>In their difficulties our commodity owners think like Faust : “Im Anfang war die Tat.” [“ In the beginning was the deed.”– Goethe, Faust.] They therefore acted and transacted before they thought. Instinctively they conform to the laws imposed by the nature of commodities. They cannot bring their commodities into relation as values, and therefore as commodities, except by comparing them with some one other commodity as the universal equivalent. That we saw from the analysis of a commodity. But a particular commodity cannot become the universal equivalent except by a social act. The social action therefore of all other commodities, sets apart the particular commodity in which they all represent their values. Thereby the bodily form of this commodity becomes the form of the socially recognised universal equivalent. To be the universal equivalent, becomes, by this social process, the specific function of the commodity thus excluded by the rest. Thus it becomes – money. “Illi unum consilium habent et virtutem et potestatem suam bestiae tradunt. Et ne quis possit emere aut vendere, nisi qui habet characterem aut nomen bestiae aut numerum nominis ejus.” [“ These have one mind, and shall give their power and strength unto the beast.” Revelations, 17: 13; “And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.” Revelations, 13: 17.] (Apocalypse.)We can see from Marx’s use of a Latin Bible instead of Luther’s translation that he had a Catholic education and wrote thinking of an audience with a Catholic background.
But apart from the political implications, the challenge Marx poses to “apolitical economics”, there are the literary and philosophical factors that make Marx a part of the canon. So how can one read Capital for pleasure?My first recommendation is to stick with the translation supervised by Engels, and I will show you why by a quick comparison>The commodity is, first of all, an external object, a thing which through its qualities satisfies human needs of whatever kind. The nature of these needs, whether they arise, for example, from the stomach, or the imagination, makes no difference.Fowkes, Penguin>A commodity is, first of all, an external object—a thing whose properties satisfy human wants or needs of whatever kind. The nature of these wants and needs—whether they come from our belly or our imagination—doesn’t matter here.Reitter, PrincetonAnd here we have the Moore-Aveling translation which was supervised and edited by Engels:>A commodity is, in the first place, an object outside us, a thing that by its properties satisfies human wants of some sort or another. The nature of such wants, whether, for instance, they spring from the stomach or from fancy, makes no difference.I think “fancy” in this instance is a much clearer translation of what Marx is referring to, but later translators felt it would be mistaken by readers to mean “fancy” as in expensive or ornate. It is just also more pleasant prose. And that’s important because we want to enjoy reading it since we are going to forget 90% of it anyway. I have compared all three translations on several places and this is my opinionIf you lads are interested, I'd like to have a little read along starting this weekend. With Capital, Volume One, Part One, Money, Chapter One, Commodities. You have the whole week to finish it, very easy for those who fancy itYou can use the philosophy channel on the poetry /lit/ discord if you want to keep track of threadshttps://discord.gg/QKnPQdqnss
>>25309277I'm not interested in joining your groomer discord.
>>25309272Stop spamming the catalog faggot
What made Marx click for me is gambling. Perverse. Most of my income comes from gambling in one form or another and I was listening to an interview with an extremely successful poker player and he talked about poker in economic terms and said he was basically providing entertainment to the losers and that was what he was reimbursed for. Obviously ridiculous. Of course there is no labor in poker, not in the Marxist sense, just capital, that is why no wealth is created, it just shifts hands. But it does follow the human logic of value, each hand, within the parameters of the game, is valued based on how many hands it takes to arrive at. And Marx doesn't say prive reflects labor value, but that it only reflects it when there is market equilibrium, which in poker is the showdown, when all the information is in. So I saw that even for gambling, Marx's explanation for what was happening made much more sense than other economic explanations
The strangest fiction to me in capitalist economics is "fiat currency". It does not exist. The dollar could not cease to be backed by gold without the petrodollar arrangement Nixon made in its place, that Saudi Arabia would only sell oil in dollars, in exchange for America having their back. The dollar still backed by a commodity. It is backed by oil.
>>25309272>Calling Land hyper fascist in any sense of the wordIt really is an empty signifier. You just know that the fag who made this picrel had no true objections with any of his prescriptions, and had to come up with a reason why they didn't like it anyway. Meltdown is literally the ultimate realization of communism. Land's capital-form is a transcendental deity which flattens all human hierarchy.
>>25310136>extremely concentrated privatization of capital is socialization of capitalIn form of production but otherwise it is the total privatization of every gain and total socialization of every loss
>>25310146It transcends production, it is an alien egregore with its own end. The fact that this is not the ultimate refutation leftists come to betrays the limits of materialist analysis. If everything is private, and the flows of the market machine emerges wholly independent of human desire, it follows that humanity becomes completely sublimated within this structure. The systemic emergence of the market becomes a unique consciousness, one that we become basic neurons inside of. The difference between the big-money man and the prole is absolutely decimated after all of humanity is eaten by its own creation.
>>25310154You are partially right. Humanity is an organism and capital is an organization of that organism but it ends up actually becoming very crude because it has to constantly expand or die and at one point it has to eat itself to do this
>>25309272
>>25310631
>>25310681Has your jerking knee ever knocked you unconscious?
>>25310811
>>25310136Its a misanthropic abomination, human techno capital is unchaining a beast from the raw potentiality of the universe. Wouldn't be surprised if a massive solar flare or pulsar one shots earth once it finally rears it's evil head.
>>25310838>it's obsessed
>>25310861
This will never work because most anons barely read and the ones that do have already read Capital.
>>25310631Not him, not you, have read Marx.
>>25310241It is the dialectic between constant Capital and variable Capital. Constant Capital constantly eat variable Capital (living labor), to grow. At one point, and due to the contradiction between valorization and devalorization, constant Capital cannot reproduce itself anymore. There is not enough living labor left to sustain it (constant Capital). Dead labor will have devoured living labor, up to a point where it is so big it cannot sustain itself anymore on living labor. This is, by the way, the era we are in since 2008.
>>25309437Yes fiat currency is an abstraction, based on growth potential. And debt. The printing of money basically follows the growth, in order to grow proportionally to the growth, and thus be an abstract general equivalent of labor time. Nowadays fiat currency is not only this, but fictitious Capital, that serve to make (since 2008) people believe that Capital can still accumulate itself, when in fact, it cannot. Fiat currency is not the problem, it is the last solution for Capital to give the illusion that it can still accumulate itself. Gold standard midwit do not understand that if you require mandatory fully backed dollar, the whole economy would totally collapse in less than a few years, at the current rate of intensification of the contradiction between valorization and devalorization.
>>25311107Labor isn't capital, variable or otherwise. >>25311117The dollar is not fiat, it is backed by oil. It is called fiat to hide this crucial truth that is behind much of our foreign policy
