We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 June 2011
Energy, someone may say, is a mere abstraction, a mere term, not a real thing. As you will. In this, as in many another respects, it is like an abstraction no one would deny reality to, and that abstraction is wealth. Wealth is the power of purchasing, as energy is the power of working. I cannot show you energy, only its effects … Abstraction or not, energy is as real as wealth – I am not sure that they are not two aspects of the same thing
[Soddy 1920, pp. 27–8].Why is it that people in this way never ask what is the nature of gold, or what is the nature of velocity? Is the nature of gold better known to us than that of force?
[Hertz 1956, p. 8]Historians of science often take for granted an efficient market theory of their own … But the history of ideas is not always so neat
[Gleick 1987, p. 181].It is said that in Poland of the 1980s, when a director wants to stage a realist drama, he chooses Waiting For Godot. Let us say I have just subjected you to a similar sort of experience. I anticipate that you, especially if you are an economist, just want to understand the way things really are.
To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.
Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.
Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.
