IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ejw/journl/v8y2011i2p174-184.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Remarks from 1809 by Dupont de Nemours on Adam Smith

Author

Listed:
  • Pierre-Samuel Dupont de Nemours

Abstract

This document offers an English translation of remarks that Pierre-Samuel Dupont de Nemours made in 1809, remarks principally about Adam Smith. Dupont suggests repeatedly that Adam Smith fudged some points in The Wealth of Nations, because, says Dupont, Smith “thought that in order to maintain public peace, one should not assault infirm eyes with a bright light turned too directly towards them.” This document from 1809 makes a nice companion to the 1788 letter from Dupont to Smith, recently translated and discussed by Prasch and Warin (2009); in which Dupont wrote: “By assaulting their eyes with a bright light, we would reconstitute their blindness.”

Suggested Citation

  • Pierre-Samuel Dupont de Nemours, 2011. "Remarks from 1809 by Dupont de Nemours on Adam Smith," Econ Journal Watch, Econ Journal Watch, vol. 8(2), pages 174-184, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:ejw:journl:v:8:y:2011:i:2:p:174-184
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://econjwatch.org/File+download/489/DupontMay2011.pdf?mimetype=pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://econjwatch.org/727
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Fred E. Foldvary, 2005. "Geo-Rent: A Plea to Public Economists," Econ Journal Watch, Econ Journal Watch, vol. 2(1), pages 106-132, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Diesel, Jonathon, 2021. "Adam Smith on usury: An esoteric reading," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 184(C), pages 727-738.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Fred E. Foldvary, 2006. "The Complex Taxonomy of the Factors," American Journal of Economics and Sociology, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 65(3), pages 787-802, July.
    2. Kumhof, Michael & Tideman, Nicolaus & Hudson, Michael & Goodhart, Charles, 2021. "Post-Corona Balanced-Budget Super-Stimulus: The Case for Shifting Taxes onto Land," CEPR Discussion Papers 16652, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    3. Stefano Moroni, 2014. "Towards a general theory of contractual communities: neither necessarily gated, nor a form of privatization," Chapters, in: David Emanuel Andersson & Stefano Moroni (ed.), Cities and Private Planning, chapter 3, pages 38-65, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    4. Fred E. Foldvary, 2014. "Governance by voluntary association," Chapters, in: David Emanuel Andersson & Stefano Moroni (ed.), Cities and Private Planning, chapter 4, pages 66-92, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    5. Foldvary, Fred Emanuel & Minola, Luca Andrea, 2017. "The taxation of land value as the means towards optimal urban development and the extirpation of excessive economic inequality," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 331-337.
    6. Daniel B. Klein & Michael J. Clark, 2006. "A Little More Liberty: What the _JEL_ Omits in Its Account of What the Economic Report of the President Omits," Econ Journal Watch, Econ Journal Watch, vol. 3(3), pages 466-483, September.
    7. Špeciánová Jitka, 2018. "Unconditional Basic Income in the Czech Republic: What Type of Taxes Could Fund It? A Theoretical Tax Analysis," Basic Income Studies, De Gruyter, vol. 13(1), pages 1-19, June.
    8. Cecil E. Bohanon & John B. Horowitz & James E. McClure, 2014. "Saying Too Little, Too Late: Public Finance Textbooks and the Excess Burdens of Taxation," Econ Journal Watch, Econ Journal Watch, vol. 11(3), pages 277-296, September.
    9. Fred E. Foldvary, 2008. "Uncovering the Costs of the Iraq War," Econ Journal Watch, Econ Journal Watch, vol. 5(3), pages 373-379, September.
    10. Zachary Gochenour & Bryan Caplan, 2013. "An entrepreneurial critique of Georgism," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 26(4), pages 483-491, December.
    11. Li Tian, 2014. "Property Rights, Land Values and Urban Development," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 15856.
    12. Dirk Löhr & Norbert Olah & Thomas Huth, 2021. "Boden, der vergessene Produktionsfaktor [Land, the Forgotten Factor of Production]," Wirtschaftsdienst, Springer;ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 101(3), pages 221-226, March.
    13. Luca A Minola & Fred E Foldvary & David E Andersson, 2020. "Fiscal principles for self-organizing cities," Environment and Planning B, , vol. 47(2), pages 235-250, February.
    14. Fred Foldvary, 2005. "Planning By Freehold," Economic Affairs, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 25(4), pages 11-15, December.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Adam Smith; Wealth of Nations; esoteric; fudging; Dupont de Nemours; luxury taxation;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • A13 - General Economics and Teaching - - General Economics - - - Relation of Economics to Social Values
    • A14 - General Economics and Teaching - - General Economics - - - Sociology of Economics
    • B0 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - General
    • B1 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - History of Economic Thought through 1925
    • B2 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - History of Economic Thought since 1925
    • B3 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - History of Economic Thought: Individuals

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ejw:journl:v:8:y:2011:i:2:p:174-184. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Jason Briggeman (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/edgmuus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.