Talk:Marginal utility/Archive 4

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Nope

I have got 'round to looking back at this article after being away from it for a while, and the lede is back to insinuating intrinsic quantification into the definition. I plan to fix this at some point in the foreseeable future. —SlamDiego_←T 07:41, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

Introduction is unneccesarily complex

The introduction is way too complex to explain what marginal utility. Marginal utility is easiest defined against Total Utility rather than using an vague sentence that makes almost no sense. 86.143.19.22 (talk) 11:13, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Absolutely. It is far too complex. Many users have complained about this, including myself. In July 2007 I proposed the following introduction---

In economics, under the assumption of cardinal utility, the marginal utility of a good or service is the increase in utility obtained by consuming or using one more unit of that good or service. However, this apparently simple definition hides some subtle philosophical issues. In particular, many economic thinkers argue that utility is not quantifiable: even if we can say that one consumption basket is more desirable than another, that does not imply that there is any meaningful scale of units to measure satisfaction or happiness. Therefore, "how much utility increases" when one more unit of some good is consumed is, according to this argument, a meaningless question.

Unfortunately, User:SlamDiego insists on maintaining this page according to his/her own criteria (which, if I understand correctly, reflect an Austrian school point of view). He/she has objected repeatedly to many users' attempts to improve readability. --Rinconsoleao (talk) 11:27, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Well, I would think that with the studies he/she has embarked upon, the importance of clarity in communication and texts is paramount. Unfortunately, seems a personal agenda is more priori. 86.143.19.22 (talk) 11:38, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

My “personal” agenda is simply that the definition be correct. —SlamDiego_←T 15:34, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

No, that's a willful misrepresentation of what I've been doing. What I have insisted is that quantification not be treated (explicitly or implicitly) as part of the general definition of marginal utility, because it isn't. The problem has been that people unfamiliar with the literature (other than the neoclassical literature) know only the the neoclassical view and think that they are simplifying the definition and principles when they are in fact over-simplifying them. Further, the lede was most complex after two neoclassical economists had at it (and buried the simple general definition under a circuitous paragraph of predefinitions); then neither of those two did anything after someone else came along and “simplified” the lede by removing from it that exposition of the general definiton, turning the lede back into a presentation of only the neoclassical conception. —SlamDiego_←T 15:34, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Two errors were noted in your definition above. The most easily understood is the reference to “one more unit” — a unit is a regular change; the general concept of marginal utility does not require regular changes. The more important error is that your conception clings to a weak cardinalization of utility, confusing weakness with absence. And G_d knows that the issue of true ordinality v. weak cardinality and of unitary versus more general changes were discussed at length. —SlamDiego_←T 15:50, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

I had to fish that lede out of a long page history, so I'm not sure it was the last version. I know you had disagreements with it, in particular distinguishing 'quantified' from 'cardinal'. I would be delighted to work with you on achieving that sort of precision if you would help me achieve an introduction accessible to a wide audience. However, after previous discussions, my impression is that a sufficiently clear opening statement will not be compatible with making the opening statement an entirely general definition (if, for that matter, the latter is possible). By the way, there may have been misrepresentation above but if so it was not willful.

By the way, my personal agenda is: (1) that the article be correct; (2) that the article be neutral; (3) that the article be a useful source of information for the largest possible audience. --Rinconsoleao (talk) 18:39, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

I engaged in a very lengthy discussion with you on each and every point; now you assert, in effect, that you just forgot.

Okay, now, first, an incorrect definition is simply not acceptable. A reader left with illusory understanding is worse-off than one who knows that he or she doesn't understand the subject. And a definition of “marginal utility” that assumes even weak quantification is as wrong as a definition of “mammal” that assumes a tail.

Second, it certainly says something that you accuse me of seeking to advance the Austrian School by my insisting that the definition be correct, while the “simplifications” always operationalize as pushing the neoclassical conception.

(If I were truly seeking to push the Austrian School, then my discussion in the article of quantification would be dismissive, or I'd do the complement of what you have done, and just delete the discussion of quantification.)

Our empirical representative for the general audience, the member of Version 1.0 Editorial Team, didn't have any trouble with the definition. It's people who arrived here mistakenly believing that they already grasp the concept who have argued that it is confusing and has to be quantified (for expository purposes or otherwise). Indeed, those people too should be served, but [1] by being exposed to the general concept rather than having their narrow preconceptions reinforced, and [2] certainly not at the cost of misleading readers who do not come with those preconceptions.

I offered to work with people on making the definition more accessible while keeping it correct. Instead, a neoclassical editor buried the general definition, making it seem parallel rather than more general, and requiring the reader to wade through multiple ad hoc technical predefinitions to get to the definition; while I had to deal with lots of bad math as the other kept trying to prove, after all, that quantification was fully general, and now acts as if he forgot the whole exercise, pushes the neoclassical special case definition as the one to use, and accuses me of non-neutrality.

Bah. —SlamDiego_←T 19:41, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

My definition, shown above, is not incorrect, because it clearly refers to a special case (cardinal utility). The next paragraph then went on to discuss definitions of MU not referring to that special case. Maybe someone deleted the Austrian version, but at least in the versions I worked on after hearing your arguments, I did not delete the issue of quantification or the Austrian definition. --Rinconsoleao (talk) 18:12, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Your definition is incorrect as a definition; it leads the reader to believe that marginal utility is defined within the concept of cardinal utility, and meaningless otherwise.

As to deletion, you in fact overtly acted to truly eliminate the general explanation of the “law” of diminishing marginal utility, and you certainly did nothing when the general definition was altogether removed from the lede. —SlamDiego_←T 20:36, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

The reason my proposed simplification referred to the neoclassical conception is not because I'm a neoclassical. I don't think I am one. It's because I do, in fact, think the neoclassical conception is simpler. The neoclassical conception defines MU as a difference (or derivative, depending on context) of a function. Your definition defines MU as the value associated with minimizing over one set (of uses) while maximizing over another (of actions) subject to a restriction (inclusion of a use). Actually, I'm not sure that's right, because it's very hard to state succinctly. But that's my whole point. This (purported) 'generalization' of the concept is really pretty hard to think about. The difference in a function U at two points x0 and x1 is a much simpler concept. That's why I propose focusing first on that case, even though it is essential for accuracy to point out that it is, in fact, a special case. --Rinconsoleao (talk) 18:12, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Again, the general concept is not more complicated. Your introduction of derivatives perfectly illustrates the issue. For you and for me, the complications of the calculus are familiar and easy; but they are complications nonetheless. And they are complications with which most readers of Wikipedia are unfamiliar; thinking in terms of functions is not something with which most readers will be comfortable. (Even simple arithmetic is a complication, albeït one familiar to most readers.) You utterly misjudge what is and is not a complication, and even what is and is not easy, because you don't see the intellectual infrastructure — and you struggle to see the flaw in that infrastructure that makes it difficult for you to recognize and understand the general concept of marginal utility.

And it's certainly not proper for you to insist that the article push aside a concept when you admit that you can't even figure out whether it is in fact the concept.

I tried to set up previous discussion so that you (and anyone else who was interested) could be walked through the general concept, after which you could perhaps have come up with ways of indeed expressing that concept more accessibly. Unfortunately, you were so cock-sure that I didn't understand things and you wouldn't attend to that, and you instead saturation-bombed the discussion with what proved to be mathematical duds. And the failure of that bad math didin't dissuade you from still pushing for replacing the general concept with the neoclassical conception. —SlamDiego_←T 20:36, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

I don't know who that Editorial member was, but perhaps he/she was a noneconomist checking for grammatical correctness, without knowing what the most common introductory definition of MU is? --Rinconsoleao (talk) 18:12, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

No, the function of the Editorial Team is not to proofread. As to him not knowing what the common definition is, yeah, he probably didn't; as I keep saying, people who have been led to believe that the neoclassical conception is the general concept are, by virtue of being misled, more challenged in learning the general than those starting fresh. —SlamDiego_←T 18:23, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

No, you're insisting on a definition that hangs upon some concept (that you have not here defined) which you label “Total Utility”. It's not that the lede makes “almost no sense”; it is merely that it doesn't fit your preconceptions. —SlamDiego_←T 15:34, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

You're arguing it be correct, I'm arguing that you're not understanding what the purpose of an introduction IS. An introduction shouldn't be the place to take into account every possible caveat in defining subjects; I have never seen in any of the books in other subjects that I've ever read, other than as juxtaposition to a standard definition. Although there are exceptions and other circumstances in the field of Nucleophilic substitution or Polarity, their definitions aren't rewritten to accomodate these exceptions because it defeats the purpose of what an introduction is. I don't see where the confusion is in this matter - you're by NO means a stupid person.

“ a preliminary thing, such as an explanatory section at the beginning of a book. ”

"introduction" -- Oxford English Dictionary

“ adjective preceding or done in preparation for something fuller or more important.
ORIGIN -- Latin praeliminaris, from prae ‘before’ + limen ‘threshold’. ”

"preliminary"-- Oxford English Dictionary

For users which are wanting to read this article to get a ramp into what Marginal Utility is, the old version although indeed correct just seems too complex and accomodating -- I know we're in the "business" of keeping things accurate here, but this shouldn't overwhelm one's rise to logic. If there is a problem with the definitions between neoclassical and possible conflicting theories, then I don't see why they can't precede the standard. I don't think that there are people who are consciously biased towards a particular field of Economics as I'm generaly not that skeptical. 86.151.222.13 (talk) 20:10, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Your claim that I do “not understanding what the purpose of an introduction IS” is foolish, and your quotations are not to-the-point.

1. Again: A person who is misled is worse-off than one who realizes that he or she doesn't understand. I have repeatedly agreed that the definition would ideally be more accessible, but the lede is indeed an explanation, and it is sometimes the only part of the article with which a reader will bother. It even more important that this lede not assert that utility is quantified than that the lede for mammals not define them as having tails.
2. Again: I have repeatedly declared mysedf as in favor of any definition that is more accessible than the present definition, so long as that definition is correct. No one on this talk page or in an edit to the article has presented a definition that is correct and more transparent. Instead, there has been a consistent pattern of attempts to erase or obscure the general concept, and to present the neoclassical conception as if it is the general concept.
3. Again: The editor for the Version 1.0 Editorial Team had no problem with the “old” definition, so the issue of transparency has been exaggerated. The people having trouble are those with a prior exposure to the neoclassical paradigm. These people should be served, but not at the cost of reinforcing narrow conceptions nor of impairing the ability of those without such prior exposure to think more generally.

As a matter of logic, I would also note that the neoclassical conception is in fact the more complicated — it imposes the additional (albeit familiar) structure of quantity. The general concept is not more complex; it is more abstract, which is the very nature of generality.

—SlamDiego_←T 20:43, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

But who's being misled? The alternatives we have offered have all made clear that they are NOT fully general, and have attempted to build in the complexities of the concept gradually. Of course it would be wrong to say "MU is the difference in utility associated with consuming one more unit" without any further discussion. But that's not what the alternative versions have done, is it? --Rinconsoleao (talk) 18:23, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

No, there it was not made clear that the definition was not fully general in the most of of what you have offered, including the most recent definition (which leads the reader to believe that marginal utility is defined in the context of cardinal utility (and that he or she must know what the ____ “cardinal” means before learning the concept). In others, you misled the reader into thinking that the generalization arose from the Benthamite notion. And (since you write of “we”), your alternatives, instead of building to the general conception, treated it as a parallel conception, and buried it in predefinitions which ensured that few weould read and virtually none could understand it. —SlamDiego_←T 20:53, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Again, I have to insist, the definition I offer above is correct, because it explicitly warns that it is not general. Generalizations should be discussed later on if they are more complicated. --Rinconsoleao (talk) 18:50, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

No, it certainly does not explicitly warn them. Again, you mistake what you're actually doing, because you don't see the intellectual infrastructure. —SlamDiego_←T 20:53, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, 86, for making a great point. Personally I suspect that if we demanded the level of correctness and generality Slam is insisting on, almost every page in Wikipedia would start with a paragraph a thousand words long. Most concepts (especially complicated philosophical concepts like utility) have many caveats requiring clarification in order to be fully (if at all possible!!) correct. A good encyclopedia article, in the opinion of many people who have looked at the MU article, is one that starts with the simplest explanation possible, and then builds on sophistication over the course of the discussion. --Rinconsoleao (talk) 18:23, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

First, stop inserting comments out-of-order. When you do so, you make it difficult if not impossible for anyone to later come along and follow the discourse.

Second, how would you view it if a simplification theory were used to rationalize pushing the labor theory of value by some of the same people who had previously pushed it based upon a claim that it were correct? (Y'know why Ricardo used the labor theory of value? Not because he thought that it was correct, but because he thought that it was a highly useful simplification.) —SlamDiego_←T 18:38, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

My understanding is that utility is a model used to analyze human behavior. All models are simplifications. Whether a given simplification is acceptable in a given context depends on the question at hand-- i.e. does it simply help one arrive at a clear answer (good) or does it tend to qualitatively change the answer obtained (bad)? So I see no problem with Ricardo's use of that assumption for the questions he analyzed when he analyzed them. --Rinconsoleao (talk) 18:49, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

It is a very great mistake to confuse a model with the thing modelled. The neoclassical conception is a model of utility. (Whether the conception is thus a model-of-a-model is a question that we can perhaps set aside.)

