The Logic of Value and the Value of Logic

摘要

Jevons composed his value theory of nonenties. These creatures are elusive.Subsequent formal refinements did not eliminate the fundamental flaw butmade it only harder to detect. A vacuous formal structure is one that cannotbe interpreted in some domain. For want of any correspondence in the monetaryeconomy, Jevons’s approach could not produce viable results. Roughlyspeaking, Jevons made value dependent on subjective factors. This papergives a rigorous formal proof that value is determined by objective conditions.Within the structural-axiomatic framework there is no formal spare room forthe major behavioral nonentities utility, optimization, rational expectations,and equilibrium.