Overview

Abstract

One thing old about our new world view is that it is fundamentally economic. Our analysis will retain throughout the same basic methodological individualism that Schumpeter assured us is the common heritage of virtually all economists. We believe that the social and economic regularities dealt with in this work cannot be usefully understood other than as the consistent outcomes of the individually rational choices of each of the relevant individuals. Yet, for all of our iconoclasm, we could hardly be calling upon hallowed tradition or higher authority to justify our assumption of individual utility maximization. Nor are we presumptuously asserting a universal methodological principle. Rather, as we shall soon see, our maximization assumption is derived from evolutionary processes. Other have traveled a similar route. And, as we shall come to strees, they have greatly improved the road that we shall over travel.