An answer can be clear but wrong; and it can certainly be clear while qualitatively different.

The article by Mc Culloch (referenced in the article and in previous discussion) demonstrates that the neoclassical conception precludes rational orderings that the general conception does not; hence, there is a qualitative difference introduced by the neoclassical model.

(There would also be a resultant need in the article to discuss the issue of proxies to deal with the standard criticisms of marginal utility theory, which challenge the existence of utility.)

The question is not whether one can get away with using a labor theory of value in some contexts. The question is of how one would feel seeing advocates of the labor theory reach for one excuse after another to rewrite the economic articles in Wikipedia (or the like) to presume said theory. —SlamDiego_←T 19:12, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

BTW, here's a really easy conception of marginal utility for the typical reader to grasp:

The marginal utility of a good or service is the amount by which pleasure or pain would be increased or decreased by a given increase or decrease in the good or service.

That's not only a bona fide conception, it's basically the one with which Jevons was working. (Bear in mind that he inheritted his notion of utility from John Stuart Mill.) Yet I haven't seen anyone suggesting that the lede begin with this narrow, easy conception. Instead, there is the attempt to have the lede begin with the present neoclassical conception, in which the earlier neoclassical relationship has been stood on its head (so that cardinal “utility” proxies preferences). So far, no one is arguing for starting with that far easier early British idea, and I'd be surprised if anyone seriously did, because easiness isn't a G_d to which to make such sacrifices. —SlamDiego_←T 21:55, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

The definition above sounds pretty good to me. Would you have any problem with amending it as follows:

The marginal utility of a good or service is the amount by which utility would be increased or decreased by a given increase or decrease in the good or service.

I would not object to a lede of that sort, providing that the article then goes on to discuss various ways in which those concepts have been more rigorously developed. --Rinconsoleao (talk) 09:19, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

You're deliberately ducking the issue of easiness now. You want to insist that utility be presented as quantified because that's easy; well, it's easier still for the layperson to conceptualize utility as pleasure or as the reduction of pain. You won't go that far (despite the historical precedent) because you're only in favor of easiness to the extent that it advances the conception with which you have been most familiar and comfortable. (And, again, the Austrian School conception did not develop from the British conception.) —SlamDiego_←T 17:22, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Thanks

Thank you, Slam. Your new introductory sentence vastly improves the readability of the definition you offer. I think it should be accessible to the typical reader. --Rinconsoleao (talk) 09:08, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

Glad it was resolved. Boy, what a strange breed us humans are. 86.130.155.136 (talk) 15:39, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

I remain open to anything that will increase accessibility while not introducing error or otherwise misleading the reader. —SlamDiego_←T 18:53, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

I'm a random user who has very little economic background. I really want to understand marginal utility and its implications without taking an entire college course on economics. I'm by no means unintelligent or uneducated, but I still can't understand this concept based on the wiki. Could somebody explain it in plain english here, and then maybe it can be worked into an understandable article? I feel that there's too much economic jargon, even if it seems simple enough to someone well-versed in economics. 74.46.62.234 (talk) 11:48, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

First, you need to understand that simplicity and accessibility are not the same thing. The introduction used to be very simple, with no special economics jargon, but many editors had difficulty with the resultant level of abstraction. It would be unacceptable to get both simplicity and accessibility by discarding truth, saying that marginal utility were something that it's not. And economics jargon is a way of packing ideas into a few words. If we never pack anything, then the introduction becomes a monstrous whale.

If each of the major schools of thought that made use of a notion of marginal utility had been careful, then I could give you an uncontroversial explanation of a common conception of the general concept. That didn't happen. But I'll try to give you a clearer idea.

When you're just gotten something or are considering getting something, like a can of soda, there is one or more possible uses to which you could put that specific can. The use to which you would/will put that can is its marginal use. The usefulness (however you judge usefulness) of that use is the marginal utility of that can.

When you're considering giving up something, or have been made to give up something, like an old hat, there was some use to which you put that specific hat; that use was its marginal use. The usefulness (however you judge usefulness) of that use is the marginal utility of that hat.

Now, what I just told you wouldn't be accepted as an introduction to this article, because the mainstream rarely if ever mentions or considers the notion of use in their discuss of utility. That notion lurks implicitly and unrecognized, because of confusions primarily located amongst the British marginalists, which continue into mainstream economics. In mainstream economics, they either think of utility as a quantified happiness, or they think of it as an any quantified proxy that fits preferences, and marginal utility is then the arithmetic difference in utility between having something and not having it. —SlamDiego_←T 20:04, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

I'm still confused by the definition (first sentence). The second sentence doesn't help either. I'm also confused by the word "agent". Who is the agent? Perhaps it would dumb things down too much, but an example would help a lot. I will note that IMHO, this article is vastly more understandable, much more understandable with a good example: http://www.investopedia.com/university/economics/economics5.asp Clemwang (talk) 18:41, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

There are many theoretically possible agents. Alternative general terms such as “actor” don't strike me as improvements, though perhaps someone could suggest something. Examples are provided later in the article.

The article at Investopedia may be easier to understand, but it is also, flatly, wrong. It is wrong because it treats a particular conception as if it is the general concept. (As if one could define “dog” with “Weimaraner”.) Read the section of this article entitled “Utility”; there are three notions of utility noted. The editors at Investopedia act as if the third of these notions (utility as quantified proxy for preference) is the general concept; in that context, they go on to presume that marginal utility is an arithmetic difference. Misrepresentation is never clarification.

Some relevant Wikipedia policies and guidelines are these:

• “Wikipedia is an encyclopedic reference, not a textbook. The purpose of Wikipedia is to present facts, not to teach subject matter.”
• “The lead should be able to stand alone as a concise overview of the article.”
• “While consideration should be given to creating interest in reading more of the article, the lead nonetheless should not ‘tease’ the reader by hinting at—but not explaining—important facts that will appear later in the article.”
• “The lead should contain no more than four paragraphs,”

If you're looking for a most accessible presentation of just the same special case conception as Investopedia confuses with the general concept, this Wikipedia article is not the place to look. This article is about and presents the general concept, and does not focus on the special case of quantified utility and arithmetic difference until it has explained the general concept without such assumptions.

On the other hand, if you have a suggestion for an example that could somehow truly clarify the article and not violate policy, then by all means present it on this talk page for consideration. —SlamDiego_←T 00:21, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Images

The article is of mighty nice quality. However I think it looks a little bit boring, I believe an appropiate image or two would redeem this. Any opinions? Lord Metroid (talk) 19:58, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

It really depends upon what sort of images one proposes to put here. —SlamDiego_←T 07:25, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

I have got no real good idea, maybe an image showing how value of a goods owner decreases with the number of goods he has or some other relationship. I want to try to promote this article to a good article and one of the criterias is images. Lord Metroid (talk) 08:49, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

Well, first, I think that there are some issues in the writing that need to be addressed before this article is nominated as a GA.

Most attempts to graphically depict a decrease in utility would embrace quantification. I've now dropped a graph in to the “Quantification of marginal utility” section, with a caption that makes it plain that there is a quantification assumption. Attempts to depict the relationship at a higher level of generality would involve digraphs confusing to most readers.

Other possible illustrations could be pictures of some of the important marginalists. —SlamDiego_←T 10:06, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

I've dropped-in some pics of economic thinkers, each by a section which mentions him. (In the section on the Marginal Revolution, I made a point of selecting three economists to represent each of the three major schools — British (Jevons), Lausanne (Pareto), and Austrian (Böhm-Bawerk).) It would be nice to have a picture of Slutsky, of Hicks, or of Allen, to illustrate the “Eclipse” section. —SlamDiego_←T 10:58, 23 February 2008 (UTC)

When I was putting those pictures into the article, I accidentally copied a section header to where it certainly didn't belong. Some other editor partially corrected that (by revising the header), but I've deleted my spurious insertion altogether. —SlamDiego_←T 12:46, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

The graph uses MU and TU on the key, and U and Q on the axes, but g is used in the text, not Q, and TU is not defined. I think I know what is meant, but could it be clarified? JBel (talk) 21:43, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

We should probably create a relabelled clone of that chart (which was created for a different article), for this article. For what it's worth, the “$Q$” is equivalent to the “$g$”, and the “$TU$” stands for “total utility”. —SlamDiego_←T 01:36, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

I hacked-out a clone, discarding most of the chart-junk, making it an SVG, and replacing the mysterious letters with English-language titles and legends. —SlamDiego_←T 04:06, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

Risk Aversion: Equivalence v. Implication

It might not be transparent why I have altered the claim that diminishing marginal utility is equivalent to risk aversion, to a claim that it implies risk aversion.

I am used to discourse in which “risk aversion” is a name (rather than a description), in which case indeed diminishing marginal utility is equivalent to risk aversion, but the present form of the article “Risk aversion” treats “risk aversion” as a description. Diminishing marginal utility is then only equivalent to risk aversion under the assumption that utility is linear in the probabilities. —SlamDiego_←T 21:27, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

Could I see the source for that above statement? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Extropian13 (talk • contribs) 23:41, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

Which above statement? As to the source for the claim as to how the the Wikipdia article uses “risk aversion”, see the article itself. As to the way that most mainstream texts define “risk aversion”, see any standard text that treats “choice under uncertainty”, such as Microeconomic Theory by Mas-Collel, Whinston, and Green. —SlamDiego_←T 05:22, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

The entire passage starting and ending here:

"I am used to discourse in which “risk aversion” is a name (rather than a description), in which case indeed diminishing marginal utility is equivalent to risk aversion, but the present form of the article “Risk aversion” treats “risk aversion” as a description. Diminishing marginal utility is then only equivalent to risk aversion under the assumption that utility is linear in the probabilities."

Also I am not asking about the definition of risk aversion but for evidence indicating how risk aversion is treated as an equivalent as opposed to being descriptive. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.197.139.250 (talk) 01:09, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

That entire passage is multiple statements, which is why, when you referred to “that above statement”, I asked for which. In any case, I gave you to the answer to the question that you now ask: “any standard text that treats ‘choice under uncertainty’, such as Microeconomic Theory by Mas-Collel, Whinston, and Green”. —SlamDiego_←T 15:00, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

It is multiple statements centered around a specific theme, which is what makes it a passage. In any event can you provide a link or citation for purposes of verification? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Extropian13 (talk • contribs) 01:34, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

You as for “the source for that above statement”. And you've twice been directed to a citation for the statement upon which you later focussed (once before you had in fact focussed upon it.) —SlamDiego_←T 07:42, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

You are regressing to a repetition of the conclusion in which I am asking for the premise. I am asking for your basis of equation as opposed implication. You have thus far responded with nothing but the "evidence exists somewhere". —Preceding unsigned comment added by Extropian13 (talk • contribs) 06:49, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

No, I've not simply said that evidence exists somewhere; I've told you specifically where you can look (and this despite your gross failure to clearly state what you sought). If you are demanding a tutorial on this point of economic theory; then I will first ask what is to be my reward for providing it to you. I'm not in the habit of providing that much free education to people who act in the manner that you do. —SlamDiego_←T 12:56, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

Misrepresenting Marxism

The Marginal Revolution and Marxism

"In his critique of political economy, Marx discussed “use-value”, a concept analogous to utility:

   A use-value has value only in use, and is realized only in the process of consumption. One and the same use-value can be used in various ways. But the extent of its possible application is limited by its existence as an object with distinct properties. It is, moreover, determined not only qualitatively but also quantitatively. Different use-values have different measures appropriate to their physical characteristics; for example, a bushel of wheat, a quire of paper, a yard of linen.[35]

He acknowledged that the value of a commodity is dependent on the use that can be garnered from it,[36] but, in his analysis, utility was considered as all or nothing; it was unnecessary to describe variable use-value; to Marx labor was the ultimate source of value."

I fail to see how Marx is saying use value is all or none in the above. That sounds like something you have read into it. Indeed the statement "One and the same use-value can be used in various ways." implies relative utility, which may or may not be subject to diminishing returns. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Extropian13 (talk • contribs)

First, you should know that the passage of interpretation to which you object was inserted by a Marxist. (You fellows trip over each other in your various interpretations and attempts to defend Marx.) Now, that prior Marxist didn't claim that the interpretation was of the quoted passage. (It might have been excised as redundant in that case.) But it's fairly easy to find exactly this interpretation in standard sources. If you want to call for a citation, it should be easy to find if someone cares to protect that sentence. —SlamDiego_←T 05:35, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

You should know as well as anyone that Marxists engage in heavy disagreements among themselves, though I fail to see how whether or not it was a Marxist that inserted the passage strengthens your interpretation. Perhaps if you can point out the specific Marxist writer you are referring to it would help.

