Dakryn's Batshit Theory of the Week

[Dak]

@Ein:

I'll refrain from any more commenting on DK then until I finish it, since pretty much any [wrong] thing he says is predicated on the LToV, so I'll give the small benefit of the doubt that Marx wows me at the end. The fact that he is happy to reference everything that supports his argument directly or by opposing with poor argument, but refuses to reference Bastiat directly smacks of fear - and for good reason.

I find it interesting he basically constantly refers to things which, if followed out logically, bring one to subjective value, but he is apparently blind to this. In fact, I could certainly argue that the nature of subjectivity asserts that even *an* LToV only verifies subjectivity. We could certainly agree on LToV being the "true" mode of value - and this would still be subjective! Of course, the actual subjective value argument asserts that we take more into account than the labor involved; in fact, the labor involved is not the highest on the list of contingent factors in valuation. If anything, contingency is the final destruction of LToV.

 

[Einherjar86]

I'm all for critiquing purported truth values, but simply suggesting that what two people agree appears to be the case doesn't get us anywhere fruitful. Two people might subjectively experience the world as flat, but we know - scientifically speaking - that it isn't. This isn't to say that the subjective truth of a personal world experiences the earth as spherical; merely that an alternative frame reveals an alternative "truth."

Marx would probably agree with you that his own practice of conceptualizing value in this way is a subjective practice; despite anything you might believe, he was not an idiot. But he would also say that when you look at how entrepreneurs and producers behave in this capitalistic society, they behave as though value can be reduced back to labor power - this is how producers come up with the projected cost of production before setting out to produce a product (apologies for the redundancy). Anything beyond that, which the capitalist pockets, is surplus value - cost that can be charged in addition to what it costs to make the product, and this is certainly reliant upon the perceived subjective desires of a consumer base.

However, what Marx argues is that the process that allows an entrepreneur to charge surplus value favors him from the very beginning because he possesses the means to organize the labor required to make the product and then charge extra - in other words, he owns the means of production. The appeal to voluntarism says that employees don't have to work for their employers; they can go get a job anywhere else they please. But when this is the case everywhere, the employee's position looks basically the same everywhere she goes. The ideal of competition and capitalism is that the individual employee can build her own business if she works hard enough; but I think your dad and Jimmy's would agree that this is near-myth, a phenomenon that happens to few.

The basic contradiction at the heart of capitalism is in its very empowerment of any and all to do whatever they please with their bodies and labor. They can quit any job they don't like. While this looks great on the surface, underneath it we find that this rational behavior does in fact conceal a form of exploitation. I don't care how free any individual is to do whatever she wants with her body; when a system in place privileges and relies upon those who already own the means of production, the freedom of employees matters little. The promise of freedom is an empty one; it is freedom up to a certain point.

I have no alternative. I don't agree with a communist system. In fact, I believe that capitalism is here to stay and probably should; but I'm willing to acknowledge, and I will claim until the end, that it operates upon a fundamental exploitation of human labor.

 

[Dak]

Well there's a ton in that post where we can agree, or at least room for expansion rather than walls.

Capitalism (for the purposes of discussion, I'm referring to the "pure form", not the reality) offers the opportunity, not guarantee, that if one possesses talent and/or ideas, that one will have the opportunity to pursue offering the product/service to the public, and that the public will determine the value, and reward in kind: well if valued and poorly if not. However, opportunity is not risk free, even in a "pure" ideal. That some do not or will not consider the risk worth the return, or that some ideas(and thusly products/services) necessarily require someone to be employed rather than an employee does not automatically entail exploitation. If I have decided the exchange of risk for security, or transaction costs as a freelancer vs employee, is worth the difference in wages vs whatever margin of profit is on my product - in a free (even if relatively) environment - there has been no exploitation.

