R, I think we have reached the point of diminishing marginal returns. I agree with Fred Guy: the work on the LTV for a century has been a desperate, inward-turning attempt tos how that it can be made coherent in the face of increasing masses of fatal objections, and it's not doing real work. It's at most a heuristic for--and not exaplantrion of--the importsnt points you make, that commodities are the products of labor, and that any society has to make large scale decsiions about hwo to divide up its socially necessary labor. But I think we have a stand off here, and probably should move on. jks
> >Justin, >a short reply. > > the disallowing of qualitative change in outputs and inputs and >setting them equal in price by assumption seems to make analysis >inherently static. This is why these assumptions are hotly contested. > >>> >> >>As far as I can tell, this is just a way of reminding us that any >>commodities out there are the product of labor, an important point, >>but npt necessarily one concerning value. > >yes Shaikh is reminding us that inputs do not magically become >outputs without the toil and misery of real labor. There is no >production of things by things. There are outputs because labor has >been materialized therein. And the outputs that we have both in >variety and quantity are those that have proven to be socially >necessary in and through exchange wherein the expansion of value is >culminated. The technical conditions of production do not themselves >yield a surplus and the technical conditions are themselves >determined socially: Value--socially necessary labor >time--determines the technical conditions of production > > > >> >>Thus both 'inputs' and 'outputs' are the >>>use forms of materialized value, and we can they say that in the >>>*real* process it is values that determine the physical production >>>data... >> >>That's very fast. Why are these "determined" by "value," SNALT, >>merely because they are produced by labor over a period of time? > > >The input means of production are not values simply because they were >produced by labor-- my home cooked pooris are not values. The input >mop are values because they proved to have represented socially >necessary abstract labor time in that they ex-changed for money at >the commencement of the circuit of capital. > > > Yet though values, the means of production do not automatically >transfer their value to the output; any idle time threatens the >moral depreciation of those means of production--such that they will >represent a lesser quantity of socially necessary abstract labor >time. The very threat of moral depreciation underlines that we are >not dealing with a technical process, plain and simple, but a social >process in and through which socially necessary labor time is >determined. > >As John Ernst recently pointed out, it is the ongoing threat of moral >depreciation--that is, the loss of the value of the means of >production--that compels capitalists to agonise the working class; >the most powerful means for the reduction of toil and trouble become >the surest way of prolonging and intensifying the working day. > >Without the theory of value we are are not conceptually prepared to >understand the most disturbing paradoxes of capitalist development. > >Rakesh > > > > > >> >>> >>> >>>Pearson after all thought that he could develop a purely >>>descriptive/phenomenalist theory of heredity by making linking the >>>character of an individual through regression equations to the >>>average character of each ancestral generation. >> >>I don't knwo what Sraffa had in mine, but that isn't my interest. >>However the quanities I want to posit should exist and be useful. >> >>> >>>Similarly I am saying that the physical production data do not >>>themselves determine the profit rate, though they can be used to >>>calculate it. >> >>But you, and Shaikh, have shown that SNALT does determine it. >> >>> >>> >>>Why do we need references to genes when we can quantitatively link >>>generations with data of ancentral heredity? Why do we need labor >>>value when we can calculate the profit rate with data of physical >>>production alone? >>> >>>It is in the interests of realistically grasping the actual process >>>that our theories should refer to genes and labor value. >>> >>>Justin, I would think then that your commitment to realism (at least >>>at levels above the subatomic one) would have you argue in favor the >>>theory of labor value? >>> >> >>Well, I'll even be a quantum realist if someone shows us how. Maybe >>the many worlds interpretation is true. But my realism is a >>Arthur-Finean, case-by-case, pragmatic realism; I'll quantify over >>whatever our best science says there is. I'm not convinced that our >>best science says the LTV is true, or that SNALT by itself >>determines prices and profits. >> >>jks >> >>_________________________________________________________________ >>Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at >>http://explorer.msn.com/intl.asp. > _________________________________________________________________ Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com/intl.asp.