In any event, it would be helpful if you found that interpretation. Since it is easy you should be able to do so rather quickly. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.197.139.250 (talk) 00:58, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

Pretty much everyone knwos that Marxists cannot agree amongst themselves. And what Marxists need to take ownership of their own disagreement. Instead, you do just the exact opposite, and refer to it as “your interpretation”, even in the face of being informed that it was inserted by a Marxist.

As to it being helpful, I don't have a pronounced felt need to help one side or another amongst the Marxists who agrue over how to salvage Marxism. —SlamDiego_←T 15:04, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

What are you talking about take "ownership" of a disagreement? That sounds like a non-argument. Do you have any other basis for arguing against a relative interpretation of Marx's passage or are you finally ready to concede the point? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Extropian13 (talk • contribs) 01:35, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

The obvious point is that you misrepresent an argument amongst Marxists as an attack originating amongst non-Marxists — even in the wake of admitting to the existence of such internal arguments. —SlamDiego_←T 07:45, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Irrelevant. The fact is you have no basis for your narrow interpretation. In any event can you present a citation, since as you yourself noted " it should be easy to find". —Preceding unsigned comment added by Extropian13 (talk • contribs) 06:50, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

No, your persistent attempt to disown the dispute (once again repeated with your calling it “your narrow interpretation”) is not the principal issue, but it certainly is relevant, exactly because you keep trying to hang the albatross around non-Marxist necks.

As to the principal issue, I'd already responded that it didn't much matter to me whether that statement stayed on not. On the one hand, that assertion anchors the whole passage to the section. On the other hand, the whole passage (quotation and interpretative assertion) was inserted into the section by a Marxist trying to champion Marxism; I just don't much care whether Marx's gropings are noted. If another Marxist (or quasi-Marxist) makes the case that the passage should go, or (what would amount to the same thing) that it should be altered in a way which makes it plainly irrelevant to the article, then I would be no more concerned than if a passage defending a Thomistic theory of value were removed. *shrug*

None-the-less, it is (as I said) fairly easy to find support for the interpretation. One finds this interpretation, for example, in Sweezy's Theory of Capitalist Development. (Whether one further accepts Sweezy's more aggressive explusion of use-value — and whether his critics read that explusion correctly — is another matter.) Marx noted that utility is a necessary though not sufficient condition for market value in Capital V1 Ch 1 §1; yet he actually attempts to find the measure of value in physical units (of labor); thus we often get the interpretation (as with that passage) that utility just plays a thumbs-up-or-down rôle. —SlamDiego_←T 13:30, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

An unwarranted generalization

This passage:

"Marginalists explain that costs of production may be what limit supply, but that these costs of production are themselves sacrificed marginal uses, and will not be borne when they are expected to exceed the marginal use of what is produced. In other words, the marginalist certainly does not explain price as a simple function of the marginal utility of a single good for one person or for some “average” person, but nonetheless insists that it results from the trade-offs that each participant would be willing to make for the various goods and services at stake, with those trade-offs being determined by marginal uses. The critics who believe that costs of production determine price, by assuming a demand that will bear the cost, have begged the essential question that the marginalists purport to answer."

Constitutes both circular reasoning, and Original Research. No source is given for the above. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Extropian13 (talk • contribs) 23:16, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

No, it's certainly neither circular reasoning nor “original research”. The immediately previous Whatley quote

It is not that pearls fetch a high price because men have dived for them; but on the contrary, men dive for them because they fetch a high price.

says much of what is said above, and the rest is simply a matter of noting the difference between marginal values and average values, and the standard economic conception of cost as forgone opportunity. (See, for example, L.S.E. Essays on Cost, edited by James M. Buchanan.) —SlamDiego_←T 08:30, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

The Whitley quote is not circular, the argument as a whole based upon the quote is what is circular. The argument is to counter the criticism that the cost of production may explain increased price as an alternative to marginal utility. Countering that cost of production is itself equivalent to marginal utility ignores Ricardo's original criticism:

http://www.econlib.org/LIBRARY/Ricardo/ricP.html

I hope you are not going to call the above reference "original research". —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.197.139.250 (talk) 01:04, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, no, you're simply grossly misunderstanding what Whately said; the circle lies in your conception of cost. Ricardo certainly never confronted marginalism, though he attempted to deal with utility-based theories with which he was familiar. I suspect that Ricardo would have been intelligent enough to understand that his arguments against those older theories would not do against the marginalist explanation. —SlamDiego_←T 15:18, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

Those are all assumption on your part and you are still ignoring the key passage from Ricardo's argument which distinguishes the cost of production from supply and demand. The key distinguishing feature is that the price of the cost of production has an absolute bottom limit, after which if the price at which you sell a commodity no longer pays for the cost of production, such production will eventually be impossible. This shows the cost of production is something qualitatively distinct from supply and demand, and merely answering that argument by saying "it is supply and demand" constitutes begging the question. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Extropian13 (talk • contribs)

No, I'm not ignoring key passages of Ricardo; I'm reading them in the context of my being an actual economist who actually understands marginalism. You argument is perfectly analogous to the many that come from creationists, who are often quite sure that they understand the theory of evolution and have spotted this-or-that fatal flaw in it. They too project their own circles upon their opponents' theory. The immediate problem is that you haven't grasped (however much you have reached) the point:

Marginalists explain that costs of production may be what limit supply, but that these costs of production are themselves sacrificed marginal uses, and will not be borne when they are expected to exceed the marginal use of what is produced.

Certainly rational people will not make X if its value is exceeded by the factors of its production, but the value of those factors is determined by the other things that they might do — alternative potential marginal uses. The cost of a factor of production is the value of the best use to which it might otherwise be put. (I have already cited for you a collection of essays on the subject of cost.) Ricardo saw a part of that (hence his theory of rent), but saw only part of it. —SlamDiego_←T 08:00, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

"and will not be borne when they are expected to exceed the marginal use of what is produced." That is the crux of your argument and it ignores the fact that what differentiates the cost of production from supply and demand is that the former can have a set minimum, whereas the later may not. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Extropian13 (talk • contribs) 06:53, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

Nope. For example, knowing that physical process of production corresponds to $q(f_{1},f_{2},\ldots ,f_{n})$ is not adequate for computing the cost of $q$. If we indeed knew the cost of each $f_{i}$, then we could infer the cost of the product, but the question then is whence these costs. if we knew every possible production function for every possible product, that still wouldn't be enough, to cost anything, because we'd have to know how to prioritize what to produce (since some acts of production preclude others). With such prioritization, the cost of each $f_{i}$ could then be seen as a sacrificed priority. Ultimately, cost (the price of factors of production) are thus to be rationally determined by the price of products, rather than the other way around. The interactions of supply curves and demand curves across the various products (final or productive) allow the transmission of information for pricing even when participants don't recognize the causal flow. —SlamDiego_←T 14:06, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

Why Was My Argument Deleted?

I made a good counter argument on how the creation of artificial diamonds would lower prices, and thus vindicate the labor theory of value determined by the cost of production. This argument was deleted from the criticisms section with no reason given. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Extropian13 (talk • contribs) 23:09, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

Also the above argument is not "Original Research" and thus violates no policy. It is based on another wiki article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthetic_diamond which itself has numerous references at the bottom. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Extropian13 (talk • contribs) 23:14, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

You need to carefully read the Wikipedia policy on “original research”. A novel synthesis is not acceptable. Worse, what contributes to the novelty of your counter-argument is that it doesn't work for a relevant purpose — it doesn't rebut marginalism. Showing that the LTV could accommodate an outcome is only here of interest if marginalism could not. As it is, marginalism has a clear explanation as to why new technologies (or a change in the physical laws of the universe) could result in a lowered price for diamonds. —SlamDiego_←T 05:50, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

I think you need to carefully consider your criticisms. The fact of the matter is the wiki I am sourcing does itself have references I can merely quote as opposed to the wiki. I was hoping you would be able to make such a simple deduction on your own, but alas you seem interested in artificially protracting the discussion. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.197.139.250 (talk) 01:06, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

When you write “the wiki I am sourcing”, it is literally gibberish, and the reader is forced to guess what you intend to say. In any event, the argument in question is incompetent, and we have no reason to take on trust your declaration that you can find such an argument a “reliable source”. —SlamDiego_←T 15:28, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

Why exactly is "Chemical and Engineering News" not a reliable source?

http://pubs.acs.org/cen/coverstory/8205/8205diamonds.html —Preceding unsigned comment added by Extropian13 (talk • contribs) 01:40, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, we needn't much worry whether Chemical and Engineering News is “reliable source” for an economics article unless it is going to make the claims of economic theory that you want to make:

the creation of artificial diamonds would lower prices, and thus vindicate the labor theory of value determined by the cost of production

It doesn't do so in the article that you cite. As I stated earlier, “[s]howing that the LTV could accommodate an outcome is only here of interest if marginalism could not.” —SlamDiego_←T 08:10, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Wow. So what you are saying is that because the article does not explicitly say "the lower price of artificial diamonds demonstrates the labor theory of value" verbatim that it is not so. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Extropian13 (talk • contribs) 06:55, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

In a sense, yes; but it doesn't say that because the conclusion doesn't follow. (Even a more general conclusion of cost-based pricing doesn't really follow.)

Again, there is an analogy here with creationism. The creationists are often convinced that this or that conclusion is an obvious consequence of some set of facts, when it is no such thing, nor even a correct inference from those facts. —SlamDiego_←T 14:11, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

Actually since the concept of marginal utility is completely subjective, even by your own admittance, I would say it has a lot more in common with creationism then my empirical argument.

Second, you are arguing that the creation of artificial diamonds does not refute the concept of marginal utility, but if so, what other conclusion can we come to? The very concept of marginal utility is rooted in the demand for diamonds, not supply. Simply put, the first is more valuable then the second for, as you said "subjective" reasons. Now you are saying even if we can make it so the first has a lower value, and value stays relatively consistent in the market place, we can still presume the price is determined by marginal utility. So basically whether diamonds raise, or lower in value as labor to procure them is increased or decreased- no matter what- this is evidence of marginal utility. To me that sounds like an ad hoc excuse which bares the concept from being empirically testable from the onset. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.220.23.229 (talk) 16:32, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

No one here has admitted that the concept of marginal utility is completely subjective. If it were, then it would be impossible to discuss it.

The concept of marginal utility is not rooted in demand; rather, demand is derived from marginal utility. Further, supply is in fact complementary demand. So you're utterly off the rails in your argument here. —SlamDiego_←T 03:56, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

Natural Logarithm => Logarithm ??

• Hi
• The article says: "Each had sought to resolve the St. Petersburg paradox, and had concluded that the marginal desirability of money decreased as it was accumulated, more specifically such that the desirability of a sum were the natural logarithm (Bernoulli) or square root (Cramer) thereof."
• does it make any sense for the desirability of a sum to be specifically the natural logarithm, and not just a general logarithm? (doesn't matter what base, changing logarithm base is just multiplying by a constant)
• I googled for "Daniel Bernoulli marginal logarithm" and all first four entries said it's the logarithm or a logarithmic function. none of these said he talked about specifically the natural logarithm:

Google Search Rank	URL	Quote
1st	http://www.bun.kyoto-u.ac.jp/phisci/Gallery/D.bernoulli_note.html	Daniel thought that the value of any amout of money is determined relative to one's whole wealth ... This makes y a logarithmic functin of x
2nd	http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/paradox-stpetersburg/	He went on to suggest that a realistic measure of the utility of money might be given by the logarithm of the money amount
3rd	http://cepa.newschool.edu/het/essays/uncert/bernoulhyp.htm	Bernoulli originally used a logarithmic function
4th	http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?MarginalUtility	Let U(m) be the utility (i.e. the desirability) of an amount of money ... U(.) is a slowly increasing function, and roughly logarithmic

• Thanks, User:yairchu
  • Bernoulli's actual article specifically used a natural logarithm. He could have used a more general logarithm; any other logarithm would have been an affine transform of the natural logarithm, and therefore the same relevant results would have obtained. —SlamDiego_←T 01:30, 27 July 2008 (UTC)
    • Would be an affine transform with translation of zero, i.e a linear transform. Do you have the quote from the actual article? thanks —Preceding unsigned comment added by Yairchu (talk • contribs) 05:08, 1 August 2008 (UTC)
      • A translation of his article was printed in Econometrica 22 (1954). You can find it in any good university library system. I don't know where my own copy is right now. —SlamDiego_←T 07:12, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Decreasing marginal utility, increasing marginal utility, and arithmetic

This string of edits result in presumption that utility must be quantified for there to be a violation of the “law” of diminishing marginal utility, or at least that it must be quantified for marginal utility to be in any sense increasing. That's simply not the case; the only thing required for diminishing marginal utility is that

$e_{n+1}\prec e_{n}$

where $e_{i}$ is the best possible use of the $i$ unit of the good or service. The only thing required for increasing marginal utility is that

$e_{n+1}\succ e_{n}$

And the examples presented do not require quantification to be explained or even in themselves imply quantification. (And if they had implied quantification, then the exposition should have exhibited the quantification if it were labelling the utility “cardinal”.) —SlamDiego_←T 14:37, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

The model with values $e_{i}$ seems to assume that an individual has a number of independent potential uses of a good or service and that only one unit can be used for each, where independence of these uses means that the utility of each use does not depend on application of other units for other uses (actually [1] uses the term "unrelated"). This is an interesting theory, but it seems that in many cases these assumptions do not apply. For example, the same person drinking a second ration of water is not independent/unrelated to drinking the first. In the examples I gave in the article these assumptions do no not apply either. Without these assumptions, and with ordinal utility only, it is not clear what "diminishing return" means.--Patrick (talk) 07:41, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, no.

