The Accounting Review Vol. 9 No. 2 1934
THE BACKGROUND OF ACCOUNTING.
Abstract
Accounting is usually regarded as an adjunct of commerce or industry which has at the most a tenuous relationship to the structure and theory of science and slight discernible similarity to of political organization. It was no accident that the double entry system of accounts was introduced in Italy. Accounting centers around two classes of records, the balance sheet and the profit-and-loss statement. Taken together they exemplify the mechanical theory of physics as well as the physiological or organic theory which is associated with evolutionary processes in which time is cardinal. An initial and fundamental point of contact and the basis for both the physical sciences and accounting is present, to begin with, in the number system which is common to both. The number one is primary in that every other number is divisible by it, thus presuming the homogeneity and divisibility of those things to which the numbers are assigned. Their homogeneous and divisible character is further amplified by the operations of addition and subtraction.
- DOI
- 10.2308/tar-7066187
- Volume
- 9
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 138-163
- Language
- en
- Sources
- openalex crossref