Thog's Guide to Quantum Economics: 50,000 Years of Accounting Basics for the Future [Paperback]

Mike Brown (Author), Zoe-Vonna Palmrose (Author), Warren Miller (Illustrator)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1, 2005

A philosophical and historical exploration of why accounting is central to any society based on commerce.

The book tells the story of a charming 50,000-year-old family of hunter-gatherer-recordkeepers – the Thogs – who describe how they invented or discovered the essential elements for measuring economic activities. Their story reminds today's accountants and those involved in financial reporting that the past holds much accounting wisdom for the future. While it is a work of scientific fiction, the story in general is historically accurate. Writing and arithmetic, for example, were first invented for bookkeeping.

In telling their story, the Thogs teach a team of real-life cutting-edge complexity scientists how back-to-basics accounting is vital to their agent-based economic modeling. Together, Thogs and scientists offer a glimpse of how to reformulate economics using ideas from physics and biology. The book is a light-hearted read, but it suggests that a serious breakthrough is on the horizon: the ability to test the consequences of our financial and accounting regulations in virtual reality before trying them out on you and me

Product Details

• Paperback: 272 pages
• Publisher: Thogian Press (January 1, 2005)
• ISBN-10: 0976469405
• ISBN-13: 978-0976469407
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5.5 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,793,471 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An Amazing Accounting Book, May 20, 2005

By 

Greg Waymire (Atlanta, GA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Thog's Guide to Quantum Economics: 50,000 Years of Accounting Basics for the Future (Paperback)

This book is a "great read." It tells in a creative and charming manner the story of how accounting came to be over the course of tens of thousands of years. Accounting students will enjoy it because of it's fresh approach.

But that's only half the story. At another level, there are some fairly important ideas that lie behind this book, which will be evident to all who peak into Dr. Z's backpack and read some of these pieces.

By using simple examples that resemble parables, this book describes how humans devised an economic institution with powerful and far-reaching consequences. The juxtaposition of historical narrative with the ongoing experimentation in complexity science is extraordinarily creative. And, the book offers a different perspective on modern accounting standard setting in the process. In sum, I've been reading "accounting books" for 30 years, and this is an exceptionally interesting one. This is definitely worth a look and very likely a careful second reading as well.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars To understand why we need accounting, February 24, 2005

By 

Robert Trezevant (Los angeles) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Thog's Guide to Quantum Economics: 50,000 Years of Accounting Basics for the Future (Paperback)

This book is a great read. For anyone who wants to understand why accounting is very necessary. Easy to read--each chapter is short and makes a new point the reader had not thought about before.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This was a fun little book to read!, July 30, 2008

By 

Abel Porras (Austin, TX) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Thog's Guide to Quantum Economics: 50,000 Years of Accounting Basics for the Future (Paperback)

This book follows the thought processes of a group of scientists in New Mexico trying to make economics more scientific. Specifically, they are attempting to use principles from the field of quantum physics and complexity science to show how societies might evolve from simple beginnings to develop more complex economic structures like banks and stock markets. Along the way they are assisted by a fictional family of "Thogs" who have been around for some 50,000 years. These Thogs instruct the scientists on how these various institutions were initially developed. While the concepts presented here are fairly complicated, the book presents them in such a way that makes both the accounting and physics easy to understand.