astronomy

Mark Blaug

Mark Blaug is a astronomy topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Mark Blaug rather than just read about it. In short: Mark Blaug FBA (; 3 April 1927 – 18 November 2011) was a Dutch-born British economist (naturalised in 1982), who covered a broad range of topics during his long career. He was married to Ruth Towse.

Key takeaways

Mark Blaug belongs to astronomy; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Mark Blaug to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Mark Blaug from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Mark Blaug FBA (; 3 April 1927 – 18 November 2011) was a Dutch-born British economist (naturalised in 1982), who covered a broad range of topics during his long career. He was married to Ruth Towse.

Life and work Blaug was born on 3 April 1927 in The Hague as Norbert Blauaug into a Jewish family.. His family fled to England in 1940. In 1955 Blaug received his PhD from Columbia University in New York under the supervision of George Stigler. Besides shorter periods in public service and in international organisations he has held academic appointments in – among others – Yale University, the University of London, the London School of Economics, the University of Exeter and the University of Buckingham. He was visiting professor in the Netherlands, University of Amsterdam and Erasmus University in Rotterdam, where he was also co-director of CHIMES (Center for History in Management and Economics). Mark Blaug made far reaching contributions to a range of topics in economic thought throughout his career. Apart from valuable contributions to the economics of art and the economics of education, he is best known for his work in history of economic thought and the methodology of economics. He died on 18 November 2011 in Peter Tavy, Devon.

Honours In 1984 he was made a Foreign Member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW). In 1988 he was made a Distinguished Fellow of the History of Economics Society. In 1989 he became an Elected Fellow of the British Academy.

Selected publications

Books Blaug, Mark (1958). Ricardian economics: a historical study (volume 8 of Yale studies in economics) (1st ed.). New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press. Reprinted as: Blaug, Mark (2012). Ricardian economics: a historical study (volume 8 of Yale studies in economics). Whitefish, MT: Literary Licensing, LLC. ISBN 9781258447861. Review: Spiegel, Henry W. (January 1959). "Ricardian economics: a historical study (book review)". The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science. 321 (1): 197–198. doi:10.1177/000271625932100176. S2CID 145396784. Blaug, Mark (1962). Economic theory in retrospect (1st ed.). Cambridge New York: Cambridge University Press. Revised as: Blaug, Mark (1997). Economic theory in retrospect (5th ed.). Cambridge New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780521577014 – via Internet Archive. Preview. Blaug, Mark (1974). The Cambridge Revolution: Success or Failure? (1st ed.). London: Institute of Economic Affairs. ISBN 9780255360623. Blaug, Mark (1980). The methodology of economics, or, How economists explain. Cambridge England New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780521294379. Revised as: Blaug, Mark (1992). The methodology of economics, or, how economists explain. Cambridge New York, NY: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780521436786 – via Internet Archive. Preview. Blaug, Mark (1985). Great economists since Keynes: an introduction to the lives & works of one hundred modern economists. Brighton: Wheatsheaf. ISBN 9781858986920. Revised as: Blaug, Mark (1998). Great economists since Keynes: an introduction to the lives & works of one hundred modern economists (2nd ed.). Cheltenham, Glos, UK; Northampton, MA, USA: Edward Elgar – via Internet Archive. Blaug, Mark (1986). Economic history and the history of economics. Brighton: Wheatsheaf. ISBN 9780745001302 – via Internet Archive. Blaug, Mark (1986). Great economists before Keynes: an introduction to the lives & works of one hundred great economists of the past. Brighton: Wheatsheaf. ISBN 9780745001609. Blaug, Mark (1990). Economic theories, true or false?: essays in the history and methodology of economics. Aldershot, Hants, England Brookfield, Vt., USA: Edward Elgar Publishing Gower Publishing Co. ISBN 9781852783761. Blaug, Mark; de Marchi, Neil (1991). Appraising economic theories : studies in the methodology of research programs. Aldershot, Hants, England Brookfield, Vermont, US: Edward Elgar Publishing Co. ISBN 9781852785154. Blaug, Mark (1997). Not only an economist: recent essays by Mark Blaug. Cheltenham, UK Brookfield, Vermont, US: Edward Elgar Publishing Co. ISBN 9781858984551. Blaug, Mark; Sturges, Rodney P. (1999). Who's who in economics. Cheltenham, UK Northampton, MA: Edward Elgar Publishing. ISBN 9781858988863.

Chapters in books Sen, Amartya (2012), "Development as capability expansion", in Saegert, Susan; DeFilippis, James (eds.), The community development reader, New York: Routledge, ISBN 9780415507769 Blaug, Mark (2005), "The social sciences: economics (volume 27)", in Goetz, Philip W.; MacHenry, Robert; Hoiberg, Dale H. (eds.), The New Encyclopædia Britannica (15th ed.), Chicago: Encyclopædia Britannica, pp. 343–352, ISBN 9781593392369

Journal articles Blaug, Mark (June 1963). "The Myth of the Old Poor Law and the Making of the New" (PDF). The Journal of Economic History. 23 (2): 151–184. doi:10.1017/S0022050700103808. JSTOR 2116435. Blaug, Mark (June 1964). "The Poor Law Report Reexamined" (PDF). The Journal of Economic History. 24 (2): 229–245. doi:10.1017/S0022050700060502. JSTOR 2115861. Blaug, Mark (May–June 1998). "Disturbing currents in modern economics". Challenge. 41 (3): 11–34. doi:10.1080/05775132.1998.11472030. JSTOR 40721829. Blaug, Mark (Summer 2000). "Henry George: rebel with a cause" (PDF). The European Journal of the History of Economic Thought. 7 (2): 270–288. doi:10.1080/096725600361816. Blaug, Mark (Winter 2001). "No History of Ideas, Please, We're Economists" (PDF). Journal of Economic Perspectives. 15 (1): 145–164. doi:10.1257/jep.15.1.145. JSTOR 2696545.

Anthologies 'Pioneers in Economics'. In 1991 and 1992 Blaug edited a series of fifty volumes, with reprints of journal articles on the history of economic thought, under the series title 'Pioneers in Economics'. The series was published by Edward Elgar Publishing.

References

Further reading "Mark Blaug". Erasmus Center for History in Management and Economics. Archived from the original on 13 July 2004. Retrieved 28 February 2007. "Mark Blaug" (PDF). Universiteit van Amsterdam, CV. Archived from the original (PDF) on 8 February 2012. Retrieved 29 February 2008. Erasmus Journal for Philosophy and Economics 6, 3, Winter 2013: Special Issue in Honor of Mark Blaug (complete PDF). Boumans, Marcel; Klaes, Matthias, eds. (2013). Mark Blaug: Rebel with Many Causes. Edward Elgar. doi:10.4337/9781783471232. hdl:10419/149699. ISBN 9781781955666. Retrieved 9 January 2019.

External links

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Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Mark Blaug

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Mark Blaug claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In astronomy, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Mark Blaug before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Mark Blaug ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Mark Blaug

In research: Mark Blaug appears in astronomy research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Mark Blaug in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Mark Blaug is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1927 births, 2011 deaths, 20th-century Dutch economists, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Mark Blaug outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Mark Blaug in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Mark Blaug means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Mark Blaug out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Mark Blaug in simple terms?

Why does Mark Blaug matter?

Because it connects several astronomy ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Mark Blaug?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Mark Blaug.