analyzes approaches to the study of complexity in the physical, biological, and social sciences.
Download or read book Dynamical Systems written by Pierre N.V. Tu and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2013-11-11 with total page 257 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Dynamic tools of analysis and modelling are increasingly used in Economics and Biology and have become more and more sophisticated in recent years, to the point where the general students without training in Dynamic Systems (DS) would be at a loss. No doubt they are referred to the original sources of mathematical theorems used in the various proofs, but the level of mathematics is generally beyond them. Students are thus left with the burden of somehow understanding advanced mathematics by themselves, with· very little help. It is to these general students, equipped only with a modest background of Calculus and Matrix Algebra that this book is dedicated. It aims at providing them with a fairly comprehensive box of dynamical tools they are expected to have at their disposal. The first three Chapters start with the most elementary notions of first and second order Differential and Difference Equations. For these, no matrix theory and hardly any calculus are needed. Then, before embarking on linear and nonlinear DS, a review of some Linear Algebra in Chapter 4 provides the bulk of matrix theory required for the study of later Chapters. Systems of Linear Differ ential Equations (Ch. 5) and Difference Equations (Ch. 6) then follow to provide students with a good background in linear DS, necessary for the subsequent study of nonlinear systems. Linear Algebra, reviewed in Ch. 4, is used freely in these and subsequent chapters to save space and time.
Download or read book Economic Biology and Behavioral Economics written by Gerald A. Cory Jr. and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2022-12-30 with total page 199 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Economic Biology and Behavioral Economics: The Prophesy of Alfred Marshall explores the prophesy of Alfred Marshall, the grand synthesizer of neoclassical economics, that the "Mecca of the economist lies in economic biology". The book presents the proof of that prophesy through examination and establishment of the fundamental biological science necessary and then applying that science to the examination of current economic theory. In doing so, the book focuses primarily on the fundamentals of neoclassical economic theory— which is the reigning theory and the general framework of which is taught as "science" in first courses in college economics. These courses are at best an idealization, if not an ideology, of the discipline—presented to fresh minds misleadingly as confirmed science. The book examines the bases and the history of these idealizations, points to the sources of their error from the biological perspective and suggests a path forward for the discipline. Through this process, the book demonstrates the power of the biological perspective anticipated by Marshall. This book provides invaluable reading for anyone interested in the future of economics and economic theory, and particularly those interested in behavioral economics and neuroeconomics.
Download or read book Structure Evidence and Heuristic written by ARMIN W. SCHULZ and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2022-08 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is the first systematic treatment of the philosophy of science underlying evolutionary economics. It does not advocate an evolutionary approach towards economics, but rather assesses the epistemic value of appealing to evolutionary biology in economics more generally. The author divides work in evolutionary economics into three distinct, albeit related, forms: a structural form, an evidential form, and a heuristic form. He then analyzes five examples of work in evolutionary economics falling under these three forms. For the structural form, he examines the parallelism between natural selection and economic decision making, and the parallelism between natural selection and market competition. For the evidential form, he looks at the relationship between animal and human economic decision making, and the evolutionary explanation of diversity in human economic decision making. Finally, for the heuristic form, he focuses on the plausibility of equilibrium modeling in evolutionary ecology and economics. In this way, he shows that linking evolutionary biology and economics can make for a powerful methodological tool that can enable progress in our understanding of various economics questions. Structure, Evidence, and Heuristic will be of interest to scholars and advanced students working in philosophy of science, philosophy of social science, evolutionary biology, and economics.
Download or read book From Evolutionary Biology to Economics and Back written by Jean-Baptiste André and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2023-01-12 with total page 193 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book offers a comprehensive exploration of the major key concepts common to economics and evolutionary biology. Written by a group of philosophers of science, biologists and economists, it proposes analyses of the meaning of twenty-five concepts from the viewpoint respectively of economics and of evolutionary biology –each followed by a short synthesis emphasizing major discrepancies and commonalities. This analysis is surrounded by chapters exploring the nature of the analogy that connects evolution and economics, and chapters that summarize the major teachings of the analyses of the keywords. Most scholars in biology and in economics know that their science has something in common with the other one, for instance the notions of competition and resources. Textbooks regularly acknowledge that the two fields share some history – Darwin borrowing from Malthus the insistence on scarcity of resources, and then behavioral ecologists adapting and transforming game theory into evolutionary game theory in the 1980s, while Friedman famously alluded to a Darwinian process yielding the extant firms. However, the real extent of the similarities, the reasons why they are so close, and the limits and even the nature of the analogy connecting economics and biological evolution, remain inexplicit. This book proposes basis analyses that can sustain such explication. It is intended for researchers, grad students and master students in evolutionary and in economics, as well as in philosophy of science.
