> Note that, actually, "Andrew''s example" is not Andrew''s but it is
> in Marx''s Capital II, Chapter 13:
That is not true. The widget example was Andrew's example, not Marx's. For
instance, in the quote you cite from Vol. 2, Ch. 13, we did not have:
* a one-product economy.
* no constant capital.
* only one capitalist ("Mr. Moneybags").
Moreover, note the following in Marx's quote:
a)
> BETWEEN THE TIME OF SOWING AND HARVESTING THE LABOUR-PROCESS
> IS ALMOST ENTIREY SUSPENDED.
the qualification "ALMOST".
b)
> In timber raising, after the sowing and
> the incidental preliminary work are completed, the seed requires
> about 100 years to be transformed into a finished product and during
> all that time it stands in comparatively very little need of the
> action of labour.
> "In all these cases additional labour is drawn on only occasionally
> during a large portion of the time of production...
the qualifications "very little" and "only occasionally".
Moreover, the Marx quotation does not speak to the issue at hand. I.e. he
does not suggest that *value* was increased without the expenditure of
living and/or dead labour.
> Andrew is not constructing a weird example or making silly
> assumptions.
If we are trying to understand some process connected with capitalism,
then it seems to me that the assumptions listed above do a great injustice
to that topic. Note that Andrew has not _just_ assumed c=0, but rather
combined that assumption with many others that are at least as
problematic.
[btw, can you remember an example that Marx made that assumed a
one-commodity economy?]
> Well, my questions are:
> a) Do Marx''s above-quoted examples exhibit the "perverse results"
> you attribute to Andrew''s example?
No, they don't. And Marx didn't use an example similar to Andrew's.
> b) Do these Marx''s examples imply that "natural processes" create
> value?
In the Marx quote, there _was_ labour performed in the drying process.
Moreover, in the quote constant capital was not eliminated by
assumption.
In solidarity, Jerry