Jim Westrich tells me that Kenneth Arrow passed away yesterday. Arrow was 95. Kenneth Arrow was one of the giants of modern economic theory. I never met Arrow, so I will leave it to others to talk about him as a man, as a teacher, and as a scholar. For me, he is and will always be the author of Social Choice and Individual Values, a 1951 monograph that was, I believe, his doctoral dissertation. It contains his elegant proof of the so-called General Possibility [or Impossibility] Theorem, a generalization of the Paradox of Majority Rule. Those who are interested can find a statement of the proof on my second blog, Formal Methods in Political Philosophy. Arrow was an old New York socialist who retained, throughout his life, an unshakable progressive orientation. I found his work to be genuinely beautiful. It was expanded and developed by another admirable and brilliant economist, Amartya Sen, in Collective Choice and Social Welfare [1970.]
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4 comments:
Did you study Latin and do you just know a few choice phrases in Latin?
A bit more than 45 years ago when I entered graduate school I passed a reading exam in Latin, but now I have to google your Latin phrases.
I do notice that you have an exceptional memory, not quite as good as Chomsky's, but very impressive in comparison with most of ours.
I know no Latin, my German is awful, and my French is not much better. I am, however, fluent in English. :) Sixty-seven years studying philosophy leaves you with a few choice phrases.
Professor, you may remember me as corresponding to you through your blog at various points, especially a few years ago, but my readership has been constant. It was your discussion of Arrow's work that put me onto his work, and social choice theory in particular, quite a few years ago. I remember sitting in the university library reading your blog posts in between essay assignments. Now I'm about to hand in my PhD which involves a substantial dollop of social choice theory, and I join you in remembrance of Kenneth Arrow and his accomplishments.
Sen's book is just out in Penguin in a new edition.
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