Economics as Plausible Conjecture

Michael H. Turk

History of Political Economy, 2010, vol. 42, issue 3, 521-546

Abstract: The examination of economics from the standpoint of language and literature, part of the “linguistic turn†in economic methodology, may be extended and inverted by setting the literary elements of economics in historical perspective. In so doing, it will emerge that in the formative period of classical economics, when the line between the literary and the scientific was blurred, there was an affinity between economics and new forms of literature, especially the novel, that helped shape the characteristic method of economics as “plausible conjecture.†Through plausible conjecture, fictions, as thought-experiments or models, are used to capture and depict essential elements of economic reality. This approach is evident in the work of François Quesnay and central to that of Adam Smith, setting the mold for later economic thinkers.

Keywords: François Quesnay; Adam Smith (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2010
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hope.dukejournals.org/content/42/3/521.full.pdf+html link to full text (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hop:hopeec:v:42:y:2010:i:3:p:521-546

Access Statistics for this article

History of Political Economy is currently edited by Kevin D. Hoover

More articles in History of Political Economy from Duke University Press Duke University Press 905 W. Main Street, Suite 18B Durham, NC 27701.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Center for the History of Political Economy Webmaster ().