Download or read book Nature written by Geerat Vermeij and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2009-02-09 with total page 460 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From humans to hermit crabs to deep water plankton, all living things compete for locally limiting resources. This universal truth unites three bodies of thought--economics, evolution, and history--that have developed largely in mutual isolation. Here, Geerat Vermeij undertakes a groundbreaking and provocative exploration of the facts and theories of biology, economics, and geology to show how processes common to all economic systems--competition, cooperation, adaptation, and feedback--govern evolution as surely as they do the human economy, and how historical patterns in both human and nonhuman evolution follow from this principle. Using a wealth of examples of evolutionary innovations, Vermeij argues that evolution and economics are one. Powerful consumers and producers exercise disproportionate controls on the characteristics, activities, and distribution of all life forms. Competition-driven demand by consumers, when coupled with supply-side conditions permitting economic growth, leads to adaptation and escalation among organisms. Although disruptions in production halt or reverse these processes temporarily, they amplify escalation in the long run to produce trends in all economic systems toward greater power, higher production rates, and a wider reach for economic systems and their strongest members. Despite our unprecedented power to shape our surroundings, we humans are subject to all the economic principles and historical trends that emerged at life's origin more than 3 billion years ago. Engagingly written, brilliantly argued, and sweeping in scope, Nature: An Economic History shows that the human institutions most likely to preserve opportunity and adaptability are, after all, built like successful living things.
Download or read book Economics as an Evolutionary Science written by Anna Sachko Gandolfi and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-02-06 with total page 273 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Economics is traditionally taken to be the social science concerned with the production, consumption, exchange, and distribution of wealth and commodities. Economists carefully track the comings and goings of the human household, whether written small (microeconomics) or large (macroeconomics) and attempt to predict future patterns under different situations. However, in constructing their models of economic behavior, economists often lose sight of the actual characteristics and motivations of their human subjects. In consequence, they have found the goal of an explanatory and predictive science to be elusive. Economics as an Evolutionary Science reorients economics toward a more direct appreciation of human nature, with an emphasis on what we have learned from recent advances in evolutionary science. The authors integrate economics and evolution to produce a social science that is rigorous, internally coherent, testable, and consistent with the natural sciences. The authors suggest an expanded definition of "fitness," as in Darwin's survival of the fittest, emphasizing not only the importance of reproduction and the quality of offspring, but also the unique ability of humans to provide material wealth to their children. The book offers a coherent explanation for the recent decline in fertility, which is shown to be consistent with the evolutionary goal of maximizing genetic success. In addition, the authors demonstrate the relevance to economics of several core concepts derived from biologists, including the genetics of parent-offspring conflict, inclusive fitness theory, and the phenomena of R-selection and K-selection. The keystone of their presentation is a cogent critique of the traditional concept of "utility." As the authors demonstrate, the concept can be modified to reflect the fundamental evolutionary principle whereby living things-including human beings-have been selected to behave in a manner that maximizes their genetic representation in future generations. Despite the extraordinary interest in applying evolutionary biology to other disciplines, Economics as an Evolutionary Science marks the first major attempt at a synthesis of biology and economics. Scholarly yet accessible, this volume offers unique and original perspectives on an entire discipline.
Download or read book Inframarginal Contributions to Development Economics written by Christis G. Tombazos and published by World Scientific Publishing Company. This book was released on 2006 with total page 572 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The core of classical economic analysis represented by William Petty and Adam Smith concentrated on the field of development economics. This classical footing of the study of development is different from the neoclassical perspective in two important respects: (a) it focuses on division of labor as the driving force of development, and (b) it emphasizes the role of the market (the "invisible hand") in exploiting productivity gains that are derived from division of labor. However these aspects have received little attention in the body of literature that represents the modern field of development economics - which largely represents the neoclassical application of marginalism. A notable exception is research that utilizes inframarginal analysis of individuals' networking decisions in an attempt to formalize the classical mechanisms that drive division of labour. This book is a first attempt to collect relevant key contributions and will be invaluable to active researchers in the field of development economics. Contents: The Origins of Inframarginal Applications to the Study of Economic Development; Development Strategies, Income Distribution, and Dual Structures; Urbanization; Entrepreneurship and the Firm; Endogenous Transaction Costs andProperty Rights; Investment, Endogenous Growth, and Social Experiments; Infrastructure, Labor Surplus, Insurance, and the Trade-Off Between Leisure and Income. Key Features An excellent introduction to the emerging field of inframarginal economics A novel collection of key contributions in the field of inframarginal development economics Provides an evolutionary perspective of the study of economic development Readership: Academic economists.
