Francis Ysidro Edgeworth
However, the University of Oxford did appoint someone we would now call an econometrician to a chair in 1891, namely Francis Ysidro Edgeworth (see Bowley 1934). This was not to a chair in statistics, but as the Drummond Professor of Political Economy at All Souls.
Edgeworth was an Irish philosopher and political economist who had previously been Tooke Professor of Economic Science and Statistics in London and made many significant contributions to statistical methods. Earlier in life, he had been a student in philosophy at Balliol College, Oxford, from 1867 to 1869, so was doubly connected with the University.In statistics, Edgeworth’s name is remembered through Edgeworth series, which approximate a probability density function in terms of its cumulants. He published many papers on statistics and his principle of maximum probability is an early version of likelihood (Edgeworth 1887). He also contributed to index number analysis. Stigler (1978: 295) viewed Edgeworth’s plan as to ‘adapt the statistical methods of the theory of errors to the quantification of uncertainty in the social, particularly economic, sciences’ and provides an excellent discussion of its implementation. The Royal Statistical Society awarded Edgeworth the Guy Medal in 1907 and he served as its President during 1912-1914. Edgeworth was also influential in the development of neoclassical economics, perhaps best known for the Edgeworth-Bowley box diagram. In 1891, he was appointed as the founding editor of the Economic Journal, where he continued as editor or joint editor until his death 35 years later (for more details on Edgeworth, see Chapter 11 in this volume by Creedy).
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