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Mathematical Economics

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Abstract

A summary of the emergence and triumph of mathematical economics. The modern phase was deeply influenced by John von Neumann’s article of 1928 on games and his paper of 1937 on economic growth. His 1944 Theory of Games and Economic Behavior, coauthored by Oskar Morgenstern, went beyond differential calculus and linear algebra and paved the way for the axiomatization of economic theory. This has enabled researchers to use precisely stated and flawlessly proved results, in the quest for the most direct link between the assumptions and the conclusions of a theorem. Economic theory is fated for a long mathematical future.

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Debreu, G. (2018). Mathematical Economics. In: The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95189-5_1083

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