Thursday, September 18, 2025 - 10:00:48 AM
Pat, I am OK. You are OK.
Adam Smith's smile of
"inexpressible benignity"
Adam Smith 1723–1790 the sometimes too highly regarded "godfather of capitalism" had two major published works in his lifetime, i.e., "The Theory of Moral Sentiments" (1759, 1761, 1767, 1774, 1781, 1790) and "The Wealth of Nations" (1776, 1778, 1784, 1786 1789), considered a precursor to the modern academic discipline of economics.
He had the habit of rewriting them repeatedly for improvement. He published 6 revised versions of the "The Theory of Moral Sentiments" over his 30 years of writing: the last just months before his death in 1790.
What students of Adam Smith too often overlook is "The Theory of Moral Sentiments" (1759-1790) was his magnum opus, his premise for "The Wealth of Nations" -- his illustrative addenda not his conclusion.
Adam Smith never married, never started a business, lived with his mother until her death six years before his. His "contemporaries and biographers described him as comically absent-minded, with peculiar habits of speech and gait, and a smile of "inexpressible benignity".
Adam Smith is the antithesis of the corporate cut-throat types he supposedly empowered, i.e., Gordon Gecko "Greed, for lack of a better word, is good."[1]
If you know anything at all about Smith the economist, you know about his parable of the pins. Smith contrasts two scenarios to highlight the power of profit:
- The individual artisan: A single worker, performing all the steps required to make a pin—drawing out the wire, straightening it, cutting it, pointing it, and attaching the head—could, with great difficulty, produce perhaps one pin a day, and certainly not more than 20.
- The specialized factory: A small factory with just 10 workers could produce 48,000 pins in a single day. This was made possible by breaking down the pin-making process into about 18 distinct, simple tasks.
Smith took this parable and worked it into the idea that the individual's greed, working to profit himself, could improve production and profits… thus advance the interest of the society i.e., more pins.
Smith referred to it, first in The Theory of Moral Sentiments" and then in "The Wealth of Nations" as the, now, proverbial "invisible hand… to advance the interest of the society[2]."
You cannot promote Adam Smith's economic philosophy without PREMISING it upon his assertion of his moral sentiments! You have to read The Theory of Moral Sentiments" as the REQUIRED premise for "The Wealth of Nations" and it makes a smile of "inexpressible benignity" -- NOT a "Gordon Gecko.[3]"
https://dgjeep.blogspot.com/2025/06/sc.html
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1FVfm-ushzCCTS5BtH1R7MeOvnDvh_kqv/view
The Issue with Trump, HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH TRUMP!
https://dgjeep.blogspot.com/2025/03/the-issue-with-trump.html
American Exceptionalism – NOT SO MUCH
https://dgjeep.blogspot.com/2023/10/american-exceptionalism-not-so-much.html
https://dgjeep.blogspot.com/2013/04/equal-rights-in-free-market-economy.html
A Balanced Budget for America
https://dgjeep.blogspot.com/2012/07/balanced-budget-for-america.html
BE AWARE, but do not be afraid, Trump is, at best and at worst, pathetically incompetent and INEFFECTIVE manager / leader!
https://dgjeep.blogspot.com/2025/01/be-aware.html
Trump does not know the name of the country he was or is to be president of...
https://dgjeep.blogspot.com/2025/01/istgtdnk.html
The constitutional small "d" undemocratic corrupt "dark money" Senate and Electoral College
https://dgjeep.blogspot.com/2024/01/dark-money-senate.html
Trump is a convicted and diagnosed psychotic criminal, chronic degenerate, maniacal liar and a "fucking moron!"
https://dgjeep.blogspot.com/2025/01/be-aware.html
The constitutional small "d" unrepresentative corrupt "dark money" Senate and Electoral College
https://dgjeep.blogspot.com/2024/01/dark-money-senate.html
The Judicial sophistry of "absolute immunity" creates "absolute power" to the ABSOLUTE CORRUPTION of We the People's unalienable rights under color of law... the AUDACITY of the INSANITY, ignorance and stupidity in support of a "fantastic or delusional" scenario.
https://dgjeep.blogspot.com/2024/01/if-that-is-not-absolute-corruption-of.html
https://dgjeep.blogspot.com/2022/09/the-facts-of-my-case-are-without.html
DGJeep v. Supreme Court of the United States (Petitions for Writ of Certiorari 07-11115, 11-8211, 13-7030, 13-5193, 14-5551, 14-10088, 15-8884 and 18-5856)
https://www.supremecourt.gov/search.aspx?Search=David+Jeep&type=Supreme-Court=Dockets
Thursday, September 18, 2025 - 10:00:48 AM
[1] Gordon Gekko is a composite character in the 1987 film Wall Street and its 2010 sequel Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gordon_Gekko
[2] "They consume little more than the poor, and in spite of their natural selfishness and rapacity, though they mean only their own conveniency, though the sole end which they propose from the labours of all the thousands whom they employ, be the gratification of their own vain and insatiable desires, they divide with the poor the produce of all their improvements. They are led by an invisible hand to make nearly the same distribution of the necessaries of life, which would have been made, had the earth been divided into equal portions among all its inhabitants, and thus without intending it, without knowing it, advance the interest of the society, and afford means to the multiplication of the species."
Smith, Adam; The Theory of Moral Sentiments (Kindle Active TOC) (p. 221).
[3] Gordon Gekko is a composite character in the 1987 film Wall Street and its 2010 sequel Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gordon_Gekko
Thanks in advance...
"Agere sequitur esse" ('action follows being')
David G. Jeep, Federal Inmate #36072-044 (formerly)
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David G. Jeep
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