In the past few decades, so-called model organisms have become a cornerstone of research in the biomedical sciences. For the scientists, the model organism is both a practice ground for developing laboratory techniques, and a source of insights into common or even universal biological...

When the German translation of Darwin’s On the Origin of Species was published in 1860, it intensified a conflict that German theologians had been fighting since the early 19th century. Arguments against the secular relativising or even thorough dismissal of the scientific, philosophical and...

There has been a remarkable growth in evolutionary economics since the 1980s. But despitethis outward success there has been inner disagreement on fundamental issues including thebuilding blocks of evolutionary theory and the very meaning of ‘evolution’ itself. This essayprovides a...

Ich werde meine Überlegungen in vier Abschnitten entwickeln. Auf die Problemexposition imersten Abschnitt folgt der zentrale zweite Abschnitt mit Überlegungen zur Ordnungsverantwortungder Unternehmen. Der dritte Abschnitt setzt sich mit der Kritik an der Ordnungsverantwortungvon Unternehmen...

The facts of social sciences are ones that stem from scientificexpertise, but in the social world, everyone is their own expert.Everyone lives in society, and experiences either first-hand, orclosely second-hand, the same phenomena that social scientistsinvestigate. Consequently, people are not...

“Population” is often a significant unit of analysis, and a point of passage for facts and models moving between the natural and social sciences, and between animals and humans. But the very existence of a population is a “fact” fraught with challenges: What distinguishes a population...

This paper reassesses and extends Hawke’s passenger railway social savings for England and Wales. Better estimates of coach costs and evidence that third class passengers would otherwise have walked reduce Hawke’s social savings by two-thirds. We calculate railway speeds, and the amount and...

The usual way to evaluate the implications of new technology for economic growth is through growth accounting techniques. This methodology has, of course, been widely employed to examine the impact of information and communications technology (ICT) and the results have dominated thinking on the...

We present evidence on social incentives in the workplace, namely on whether workers’ behavioris affected by the presence of those they are socially tied to, even in settings where thereare no externalities among workers due to either the production technology or the compensationscheme in...

In this paper the author argues that social scientists need to do more toprovide policy-relevant research. Rapid technological and economicchange raise new issues about how policy should adjust that are notadequately addressed by older and narrower approaches. The authorsuggests two ways in...