================= HES POSTING =========================== 
 
> This from Ron Stanfield  
> Marshall was very leery of the use of mathematics in economics. The lineage  
> of the formalist rev is not from Camridge Sch but Walras. 
> 
 
Certainly, Marshall was leery of mathematics and formalism in general. 
The substance of his work is evidence of that. Nevertheless, Marshall's 
institutional contribution to the discipline's evolution, which was 
fundamental, played its own part in the ascendancy of formalism. 
 
Marshall spent his life looking for empirical detail which would  
conform to his ambitions (a priorist?) for a universalist theoretical  
domain.  Ultimately, he failed in this. He passed on the theory,  
increasingly devoid of the empirics (who reads Industry and Trade  
these days?); or at least future generations picked up what they  
wanted. 
 
Along the way, however, Marshall achieved a decisive victory against the 
English historical economists (anti-formalist warriors par excellence), 
and passed his mantle on to the tedious Pigou. Joan Robinson's tedious 
Economics of Imperfect Competition maintained the rot. 
 
D H MacGregor (who?) (for a Cambridge type) had a better vision of the  
industrial process, and look what happened to him.  Cast into the  
outer darkness. 
 
Other non-English-speaking people had a tolerable understanding too (e.g.  
Herman Levy) but they were German, etc. so they didn't count. 
 
Evan Jones 
============ FOOTER TO HES POSTING ============ 
For information, send the message "info HES" to [log in to unmask]