1. $e_{i}$ is just the marginal use; it is at least implicit in any model of behavior. In your drinking example, the first drink of water is $e_{n}$ and the second drink is $e_{n+1}$.
2. An assignment of a quantity of satisfaction to $e_{n}$ and another to $e_{n+1}$ such that the first is greater than the second will necessarily imply $e_{n+1}\prec e_{n}$ for some relationship $\prec ~$; thus, the ordering relationship amongst the marginal uses is also always at least implicit.
3. While, in combination with economic rationality, an assumption of what McCulloch calls “unrelatedness” is sufficient for $e_{n+1}\prec e_{n}$, it is not a necessary condition.
4. What McCulloch calls “unrelatedness” isn't the a sort of independence that precludes the second glass of water being used for a second drink by the same person. Underlying such satiation are the uses to which the body puts (or, in some sense, expects to put) the additional resources.
5. Quantification doesn't, in fact, serve to explain cases of $e_{n+1}\prec e_{n}$ or of $e_{n+1}\succ e_{n}$ at all. It is simply a representation, and representation is all for which mainstream economic theory typically now uses it. (Any standard graduate text on microeconomic theory will simply present a quantification that it calls “utility” as a proxy for preferences. Unfortunately, that representation is not without loss of generality (and, additionally, many people are all too eager to impute further significances to it that cannot be justified).)
6. Although people are used to a presumption that “feelings” are quantified, an explanation by resort to bald reference to '“feelings” of satisfaction doesn't intrinsically entail quantification. Simply accepting that the second glass of water is less enjoyable wouldn't imply that it is arithmetically less enjoyable.

—SlamDiego_←T 08:42, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

This "arithmetic" is meaningless if it is not related to feelings or behavior.--Patrick (talk) 09:37, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

That's not a counter-argument. The relevant behavior is already implied in the ordering relationships; the arithmetic adds nothing, and reduces generality by excluding some rational orderings (and the behavior that they imply). As to feelings, it is only in the modern era that people have come into the habit of imputing quantity and attempting to perform arithmetic upon them.

Distinct and important behavioral conclusions can be drawn from quantification, but the “law” of diminishing marginal utility is not amongst them, and quantification is not required for there to be deviations from the “law”. The article, further-on, has a discussion of quantification, and in its historical section notes that a theory of EU maximization entails a quantified conception of utility. (However, this article is not the place for a full-blown discussion of EU maximization.) And, as the article notes, EU maximization is not uncontroversial; as a description of actual human behavior, it is quite flawed, and it is subject to sound criticisms as a normative model.

BTW, do not inject your comments within those of another editor; it makes the discourse very difficult for later parties to follow. —SlamDiego_←T 10:07, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

I have avoided for now the suggestion that the examples presented require quantification. Do not delete useful clarifications and examples, modify them if you think you can improve them.--Patrick (talk) 11:44, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

I didn't delete actual clarifications. I have no objection to the inclusion of examples, and have added one; however, your second and third examples were not substantially distinct, and I have telescoped them. I have also replaced informal language and redundancy with formal language and concision. The remaninder of your changes were inaccurate, misleading, or simply arbitrary, and the recurring use of informal language was inappropriate.

There is no legitimate basis for thinking that quantification might be necessary for the “law” (or its breach) to be meaningful, and you should not rewrite the article to insinuate that it even might be.

As to your desire to present the “law” more as if it were a law, that's simply unscientific. Any proposed law could trivially be said to “hold with restrictions”; every $P$ is true everywhere except where it isn't. While the “law” is on firmer ground than if it were a mere instrumental assumption (as some economic theorists would claim it to be), nonetheless it is not a tautology, it cannot be proven by introspection, and it cannot be tested in the same manner as an ordinary proposition of physics or of biology. A declaration that there is always some point past which marginal utility diminishes is either plain ol' “original research” or the regurgitation of an opinion. —SlamDiego_←T 12:14, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

WP:OR and McConnell

Aaquilino's reference to McConnell is ill-considered. Nowhere in McConnell is there a proof or even a claim that diminishing marginal utility is insufficient for convexity of indifference curves. (Discussion is in the appendix to Chapter 21.) Again, the claim of insufficiency is “original research”, and it is quite in error. —SlamDiego_←T 18:40, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

(Not in McConnell's text, but elsewhere, I have found authors claiming that diminishing marginal utility is not sufficient, but this claim is based on a notion of “diminishing marginal utility” such that is said to be “diminishing” when it is not, in fact, diminsihing. More specifically, it is said to be “diminishing” when it would diminish were it not for interaction with the other good. There is a distinction between utility obeying the “law” of diminishing marginal utility and utility diminsihing more generally. This issue was meant to be picked-up by the “all else being equal” earlier in the article; I have added a parenthetical note on complementarity of uses to make matters more explicit.) —SlamDiego_←T 10:24, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

The deeper issue is this: marginal utility theorists were aware, before Hicks and Allen, that complementarity could throw a wrench in the works. So they assume an absence of significant complementarity as typical. Hicks and Allen just more baldly assume that indifference curves are convex. In other words, the marginal utility theorists assumed-away one thing which would lead to non-convex indifference curves, while Hicks and Allen just assumed-away the non-convexity. The fact that marginal utility theory needs the one assumption, whereas Hicks and Allen make the other, doesn't show that the former is somehow incorrect or that the latter is somehow more advanced. —SlamDiego_←T 22:21, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

Tangent

McConnell does provide a fine illustration of a mainstream economists who bobbles marginal utility theory and thus thinks that it is old-fashioned and ultimately incorrect. McConnell represents indifference curve analysis as “A more advanced explanation of consumer behavior and equilibrium”. He proceeds to this comparision from the presumption, explicitly given in the Appendix to Chapter 21, in a section entitled “The Measurement of Utility”, that

The marginal utility theory assumes that utility is numerically measurable, that is, that the consumer can say how much extra utility he or she derives from each extra unit of A or B.

That's simply wrong on two counts.

First, as has been repeatedly labored on this talk page, the general theory of marginal utility does not assume that marginal utility is numerically measurable.

Second the assertions

• that utility is numerically measurable
• that the consumer can say how much extra utility he or she derives from each extra unit of A or of B

are not equivalent. That's a matter of simple logic. As many or most readers of this talk page will know, when there is an assumption of numeric measurability,

• the actual asumption is that it is known to the economist rather than necessarily to the agent
• typically, the numeric measure serves as no more than a proxy for preferences
• the measure is considered to be significant only up to an affine transformation (or perhaps up to a monotonic transformation)

—SlamDiego_←T 18:40, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

Origins of the Marginal Revolution

Hello,

I just thought I'd point out that the while the Marginal Revolution may not have been a direct response to Marx himself, some scholars suggest that it was a reaction to workers movements and socialist movements who were inspired by the Ricardian labor theory of value long before Marx arrived on the scene. As Ronald Meek points out in "Studies in the Labor Theory of Value", there were many "radical economists" before Marx that picked up on the classical LTV to agitate on behalf of workers (121). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.171.216.108 (talk) 16:32, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

One really shouldn't use the word “scholar” for those irresponsibly unfamiliar with the history about which they write. As the article notes, marginalist theories can be found at least as early as 1728 (almost a hundred years before Ricardo's Principles) and (though the article doesn't yet cover this area well) proto-marginalists had long recognized that some relationship between usefulness and rarity was the ultimate determinant of value. The proto-marginalists and pre-MR marginalists began challenging cost-based theories, well before socialistic economists had done anything of note with the labor theory, and when Ricardo's work came out, the proto-marginalists and pre-MR marginalists challenged it as an expression of their more general challenge. The simple fact is that over-and-over, people were producing marginalist or proto-marginalist theories. The claim that Jevons, Menger, and Walras just accidentally fit that pre-existing pattern and were really trying to refute socialist economists is obviously wishful thinking without supporting evidence. In fact, Menger seems to have been something of a social democrat, and von Wieser was quite socialistic (though the beginnings of the calculation argument may be found his work).

What is plausible is exactly what the article already notes: That part of the reason that the work of those particular three ultimately got sustained mainstream attention was that marginalism, far more radically different from classical economics than was “radical economics”, could more ably critique Marxist economics than could classical economics. That is to say that marginalism was not itself a response to “radical economics”, but its adoption by the mainstream at least in part was. —SlamDiego_←T 01:07, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

BTW, the only socialist that I've found who actually used LTV economics to argue before Marx for socialism was Thomas Hodgskin (who had become notably less socialistic and more liberal well before Jevons' first paper presenting a theory of marginal utility); if there were others, then they made very little impression. —SlamDiego_←T 00:28, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

The “History” section is a history section

The “History” section is about the history of the development of the idea of marginal utility, and presents its material in historical order. The subsection “The Marginal Revolution and Marxism” is concerned with the historical significance of Marxism for the development and adoption of the idea of marginal utility, not for Marxist pot-shots from just any era. A criticism from a 1977 book plainly played no rôle during the Marginal Revolution.

As to the quotation from Mattick, with the first sentence untruncated, it is

It was not long until the entire theory of marginal utility was abandoned, since it obviously rested on circular reasoning. Although it tried to explain prices, prices were necessary to explain marginal utility.

The truncation both changes the meaning of the sentence and represents an attempt at “synthesis”. Mattick's original claim is written with a reckless disregard for the truth; one can read “A Reconsideration of the Theory of Value” and Value and Capital (by Hicks and Allen, whose work displaced marginal utility) for the actual reasons that the notion of marginal utility fell from favor, and these reasons are summarized in the subsection “Eclipse”: the mainstream didn't see circular reasoning; they saw an unnecessary assumption of some underlying quantity.

Nor was there any circle, perceived or actual, in the relationship between the explanation of prices and of marginal utility. Lots of systems exist with feedback, and explanation that acknowledge and describe feedback aren't ipso facto examples of circular reasoning.

This criticism would quite fit amongst the Marxist attacks in the “Criticism” section of “Marginalism”, insofar as that screed-of-a-subsection generally serves to make Marxists look bad by a failure of some Marxists to comprehend the structure of marginalist theory. —SlamDiego_←T 11:29, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

Putting the paradox in the lede

There are problems with putting the paradox of water and diamonds in the lede section.

First, the paradox is not really one of two peculiar goods; but, without a background, many readers are going to take it as such, as if the whole point was to resolve a strangeness just about water and diamonds.

Second, even if it is made clear that this paradox exists across multiple pairings of types of gooda and of services, there is still the impression given that the principal use of the marginal utility concept is to resolve a paradox. But, while the paradox served to draw attention, the concept could have been developed without it. Indeed, Cramer and Bernoulli didn't reference that paradox at all when they made their explicit introductions of the concept, which predate those by Lloyd, Senior, &alli; the lede section could as much or more reasonably declare that “The ‘law’ of diminishing marginal utility can explain the ‘St. Petersburg paradox’” — that paradox which provoked Cramer and Bernoulli. But the concept could have been developed without consideration of either paradox, and carries a lot more water than resolving a paradox or two. —SlamDiego_←T 10:09, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

Confused edit

Edit 267902796 is wrong on two counts. First, the marginal utility of one good or service is not immediately associated with a change in the quantity of any good or service, but with a change in that good or service. Second, the word “either” makes a disjunction exclusive, but there really isn't a clear distinction between goods and services. Ultimately, we want goods exactly for the service that they provide. —SlamDiego_←T 23:20, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

Good article nomination

Since no one has nominated this article, I think I will. According to Wikipedia, the criteron for knowing if an article is GA is: (the article is) Useful to nearly all readers, with no obvious problems; approaching (although not equalling) the quality of a professional encyclopedia. --Forich (talk) 17:08, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

It's a decent article, and could pass with a little work. Consider checking it against the more detailed criteria at WP:GA? before nominating. Regards, Skomorokh 17:15, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

I think that this article runs into trouble at criterion 5. Although there has lately been considerably less edit warring here, there were repeated wars in the past, the underlying reasons for those wars have only partially abated, and promotion of this article is likely to invite the renewed attention of warriors. There wouldn't be much point in a self-defeating promotion, under which the article would fail the criteria exactly as an indirect result of having once been deemed to meet them. —SlamDiego_←T 06:25, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

The water example for diminishing marginal utility isn't the best one

The problem with the water example is that it doesn't go to show that there is less value assigned to each additional water and so doesn't explain the most common scenario of the law of diminishing marginal utility as succinctly described by http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Law_of_diminishing_marginal_utility

The problem with the example is that the use of the water changes. So rather than have e1, e2, e3 (the value of the same substance water which we'd like to compare). We are really comparing uses of water, a, b and c, and the assigned relationships between them i.e. human>dog>plant. What makes this more confusing for readers is that although the dependencies between these uses are described in reality they are more complex (this is mentioned that it might be that plant>dog>human) but there might be arguments such as, why not give half the water to yourself and the second half to the dog. Obviously this seeks to alter the scenario, but ideally the hypothetical scenario chosen should not offer too many real world distractions for readers.

