Quote

Economic problems have no sharp edges. They shade off imperceptibly into politics, sociology, and ethics. Indeed, it is hardly an exaggeration to say that the ultimate answer to every economic problem lies in some other field.

Kenneth E. Boulding

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Kenneth E. Boulding
Age: 83 †
Born: 1910
Born: January 18
Died: 1993
Died: March 18
Author
Economist
Philosopher
Poet
University Teacher
City of Liverpool
Kenneth Ewart Boulding
Problems
Edges
Answers
Ethics
Economic
Field
Imperceptibly
Politics
Indeed
Sociology
Lying
Ultimate
Exaggeration
Problem
Answer
Sharp
Every
Fields
Shade
Lies
Hardly

More quotes by Kenneth E. Boulding

Image
The right to have children should be a marketable commodity, bought and traded by individuals but absolutely limited by the state.
Kenneth E. Boulding
Image
The discounting presumably is to be done for each period of time at that rate of interest which represents the alternative cost of employing capital in the occupation in question that is, at the rate which the entrepreneur could obtain in other investments
Kenneth E. Boulding
Image
Nothing fails like success because we don't learn from it. We learn only from failure.
Kenneth E. Boulding
Image
If a totally new image is to come into being however, there must be sensitivity to internal messages, the image itself must be sensitive to change, must be unstable, and it must include a value image which places high value on trials, experiments, and the trying of new things.
Kenneth E. Boulding
Image
The human condition can almost be summed up in the observation that, whereas all experiences are of the past, all decisions are about the future. It is the great task of human knowledge to bridge this gap and to find those patterns in the past which can be projected into the future as realistic images.
Kenneth E. Boulding
Image
[The historical] development in the international system may almost be defined as the process by which we pass from stable war to stable peace.
Kenneth E. Boulding
Image
[The consumer is] the supreme mover of economic order... for whom all goods are made and towards whom all economic activity is directed.
Kenneth E. Boulding
Image
The concept of a value-free science is absurd.
Kenneth E. Boulding
Image
Economists are like computers. They need to have facts punched into them.
Kenneth E. Boulding
Image
Economics has been incurably growth-oriented and addicted to everybody growing richer, even at the cost of exhaustion of resources and pollution of the environment.
Kenneth E. Boulding
Image
[The question for the behavioral disciplines is simply] what is better, and how do we get there?
Kenneth E. Boulding
Image
Are we to regard the world of nature simply as a storehouse to be robbed for the immediate benefit of man? ... Does man have any responsibility for the preservation of a decent balance in nature, for the preservation of rare species, or even for the indefinite continuance of his race?
Kenneth E. Boulding
Image
In any evolutionary process, even in the arts, the search for novelty becomes corrupting.
Kenneth E. Boulding
Image
[The loss-of-strength gradient is] the degree to which military and political power diminishes as we move a unit distance away from its home base.
Kenneth E. Boulding
Image
Physicists only talk to physicists, economists to economists-worse still, nuclear physicists only talk to nuclear physicists and econometricians to econometricians. One wonders sometimes if science will not grind to a stop in an assemblage of walled-in hermits, each mumbling to himself words in a private language that only he can understand.
Kenneth E. Boulding
Image
All knowledge is gained through an orderly loss of information.
Kenneth E. Boulding
Image
Mathematicians themselves set up standards of generality and elegance in their exposition which are a bar to understand.
Kenneth E. Boulding
Image
The greater the penalties laid on sellers in the black market... the higher the black market price.
Kenneth E. Boulding
Image
Conflict may be defined as a situation of competition in which the parties are aware of the incompatibility of potential future positions, and in which each party wishes to occupy a position that is incompatible with the wishes of the other.
Kenneth E. Boulding
Image
One advantage of exhibiting a hierarchy of systems in this way is that it gives us some idea of the present gaps in both theoretical and empirical knowledge. Adequate theoretical models extend up to about the fourth level, and not much beyond. Empirical knowledge is deficient at practically all levels.
Kenneth E. Boulding