The two preponderant forces at work are technological development, whi — Jan Tinbergen

"Mankind’s problems can no longer be solved by national governments. What is needed is a World Government. This can best be achieved by strengthening the United Nations system. In some cases, this would mean changing the role of UN agencies from advice-giving to implementation. But some of the most important new institutions would be financial—a World Treasury and a World Central Bank. Just as each nation has a system of income redistribution, so there should be a corresponding ‘World Financial Policy’ to be implemented by the World Bank and the World Central Bank. Some of these proposals are, no doubt, far-fetched and beyond the horizon of today’s political possibilities. But the idealist of today often turns out to be the realists of tomorrow."

"The dominant role played by... exporters’ and importers’ GNP and distance in explaining trade flows."

"Tinbergens methodology was exceptional at that time and was received sometimes with scepticism. In particular J.M. Keynes (1939), at the time editor of the Economic Journal, reviewed Professor Tinbergens Method quite critically, raising as one of the fundamental points that The method is neither of discovery nor of criticism. It is a means of giving quantitative precision to what, in qualitative terms, we know already as the result of a complete theoretical analysis. Of course the latter criticism illustrates precisely Tinbergens conviction that knowledge relevant for policy making should preferably be quantitative in nature. As to discovery, Tinbergen (1940) in his Reply indicated that it sometimes happens that the course of the curves itself suggests that some factor not mentioned in most economic textbooks must be of great importance, and he mentioned some examples. As to the possibility of criticism, it seems to me, Tinbergen (1940) argued, that the value found for one or more of the regression coefficients may imply a criticism on one or more of the theories that have been used. In a Comment to Tinbergens Reply, Keynes (1940) still held some doubts: that there is anyone I would trust with it at the present stage or that this brand of statistical alchemy is ripe to become a branch of science, I am not yet persuaded. But Keynes concluded: No one could be more frank, more painstaking, more free from subjective bias or parti pris than professor Tinbergen... But Newton, Boyle and Locke all played with alchemy. So let him continue. And so Tinbergen did."

"To Ehrenfest I owe a great deal. I studied physics at a time when a number of fascinating persons were there together. Ehrenfest would not instruct as such, as he preferred dialogue. Thanks to him I could participate in discussions with Albert Einstein. Also Kamerling Onnes, Lorentz and Zeeman were present. Being a student in the hands of such teachers, you are very fortunate indeed."

"The advantages of models are, on one hand, that they force us to present a "complete" theory by which I mean a theory taking into account all relevant phenomena and relations and, on the other hand, the confrontation with observation, that is, reality."

"First of all I want to remind you of the essential features of models. In my opinion they are: (i) drawing up a list of the variables to be considered; (ii) drawing up a list of the equations or relations the variables have to obey and (iii) testing the validity of the equations, which implies the estimation of their coefficients, if any. As a consequence of especially (iii) we may have to revise (i) and (ii) so as to arrive at a satisfactory degree of realism of the theory embodied in the model. Then, the model may be used for various purposes, that is, for the solution of various problems. The advantages of models are, on one hand, that they force us to present a "complete" theory by which I mean a theory taking into account all relevant phenomena and relations and, on the other hand, the confrontation with observation, that is, reality. Of course these remarks are far from new."