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prison sentence is undoubtedly a source of joy to a man who counted on being hanged, and it is ridiculous to say that it is "really" only an escapefrom a worse pain, or the inheritance a deprivation of a greater pleasure. The comparison of alternatives and fact of preference is the real thing;pleasure and pain are accidental and arbitrary matters.11. The phrase "equal utility," as we shall presently see, should be taken to refer merely to the fact of indifference in choice, and not a comparisonbetween quantities in the true sense at all. We avoid the expression "marginal" utility, because of its implication that there is a difference in thesignificance of different portions of the same supply. In speaking of the utility of a supply, however, it is sometimes useful to have some word todistinguish between the utility per unit and the utility of the supply as a whole. When it seems advisable we shall use the expression "specific utility"to indicate utility per unit.The general method of taking the principle of choice as the starting-point of economic reasoning and treating "diminishing utility" in a comparativesense has been used with especial clearness and force by Wicksteed (Common Sense of Political Economy), and is also adopted by Fetter inhis recent work (Economic Principles). Economists generally have been coming to recognize that the psychology of the subject is properlybehavioristic; that an economist need not be a hedonist (Jevons and Edgeworth notwithstanding), and that he does not need even to consider theissue between rival psychologies of choice. See Mitchell, "The Rôle of Money in Economic Theory," Proceedings, Twenty-Eighth Annual Meeting ofthe American Economic Association. The principle of relativity of utility and value holds in the same way under any theory of motivation. B. M.Anderson, Jr. (Social Value, and Value of Money, chap. I) advocates a theory of absolute social value, defining value, as we have done, as powerto motivate conduct. It is hard to explain his failure to see that this notion is as relative as any other, is in fact the most obviously relative of all.Motivation of conduct means of "this" conduct rather than some other, and is obviously inconceivable apart from a situation presenting alternativesbetween which comparison and choice must be made. Davenport, also (Economics of Enterprise, chap. VII), while insisting on the importance ofrelative utility in economic reasoning, treats utility itself as an absolute magnitude. The present writer finds it impossible to conceive such an entity.12. Close scrutiny makes it appear doubtful just how much real explanatory value the viewpoint of the utilization of resources adds to the bareprinciple of combining alternatives. It seems that what we call a "resource" is such, not on its own account, but solely because of the uses to which itcan be put, and its quantitative aspect, how much resource there is, is still more evidently determinable only in terms of the use. But at least theresource idea helps us to mediate in thought the fact of the quantitatively alternative character of the opposed lines of utilization, as is shown by thefact that we habitually make use of it. The form of the unsophisticated psychosis in regard to sacrifices or "costs" is in fact a bit puzzling. If we askwhat a thing has cost, we seem inclined to answer first in terms of money or effort, etc., i.e., of "resources"; but when pressed, we are likely to goback of the latter and evaluate the resource in turn in terms of some other utility which might have been had for it. The "ontologizing" of the notion ofresources seems to be an illustration of an "instrumental concept," but one which it would be difficult to get along without.13. Principles of Economics, book V, chap. II, sec. 1.14. Which, to be sure, is not very far. Nor is this any criticism of the boy. Quite the contrary! It is evident that the rational thing to do is to be irrational,where deliberation and estimation cost more than they are worth. That this is very often true, and that men still oftener (perhaps) behave as if itwere, does not vitiate economic reasoning to the extent that might be supposed. For these irrationalities (whether rational or irrational!) tend tooffset each other. The applicability of the general "theory" of conduct to a particular individual in a particular case is likely to give results borderingon the grotesque, but en masse and in the long run it is not so. The market behaves as if men were wont to calculate with the utmost precision inmaking their choices. We live largely, of necessity, by rule and blindly; but the results approximate rationality fairly well on an average.15. The discussion assumes that the quantitative relation between the alternatives themselves remains unchanged, that one is sacrificed for theother in the same ratio throughout, or "resources" converted into both at the same rate, In practice this is only exceptionally possible; in general notonly the relative importance of given quantities of alternative goods will change as the supply changes, but in addition the amount of one which mustbe sacrificed to obtain a given amount of the other will increase as the supply of the first increases; i.e., a "law of diminishing productivity" (likewisea law of proportions merely) becomes operative in addition to the law of diminishing utility (and works in the same direction).Professor Patten has raised the objection to the utility analysis that consumption also requires time, which must be saved out of the productiveoperations. (See Annals, Amer. Acad. 1892-93, pp. 726-28. Cf. also Edgeworth, Mathematical Psychics, p. 68, where the energy as well as timerequired for consumption is considered.) It seems logically more accurate, however, to include in production everything except the actualexperience of satisfaction, and if this is done the objection loses its force. In our method of approach to the problem, viewing it as a matter ofchoice between (i.e., combination of) alternatives, and taking the alternatives simply for whatever they may be in the facts of the case, the wholeissue loses its relevance.16. This may be expressed in technical phrase by saying that they are "ordinal" rather than "quantitative"; they are variable, but not measurable,can be ranked, but not added. The nature of this attribute will lose its mystery if any simple sensation, as a sensation, is considered for a moment. Itis easy to tell when one light is brighter than another, impossible to tell how much brighter. The intensity of light is indeed "measured" by science,but it is done by a method analogous in principle to the discussion of utility above. One light is removed to such a distance that it becomes equal inintensity to the standard, and the distance is measured. Obviously this does not involve the measurement of sensation at all. Similarly, athermometer does not measure the sensation of heat, or a balance that of weight. A better illustration of "ordinal" variables is furnished by the field