From: Andrew Brown (A.Brown@LUBS.LEEDS.AC.UK)
Date: Wed Mar 23 2005 - 06:58:27 EST
Thanks Jerry, Of course, to be trivial or obvious is not to be logically inconsistent. In fact, my theme has always has an ontological aspect in that my bench mark for gauging triviality or otherwise is the 'real world'. Despite appearance to the contrary we actually seem to be making as much progress as can ever be expected in such a forum, rather than continually talking past one another, from my point of view. Thus I have now clarified that what becomes 'obviously' incommensurable through introduction of new goods is a measure of generalised exchange value or, slightly more concretely put, 'purchasing power'. Ajit has all along, it now becomes clear to me, simply been insisting that one can compare not generalised exchange value or purchasing power but merely the rate at which a given good exchanges for one other good through introduction of new goods. Of course if one chooses as numeraire a new good then one cannot compare 'prices' with the old system. In reality it seems to me that we are interested in generalised exchange value or purchasing power. This is why value (the 'third thing') is important. Thanks again, Andy -----Original Message----- From: OPE-L [mailto:OPE-L@SUS.CSUCHICO.EDU] On Behalf Of Gerald_A_Levy@MSN.COM Sent: 22 March 2005 22:36 To: OPE-L@SUS.CSUCHICO.EDU Subject: Re: [OPE-L] standard commodity Hi Andy (and Ajit and others): The tennis match that you are playing with Ajit is confusing -- to me at least. In an earlier volley, you claimed that the results about basic goods in Ajit's and Paul C's paper were "obvious" and "trivial". Now it is clear that your disagreement with Ajit is _primarily_ *ontological*. Perhaps if the both of you could focus on _either_ the formal logical consistency of the paper _or_ the ontological question (re commodity, money, value, capitalism, etc.) then you might not be talking past each other as much, imho. It also seems to me that neither one of you are going to convince the other of your position. If that is the case, then the goal of the exchange should simply be clarification. In solidarity, Jerry
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