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@xy, member from Sept. 25, 2023

Favourite quotes (21448)

“It is paradoxical that an administration that came to office rejecting the whole apparatus of Keynesian economics finds itself presiding over a stream of what threaten to be permanent deficits.”

Thomas J. Sargent (1943) American economist

Thomas J. Sargent "Back to Basics On Budgets", The New York Times (August 10, 1983).

“Cagan’s adaptive mechanism for explaining expectations of inflation has sometimes been criticized as an ad hoc formulation that is inconsistent with the hypothesis that expectations are rational. In this paper, we have showed that conditions exist under which adaptive expectations are fully rational.”

Thomas J. Sargent (1943) American economist

"Rational expectations and the dynamics of hyperinflation." 1973

“My published work is just a record of my learning. I'm sharing it with people so they won't make the same mistakes that I did. It's been a painful and slow process. My work is like a journey, a journey of discovery.”

Thomas J. Sargent (1943) American economist

Thomas J. Sargent, in Conversations with Economists (1983) by Arjo Klamer

“My recollection is that Bob Lucas and Ed Prescott were initially very enthusiastic about rational expectations econometrics. After all, it simply involved imposing on ourselves the same high standards we had criticized the Keynesians for failing to live up to. But after about five years of doing likelihood ratio tests on rational expectations models, I recall Bob Lucas and Ed Prescott both telling me that those tests were rejecting too many good models.”

Thomas J. Sargent (1943) American economist

Thomas J. Sargent interviewed by George W. Evans & Seppo Honkapohja, Macroeconomic Dynamics, 9, 2005, 561–583.

“What policymakers (and econometricians) should recognize, then, is that societies face a meaningful set of choices about alternative economic policy regimes.”

Thomas J. Sargent (1943) American economist

"Rational expectations and the dynamics of hyperinflation." 1973

“Q: “Professor Sargent, can you tell me what CD rates will be in two years?””

Thomas J. Sargent (1943) American economist

Sargent: “No.” <br class="br">Thomas J. Sargent in: Ally Bank TV Spot, 'Predictions' Featuring Thomas Sargent http://www.ispot.tv/ad/7Lj9/ally-bank-predictions-featuring-thomas-sargent.

“For policy, the central fact is that Keynesian policy recommendations have no sounder basis, in a scientific sense, than recommendations of non-Keynesian economists or, for that matter, non-economists.”

Thomas J. Sargent (1943) American economist

Robert Lucas, Jr. and Thomas J. Sargent, "After Keynesian macroeconomics", After the Phillips Curve: Persistence of High Inflation and High Unemployment (1978).

“Economics is organized common sense. Here is a short list of valuable lessons that our beautiful subject teaches.”

Thomas J. Sargent (1943) American economist

Thomas J. Sargent, University of California at Berkeley graduation speech (2007), quoted in David Glasner, " Memo to Tom Sargent: Economics Is More than Just Common Sense https://uneasymoney.com/2014/04/25/memo-to-tom-sargent-economics-is-more-than-just-common-sense/" (2014)

“I always look for colleagues who are smart, and who know a lot in many fields. The obvious advantage is that he or she may be able to solve the problem that has produced trouble in your work. Also smart and knowledgeable colleagues can save you time, and are interesting and inspiring!”

Martin Lewis Perl (1927–2014) American scientist

Essay on Creativity in Science and Engineering

“For every good idea, expect to have five, ten, twenty wrong or useless ideas. You cannot avoid the bad ideas if you keep your imagination free. There is no spam filter for bad ideas.”

Martin Lewis Perl (1927–2014) American scientist

Essay on Creativity in Science and Engineering

“Experimental science is a craft and an art, and part of the art is knowing when to end a fruitless experiment. There is a danger of becoming obsessed with a fruitless experiment even if it goes nowhere.”

Martin Lewis Perl (1927–2014) American scientist

Nobel prize lecture

“Imagination and obsession are the keys to getting a good idea. To help your imagination keep your eyes and ears open. Avoid the "not invented here prejudice."”

Martin Lewis Perl (1927–2014) American scientist

Essay on Creativity in Science and Engineering

“You may turn a bad idea into a good idea — don't kill the bad idea prematurely. A bad idea can evolve into a good idea.”

Martin Lewis Perl (1927–2014) American scientist

Essay on Creativity in Science and Engineering

“Common elements of creativity are originality and imagination. Creativity is intertwined with the freedom to design, to invent and to dream. In engineering and science a creative idea is useful only if it meets three conditions: the constraint of the natural laws, the constraint of cost, and the constraint of technical feasibility.”

Martin Lewis Perl (1927–2014) American scientist

Essay on Creativity in Science and Engineering

“It is always a good plan for a speculative experimenter to have two experiments going, or at least one going and one being built.”

Martin Lewis Perl (1927–2014) American scientist

Nobel Lecture http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1995/perl-lecture.html, Martin L. Perl, The Nobel Prize in Physics 1995 <br class="br">Nobel prize lecture

“The best colleagues are those who will think about your ideas, who will talk with you and offer insight, constructive criticism. No one needs to be crushed for having a new idea.”

Martin Lewis Perl (1927–2014) American scientist

"Creativity in Science and Engineering", Martin Perl's blog Reflections on Physics … from the Tau to Dark Energy http://martinperl.com/ <br class="br">Essay on Creativity in Science and Engineering

“The experimenter dealing with nature faces an outside and often hard world. Natures' curriculum cannot be changed.”

Martin Lewis Perl (1927–2014) American scientist

in his Nobel Autobiography, edited by [Gösta Ekspong, Nobel Lectures in Physics 1991-1995, World Scientific, 1997, 9810226780, 161]

“I have found more peace in the knowledge of truth than anger in the feeling of oppression, and the most precious fruit that I could want to collect in this memoir would be to inspire my readers with that peace of mind arising from the clear perception of evil and its causes.”

Pierre Joseph Proudhon (1809–1865) French politician, mutualist philosopher, economist, and socialist

Preface
What is Property? (1840)

“I should like to restore with one hand what I destroy with the other. When pruning an old tree one should avoid destroying the buds and fruit; you know this is as well as anyone.”

Pierre Joseph Proudhon (1809–1865) French politician, mutualist philosopher, economist, and socialist

Preface
What is Property? (1840)

“If we pass from physical nature to the moral world, here we still find ourselves subject to the same deceptions of appearance, to the same influence of spontaneity and habit.”

Pierre Joseph Proudhon (1809–1865) French politician, mutualist philosopher, economist, and socialist

Source: What is Property? (1840), Chapter One