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Jevons’s Debt to Bentham: Mathematical Economy, Morals and Psychology
Author(s) -
Sigot Nathalie
Publication year - 2002
Publication title -
the manchester school
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.361
H-Index - 42
eISSN - 1467-9957
pISSN - 1463-6786
DOI - 10.1111/1467-9957.00295
Subject(s) - utilitarianism , mill , section (typography) , economics , feeling , debt , interpretation (philosophy) , mathematical economics , positive economics , epistemology , philosophy , calculus (dental) , computer science , engineering , macroeconomics , mechanical engineering , medicine , linguistics , dentistry , operating system
The aim of this paper is to show that Jevons’s utilitarianism is to be related to his attempt to build a mathematical theory of economics: the ‘ felicific calculus ’ provides the instrument for transforming sensations into quantities. The first section shows that Jevons referred to Bentham’s calculus but made it much simpler to enable the mathematical instrument to be introduced. The second section is devoted to his rejection of Mill’s attempt to make utilitarianism a morally reasonable philosophy by introducing qualities of feelings. But I endeavour to show that avoiding Mill’s interpretation did not mean that Jevons gave up on moral matters.