Download or read book Ideas in Economics written by R. D. Collison Black and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 1986 with total page 268 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Papers presented at the 1985 meeting of the Section F of the British Association for the Advancement of Science at the University of Strathclyde. Includes bibliographies and index.
Download or read book Sociobiology and Bioeconomics written by Peter Koslowski and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2013-03-09 with total page 342 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The theory of evolution and Neo-Darwinian biological theory extend their analysis in sociobiology from the life sciences and the animal societies to human societies. Sociobiology as a unifying theory of the social interaction within and between species has led to an integration of economic analysis into biology. The economy of nature has become the subject of bioeconomics which in turn transferred biological analysis to the human economy. Evolution, competition, selection, and cooperation are phenomena common to the economy of nature and human economy. The inclusion of economic and cultural theory in evolution theory raises the question whether the Neo-Darwinian Synthesis with its exclusive concern with somatic heredity is able to incorporate developmental systems of the human economy and of cultural heredity. A new synthesis of the natural and the social sciences is in the making.
Download or read book Structure Evidence and Heuristic written by Armin W. Schulz and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2020-04-22 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is the first systematic treatment of the philosophy of science underlying evolutionary economics. It does not advocate an evolutionary approach towards economics, but rather assesses the epistemic value of appealing to evolutionary biology in economics more generally. The author divides work in evolutionary economics into three distinct, albeit related, forms: a structural form, an evidential form, and a heuristic form. He then analyzes five examples of work in evolutionary economics falling under these three forms. For the structural form, he examines the parallelism between natural selection and economic decision making, and the parallelism between natural selection and market competition. For the evidential form, he looks at the relationship between animal and human economic decision making, and the evolutionary explanation of diversity in human economic decision making. Finally, for the heuristic form, he focuses on the plausibility of equilibrium modeling in evolutionary ecology and economics. In this way, he shows that linking evolutionary biology and economics can make for a powerful methodological tool that can enable progress in our understanding of various economics questions. Structure, Evidence, and Heuristic will be of interest to scholars and advanced students working in philosophy of science, philosophy of social science, evolutionary biology, and economics.
Download or read book Economic Biology and Behavioral Economics written by Gerald A. Cory and published by . This book was released on 2022-09 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Economic Biology and Behavioral Economics: The Prophesy of Alfred Marshall explores the prophesy of Alfred Marshall, the grand synthesizer of neoclassical economics, that the "Mecca of the economist lies in economic biology". The book presents the proof of that prophesy through examination and establishment of the fundamental biological science necessary and then applying that science to the examination of current economic theory. In doing so, the book focuses primarily on the fundamentals of neoclassical economic theory- which is the reigning theory and the general framework of which is taught as "science" in first courses in college economics. These courses are at best an idealization, if not an ideology, of the discipline-presented to fresh minds misleadingly as confirmed science. The book examines the bases and the history of these idealizations, points to the sources of their error from the biological perspective and suggests a path forward for the discipline. Through this process, the book demonstrates the power of the biological perspective anticipated by Marshall. This book provides invaluable reading for anyone interested in the future of economics and economic theory, and particularly those interested in behavioral economics and neuroeconomics"--
Download or read book Economics in Nature written by Ronald Noë and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2006-01-19 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Studies of sexual selection, interspecific mutualism, and intraspecific cooperation show that individuals exchange commodities to their mutual benefit. The exchange values of commodities are a source of conflict, and behavioral mechanisms such as partner choice and contest between competitors determines the composition of trading pairs or groups. These "biological markets" can be examined to gain a better understanding of the underlying principles of evolutionary ecology. In this volume scientists from different disciplines combine insights from economics, evolutionary biology, and the social sciences to look at comparative aspects of economic behavior in humans and other animals.
Download or read book Biosocial Surveys written by National Research Council and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 2008-01-06 with total page 429 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Biosocial Surveys analyzes the latest research on the increasing number of multipurpose household surveys that collect biological data along with the more familiar interviewerâ€"respondent information. This book serves as a follow-up to the 2003 volume, Cells and Surveys: Should Biological Measures Be Included in Social Science Research? and asks these questions: What have the social sciences, especially demography, learned from those efforts and the greater interdisciplinary communication that has resulted from them? Which biological or genetic information has proven most useful to researchers? How can better models be developed to help integrate biological and social science information in ways that can broaden scientific understanding? This volume contains a collection of 17 papers by distinguished experts in demography, biology, economics, epidemiology, and survey methodology. It is an invaluable sourcebook for social and behavioral science researchers who are working with biosocial data.