My biggest problem with the example is that it doesn't actually prove that diminishing marginal utility is taking place. I could claim that when you receive two waters, that actually the utility of the second water equals the first! But since the example is set up in terms of matching and you don't have the opportunity to give the 2nd water to yourself again, you can't actually demonstrate that there is less utility in it. There may indeed be the same utility in that water, but because in this hypothetical world to avoid waste the only next best thing you can do is give it to the dog, then that is what you do. Even if the example was modified to allow for the possiblity of giving the water to yourself, it wouldn't demonstrate DMU is taking place.

Can we come up with a better example please?! As it stands, I don't think this should be nominated as a good article. Even mangos with theoretical utility would be better as in wiki.answers.com. Obviously if we can find one that makes a natural comparison and is easier to understand that would be best. --Dmg46664 (talk) 15:30, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, but you've quite misinformed.

Here is an famous example of the principle from Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk:

A pioneer farmer had five sacks of grain, with no way of selling them or buying more. He had five possible uses: as basic feed for himself, food to build strength, food for his chickens for dietary variation, an ingredient for making whisky and feed for his parrots to amuse him. Then the farmer lost one sack of grain. Instead of reducing every activity by a fifth, the farmer simply starved the parrots as they were of less utility than the other four uses; in other words they were on the margin. And it is on the margin, and not with a view to the big picture, that we make economic decisions.

This example is very much like the water example. Now, if you'll read about Böhm-Bawerk, you'll see that he was one of the more important figures of the Marginal Revolution, and certainly well-placed to understand the principle. So where have you gone wrong?

Well, you're probably proceeding from what you were taught by instructors who were unaware of all but one tradition of marginalism, and thus who mistook a special case with the general theory. They (and hence you) presume that utility is at least weakly quantified, that marginal utility is a arithmetic difference or rate of change, and that utility diminishes as a result of psychological exhaustion.

If you will attend more carefully to what the article says up-to, through, and immediately following its water examples, then you'll be exposed to a general explanation. In the absence of tipping points, rational people order uses by priority, and that is what causes marginal utility to diminish. (The diminution is a change of rank, and not necessarily quantitative.) That remains true even where various sorts of satiation are possible. Nor is there really such a thing as applying successive units to the same use. To drink a second glass of water or eat a second mango is not to put it a body that is in the same state as it was for the first glass or mango (nor will the body take the substance that it gets from the second glass or second mango and put and distribute it as it did the substance from the first). —SlamDiego_←T 17:15, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Revision of 05:16, 12 May 2009

Bkwillwm effected two changes.

The first of these, insertion of “{{main|Diminishing marginal utility}}”, created a loop-de-loop, as “Diminishing marginal utility” is just a redirect back to that very section of the article.

The second, removal of

(The diminishing of utility should not necessarily be taken to be itself an arithmetic subtraction. It may be no more than a purely ordinal change.)

is apparently supposed to be motivated by the edit summary: “This is the Austrian view of utility, which is already in the article. We don't need to qualify use of the word utility.”

The isssue that the removed section addresses is not whether marginal utility is necessarily quantitative, but whether marginal utility can diminish wihout being quantitative. The talk history of this article and discussions elsewhere have repeatedly shown that some people (including some holders of economics degrees) often think that at least a weak quantification must hold for marginal utility to be meaningfully diminishing. (Indeed, look at the objection which began the immediately previous discussion here.)

Radeksz reversed it on the grounds “ordinal utility is not particular to Austrian economics - if I understand your objection correctly”.

As to the relationship of the Austrian School, the mainstream notion of ordinal utility is indeed weakly quantified, based on the presumption that any rational preference ordering can be fit to some quantifications, but that none of the quantifications to which it can be fit is uniquely meaningful. It remained for J.H. McCulloch to shown (by adapting mathematical work from probability theory) that some rational preference orderings could not be it to any quantification, but that the Austrian School notion of utility, of marginal utility, and of dminishing utility remained coherent. This article doesn't need to shout “Rah! Rah! Austrian School!”, but it needs to present the subject of marginal utility at full generality. The possibility of an assumption of quantification is repeatedly noted as relevant, but it needs to be distinguished from the underlying concepts of utility, of marginal utility, and of diminishing marginal utility. —SlamDiego_←T 12:59, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, I wasn't on my game with the edit in question. I just added a see also template link to distributive efficiency, the article I meant to link to instead of the circular link. I also jumped the gun on removing the section on ordinal utility because I've worked on other pages in the past where Austrian editors inserted qualifiers after every mention of utility. The Austrian view of utility is a minority, but legitimate, viewpoint, so it deserves attention, but not constant repetition. I thought the discussion of ordinal utility was repetitive here, but clearly it was making a point that I missed. BTW, I'm not wedded to the link to distributive efficiency, so that can be removed if others don't think it's relevant. Thanks for fixing up my edits.--Bkwillwm (talk) 00:36, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

I've moved that link into the “See also” section. —SlamDiego_←T 11:57, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

But what's the goal of this article?

Is the goal to describe what experts know, or to educate the general public? These are two completely different things. (It seems to me, the goal must be clearly resolved and authors must be willing to pay the costs of that choice.)

For example the short section on Marginality seems to do the former, but not the latter. The reason why it makes sense to the expert is because he already has examples in his head. But to the general public without those anchors, almost any of those sentences can have many meanings. Compound all those possible paths as sentence is added to sentence, and one quickly lands in confusion and chaos.

One possible remedy for this is to add examples. (Or when complex, perhaps several varied examples.)

One cost of adding examples is adding bulk. This implies cuts elsewhere may have to be made in the name of best reaching the over all goal. However, would not the general public find many of these subcategories rather rare and arcane? An encyclopedia article should not attempt to outline a semester.

I am often disappointed in Wiki's technical articles that have not subjected themselves to this discipline, and seem to be written for the pleasure of the authors, ("See MY education!") rather than to educate the general public. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.127.88.207 (talk) 20:01, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

The goal of this article is to provide an accurate explanation of its subject. Accessibility is desirable everywhere that it can be achieved without a loss of accuracy.

As to the discussion of marginality, upon investigation you'd in fact find that most encyclopediae and textbooks on marginal utility and marginalistm never bother to explain the concept of marginality at all. Further, while examples might well improve the accessibility of the section, what it actually requires to be understood are not examples but just a knowledge of logic and of English, and neither at the level of someone whose education focussed on either field. No one is showing off education in that section, though the ability of the reader to think may be over-estimated.

Which section do you think is arcane? Some would see the section on marginality, for the expansion of which you propose to cut other sections, as the most arcane here. Certainly, it's the least likely to be covered in other treatments. The point is not that it is arcane; it's that paring could cause isomorphic criticism from others.

I'd wager that the section that most readers would find arcane is the history section. And it is advisedly placed at the end, so that readers with no interest in how these insights were developed can easily ignore it. —SlamDiego_←T 20:39, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

Introduction is still unnecessarily complex

After extensive discussion, SlamDiego agreed to make some simplifications to the introduction, but other users still argue that the introduction is inappropriate: [2]. Another user recently made a long, substantive argument about why this article needs to be simplified, but SlamDiego considered parts of his argument offensive and therefore insisted that they be deleted. I will restore parts of those arguments below, trying hard to avoid parts that might be construed as personal attacks.

But before I do that, here is my main point. SlamDiego has tried to write an introduction that is fully accurate that deals with (what he considers) a fully general treatment of the concept. Readers have repeatedly complained that his introduction is incomprehensible.

I would instead suggest writing an introduction that is not fully general. An introduction can be entirely accurate, without being entirely general, as long as it makes entirely clear that it is simplifying by discussing a special case. Greater generality can be (and should be) achieved later on in the article.

Of course, what is 'simplest' is in the ear of the beholder. Most of those who complained about this article have instead suggested definitions that involve 'quantified' notions of utility, which SlamDiego has argued is not necessarily the simplest way of presenting the concept. But given the long history of challenges to this article, I would strongly favor changing to an introduction other users would find simpler.

Previously deleted comments of the other editor, arguing in favor of starting with a more elementary introduction, are shown below. They come from the section 'Whats the goal of this article'. I have edited out a few sections that might be construed as personal attacks. --Rinconsoleao (talk) 10:28, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

If I'm reading reality properly, no you won't get complaints over the history section at the back for being arcane, simply because it is at the back. You read that right, in putting it there. Those complaints will be directed towards the front of the article where many people are hoping to scoop up a quick concept somewhat deeper than a dictionary's. (That was my EXACT need.) They may progress in complexity as they choose by reading further. That's the typical format of an unspecialized encyclopedia. A good writer's first rule is the understanding that nobody is as interested in, 1) his words, nor 2) his topic, as he is. I recognize what I request is as difficult as writing gets.

What did I find useful? After spending 15 minutes here, I bombed and went here:

Google; "define: Marginal utility"

Definitions of Marginal utility on the Web:

• (economics) the amount that utility increases with an increase of one unit of an economic good or service

http://wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=marginal%20utility

• The additional utility to a consumer from an additional unit of an economic good

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/marginal_utility

• In a utility function, the increase in utility associated with a one-unit increase in consumption of one good; or the partial derivative of the utility function.

http://www-personal.umich.edu/~alandear/glossary/m.html

Five minutes in the hyper-texted glossary did it. Sometime later I returned here, and that section (the last few sentences) I saw as gibberish was suddenly readable. I don't know what the missing key(s) was, but then, as an educator, that's YOUR job. If I were to guess, sentences that once had several possible meanings now seemed precise, such is the power of context.

IMO, you should start with a glossary-type definition, (conceptual) then and only when completed with lay terminology, build details. I recognize that preparing for the foundation may be most painful of all writing. But you try to do too much in the opening paragraphs. I suspect your first two sentences explains why. While noble, perfectionism is rarely a functional value. If you are not writing to be accessible to the general public, then you are not writing an encyclopedia article (that will withstand time).

• Doug —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.127.88.207 (talk) 04:44, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

(The preceding sections were re-inserted by --Rinconsoleao (talk) 10:35, 23 July 2009 (UTC).)

Rinconsoleao, here is policy:

The lead should be able to stand alone as a concise overview of the article.

While consideration should be given to creating interest in reading more of the article, the lead nonetheless should not "tease" the reader by hinting at—but not explaining—important facts that will appear later in the article.

The lead should contain no more than four paragraphs,

We are not writing a text-book, in which successive approximations may take the reader from an over-simplification to a perhaps accurate understanding.

BTW, in titling this section, you are abusing the word “complex”. The introduction may not be as easy, as accessible as we would like, but it is not complex, and every change that you propose would increase its complexity. —SlamDiego_←T 11:31, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Doug: First, each and every one of the definitions that you cite is wrong:

1. The first definition is wrong because it defines marginal utility in terms of a unitary increase in the good or in the service. The relevant changes may not be of units, and they may be decreases as well as increases. Further, the use of the word “additional” is at best misleading in the case of an increase in the good or in the service, and is flat wrong in the case of a decrease.
2. The second definition is wrong because it plainly requires that utility be quantified, and again defines marginal utility in terms of a unitary increase in the good or in the service.
3. The third definition is wrong because it only allows for either a unitary uncrease or a instantaneous increase in the good or in the service, only allows for an increase, and plainly requires that utility be quantified.

Being wrong allows each of these definitions to be easier to apprehend than the present definition in this article, but the result is that reader has been led to think that he or she has the concept of marginal utility when he or she doesn't. (And the history of this talk page has shown ample illustration of people who hadn't learned better.)

As to you suggestion on structure, you are proceeding as if Wikipedia is a text-book, which it is not, and with apparent ignorance of the policy on the structure of ledes.

If you (and perhaps Rinconsoleao) would like to start a separate project of a Wiki economics text-book, then you might be able to interest the Wikimedia foundation in the idea, and you certainly could start your own website. But your criticisms are grossly misplaced here.