Now, to history and/or the current situation: Certainly there is and has been exploitation, but not because of any labor theory of value! The exploitation is in the form of legal restriction, which keeps potential self or general employers on the sideline, mitigating "creative destruction", in favor of "entrenched interests", and yes big industry/finance/"capital" etc. is certainly ongoingly guilty of rigging the legal system in their favor. However, "nature finds a way", or maybe in keeping with the nature of an economic discussion, "capital" finds a way. "Barriers to entry" are ever increasing to prevent competition, because competition requires that business constantly serve the public rather than fleece them (whether them includes employees or customers). However, even with significant restrictions we see "new" money combat "old". Owning the means of production is challenged when the means of production, or distribution become obsolete (which can be via ideas or technology), this is the primary manner of challenge in a mixed economy, which makes up essentially every economy now.

Rentseeking, license/certification defacto cartelization, etc. are the origination of "wage-slaves", not any sort of value theory. Now I know, as I admitted above, that big business will certainly pursue these things. However, they are aided by misguided public opinion that these things are in the public interest. In every case, legal protections ostensibly in the interest of the public are merely creating a fox-and-henhouse situation or worse.

"Free marketers" do not disagree that the current real and historical real model of capitalism has rested on exploitation, they merely disagree where the root/nature of the exploitation lies, and will also claim this until the end(of the state).

 

[Einherjar86]

Now, to history and/or the current situation: Certainly there is and has been exploitation, but not because of any labor theory of value!

Agreed. However, what Marx is saying is that under capitalism (as it has manifested in history, during the historical period in which he is writing) value is hypostatized as being derived from labor, even if this isn't its true source. This is how producers treat it in their very action. It is, again, not an axiom of valuation or an origin of value itself, but an effect, or symptom, of the historical dynamics of labor and value under capitalism.

And once value is hypostatized as labor power, according to Marx, this becomes an impetus for the source of that labor (i.e. the proletariat) to resist.

 

[Dak]

Agreed. However, what Marx is saying is that under capitalism (as it has manifested in history, during the historical period in which he is writing) value is hypostatized as being derived from labor, even if this isn't its true source. This is how producers treat it in their very action. It is, again, not an axiom of valuation or an origin of value itself, but an effect, or symptom, of the historical dynamics of labor and value under capitalism.

And once value is hypostatized as labor power, according to Marx, this becomes an impetus for the source of that labor (i.e. the proletariat) to resist.

Not taking the time to quibble about the first part, the last part was obviously incorrect. Furthermore, generally speaking, communism never took root in remotely market oriented economies, rather only in imperial countries or power vacuums. Of course, I know the counter to that is because "mixing" placates the masses, but I think that is only half true, and not in a way that is beneficial to that counter.

Learned something new btw:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/09/07/priceless-how-the-federal_n_278805.html

One critical way the Fed exerts control on academic economists is through its relationships with the field's gatekeepers. For instance, at the Journal of Monetary Economics, a must-publish venue for rising economists, more than half of the editorial board members are currently on the Fed payroll -- and the rest have been in the past.

.....

The Fed keeps many of the influential editors of prominent academic journals on its payroll. It is common for a journal editor to review submissions dealing with Fed policy while also taking the bank's money. A HuffPost review of seven top journals found that 84 of the 190 editorial board members were affiliated with the Federal Reserve in one way or another.

"Try to publish an article critical of the Fed with an editor who works for the Fed," says Galbraith. And the journals, in turn, determine which economists get tenure and what ideas are considered respectable.

The pharmaceutical industry has similarly worked to control key medical journals, but that involves several companies. In the field of economics, it's just the Fed.

Being on the Fed payroll isn't just about the money, either. A relationship with the Fed carries prestige; invitations to Fed conferences and offers of visiting scholarships with the bank signal a rising star or an economist who has arrived.

Affiliations with the Fed have become the oxygen of academic life for monetary economists. "It's very important, if you are tenure track and don't have tenure, to show that you are valued by the Federal Reserve," says Jane D'Arista, a Fed critic and an economist with the Political Economy Research Institute at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.

