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From: owner-ope-l@galaxy.csuchico.edu on behalf of Ajit Sinha
Sent: Friday, April 03, 1998 5:18 AM
To: ope-l@galaxy.csuchico.edu
Subject: Re: [OPE-L] Re: Two Rates of Profit
Ajit wrote:
"There is no need to *explicitly* assume no technical change when the
question of technical change is simply not a part of the problem under
investigation. It is a proble of deriving a set of prices from a *given*
set of technology. Why should anybody explicitly mention that there is no
technical change here? This should satisfy Andrew, so that I don't have to
repeat the same thing in a separate message."
I'm satisfied with the format in which Ajit has responded. But I'm afraid I
find the content less than satisfactory.
The positive element is Ajit's implicit acknowledgment that Marx does not
explicitly assume there's no technical change when he discusses the
transformation of commodity values into production prices. Yet I reject
Ajit's criterion for judging what an assumption is. Evidently, if something
is not part of the problem under investigation (e.g., "the question of
technical change is simply not a part of the problem under investigation"),
Ajit holds that it is implicitly assumed not to exist.
The question of the existence of human beings is not part of the problem
Galileo investigated when he concluded that heavy and light bodies fall
equally fast. Did he therefore assume that human beings do not exist?
The question of capitalist crisis is not part of the problem that Marx
investigated in Ch. 9 of _Capital_ III. Did he therefore assume that
capitalism is crisis-free?
So what's the alternative way of understanding these matters? Simply this:
if something is not part of the problem under investigation, then the results
of the investigation, if valid, apply EQUALLY when it doesn't exist AND when
it does exist.
Thus, because the question of the existence of human beings is not part of the
problem Galileo investigated, his conclusion, to the extent it is valid, is
valid whether or not human beings exist.
Thus, because the question of capitalist crisis is not part of the problem
that Marx investigated in Ch. 9 of _Capital_ III, his conclusions, to the
extent they are valid, are valid whether or not capitalism is crisis-prone.
Thus, because the question of technical change is not part of the problem that
Marx investigated in Ch. 9 of _Capital_ III, his conclusions, to the extent
they are valid, are valid when technology isn't changing *and* when it is
changing.
Ajit's statement that "It is a proble[m] of deriving a set of prices from a
*given*
set of technology" is at variance with the text of Chapter 9 of _Capital_ III.
Marx "derives" (so to speak) the prices of outputs from given sums of value
advanced, used up, and produced.
Of course, Ajit dislikes Marx's own resolution of the problem. To be sure, it
doesn't resolve the problem that concerns Ajit. But it does solve a different
problem that simultaneism doesn't even pose: what determines the magnitude of
the increase in the sum of value the capitalists have after production over
the sum of value they advanced before production?
Andrew Kliman