Geoffrey M. Hodgson and Thorbjorn Knudsen, Darwin's Conjecture: The search for general principles of social and economic evolution

摘要

Hodgson and Knudsen's important book provides rigorous foundations for evolutionary economics. The field of evolutionary economics is broad enough to encompass both rigorous work and an unfortunate hodgepodge of loose analogies. Hodgson and Knudsen want to banish loose analogies and vague language in favor of a logically tight metatheoretic framework for applied theory. Their metatheoretic framework is "generalized Darwinism," which encompasses biological and social evolution. Their book is a contribution, therefore, to the Darwinian worldview and not only evolutionary economics. In particular, their discussion of "replicators" (a generalization of genotype) as "generative," if correct, is as much a contribution to biology as to economics (p. 122-132).