BTW, your original claim was that “arcane” sub-sections could be cut in order to flesh-out the beginning sections. Claiming that the initial sections themselves are arcane doesn't identify the ostensibly arcane sections that you think could be cut to make room for expansion of the initial sections. —SlamDiego_←T 11:11, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Good, now we are making progress and addressing the structure of the article. I see no problem at all in sticking to the Wikipedia principles displayed above-- one can easily begin with a special case and generalize it in much less than four paragraphs in a way that allows the lead to stand in for the whole article.--Rinconsoleao (talk) 12:13, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Nope. You're not going to be able to conform to policy and do what you propose. —SlamDiego_←T 12:35, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

As for the definitions offered by Doug, every single criticism offered by SlamDiego is a criticism about their generality. In other words, each definition is correct if applied in the context of a particular way of thinking about utility and/or a specific way of counting changes in use. They are only incorrect insofar as they fail to deal with more general frameworks of analysis. Therefore, I think any one of those definitions, with small changes perhaps, would be an adequate introductory sentence for the article, as long as the article immediately makes clear that they are not fully general. --Rinconsoleao (talk) 12:18, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

No, it wouldn't be correct to define “man” to be John Richard Hicks, even though he is indeed a special case of a man; there is simply no “particular way of thinking about men” that somehow makes that definition correct. And, likewise, there is no “particular way of thinking about utility” that makes any one of those three definitions correct as a definition. This article is not going to misrepresent the concept even momentarily. And telling the reader that he or she is not going to get the actual definition of “marginal utility” until the fourth paragraph ought to be recognized as a non-starter. The reader is entitled to that definition in the first paragraph, and only with d_rn'd good reason should it not be in the very first sentence. —SlamDiego_←T 12:35, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Each of the definitions above is entirely correct if (1) we focus on the special case of 'quantified' utility, (2) we assume 'units' of the goods are defined, and (3) we understand discussion of increases to be shorthand for discussion of increases and/or decreases. --Rinconsoleao (talk) 13:15, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

No, no more than John Richard Hicks is correct as a definition of “man” if we focus on the special case of English, Nobel-Prize-winning economists born in 1904. Focussing on special cases doesn't change otherwise false definitions to true. The fact that John Richard Hicks was indeed a man doesn't allow one to define “man” by looking only at this one man. —SlamDiego_←T 13:24, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

How would you define 'man', by the way? Are you convinced that it is possible to provide a fully general definition (let alone to do so in four paragraphs)? If your definition involves the word 'male', or the word 'human being' you are merely begging my question by pushing it one step back. --Rinconsoleao (talk) 14:10, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

No, that's not begging the question, which is the use of a principle as its own defense. All definitions themselves contain terms; that doesn't make them all circular (which would be the nearest thing to begging the question with a definition, though not the same thing). There are, BTW, human beings who are not men (my girlfriend, for example), and males who are not human beings (my dog, for example). But I'd be more likely to try “adult male person”.

But if the question is of whether the definition presently used in the article is fully general, the reply is that if an example is found which didn't fit, then the definition would need to be somehow broadened. —SlamDiego_←T 14:38, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

I would also define 'man' as 'adult male person', but I would never claim that definition is fully general, because I would never expect to find a fully general definition of any of the three words it contains. How exactly do we distinguish an adult from a non-adult? How exactly do we distinguish a male from a non-male? How exactly do we distinguish an person from a non-person? --Rinconsoleao (talk) 14:49, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

It isn't the job of a definition to define its component terms; that's the job of other definitions, until one is reduced to “ostensive definitions” (which, as Felix Kaufmann noted, aren't really definitions, but which none-the-less may have legitimate conceptual rôles). You're confusing generality with a different sort of closure, having an infrastructure of definition with everything well-defined (or, at least, everything well-defined except those things for which only ostensive definitions can be provided, and having unimpeachable ostensive definitions in those cases). It simply isn't any editor's responsibility to demonstrate such closure, but the lack of such proof also isn't an excuse for allowing demonstrably incorrect definitions to be used. If I insisted that adult American male person were a proper definition of “man”, this wouldn't be vindicated by the fact that some men are indeed Americans, nor by your doubts about the definition of “male”. —SlamDiego_←T 15:07, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

My point is that you are claiming the Austrian theory of marginal use provides a fully general definition of marginal utility, without even attempting to define the crucial terms 'use' and 'action' required in your definition of marginal use, from which we are supposed to understand your definition of marginal utility. I would instead suggest stating clearly what sort of assumptions we are making about utility, and providing a definition of marginal utility consistent with those assumptions, and then discussing some alternative theories that have generalized the concept of marginal utility. --Rinconsoleao (talk) 15:15, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

And that point isn't a counter-argument to the claim of generality. The concepts of use and of action here are no different from those in ordinary economic discourse, nor from those in ordinary lay discourse. (If they were being used in some peculiar manner, then the reader would be entitled to a definition or at least to a Wiki-link.) Meanwhile, if we replace this ordinary language with a discussion in the lede found in POSets (for full generality), then we'll have something far less accessible; and if we go where you're again trying to get us, to actually state clearly what sort of assumption we are making about utility, we would be talking about mappings to $\Re$, defining “monotonic transform”, &c. Plainly, this is a stalking horse that cannot make a single lap around the course. —SlamDiego_←T 16:26, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Here, in fact, is policy:

The first paragraph of the introductory text needs to unambiguously define the topic for the reader.

You simply don't get to delay the actual definition in favor of approximations or of special cases. —SlamDiego_←T 13:24, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Speaking of Wiki policy, here is policy:

The lead section should briefly summarize the most important points covered in an article in such a way that it can stand on its own as a concise version of the article. It is even more important here than for the rest of the article that the text be accessible.

--Rinconsoleao (talk) 13:34, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Indeed, and I have repeatedly agreed that the lede should be as accessible as it can be while remaining correct, and that it is not as accessible as I would like it to be. —SlamDiego_←T 13:52, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

It is doubtful that the current version of the introduction is fully general

SlamDiego bases his objection to an introduction most readers would find simpler on claims that the proposed alternatives are not fully general.

However, it seems unlikely that the definition offered here is in fact fully general. None of the references I have seen show exactly how the theory of Marginal use on which SlamDiego bases his supposedly general definition can deal in full generality with issues of time and probability.

For example, standard 20th century general equilibrium theory deals with contingent goods, like 'a bushel of wheat delivered in Chicago at noon on June 20, 2001, if it is raining at that time'. What exactly is meant by the 'use' of such a good? Standard general equilibrium theory need not ask this question, because its definitions of utility do not go by way of a definition of uses; instead, utility is defined as a partial ordering of bundles of goods. Has the Austrian theory of Marginal use answered questions like these? Not in the references I have seen. If it has not, then the definition offered in this article is not general and therefore has no claim to priority over other definitions that are also correct within their own limited theoretical contexts. --Rinconsoleao (talk) 13:47, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

First, let's take that bushel of wheat, delivered in Chicago at noon on 20 June, if it is raining, and let's add a constraint (which we will completely drop after it is explored) — that the bushel cannot be used to make food. What happens to it's place in the partial ordering? It changes, and it changes exactly and only because the available uses have changed to preclude whatever might be the best use. If the purchaser were the final purchaser, this is obvious; if the purchaser is himself a reseller, this is because those who might buy it are expected to change their behavior. Whereas before the purchaser at noon might have used it to obtain $5.00 from Tom, now the best that he can do is use it to obtain $0.25 from Dick.

Now, let's remove that odd constraint, but ask why it might make a difference whether it rain (as in the original). And the basic answer is the same. The best use available to the purchaser is expected to change, whether this is in own-consumption on in resale.

All that's pretty basic economics, and not really peculiar to any school. Any economist should be able to answer it off the top of his head. —SlamDiego_←T 14:21, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Please provide a reference related to the theory of Marginal use as applied to contingent claims, like the bushel of wheat I mentioned. --Rinconsoleao (talk) 14:53, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

I see if I can find one. It might help if I knew for what you wanted it. A contingent claim is simply a lottery. A contingent commodity or contingent service is simply a lottery that pays-off in-kind. Various members of the Austrian School wrote about lotteries, and their arguments have been founded in their marginal utility theory. I've not run across non-trivial work on lotteries from any school that I find particularly convincing, because the notions of probability either seem deficient, or are so difficult to employ that little theory has been accomplished with them. —SlamDiego_←T 16:34, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Yes, some references about how Austrian proponents of the marginal use concept think about lotteries would be helpful. --Rinconsoleao (talk) 16:37, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Well, then, you could steel yourself and read Human Action up to and through chapter VI, which is on uncertainty. You might get some value just going right to that chapter, but v. Mises was trying to build his case from some Kantian ground upward, and so parts of that chapter could be misunderstood if the previous stuff weren't read. The prominent Austrian School member who was most focussed on uncertainty was probably Ludwig Lachmann, but I don't know what to recommend from his stuff. I am not an Austrian School fan-boy, and I've had other fish to fry besides trying to absorb the Austrian School corpus. —SlamDiego_←T 16:44, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

The comments that were deleted

An editor, who signed as 'Doug' but did not give his Wiki user name, made some comments on this page which seemed to me very useful. User SlamDiego deleted them, interpreting them as a personal attack. I have tried to restore them, but SlamDiego deleted them again. I have tried to point out to him that the language he specifically interpreted as a personal attack does not, to me, seem like a personal attack. I would ask SlamDiego, please, to restore those comments (feel free to delete specific bits that you interpret as a personal attack); otherwise I would ask other editors to restore them.

My main concern about this page, like that of many others who have criticized it, is that it fails to introduce the material in an accessible way. I believe that can be done, with no lack of accuracy, as long as we make clear that simple definitions based on 'quantifications' of utility are not a fully general treatment of the concept. SlamDiego made some progress on clarifying the introduction in response to my previous comments (above), but I think, and other readers agree, that the page still fails to achieve sufficient clarity. --Rinconsoleao (talk) 08:05, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

First, restoring those comment involves a violation of WP:NPA. Calling for a violation of WP:NPA isn't much better than just engaging in it. I have repeatedly suggested that they be restated without the personal attack, yet you don't even acknowledge the possibility.

Second, I have repeatedly stated that it would be a good thing for this article to be more accessible so long as accuracy is preserved. And I have repeatedly suggested that any editor who thinks that he or she can write a more accessible yet accurate lede present a candidate here. Where is your candidate? BTW, I remind you that not only must we avoid the presumption of quantification of utility, but also the presumption that the change of the good or of the service is unitary. (That point is proven by the counter-example of neoclassical economists working in terms of derivatives — instantaneous changes are not unitary — but should be obvious from the underlying logic.)

And, while I'm here, let me remind or notify editors that

Wikipedia is an encyclopedic reference, not a textbook. The purpose of Wikipedia is to present facts, not to teach subject matter.

—SlamDiego_←T 08:22, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

What is the purpose of communication? I would suggest the more people than can correctly understand the message the more successful the communication would seem to be. As an economics student I've found that in relation to textbooks the less accomplished is an author the more complicated is the language in the text (regardless of the subject matter), the explanation seems to be related to an intellectual form of "small man syndrome", the same could be said about Wiki articles. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 220.253.93.55 (talk) 00:53, 28 August 2010 (UTC)

Independence from presumptions of self-interested behavior

This section does not prove for the claim that self-interest is not occurring in a scenario where the individual is making a choice to create greater value for someone else, particularly when it describes actions which are clearly volitional in nature, therefore based on conscious choices. There are at least two reasons why this is problematic:

1. Example: A mother may place greater priority over the life of her child, but to choose such a decision is still based on a set of self-interest based priorities (and arguably so, which goes to the second problem...)

2. Value is subjective to the individual, which is at best an empirical but informative enough point from which to establish economic theory or law.

Insomuch that an individual could act outside of self-interest, this does more to question whether such an agent can be perceived as possessing an ethical/moral capacity in order to be characterized as a volitional entity in the first place.

There is reason to argue against presumptions of objectively determined value as they contradict the purpose of economic study altogether (sans fictional constructs meant to inform readers), but to claim that self-interest is not present when discussing volitional actions runs counter to what the sphere of economic study is about.

If you want to ascribe motives to storms and tides, this is not the place to do so. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.69.194.194 (talk) 04:04, 7 August 2009 (UTC)

First, do not jump the queue when putting comments on talk pages. Altogether new sections belong after previously created sections. Comments within sections that are not in reply to comments already present belong at the end of the section. Comments in reply to earlier comments belong after any earlier replies to that comment and to replies to those replies &c (preferably indented one unit more than the comment to which they are replies).

