“Ferdinando Galiani (Della moneta, 1750) defined utilità as ‘the power of a thing to procure us felicity.’ Similarly, Jeremy Bentham at first spoke of utility as ‘that property in any object, whereby it tends to produce benefit, advantage, pleasure, good or happiness’ (An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation, 1780). But the meaning of the term has shifted continuously and even today ‘utility’ circulates with various, albeit cognate, connotations. By referring to the principle of utility as the principle of the greatest happiness of the greatest number, Bentham himself paved the way for this terminological license. The ensuing confusion prompted W. Stanley Jevons to insist that ‘Utility is not an Intrinsic Quality,’ but ‘the sum of the pleasure created and the pain prevented’ (The Theory of Political Economy, 1871).” (N. Georgescu Roegen, Dictionary of the history of economic ideas)

Também citado em: Egidi, Massimo (2005), "From Bounded Rationality to Behavioral Economics," CEEL - University of Trento