Re Steve K's [5193]: Steve wrote: I'm rather lucky that my PC crashed before I could reply to this, because it gave me the chance to take a few deep breaths. I am accustomed to asking others on this list to "read my lips", but not you. I choose my words fairly carefully in my posts, and I would appreciate if you would read them carefully. I did NOT say that "qualitative issues lie outside of Marx's analysis". I said that "qualitative issues form no part of his CORE analysis" (even that statement I qualified. And of course, my statement was in contrast to the neoclassicals--which further qualifies it). ------------------------ I'm sorry if I misunderstood the points you were making and didn't read your post as carefully as I should have. BUT, even as you explain your position above, I disagree with it. I think, rather, that qualitative issues DO form a part of his CORE analysis. His CORE analysis is of value and that concerns BOTH quality and quantity. ----------------------------- Steve continued: But perhaps I didn't choose my words carefully enough. By "core", I meant something like "foundation concepts from which he derived his pivotal initial arguments on the source of value and determination of prices". I hope that's clearer. ------------------------------- It's clearer -- but again I disagree. He derived his pivotal early arguments based on an analysis of the commodity. That was his starting point -- not use-value nor exchange-value. It was only in the unfolding of the character of the commodity that the categories of use-value, value, and exchange-value were introduced. ------------------------------- Steve continues: So I agree with everything you posted about the role of quality, but it makes no difference to my argument, or to the difference between us over this initial issue: whether use-value can be quantitative in Marx's CORE (as defined above) analysis, and whether I had or had not found at least prima facie textual evidence to support that--for example, the statement that "use-value and exchange-value are intrinsically incommensurable MAGNITUDES". --------------------------------- I don't think it's "prima facie" evidence, but I agree that it is a quote worthy of discussion. You might want to ask yourself how categories which are "intrinsically incommensurable" can both be expressed quantitatively as magnitudes. It is only to the extent that the quality (use-value) can be expressed through the commodity-form and commodities have value and that value comes to be necessarily expressed through the value-form that magnitude has meaning for the commodity's exchange-value. (You might also want to see how the subject of magnitude unfolds and is a component part of the Hegelian logical system.) ----------------------------------------- Steve continues: Now, from the next segment of your reply, it appears that you don't regard this or any other textual excerpt I found as conclusive or even suggestive of this interpretation. ---------------------------------- I just wanted to concentrate on what appeared to me to be the CORE differences in interpretation. It seemed a more fruitful way to discuss the topic rather than offering alternative explanations and readings of so many of the quotes cited. In some cases, especially in the early part of your post when you quoted Marx about the importance of use-value, I didn't comment because I agreed with those quotes. Therefore, there was nothing to discuss (especially since I made my perspectives on that issue known to you close to 6 years ago and on repeated occasions since). In any event, I've been the one who has been willing to talk to you about this -- that's more than others on this list have been willing to do lately. ------------------------------------- Steve closes: If so, I can't convince you, so as with so much else on this discussion list, we'll just have to agree to disagree. ------------------------------------- That's up to you. Hopefully, others will join in and we can have more than a 2 person exchange. But, listmembers discuss what they want to discuss and over time I have come to realize that they don't always want to discuss the topics I want to discuss. Eventually, you may come to the same conclusion -- but I hope not. In solidarity, Jerry PS: Sorry about your computer. I hope there was no damage done to the machine ... after all, that would represent a premature loss of use-value. How can I tell that use-value has declined, you ask? I can tell because your computer takes the value-form and would have either a resale value, expressed in money, or no resale value at all (except, perhaps, as scrap).
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