Robert King, editor in chief of the Journal of Monetary Economics and a visiting scholar at the Richmond Federal Reserve Bank, dismisses the notion that his journal was influenced by its Fed connections. "I think that the suggestion is a silly one, based on my own experience at least," he wrote in an e-mail. (His full response is at the bottom.)

Of course you do Robert King, of course you do.

 

[Einherjar86]

Not taking the time to quibble about the first part, the last part was obviously incorrect.

Obviously incorrect, obviously.

Geography and infrastructure keep me from responding in full, so that will have to come next month. I'm currently in Italy, exploring the Paradise of Exiles. Human history dwarfs the inchoate stumbling of the States, and the testaments here keep me starry-eyed. I've recovered from the haze of jet lag only to find myself disoriented by a haze of wine and grappa. I visited Rome and stood in the wide forum where Caesar was stabbed, and in the tiny apartment where John Keats succumbed to tuberculosis. I stood where the gladiators walked into the Flavian Amphitheater. I would call Rome the City of Hallowed Paths because I can't imagine what remains those streets are paved over. In some places they dig down fifty feet for excavations, and they still haven't exposed everything. The Roman ground is literally the ruins of past centuries. Strata, as Deleuze and Guattari said. The weight of a city on the backs of slaughtered masses.

"So. Here are the dead fathers."

 

[Dak]

Obviously incorrect, obviously.

What I mean is that what Marx expected didn't happen.

Geography and infrastructure keep me from responding in full, so that will have to come next month. I'm currently in Italy, exploring the Paradise of Exiles. Human history dwarfs the inchoate stumbling of the States, and the testaments here keep me starry-eyed. I've recovered from the haze of jet lag only to find myself disoriented by a haze of wine and grappa. I visited Rome and stood in the wide forum where Caesar was stabbed, and in the tiny apartment where John Keats succumbed to tuberculosis. I stood where the gladiators walked into the Flavian Amphitheater. I would call Rome the City of Hallowed Paths because I can't imagine what remains those streets are paved over. In some places they dig down fifty feet for excavations, and they still haven't exposed everything. The Roman ground is literally the ruins of past centuries. Strata, as Deleuze and Guattari said. The weight of a city on the backs of slaughtered masses.

"So. Here are the dead fathers."

I hope I can afford (in time and money) to do some world travelling at some point. Guessing it won't be until the kids are grown, and probably gone.

While there are many places that can claim to be older, and other places that can claim equal importance respective to their own eras, I don't know if any other place has maintained a consistent level of importance for as long as Rome, primarily due to the Catholic Church. Of course, the city was not only built on the backs of the slaughtered masses in the city proper, but also in blood and treasure spilt and extracted in far off lands, even extending to today in the form of the money flowing into the Vatican.

 

[Jimmy... Dead.]

On a whim I just decided to listen to some Stefan Molyneux and holy shit is this guy a condescending, self righteous cock sucker. I was listening to fan questions and almost every time he gets a question from a fan that involves some sort of problem he or she is having Stefan resorts to the fallacy of will power. Just black and white non sense. I never hear him mention neuroscience or sociology etc, it's just one quip, cliche or joke after another. Don;t get me wrong he's a smart guy and he makes some good basic points. I even agree with a lot that he has to say initially but he's ridiculously simple; he just doesn't take the next step imho. And his attitude and tone is awful, just an unlikeable dick.

 

[Dak]

Haha Stefan. I was just reading a thing about him the other day, about how he's devolved so much in the last 3 years or so, pandering to the audience that chose him. Not that he was fantastic before, but he had some insight. But yeah, he ridiculously simplifies shit. On top of it, he does the Glenn Beck, talking to YOU directly thing.

On a more funny yet prescient thing:



This is the thing I was saying at 23-25 to my fellow Marines: We're getting paid to be here, and just sitting on our ass is fucking boring. Do your damn job, earn your paycheck, and the day goes by faster as a fucking bonus.

 

[Jimmy... Dead.]

