Behavioral economics

Quality of life Quality of life (QOL) is the general well-being of individuals and societies. QOL has a wide range of contexts, including the fields of international development, healthcare, politics and employment. Quality of life should not be confused with the concept of standard of living, which is based primarily on income. Overview[edit] Standard indicators of the quality of life include not only wealth and employment but also the built environment, physical and mental health, education, recreation and leisure time, and social belonging.[1][2] According to ecological economist Robert Costanza: While Quality of Life (QOL) has long been an explicit or implicit policy goal, adequate definition and measurement have been elusive. Identity and engagementCreativity and recreationMemory and projectionBelief and ideasGender and generationsEnquiry and learningWellbeing and health Also frequently related are concepts such as freedom, human rights, and happiness. Quantitative measurement[edit] Other measures[edit]

Psychology Psychology is an academic and applied discipline that involves the scientific study of mental functions and behaviors.[1][2] Psychology has the immediate goal of understanding individuals and groups by both establishing general principles and researching specific cases,[3][4] and by many accounts it ultimately aims to benefit society.[5][6] In this field, a professional practitioner or researcher is called a psychologist and can be classified as a social, behavioral, or cognitive scientist. Psychologists attempt to understand the role of mental functions in individual and social behavior, while also exploring the physiological and biological processes that underlie cognitive functions and behaviors. While psychological knowledge is often applied to the assessment and treatment of mental health problems, it is also directed towards understanding and solving problems in many different spheres of human activity. Etymology History Structuralism Functionalism Psychoanalysis Behaviorism Humanistic

Philosophy Karl Popper: Discussion Popper's Problem of Induction. Quotes Karl Popper Discussion of Metaphysics / Philosophy of Karl Popper's Problem of Induction & the Evolution of Absolute Truth Karl Popper Pictures, Quotes 'Objective Knowledge' In my opinion, the greatest scandal of philosophy is that, while all around us the world of nature perishes - and not the world of nature alone - philosophers continue to talk, sometimes cleverly and sometimes not, about the question of whether this world exists. They get involved in scholasticism, in linguistic puzzles such as, for example, whether or not there are differences between 'being' and 'existing'. (Popper, 1975) Introduction to Karl Popper The philosophy of Karl Popper and Thomas Kuhn are very similar - they argue that truth is evolving and can never be absolutely known. I apologise if this is abrupt - but we can now deduce what reality is without opinion, so this is stated absolutely simply because it is true. Geoff Haselhurst Realism of Karl Popper My thesis is that realism is neither demonstrable nor refutable.

Slutsky equation Equation in economics In microeconomics, the Slutsky equation (or Slutsky identity), named after Eugen Slutsky, relates changes in Marshallian (uncompensated) demand to changes in Hicksian (compensated) demand, which is known as such since it compensates to maintain a fixed level of utility. There are two parts of the Slutsky equation, namely the substitution effect, and income effect. a substitution effect: when the price of good changes, as it becomes relatively cheaper, if hypothetically consumer's consumption remains same, income would be freed up which could be spent on a combination of each or more of the goods.an income effect: the purchasing power of a consumer increases as a result of a price decrease, so the consumer can now afford better products or more of the same products, depending on whether the product itself is a normal good or an inferior good. The Slutsky equation decomposes the change in demand for good i in response to a change in the price of good j: where . When .

