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' (also spelled '; () is a
Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through ...
phrase, meaning "other things equal"; some other English translations of the phrase are "all other things being equal", "other things held constant", "all else unchanged", and "all else being equal". A statement about a causal, empirical, or logical relation between two states of affairs is ''ceteris paribus'' if it is acknowledged that the statement, although usually accurate in expected conditions, can fail because of, or the relation can be abolished by, intervening factors. chapter 2 A ''ceteris paribus'' assumption is often key to scientific inquiry, because scientists seek to eliminate factors that perturb a relation of interest. Thus
epidemiologist Epidemiology is the study and analysis of the distribution (who, when, and where), patterns and determinants of health and disease conditions in a defined population. It is a cornerstone of public health, and shapes policy decisions and evid ...
s, for example, may seek to control independent variables as factors that may influence dependent variables—the outcomes of interest. Likewise, in scientific modeling, simplifying assumptions permit illustration of concepts considered relevant to the inquiry. An example in economics is "If the price of milk falls, ceteris paribus, the demand for milk will rise." This means that, if other factors, such as deflation, pricing objectives, utility, and marketing methods, do not change, the decrease in the price of milk will lead to an increase in demand for it. In the philosophy of science, there is debate about ''ceteris paribus'' statements. In the logical empiricist view, fundamental physics tends to state universal laws, whereas other sciences, such as biology, and social sciences, such as economics and psychology, tend to state laws that hold true in normal conditions but have exceptions: ''ceteris paribus'' laws (''cp laws'').Alexander Reutlinger, Gerhard Schurz & Andreas Hüttemann
"Ceteris paribus laws"
in Edward N Zalta, ed, ''The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy'', Spring 2014 edn.
The focus on universal laws is a criterion distinguishing fundamental physics as fundamental, whereas cp laws are predominant in most other sciences as
special science Special sciences are those sciences other than fundamental physics. In this view, chemistry, biology, and neuroscience—indeed, all sciences except fundamental physics—are special sciences. The status of the special sciences, and their relati ...
s, whose laws hold in special cases. This distinction assumes a logical empiricist view of science. It does not readily apply in a mechanistic understanding of scientific discovery. There is reasonable disagreement as to whether mechanisms or laws are the appropriate model; mechanisms are the favored method.Glennan, S. (2014). Mechanisms. In M. Curd & S. Psillos (eds.), ''The Routledge companion to philosophy of science'' (2nd ed., pp. 420–428). New York: Routledge. Another possibility if we assume ''ceteris paribus'' in a scenario is the tendency to ignore many important factors that may play even greater roles in the measure of the dependent variable. Some assumptions tend to be highly unrealistic and can lead to wrong beliefs among scientists.


Economics

Economics' ''ceteris paribus'' conditions include: * The number of consumers in the market * Consumer tastes or preferences * Prices of substitute goods * Consumer price expectations * Personal income


Interpretation

One of the disciplines in which ''ceteris paribus'' clauses are most widely used is
economics Economics () is the social science that studies the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services. Economics focuses on the behaviour and interactions of economic agents and how economies work. Microeconomics anal ...
, in which they are employed to simplify the formulation and description of economic outcomes. When using ''ceteris paribus'' in economics, one assumes that all other variables except those under immediate consideration are held constant. For example, it can be predicted that if the price of
beef Beef is the culinary name for meat from cattle (''Bos taurus''). In prehistoric times, humankind hunted aurochs and later domesticated them. Since that time, numerous breeds of cattle have been bred specifically for the quality or quantit ...
''increases''—''ceteris paribus''—the quantity of beef demanded by buyers will ''decrease''. In this example, the clause is used to operationally describe everything surrounding the relationship between both the ''price'' and the ''quantity demanded'' of an ordinary good. This operational description intentionally ignores both known and unknown factors that may also influence the relationship between price and quantity demanded, and thus to assume ''ceteris paribus'' is to assume away any interference with the given example. Such factors that would be intentionally ignored include: a change in the price of substitute goods, (e.g., the price of pork or lamb); a change in the level of
risk aversion In economics and finance, risk aversion is the tendency of people to prefer outcomes with low uncertainty to those outcomes with high uncertainty, even if the average outcome of the latter is equal to or higher in monetary value than the more ...
among buyers (e.g., due to an increase in the fear of mad cow disease); and a change in the level of overall demand for a good regardless of its current price (e.g., a societal shift toward vegetarianism). The clause is often loosely translated as "holding all else constant." It does not imply that no other things will in fact change; rather, it isolates the effect of one particular change. Holding all other things constant is directly analogous to using a partial derivative in
calculus Calculus, originally called infinitesimal calculus or "the calculus of infinitesimals", is the mathematics, mathematical study of continuous change, in the same way that geometry is the study of shape, and algebra is the study of generalizati ...
rather than a total derivative, and to running a regression containing multiple variables rather than just one in order to isolate the individual effect of one of the variables. Ceteris paribus is an extension of scientific modeling. The scientific method is built on identifying, isolating, and testing the impact of an independent variable on a dependent variable. One thing to note is that since economic variables can only be isolated in theory and not in practice, ceteris paribus can only ever highlight tendencies, not absolutes.


Characterization given by Alfred Marshall

The clause is used to consider the effect of some causes in isolation, by assuming that other influences are absent. Alfred Marshall expressed the use of the clause as follows:


Two uses

The above passage by Marshall highlights two ways in which the ''ceteris paribus'' clause may be used: The one is ''hypothetical'', in the sense that some factor is assumed fixed in order to analyse the influence of another factor in isolation. This would be hypothetical isolation. An example would be the hypothetical separation of the income effect and the substitution effect of a price change, which actually go together. The other use of the ''ceteris paribus'' clause is to see it as a means for obtaining an approximate solution. Here it would yield a substantive isolation. Substantive isolation has two aspects: temporal and causal. Temporal isolation requires the factors fixed under the ''ceteris paribus'' clause to actually move so slowly relative to the other influence that they can be taken as practically constant at any point in time. So, if vegetarianism spreads very slowly, inducing a slow decline in the demand for beef, and the market for beef clears comparatively quickly, we can determine the price of beef at any instant by the intersection of supply and demand, and the changing demand for beef will account for the price changes over time ( Temporary Equilibrium Method). The other aspect of substantive isolation is causal isolation: those factors frozen under a ''ceteris paribus'' clause should not significantly be affected by the processes under study. If a change in government policies induces changes in consumers' behaviour on the same time scale, the assumption that consumer behaviour remains unchanged while policy changes is inadmissible as a substantive isolation ( Lucas critique).


See also

* Apples and oranges * Confounding * List of Latin phrases *'' Mutatis mutandis'' * Occam's razor * Partial derivative


Notes


References

* Marshall, A. 1920. Principles of economics. Vol. 1. 8th ed. London: Macmillan.


External links

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Listen to Ceteris Paribus
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ceteris Paribus Latin logical phrases Latin philosophical phrases Philosophy of science Causality Philosophy of economics