Ever notice those people are usually really mean or assholes, at least be fucking nice. I can't comprehend people at their job or in public really who are just shitty. It's that default attitude David Foster Wallace talks about. But here I am being a hypocrite huh, simplifying people, ah fuck Stefen anyway.

 

[SentinelSlain]

For Dak

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oeHzc1h8k7o

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0eDTcGkOJj4

 

[Dak]

I'm not sure why those were addressed to me? I'm not any particular friend of democracy any moreso than some other ocracy.

 

[SentinelSlain]

It's more that in latin america, over the past 50-60 years, maybe in hundreds of years, capitalism has been the more likely candidate in putting guns to people's heads that communism / socialism. The land reform, for example, in Guatemala, was initiated by a pro US, democratically elected guy, was mild and he his own family were basically the losers in it, he redistributed his own land to peasants. All of the rich people in Venezuela are still rich, nobody came to kill them or take the money.

 

[Dak]

Interesting assertion. I'm just not sure what gun-to-the-head capitalistic countries in Latin America you are referring to.

 

[SentinelSlain]

watch the videos then. they are both good and are either notable in themselves or because of the presenter.

 

[Dak]

#1. I don't have the time to watch 3 hours of documentary about pretty well known history, during a school semester.
#2. Capitalism is, by definition, not putting a gun to someones head. Otherwise I could just go mug you and claim "the invisible hand at work!".
#3. The US spook and military apparati was very instrumental in preventing democracy in many areas. This is government policy, not a market action.

 

[Einherjar86]

I don't think there's any convincing way to define what capitalism is not.

 

[Jimmy... Dead.]

I enjoyed this read

My Own Personal Nothingness
From a childhood hallucination to the halls of theoretical physics.
By Alan Lightman
http://nautil.us/issue/16/nothingness/my-own-personal-nothingness

"My most vivid encounter with Nothingness occurred in a remarkable experience I had as a child of 9 years old. It was a Sunday afternoon. I was standing alone in a bedroom of my home in Memphis Tennessee, gazing out the window at the empty street, listening to the faint sound of a train passing a great distance away, and suddenly I felt that I was looking at myself from outside my body. I was somewhere in the cosmos. For a brief few moments, I had the sensation of seeing my entire life, and indeed the life of the entire planet, as a brief flicker in a vast chasm of time, with an infinite span of time before my existence and an infinite span of time afterward. My fleeting sensation included infinite space. Without body or mind, I was somehow floating in the gargantuan stretch of space, far beyond the solar system and even the galaxy, space that stretched on and on and on. I felt myself to be a tiny speck, insignificant in a vast universe that cared nothing about me or any living beings and their little dots of existence, a universe that simply was. And I felt that everything I had experienced in my young life, the joy and the sadness, and everything that I would later experience, meant absolutely nothing in the grand scheme of things. It was a realization both liberating and terrifying at once. Then, the moment was over, and I was back in my body."

"The strange hallucination lasted only a minute or so. I have never experienced it since. Although Nothingness would seem to exclude awareness along with the exclusion of everything else, awareness was part of that childhood experience, but not the usual awareness I would locate within the three pounds of gray matter in my head. It was a different kind of awareness. I am not religious, and I do not believe in the supernatural. I do not think for a minute that my mind actually left my body. But for a few moments I did experience a profound absence of the familiar surroundings and thoughts we create to anchor our lives. It was a kind of Nothingness."

 

[Einherjar86]

o hai Rust Cohle.

 

[SentinelSlain]

#2. Capitalism is, by definition, not putting a gun to someones head. Otherwise I could just go mug you and claim "the invisible hand at work!".

You pay taxes right? How much do you agree with the stuff that they get spent on? Also, who decides which aspects of state spending are seen in a critical light when you watch the news? Disadvantaged groups, outsiders? Probably not.

#3. The US spook and military apparati was very instrumental in preventing democracy in many areas. This is government policy, not a market action.

Well how much do you think those things differ in the united states anyway? United Fruit basically ordered the US interventions in one of those countries, was it Guatemala? can't remember, it's in the videos anyway.