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NONTHEMATIC / Vol. 30, No. 2 (Summer 1963)


Transitivity may be defined as that characteristic of rationality or consistency of choice such that if a person or group prefers A to B or C, he or it also prefers A to C. Less consciously political theorists assume transitivity when they hold that free and informed voting produces choices--on candidates or issues--that accurately reflect the voters’ preferences or desires... Thus transitivity is a key assumption in each of the social sciences, and it is especially so in economics. Is it a valid assumption that will meet an empirical test?

During the past several generations there have been important changes in North American family relationships. While this essay emphasizes the husband-wife relation, its main perspectives also apply to the relations between parents and children. The “data” presented here come from the casual observations of family life that are made by everyone, rather than from a formal study of the family.

All philosophy, for Henri Bergson, begins with the fundamental experience of real duration: that is, with an awareness that the time of the human psychic life is pure change, an endless continuity of becoming, an uninterrupted upsurge of novelty. Through the faculty memory, mental life goes on swelling with the duration it has accumulated. The whole past of an individual is made known through an impulse, a tendency to act in one way or another; although only a small portion of this past will find any representation in conscious ideas.

M. Ladd Thomas

In the Philippines, central-local relations are not clearly defined. There, neither complete centralization nor substantial local autonomy exists--if the former can be said to be a condition in which the national government exercises all important functions, whereas the latter is typified by localities wielding significant powers. Rather a peculiar blending of the two extremes is found.

Modern democratic societies are highly differentiated. In contrast to relatively undifferentiated primitive societies, the basic functional needs of modern societies tend to be fulfilled by activities that are performed in segregated and specialized social units. The typical individual, however, participates in one way or another in many of these units.

Review of books by Alexander Gesrchenkron. Economic Backwardness in Historical Perspective. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1962. And Jan Tinbergin. Shaping the World Economy. New York. The Twentieth Century Fund, 1962. 330 pp.

Review of book by Simon Kuznets. Capital in the American Economy: Its Formation and Financing. Princeton: Princeton U. Press, 1961. 664 pp.

Review of book by Wilbert Moore. The Conduct of the Corporation. New York: Random House, 1962. 285 pp.

Review of book by Loomis, Charles P., Zona K. Loomis. Modern Social Theories: Selected American Writers. New York: The Free Press of Glencoe. 1961. 1,479 pp.

Review of book by Ludwig Gumplowicz. New York; Paine-Whitman Publishers. 1963. 336 pp. (edited with an introduction and notes by Irving L. Horowitz)

Review of book by Quentin Gibson. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. 1960. (New York: The Humanities Press. 1960). 214 pp.

Review of book by Hans Morgenthau.New York: Alfred A. Knopf. 1960. 359 pp.

Review of book by R. Evely and I. M. D. Little. London: Cambridge University Press [for the National Institute of Economic and Social Research]. 1960. 357 pp.

Review of book by Maurice Natanson. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff. 1962. 220 pp.

Review of book by Kathleen Jones and Roy Sidebotham. New York: The Humanities Press, Inc. (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, Ltd.). 1962. 210 pp.

Review of book by Philip B. Kurland. Chicago: Aldine Publishing Company. 1962. 127 pp.

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