Antoine Lavoisier Quotes
One succeeds in obtaining an equivalent production at a lower price by improving the arts, trades and agriculture and by developing the physical and moral qualities of workers, farmers and craftsmen.
Lavoisier, Antoine. Quoted in Lavoisier: Chemist, Biologist, Economist, by Jean-Pierre Poirier, translated by Rebecca Balinski, University of Pennsylvania Press, 1996, p. 293.
first for women
This was an incredible prediction that few people thought was possible. This speech was given in the early days of WWII when it was far from clear that we would win.
This is a classic illustration of a quotation illustrating the problem that political discussions have with the issue of causality. Conrad is absolutely correct in stating that investment and innovation as the direct cause for most productivity. However, without the demand created by consumption (or the prospect of it) there will be little capital and effort at innovation. There is a causal chain and different ideological proponents argue for their preferred link in the chain tending to ignore the other links. Many liberals tout increasing consumption and pay little attention to the investment and innovation—an error of the opposite of Conrad’s.
At the time very few industrialists appreciated the value of particular workers and tended to think of them as interchangeable parts.
Abd al-Rahman Ibn Mohammad. He is generally regarded to be the World’s first social scientist. The largest statue in Tunisia of not of a military leader of king, but of this social scientist.
This view that the more people a country has, the richer it is, has gone hand in hand with the notion that a large population will assure a nation of extensive military prowess. However, both of these are now known to be false. The most heavily populated nations are among the poorest, and military prowess is more a function of the training of troops and the modern tools and weapons. Tiny Israel has demonstrated that many times since its origin. It has been attacked over and over by several nations at a time. Despite the fact that Israel was vastly outnumbered by enemy troops and weapons like tanks and planes, Israel has repeatedly demolished the more populous enemies. The world, observing this, no longer emphasizes trying to build a large manpower pool as it does not help militarily and it makes full employment very difficult.
Antoine-Laurent de Lavoisier, also Antoine Lavoisier after the French Revolution, was a French nobleman and chemist who was central to the 18th-century chemical revolution and who had a large influence on both the history of chemistry and the history of biology. He is widely considered in popular literature as the "father of modern chemistry".
