tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28755195.post2761106969901747661..comments2023-09-25T04:26:51.568-06:00Comments on The Barefoot Bum: The privilege of capitalLarry Hamelinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08788697573946266404noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28755195.post-25092687639053443042009-11-04T04:50:02.678-07:002009-11-04T04:50:02.678-07:00it's damn good to hear your refreshing bile fi...<i>it's damn good to hear your refreshing bile filled vituperations. Seriously, that is actually meant as a compliment. </i><br /><br />Fair enough; I'll take the comment in the spirit you made it. :-)<br /><br /><i>My reading of Marxism is that this inequality is built into the concept of capital; that it inevitably arises whenever we set up a system involving money.</i><br /><br />I'm not sure that this is Marx's position; if it is, I don't believe it's correct.<br /><br />Much depends, of course, on what precisely we mean by "capital". In the most general descriptive sense, capital consists of any resources consumed prior to and intentionally in the service of additional production. The surplus of one harvest is the capital to generate the next. Of course, in describing capitalism, Marx adds additional conditions, notably that Marxian capital is used to produce commodities specifically for exchange.<br /><br />Of course, Marx predates finance capitalism and <i>de facto</i> and <i>de jure</i> fiat money, and he underestimates the power of imperialism. It fell to Lenin to begin discussion of these topics in <a href="http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1916/imp-hsc/" rel="nofollow">Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism</a>.<br /><br />While it's definitely the case that a lot of people have delusional beliefs about money (believing, for example, that we can run out of money on a large social scale) I do not believe that these delusions are the underlying cause of our problems; they seem more like <i>symptoms</i>.<br /><br />It's sometimes difficult, though, to separate out a delusion itself from the interests of those propagating that delusion as effective causes: after all, the people who intentionally propagate a delusion do so precisely because they expect the delusion will advance their interests, because they expect the delusion itself to have efficacy.<br /><br />I have been (more-or-lest justly) accused of eclecticism: I think we must address both the symptoms and the underlying cause. Indeed I think that while communism and socialism are relatively weak, it's best to try <i>everything</i> we can think of, and not worry too much about whether the other guy is addressing what we would like to address, focusing our criticism on the merits of specific ideas.Larry Hamelinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08788697573946266404noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28755195.post-37006780565078647972009-11-04T04:27:31.360-07:002009-11-04T04:27:31.360-07:00Hey Larry.
First off the near obligatory lead in ...Hey Larry.<br /><br />First off the near obligatory lead in which I say despite the fact you're a cantankerous bastard who despises everything I, as an academic philosopher in training, stand for in one sense, it's damn good to hear your refreshing bile filled vituperations. Seriously, that is actually meant as a compliment. <br /><br />To the real meat of my comment, though I'm going to admit while I'm cautiously supportive of Marxism in a general "haven't really read a lot about it sense", I'm a little sceptical about the arguments regarding the inherent wrongs that capital creates. <br /><br />Take this post where the major assertion deals with the equality of access to surplus. My reading of Marxism is that this inequality is built into the concept of capital; that it inevitably arises whenever we set up a system involving money. It's that claim that I'm wavering on simply because money seems very useful to me and I'm not sure if it can be changed out that easily. Far more easy would be to concentrate on for example consolidating worker power effectively and in a more philosophical way getting people to realise in a way they don't seem to now that money isn't a thing to be aimed at and that rather it's just standing in for something we have a harder time quantifying, namely our time. <br /><br />It strikes me that a useful analogy here is with science and it's relationship with maths. It's easy to forget that maths doesn't literally describe the universe. In order for maths to actually describe the universe we need to set up largely arbitrary standards like the distance of a meter which enable us to quantify say distances in a way that lets us examine it in a rigorous manner. Money is like meters in that sense and the real problem seems to be more people forgetting that and believing the money itself is real rather than a useful arbitrary measurement.That Guy Montaghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10387637105335886493noreply@blogger.com