Second, this article does not argue for or against psychological egoism (which can indeed be rendered tautologically true, albeït at the cost of vacuousness). This article advisely refers to “ordinary notions of self-interested behavior”. This article does not oppose or support psychological egoism, nor does it deny or affirm that it has some other rôle in economics. Likewise for various notions of volition. This article is about marginal utility. Nor is this talk page the place to engage in debate about psychological egoism or about volition. —SlamDiego_←T 04:30, 7 August 2009 (UTC)

A basic tenet of neoclassical consumer theory is that consumers act in their rational self-interest. Self-interest is narrowly defined to include only those interests that affect one's economic well being - the model excludes "other ragarding motives." Smith, The Law and Economics of Irrational Behavior (Stanford 2005). The classic example is the anonymous contribution - the consumer of neoclassical consumer would never make such a gift because no possible economic benefits could be derived from the gift. The fact that the actor might gain some satisfaction is irrelevant.--Jgard5000 (talk) 12:41, 29 September 2009 (UTC)jgard5000 Also criticisms of the assumptions - "that is not the way people behave"- are irrelevant in assessing the validity of the theory. The economist are saying assume that people act in their economic self interest - from these assumption economists derive refutable hypotheses - it is these hypotheses that either fail or succeed - the issue is how well these hypotheses explain human behavior (the predictive value is entirely of secondary importance) - the hypothese are tested empirically ---Jgard5000 (talk) 13:11, 29 September 2009 (UTC)jgard5000

This article isn't about the basic tenets of neoclassical economics. It's about one particular notion, which notion isn't even peculiar to neoclassical economics. And, as I've already noted, this is not the place to argue for the legitimacy of a proposition of “self-interested” behavior, whether argument be based on a notion that such a proposition is true a priori or one merely that it has proved a useful approximation. Take it elsewhere. —SlamDiego_←T 18:51, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

LEAD clarity

Note: I've pasted the first two paragraphs below from my talk page.—DMCer™ 21:24, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

Your edit to “Marginal utility” replaced a general definition with one particular conception, and was therefore wrong. For example, as the article itself notes, the mainstream of economic theory does not define “utility” in terms of satisfaction; rather, “utility” is defined as a quantified proxy of preference. (Introductory undergraduate courses often punt to something like the original conception of the British marginalists, because it's easier to teach and because few economists are in fact really familiar with topic more generally. But “Wikipedia is an encyclopedic reference, not a textbook. The purpose of Wikipedia is to present facts, not to teach subject matter.”) And marginal changes are not simply any potential or actual increases, but also decreases. —SlamDiego_←T 18:09, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

You state utility is defined as a "quantified proxy of preference." Are you aware that nowhere online or in economic literature are those terms used? By the same measure, "proxy of preference" returns just two results. I've seen marginal utility explained countless different ways, usually more clearly than the lead sentence of the article — not because they were inaccurate definitions, but because the lead is simply not written very well. As you state that marginal changes include both potential increases and decreases in utility, why not just use my revision and build upon it to describe the decreases as well? At any rate, I would argue that what I wrote seems to be in line with mainstream economy theory.—DMCer™ 21:24, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

It really doesn't matter whether those terms are used, let alone whether they are used on-line. There is no policy or guideline against getting right to the point on a talk page!

Get a copy of Kreps' A Course in Microeconomic Theory (you'll find it in the Dartmouth College library system); read the section “Utility representations” in Chapter 3. That's a “reliable” source, and pretty much any other graduate-level text will handle utility the same way, as a quantified proxy of preference, without any reference to satisfaction, to pleasure, or whatever. I expressed that in my comment on your talk page (which comment you've copied above) concisely; whether the expression is perfectly original or not is not particularly important.

As I have said seemingly innumerable times, I have no problem with the idea of writing the lede so that it is more easily understood, so long as it doesn't actively misrepresent the subject. And, until someone can write a lede that is more clear without actively misrepresenting the subject, and otherwise in conformance with Wikipedia policy and guidelines, there should be a lot less purely unproductive (or face-saving) carping about the lede being hard to read. —SlamDiego_←T 22:57, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

BTW, the conception of utility as a quantified proxy for preference is not the one that I think best; but this article isn't about the conceptualization of marginal utility that any one person or school favors; this article is about the general notion, with particular conceptions identified as special cases. —SlamDiego_←T 23:14, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

No one is saving face or complaining, and isn't helpful to characterize sincere efforts to improve an article in that way. I've long since left Dartmouth, so I'm not privy to the library system. However, the books I've looked at so far, define marginal utility more along the lines of what I've written. Look up the phrase on Google Books, and you will see most of the listed leading academic texts define the term the way I've characterized it. Your unnecessarily dense wording, including the "quantified proxy of preference," seems to be in the minority. Nobody is trying to convert this article into a teaching tool, rather than a platform to present facts. However, that does not preclude it from being as clear, if not clearer, than the leading economic literature.—DMCer™ 00:32, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

To deny that you are complaining is an absurdity.

I'm well aware that many authors define utility as you propose. (Indeed, it's close or equivalent to the conception that I think best.) But reference to “most” or to “few” doesn't cut it. This article isn't simply about any one conception, no matter how popular; it is, first and foremost, about the general concept, as has already been noted to you. A lede that literally excludes what you believe to be a minority conception is grossly inappropriate. (The notion of utility as a quantified proxy for preference in fact dominates the expert literature, with which you are evidently unfamiliar.)

Again: There is no policy or guideline against getting right to the point on a talk page. Complaining that my comment on your talk page was “unnecessarily dense” isn't going to get you anything, just as objecting that that particular term wasn't found in your googling isn't going to get you anything.

Also again: Until someone can write a lede that is more clear without actively misrepresenting the subject, and that is otherwise in conformance with Wikipedia policy and guidelines, there should be a lot less carping about the lede being hard to read. The general concept is not nearly so easy to understand as is any one of the four-or-so popular conceptions; that's just the way that it goes. —SlamDiego_←T 01:00, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm again requesting you keep a cool head and stop accusing other of complaining. I'm focused on improvement here, as indicated by my willingness to revise the defining sentences. So far, you've only reverted my attempts, and accused my of complaining — all while admitting the lead isn't perfect and waiting for "someone" who can rewrite the lead. I Also don't know why you keep raising the obvious fact that "there is no policy or guideline against getting right to the point..." Of course there isn't, who's saying there is? I never said anything about your comment on my talk page, I'm not sure what you're talking about. I copied the text here so others could read it, and by "dense," I was referring to the current wording of the lead, not anything you posted on some talk page. If you're not willing to discuss my attempt at improving the lead, especially in the content of the literature I referred to above, then the best thing I can do is do build up a number of sources, and add the citations to what I wrote.—DMCer™ 01:17, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Here's what you wrote in your earlier comment:

Your unnecessarily dense wording, including the "quantified proxy of preference,"

I used the term “quantified proxy of preference” wording exactly and only in my comments on talk pages, yet now you say

by "dense," I was referring to the current wording of the lead, not anything you posted on some talk page

a blatantly false claim. Just stop.

I'm willing to engage in discussion that identifies improvement as improvement, complaining as complaining, and bullshit as bullshit. If you can propose wording for the lede that is actually correct, in conformance with Wikipedia policy and guidelines, and clearer, I'd be happy to discuss it. So far, you've made changes that were wrong, complained about the wording of my comments as “unnecessarily dense” and about the lede as is, and then misrepresented what you've previously said. Unsurprisingly, I'm not hopeful.

Accumulating

• multiple sources who identify utility with quantified pleasure and pain (as did the British marginalists); or
• multiple sources who identified utility with unquantified satisfaction (as does the Austrian School); or
• multiple sources who identified utility with quantified usefulness (as did the Lausanne School); or
• multiple sources who identified utility with a quantified proxy for preference (as has the mainstream of decision theorists)

does not legitimized defining marginal utility in terms of any one of those conceptions. Don't bother; it takes no more than one “notable” source from any of the other approaches to trump you, and such sources are already cited in the article. Don't let this be a self-referential loop; it's then infinite. —SlamDiego_←T 01:52, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm not concerned with "he said, she said," so I won't address the talk page issue you keep going back to. About the article: you've made no attempts at improving the lead, which you admit can be improved. I've already stated why I believe the literature doesn't support the current wording. Perhaps other users from the economics wikiproject may have better luck at convincing you to fix the wording.—DMCer™ 03:00, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

1. Rather, you're not concerned to apologize in the context of having been plainly shown to have said misrepresented what each of us has said.
2. No, I have improved the accessibility lede in the past. The fact that I hope for it to be further improved doesn't mean that I presently know how to improve it, nor that any change would be an improvement.
3. I've already noted very clearly why you're quite wrong to think that representing what you believe to be a predominant conception as the general concept is inappropriate.
4. Other members of the Wikiproject are already following this page. A few of them have likewise tried to impose what they believe to be the predominant conception, albeït that it has been a different conception from that which you've pushed. But still others have recognized that, yep, we have to write the lede so that no genuine concept of marginal utility (and certainly no “notable” concept) is rendered unthinkable by the lede.

—SlamDiego_←T 03:30, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

It appears I've stepped into the middle of an ongoing discussion. A suggestion, if agreement cannot be reached, please leave a note at the Wikiproject Economics talk page, for help to reach a resolution. LK (talk) 04:53, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

The subject has been raised there before, and discussed here before, at great length. In practice now-a-days, taking things to WikiProject Economics immediately degenerates into a battle between cliques, rather than a collegial discussion producing articles of quality. —SlamDiego_←T 05:00, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

A minor matter. Em Dashes should be un-spaced. If spaced, en-dashes are preferred. See the relevant section in the MOS: MOS:EMDASH. LK (talk) 05:02, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

That's crappy style, but I bow to the MoS. —SlamDiego_←T 05:06, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

I've just gone through the history of this talk page, and I believe your comments are teetering a bit too close to ownership for me to be comfortable spending a lot of time on this. I'll raise this issue with other econ project members, as many people have had the same concern as I have, and have raised sources as well. But for now, I don't believe you're being constructive, so I won't press it today.—DMCer™ 10:34, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

It's not ownership; it's maintenance. The history of this article is one in which editors who really don't know the subject — and, again, I have cited “reliable” sources — make changes based upon exposure either to just one or to just two of the various notions, then refuse to attend to the citations that don't fit their presumptions, or ignore the relevant Wikipedia policies and guidelines. Maintenance of this article has largely amounted to keeping editors from destructively changing the article to define-away any but their pet one notion or two notions.

It isn't that “many people have had the same concern as [you] have”. What's the same between you and the earlier editors is just the attempt to displace all other notions with your pet notion(s) — but the other editors have had different pets.

The notion of utility that is in the sources that you raised is-and-was already covered by the article, with sources; the other notions that you are trying to define away are also covered, with sources. Your googling was found on the silly principle that since the precise term that I used in a comment wasn't found, then somehow you could erase the other notions, in spite of “reliable” sources long having been used in the article to show that these notions were also well established. —SlamDiego_←T 18:19, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

my review of the article

I've read the history of the article, and it strikes me that so many editors (most of them with good achievements in Wikipedia) can't agree on such a known subject in economics. I hope that we can bring this to Good article nomination (as soon as the edit wars stop). Here is my modest take on reviewing the body of the article. By the way, I am a neoclassical orthodox economist with a little knowledge of the Austrian view (basically, I read and studied the McCulloch 1977 article that is cited in the history of this talk page).

• Marginality

I have no complaint on this section. It is clear and accurate. Orthodox theory do consider marginal changes to be inifinitesimal.

• Diminishing marginal utility

"An individual will typically be able to partially order the potential uses of a good or service. For example, a ration of water might be used to sustain oneself, a dog, or a rose bush. Say that a given person gives her own sustenance highest priority, that of the dog next highest priority, and lowest priority to saving the roses. In that case, if the individual has two rations of water, then the marginal utility of either of those rations is that of sustaining the dog. The marginal utility of a third unit would be that of watering the roses".

Under orthodox theory, it is not necessary to give different uses to the marginal change of a good or service, so this paragraph may be revised to be more general. In fact, I believe that the word diminishing was first used to reflect the fact that: i) there was a psychologycal saturation after consuming the marginal change, and ii) there was an arithmetical change that was negative in the cardinal utility of the individual. Later, when the discipline moved towards ordinality, the term diminishing lost any psychological interpretation (an equivalent utility function could give you now a positive second derivative) but instead got clouded under several assumptions about satiability, convexity, and etc (what us orthodox call primitives). I think that when people in the early 20th century refer to a diminishing marginal utility they meant the british or marshallian approach (the one where it doesn't matter what ordering you give to potential uses), even though Menger had a lot of notability with his examples of farmers giving different ordered uses to goods (only that mainstream textbooks just said: hey, Menger did the same as Marshall, except that he used non-mathematical examples).

"(The diminishing of marginal utility should not necessarily be taken to be itself an arithmetic subtraction. It may be no more than a purely ordinal change)".

This argument is supported with references from 1968 and 1977 (wich are reliable, no doubt), but I think they push some Point of View (POV). Here is the semantic trouble as I see it: Austrian had an excellent and original definition of hierarchical-uses-of-descending-importance which McCullochs' article calls diminishing marginal utility, BUT this was in 1977 and so it conflicts with the orthodox definition that got into mainstream since Marshall years (c.1890). So we have a case where a better theory borrowed the term diminishing marginal utility when they actually refer to hierarchical-uses-of-descending-importance. The keyword is diminishing: utility (orthodox utility) actually diminishes (as in going from 10 utils to 9 utils), whereas uses (austrian uses) just descend in the scale of importance, so no quantity is diminishing here. The problem is semantic, because it's not, strictly speaking, the same concept. Later in his article, McCulloch explains that, as an extension to the formalization he is providing, a numerical index can also be attached to the austrian approach (even though it is not necessary for it to work).

"(...) the concept and logic of marginal utility are independent of the presumption that people pursue self-interest.[17] For example, a different person might give highest priority to the rose bush, next highest to the dog, and last to himself. In that case, if the individual has three rations of water, then the marginal utility of any one of those rations is that of watering the person. With just two rations, the person is left unwatered and the marginal utility of either ration is that of watering the dog. Likewise, a person could give highest priority to the needs of one of her neighbors, next to another, and so forth, placing her own welfare last; the concept of diminishing marginal utility would still apply".

