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Value is the most invincible and impalpable of ghosts, and comes and goes unthought of, while the visible and dense matter remains as it was.
William Stanley Jevons
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Interpretation

What this quote means

Value is often intangible and unseen, contrasting with the physical world's permanence.

In this quote, William Stanley Jevons highlights the elusive nature of value, suggesting that while tangible objects may seem constant, it is the concept of value that is often overlooked yet profoundly influences our perception and decision-making. This underscores the idea that what truly matters may not always be visible or easily quantified.

Themes

ValuePhilosophyIntangiblePerceptionImportance

In practice

Example use cases

In a business meeting discussing the unseen value of employee satisfaction.

More from William Stanley Jevons

Whoever wishes to acquire a deep acquaintance with Nature must observe that there are analogies which connect whole branches of science in a parallel manner, and enable us to infer of one class of phenomena what we know of another. It has thus happened on several occasions that the discovery of an unsuspected analogy between two branches of knowledge has been the starting point for a rapid course of discovery.
William Stanley JevonsRead
It is clear that Economics, if it is to be a science at all, must be a mathematical science ... simply because it deals with quantities... As the complete theory of almost every other science involves the use of calculus, so we cannot have a true theory of Economics without its aid.
William Stanley JevonsRead

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