any comments appreciated. By vol 3, Marx is nearing his descent to the concrete totality, yet Marx seems not interested in *individual* capitals even as he approaches them because any one individual capital does not yield--as a result of the variance in compositions--surplus value at the same rate as would the *typical particular* capitalist (that is, the prototype of or a perfect aliquot of the whole class; Meek links Marx's typical particular of a capital of average composition to Sraffa's standard commodity). In vol 3 Marx remains more interested in total surplus value produced by all the individual capitals, and it is only in terms of capital-as-a-whole that the total mass of surplus value can be defined, and the average rate of profit determined. Capital-as-a-whole is thus revealed to be itself a concrete unit with its own specific attributes. So even as Marx comes to appreciate fully individuality, as opposed to typical particularity, in the multiplicity of capitals, he is not ultimately interested in the the multiplicity or aggregate of individual capitals but with the concrete individual that is itself capital as a whole. Itself a concrete individual, capital-as-a-whole is thus not like say boats-as-a whole which is merely a *generalized concrete abstraction* for small open craft, ocean liners, battleships and and exchange carriers. In this latter case the members are of course more concrete than the abstract class. But in the case of capital-as-a-whole, the class itself has been concretized in that it alone has attributes that its members, as individuals *abstracted* from that class, do not. The capitalist *class* is not a not a mere plurality of capitals; it is itself a fairly concrete unit. I do not think we have here a fallacy of misplaced concreteness or an error of hypostatizing. Though I do not know whether I am making sense either. And it may be that the fault should be put on capitalist social relations, not those social scientists who reject methodological individualism which seems only to accord concreteness to members, not classes. Such a stricture may be illsuited for the very society that produces the standpoint of the individualist. rb
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