I agree with this one. Self interest enters orthodox microeconomics only to the extent that people make choices based on the maximization of their own utility functions, there is nothing in the "primitives" or assumptions-preference-orders that explicitelly mandates people to be egotistic.

Finally, the history section is what I like the most. It is well balanced, rich in facts, neutral POV, and well written and illustrated. So, in conclusion, I think that the article is excelent in its current state, except that for some parts of it, marginal utility needs to be divided into two: there is a british marginal utility, and an austrian marginal utility, and they are not strictly the same concept. Unfortunately, to label the former two in a different way would be original research. I don't agree with the view of the main editor who says that general = austrian and specific = orthodox (a view that ultimately reflect on the discussion over the lead): the article is about a not-so-good theory (the british one, let's admit it) that has taken for its own the concept of marginal utility, on the other hand, the austrians have a good theory that is not based on the exact same concept. In other words, history has given prominence to the marginal utility of the british, but many years later, austrian realized that they had: i) polished the concept of marginal use that magically wraps everything together; and ii) formalized their ideas in a way that made everithing quantifiable and thus, more comparable to the british-orthodoxy, and now the two things are making its definition a mess.--Forich (talk) 01:52, 15 January 2010 (UTC)

I'll respond to some specifics here:

“Under orthodox theory, it is not necessary to give different uses to the marginal change of a good or service”

You're missing an essential point here: It is never possible to give identical use to two marginal changes. When, in everyday speech, we speak of two uses being the same, we really mean that mutatis mutandis. The posterior change is in a different context, established by the prior change and any changes in-between whichever two are noted. Now, presentations of orthodox theory usually skip-over why it should be that marginal utility would change, simply presuming that it does for unstated reason. But when a mainstream theorist does provide a rationale (typicaly as a result of being pressed by a student ;) ), he or she will in fact fall to discussing uses, and reach for the fact, for example, that putting a second glass of water into a stomach that already has a first glass in it is doing something different. (The sort of psychological saturation that you mention below is likewise a result of prior use changing context so that identical subsequent use being impossible.) And, when the Austrian School explicitly refers to uses, it isn't excluding things such as eating a second candy bar.

“I believe that the word diminishing was first used to reflect the fact that: i) there was a psychologycal saturation after consuming the marginal change, and ii) there was an arithmetical change that was negative in the cardinal utility of the individual.”

Walras was very explicit in rejecting hedonic notions, though he did indeed assume that utilité (very simply, usefulness) was quantified. So your conjecture of the notion of diminishing marginal utility excludes not just one but two of the three first-generation preceptors of the Marginal Revolution. The essential problem for your conjecture here is that all three of the first-generation preceptors were not simply talking of something that was subsequently labelled “marginal utility”, but they were invoking a principal that came to be called “diminishing marginal utility”, and they at least agreed that on some level, they were writing about the same thing. I'll return to that issue of what the same thing is below.

By the way, economists didn't begin to use the phrase “diminishing marginal utility” until after they'd begun using the phrase “marginal utility”, which they got by way of translating a work from the second generation of the Austrian School.

“I think that when people in the early 20th century refer to a diminishing marginal utility they meant the british or marshallian approach”

No. That's certainly what the vast majority of the British meant, but they'd not yet displaced the Lausanne and Austrian Schools in the rest of Europe. (The Austrian School flourished there until the rise of Nazism.)

“Menger had a lot of notability with his examples of farmers”

I believe that the example that you have in-mind was from Böhm-Bawerk.

“I don't agree with the view of the main editor who says that general = austrian and specific = orthodox”

The principal issue here is mathematical. If one is to locate the sameness amongst what Jevons, Menger, and Walras (and then later figures such as Ramsey and Arrow) were discussing, we must strip away the distinct elements and see what remains. A quantification is a special case of a total ordering (which, in turn, is a special case of a partial ordering). The Austrian School was talking about elements of the feasible set to which a total ordering of desirability could be applied; Jevons and Walras about elements of the feasible set to which a quantification of desirability could be applied; those quantifications imply a total ordering, and thereïn is a sameness. Likewise, the arithmetic differences between total quantified utilities are mathematically special cases of orderings amongst changes of goods or of services.

As I've noted, Walras used a term which, for him, simply meant usefulness. Meanwhile, Bentham &alii hadn't arbitrarily grabbed the word “utility”, which had meant usefulness, for a different concept; they simply though that they had identified true usefulness. And not only did “utility” mean usefulness before those who believed in an hedonic calculus applied to to pleasure or the relief of pain, but it retains that meaning in everyday speech.

Now, the article doesn't declare that the Austrian School conception as such is the generalization; but when conceptions are stripped of peculiar notions of utility (hedonism and quantification), to hold only that which is the same across various notions, indeed the result is indistinguishable from the Austrian School notion.

“the history section is what I like the most. It is well balanced, rich in facts, neutral POV, and well written and illustrated.”

Thanks. In fact this section is one of those (so far) least affected by other editors, and my efforts there were driven by exactly the same spirit as drove my efforts in other part of the article. —SlamDiego_←T 04:35, 15 January 2010 (UTC)

:"I believe that the example that you have in-mind was from Böhm-Bawerk".

You're right, I meant Böhm-Bawerk, sorry. --Forich (talk) 01:11, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

:"and they at least agreed that on some level, they were writing about the same thing."

It is either "same subject, different approach", in which case the subject is broader (e.g. decision theory), or it is what I "conjectured": "different subject, different approach, similar applicability"; where one subject is "ranked uses of goods that may or may not derive in a utility function" and the other is "ranked preferences over goods which must derive in a utility function". The first subject is Austrian's marginal utility, and the second is neoclassical economists'. --Forich (talk) 01:11, 20 January 2010 (UTC).

The first and second generations of the Marginal Revolution didn't simply agree that they were addressing the same or similar problems; they agreed that at some level it was the same solution. The article can, should, and does treat the subject at a level where they are indeed all the same. Ranked preferences are based on use; if we ask a mainstream economist what will happen to the preference ordering of a good or of a service and why it will happen should a new use be discovered or an old use be somehow lost, he or she will not stand there helpless, but be able to explain. And rankings to which quantification in your sense must be applied are a special case of rankings more generally. The operations on quantities not something instead of any operations on rankings, but special cases of operations on rankings. The article also notes how their more specific notions (and the present mainstream notion) of utility differ, and how the popular special case assumptions of quantification, continuity, and differentiability of utility affect the notion of marginal utility and of diminishing marginal utility. —SlamDiego_←T 02:20, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

Slamdiego, let me return to the issue of what people perceived marginal utility was, at the beginning of the 20th century, using this quote from Davenport (1902, p. 361):

"Acquiescence in the term utility carries with it also an acceptance of marginal utility. Entirely aside from any question as to the dubious purposes to which this second term has been subjected in economic discussion, it is clear that it stands for an actual fact in individual experience. Its best illustration is found in the falling intensity of the desires of any individual for any given sort of commodity at any given point of time. Succesive increments of supply call forth a continually diminishing response of desire". The reference is Davenport, H. (1902). "Proposed modifications in Austrian theory and terminology". Quarterly journal of economics 16(3): pp. 355-384.

In my opinion, austrians did coined the term marginal utility(it is a fact you and others have demonstrated, even though the notion arises in earlier work by Bernoulli), but the definition of the quote above took over the original austrian definition, and since then (1902, at least) the british approach to marginal utility has reigned as THE most popular definition, and as such, it should be treated in the lead section of an encyclopedic article on the subject.--Forich (talk) 01:59, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Forich— First, let me acknowledge the excellence of your investigating some of the relatively early literature. But you're referring to an English-language author. And though utility had come to refer to an intensity of desire amongst most of the English-speaking economists at about the time that Davenport was writing, and figures such as Davenport (and Edgeworth before him) thought there was an sound basis in introspection for this conception, that conception was part of what led to a collapse in support for utility theory amongst English-speaking economists. (See Stigler's “The Development of Utility Theory”, originally in JPE, 1950, but since reprinted at least a few times.) Utility made a come-back amongst the mainstream of these economists in the '40s and '50s when it was divorced from references to introspection and to desire. See, for example, the treatment of utility in Kreps's A Course in Microeconomic Theory; he doesn't identify utility as any more than a quantification that fits preferences. (BTW, if you've not read Kreps, then you'll probably really enjoy at least the earliest parts of his book.) The whole reason for all the discussion about monotonic or affine transformations is because the notion of intensity of desire is no longer entailed.

More importantly, ledes should not make views appear wrong or incoherent ex definitione unless they somehow truly are. The lede does make plain

Under the mainstream assumptions, the marginal utility of a good or service is the posited quantified change in utility obtained by increasing or decreasing use of that good or service.

But there is a persistent tradition, which played a major rôle in the Marginal Revolution, that has operated without the assumption of quantification.

(And if you enjoyed that article by Davenport, then see also his The Economics of Enterprise, 1913. Lots of good stuff in there, though I am more sure of the notion that you would enjoy Kreps.) —SlamDiego_←T 04:33, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

SlamDiego, thanks for your observation on my use of sources, I do have access to some good material, but I don't have with me the Kreps textbook you mentioned (I do like his work). What is utility? That's the key question. I feel it is important to strip these terms of the unnecessary technicalities of the ortodox textbooks as it will pay off for the general public (but it is a real challenge). You said in some earlier comment:

"Walras used a term which, for him, simply meant usefulness. Meanwhile, Bentham &alii hadn't arbitrarily grabbed the word “utility”, which had meant usefulness, for a different concept; they simply though that they had identified true usefulness. And not only did “utility” mean usefulness before those who believed in an hedonic calculus applied to to pleasure or the relief of pain, but it retains that meaning in everyday speech.".

I think we agree that "utility" has received at least four different meanings : i) in everyday speech, it is the degree of usefulness of something; ii) in hedonism and benthamism, it is the exact measure of pleasure or pain; iii) in neoclassical economics (with the right mathematics ;) ), it is some kind of index that maps ordered preferences into the scale of real numbers, simultaneously preserving a few relevant assumptions; iv) in austrian economics, it is "a position on this scale of wants (scale of wants = subjective rank-ordering of the set of all wants which arranges them in the order of their importance to the individual" (McCulloch 1997, p. 250). Based on which one of the former definitions of utility, are we going to write the definition of marginal utility? It seems you know well the economic thought held by the first, second, and third generations of marginalists, could it be that they are treating ambiguously the definition of "utility"? If thats the case, we are screwed, and Wikiproject Videogames will continue to kick our ass, ;) --Forich (talk) 01:53, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Haha! Well, I think that there is generally some degree of ambiguity in early thinking in most sciences, and certainly in economics. Consider, for example, the distinction between marginal productivity and economy of scale. Economists were confusing these two for centuries, and it was only when Wicksteed finally went at it in the 20th Century that someone clearly disentangled things. (And, of course, there was a lag between Wicksteed's discussion and the rest of the profession catching-up.) But what I am arguing is that the different conceptions of utility did have a shared content (as well as distinctive assumptions and presumptions), and that this shared content is actually what gets the major results across all of these schools. The fact that the Benthamites thought that the true measure of utility was pleasure or the removal of pain wasn't what got Jevons diminishing marginal utility and the application thereof to decision-theory, and the fact that he, the Walrasians, early neoclassicals, and more recent neoclassicals ascribed quantity really just helped them to impose ordering. (The last evidently recognize this, in their reference to “ordinal” utility, though few of them recognize the unfortunate side-effect of ruling-out some economically rational orderings.) —SlamDiego_←T 04:23, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Also, the lead section currently looks like this: "In economics, the marginal utility of a good or service is the utility gained (or lost) from an increase (or decrease) in the amount available of that good or service". I think it is not a complex definition, and it is verifiable BUT it has circularity: "the marginal utility is the utility...". Think about it, if we were defining "black swan" like this: "black swans are swans that that do not emit or reflect light in any part of the visible spectrum", a casual reader (with no previous knowledge of swans) won't be able to recognize a black swan when he sees one! Same for our current definition of marginal utility. --Forich (talk) 01:53, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Ah, well, I don't agree that this is circular, though I do agree that it presumes some prior knowledge of the concept of utility, just as defining “black swans” as a sort of swan presumes a prior concept of swans. But likewise, defining “swan” in terms of “bird” presumes a prior knowledge of that term. Every true definition presumes some knowledge of prior terms, until one gets to “ostensive definitions” (exposing people to elements of a set while naming the set). I can well understand the desire to remove any unnecessary reference to such prior terminology, but my earliest efforts to write a more Ockhamistic definition resulted in some pretty strong denunciations of the results. But if you think that you can produce a definition of marginal utility that will not, in fact, use the term “utility” or a synonym, will not leave readers more baffled, and will not result in even greater conflict with other editors, then I'd be happy to discuss it. But my own view is that the best solution is to have a section below which discusses the relevant meaning(s) of “utility”. —SlamDiego_←T 04:23, 29 January 2010 (UTC)