Utility Quotes - Page 13

• The utility, or intrinsic value of gold as a commodity is now considerably less than in the past; its monetary status has become extraordinarily ambiguous; and its future is highly uncertain.

  Benjamin Graham

  Past, Gold, Commodity

  "Storage and Stability". Book by Benjamin Graham.Part III, Chapter X, The Status of Gold and Silver, p. 127, 1937.

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• The calculus of utility aims at supplying the ordinary wants of man at the least cost of labour.

  William Stanley Jevons

  Men, Ordinary, Cost

  William Stanley Jevons (1871). “The Theory of Political Economy”, p.32

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• Some people in the utility industry have called it 'circling the drain'

  Richard Kauffmann

  People, Energy, Drains

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• False is the idea of utility that sacrifices a thousand real advantages for one imaginary or trifling inconvenience; that would take fire from men because it burns, and water because one may drown in it; that has no remedy for evils except destruction. The laws that forbid the carrying of arms are laws of such a nature. They disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes.

  Cesare Beccaria

  Real, Sacrifice, Men

  Cesare Beccaria (1963). “On Crimes and Punishments”, Pearson College Division

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• It so happens that the work which is likely to be our most durable monument, and to convey some knowledge of us to the most remote posterity, is a work of bare utility; not a shrine, not a fortress, not a palace, but a bridge.

  Montgomery Schuyler

  Engineering, Bridges, Shrines

  Montgomery Schuyler (1892). “American Architecture”

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• I sincerely wish you may find it convenient to come here. the pleasure of the trip will be less than you expect, but the utility greater. it will make you adore your own country, it's soil, it's climate, it's equality, liberty, laws, people & manners. my god! how little do my countrymen know.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Country, Law, People

  Thomas Jefferson (2010). “The Works of Thomas Jefferson: Notes on Virginia II, Correspondence 1782-1786”, p.424, Cosimo, Inc.

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• It is folly to use as one's guide in the selection of fundamental science the criterion of utility. Not because (scientists)... despise utility. But because. .. useful outcomes are best identified after the making of discoveries, rather than before.

  John Charles Polanyi

  Science, Discovery, Use

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• Science has a simple faith, which transcends utility. Nearly all men of science, all men of learning for that matter, and men of simple ways too, have it in some form and in some degree. It is the faith that it is the privilege of man to learn to understand, and that this is his mission. If we abandon that mission under stress we shall abandon it forever, for stress will not cease. Knowledge for the sake of understanding, not merely to prevail, that is the essence of our being. None can define its limits, or set its ultimate boundaries.

  Vannevar Bush

  Faith, Stress, Knowledge

  "Science is Not Enough" by Vannevar Bush, Ch. X, (p. 191), 1967.

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• No human being has the faculty of originally creating matter, which is more than nature itself can do. But any one may avail himself of the agents offered him by nature, to invest matter with utility.

  Jean-Baptiste Say

  Creating, Agents, May

  Jean Baptiste Say, Charles Robert Prinsep (1857). “A Treatise on Political Economy; Or, The Production, Distribution, and Consumption of Wealth”, p.65

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• The information highway is being sold to us as delivering information, but what it's really delivering is data... Unlike data, information has utility, timeliness, accuracy, a pedigree... Editors serve as barometers of quality, and most of an editor's time is spent saying no.

  Clifford Stoll

  Data, Editors, Quality

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• One of the most important axioms is, that as the quantity of any commodity, for instance, plain food, which a man has to consume, increases, so the utility or benefit derived from the last portion used decreases in degree. The decrease in enjoyment between the beginning and the end of a meal may be taken as an example.

  William Stanley Jevons

  Taken, Men, Important

  William Stanley Jevons (1973). “Papers and correspondence of William Stanley Jevons”

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• The difficulties of economics are mainly the difficulties of conceiving clearly and fully the conditions of utility.

  William Stanley Jevons

  Economics, Difficulty, Conceiving

  William Stanley Jevons (1970). “The Theory of Political Economy”, Penguin (Non-Classics)

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• The point of equilibrium will be known by the criterion that an infinitely small amount of commodity exchanged in addition, at the same rate, will bring neither gain nor loss of utility.

  William Stanley Jevons

  Loss, Gains, Commodity

  1871 The Theory of Political Economy.

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• Men first feel necessity, then look for utility, next attend to comfort, still later amuse themselves with pleasure, thence grow dissolute in luxury, and finally go mad and waste their substance.

  Giambattista Vico

  Men, Luxury, Mad

  Giambattista Vico (2015). “The New Science of Giambattista Vico”, p.153, Cornell University Press

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• The other animals humans eat, use in science, hunt, trap, and exploit in a variety of ways, have a life of their own that is of importance to them apart from their utility to us. They are not only in the world, they are aware of it. What happens to them matters to them. Each has a life that fares better or worse for the one whose life it is.

  Tom Regan

  Life, Nature, Animal

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• That the foundation of our national policy should be laid in private morality. If individuals be not influenced by moral principles, it is in vain to look for public virtue; it is, therefore, the duty of legislators to enforce, both by precept and example, the utility, as well as the necessity, of a strict adherence to the rules of distributive justice.

  James Madison

  Justice, Voting, Foundation

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