Rakesh, You are still being non-responsive. Please read my words very carefully. And please please please stay on one issue at first -- how to test the truth-value of Fred Moseley's claim that HIS "prices of production" change if and only if technology (productivity of labor) changes. I am not concerned with Marx here, nor the meaning of prices of production, nor the validity of Fred's interpretation of Marx, nor anything else except how to test the truth-value of this one specific claim Fred Moseley has made. Since you don't like my test, please tell me how YOU would test the truth-value of Moseley's claim that HIS "prices of production" change if and only if technology changes. "The idea behind this claim seems to be that only as a result of a change in the productivity of labor could there be a substantial enough change for the resultant (theoretical) prices to serve again as centers of gravity or long term average prices." I also don't care here about the idea behind the claim. Just how to test the claim. If you don't like my way of testing it, give me one of your own. "But if we abstract away these interferences, it is still possible for the c and v in each or all of the five branches and prices of production to change. But the reason they will now change will be technical change alone. And that's by definition. For example, the c/v ratios will tend to rise or the s/v ratios will tend rise." Are you saying this is true of MOSELEY'S "prices of production"? If so, I say you're wrong. It doesn't matter a whit how much you quote to me what he argues. I know what he argues. I'm saying there's an internal contradiction in his argument. I don't want to explain why there's an internal contradiction, because I don't want to descend down the slippery slope of trying to convince you, or him, or anything subjective like that. If I'm wrong, all one has to do is come up with the numbers to show it, or even come up with an alternative test. All I want is an agreed-upon test of the matter. You can't beg off this problem by saying Moseley must be right "by definition." There is an internal contradiction in his definitions. That's what's at issue. Marx's 5 branches are irrelevant here. We're NOT talking about the *transformation* of *values* into production prices. We are talking about the influence of a change in labor productivity -- technology -- on production prices. Please please please do not divert. Please stick to this issue and it alone. "These changes in monetary magnitudes only insofar as they are a result of changes in the technical conditions of production are alone allowed to transform prices of production--Marx simply abstracts away from the other reasons c and v or s/v could change. So there is a moment of idealization in Marx's theory of prices of production." Forget Marx. Forget method. Forget definitions. Give me a test of Moseley's claim or accept mine. We need a way of testing what he says. Otherwise, he can get away with making unsubstantiated assertions that seem to make sense (when and because one has not confronted the internal contradiction). I don't want that to happen. Let us be done with assertions. PROOF is what is needed. "At least that's how I understand the argument to restrict changes in prices of production to those changes brought about by changes in the productivity of labor." You're not paying attention. I'm trying to test the TRUTH-VALUE of Moseley's claim that HIS prices of production always change when labor productivity changes. What you've just written is off the point. "In my opinion, the more important question remains whether due to that restriction itself, it is impossible (since productivity is rising continously if not in a single branch then at least in the system as a whole) to accept the Sraffian formalism in which input and output prices are set equal, so as to remove one of the equations and make a solution possible. Here I think I agree with you, Giusanni and others." Forget your opinions, forget what is important, forget who agrees with whom and who's sleeping with whom. Give me a test of Moseley's claim or accept mine. We need a way of testing what he says. Otherwise, he can get away with unsubstantiated assertions that seem to make sense (because one has not confronted the internal contradiction). I don't want that to happen. Let us be done with assertions. PROOF is what is needed. "As implicit above, I think said restriction is built into the definition of price of production." The problem, again, is that his claims concerning the implications of his interpretation are false. It makes no sense to say that his claims must be true by definition. That completely ignores the fact that his definitions can conflict with one another. Oy. "Of course your post was not cowritten. What I am saying is that by asking Fred to take as his given a physical system, you seemed to be undermining the interpretation you share with others." I don't see that this explains the reference to "cowriters" who happen to be people with whom I've never written anything. In any case, forget my interpretation. Forget givens. Please concentrate exclusively on how you would test whether, according to Fred's own arguments, it is possible to there to be a change in productivity without a change in production prices. Andrew Kliman
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