Happiness Happiness is a mental or emotional state of well-being defined by positive or pleasant emotions ranging from contentment to intense joy.[1] A variety of biological, psychological, religious, and philosophical approaches have striven to define happiness and identify its sources. Various research groups, including positive psychology, are employing the scientific method to research questions about what "happiness" is, and how it might be attained. The United Nations declared 20 March the International Day of Happiness to recognise the relevance of happiness and wellbeing as universal goals. Definition Philosophers and religious thinkers often define happiness in terms of living a good life, or flourishing, rather than simply as an emotion. Happiness is a fuzzy concept and can mean many different things to many people. Research results Meditation has been found to lead to high activity in the brain's left prefrontal cortex, which in turn has been found to correlate with happiness.[11] Buddhism

Economics For a topical guide to this subject, see Outline of economics. Economics is the social science that studies the behavior of individuals, households, and organizations (called economic actors, players, or agents), when they manage or use scarce resources, which have alternative uses, to achieve desired ends. Agents are assumed to act rationally, have multiple desirable ends in sight, limited resources to obtain these ends, a set of stable preferences, a definite overall guiding objective, and the capability of making a choice. There exists an economic problem, subject to study by economic science, when a decision (choice) has to be made by one or more resource-controlling players to attain the best possible outcome under bounded rational conditions. Definitions There are a variety of modern definitions of economics. a branch of the science of a statesman or legislator [with the twofold objectives of providing] a plentiful revenue or subsistence for the people ... J. Microeconomics Markets

Nietzsche: Beyond Good and Evil A brilliant young man, he was appointed professor at the University of Basel aged 24 having not even finished his degree. His evanescent philosophical life ended 20 years later when he went insane and died shortly afterwards. Nietzsche's argued that the Christian system of faith and worship was not only incorrect, but harmful to society because it allowed the weak to rule the strong - it suppressed the will to power which was the driving force of human character. However, without God he felt that the future of man might spiral into a society of nihilism, devoid of any meaning; his aim was for man to realise the lack of divine purpose and create his own values. Watch the full documentary now -

First-order approach Historically,[1] the first-order approach was the main tool used to solve the first formal moral hazard models, such as those of Richard Zeckhauser, [3] Michael Spence,[4] and Joseph Stiglitz.[5] Not long after these models were published, James Mirrlees was the first to point out that the approach was not generally valid, and sometimes imposed even stronger necessary conditions than those of the original problem.[2] Following this realization, he[6] and other economists such as Bengt Holmström,[7] William P. Rogerson[2] and Ian Jewitt[8] gave both sufficient conditions for cases where the first-order approach gives a valid solution to the problem, and also different techniques that could be applied to solve general principal-agent models. Mathematical formulation [edit] In mathematical terms, the first-order approach relaxes the more general incentive compatibility constraint in the principal's problem. and proposes a contract to the agent by solving the following program: subject to and

Meritocracy Definitions[edit] Early definitions[edit] Supporters of meritocracies do not necessarily agree on the nature of "merit", however, they do tend to agree that "merit" itself should be a primary consideration during evaluation. In a more general sense, meritocracy can refer to any form of government based on achievement. This is in contrast to the term originally coined by Michael Young in 1958, who critically defined it as a system where "merit is equated with intelligence-plus-effort, its possessors are identified at an early age and selected for appropriate intensive education, and there is an obsession with quantification, test-scoring, and qualifications." [5] Meritocracy in its wider sense, may be any general act of judgment upon the basis of various demonstrated merits; such acts frequently are described in sociology and psychology. More recent definitions[edit] The most common form of meritocratic screening found today is the college degree. Etymology[edit] History[edit] Australia[edit]

Linguistics In the early 20th century Ferdinand de Saussure distinguished between the notions of langue and parole in his formulation of structural linguistics. According to him, parole is the specific utterance of speech, whereas langue refers to an abstract phenomenon that theoretically defines the principles and system of rules that govern a language.[9] This distinction resembles the one made by Noam Chomsky between competence and performance, where competence is individual's ideal knowledge of a language, while performance is the specific way in which it is used.[10] In classical Indian philosophy of language, the Sanskrit philosophers like Patanjali and Katyayana had distinguished between sphota (light) and dhvani (sound). In the late 20th century, French philosopher Jacques Derrida distinguished between the notions of speech and writing.[11] Nomenclature[edit] Variation and Universality[edit] Lexicon[edit] The lexicon is a catalogue of words and terms that are stored in a speaker's mind.