Marx's capital

>But the Ricardian definition of value, in spite of its ominous characteristics, has a feature which makes it dear to the heart of the honest bourgeois. It appeals with irresistible force to his sense of justice. Justice and equality of rights are the cornerstones on which the bourgeois of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries would like to erect his social edifice over the ruins of feudal injustice, inequality and privilege. And the determination of value of commodities by labour and the free exchange of the products of labour, taking place according to this measure of value between commodity owners with equal rights, these are, as Marx has already proved, the real foundations on which the whole political, juridical and philosophical ideology of the modern bourgeoisie has been built. Once it is recognised that labour is the measure of value of a commodity, the better feelings of the honest bourgeois cannot but be deeply wounded by the wickedness of a world which, while recognising the basic law of justice in name, still in fact appears at every moment to set it aside without compunction. And the petty bourgeois especially, whose honest labour – even if it is only that of his workmen and apprentices – is daily more and more depreciated in value by the competition of large-scale production and machinery, this small-scale producer especially must long for a society in which the exchange of products according to their labour value is at last a complete and invariable truth. In other words, he must long for a society in which a single law of commodity production prevails exclusively and in full, but in which the conditions are abolished in which it can prevail at all, viz., the other laws of commodity production and, later, of capitalist production.

...
>First, continual deviations of the prices of commodities from their values are the necessary condition in and through which the value of the commodities as such can come into existence. Only through the fluctuations of competition, and consequently of commodity prices, does the law of value of commodity production assert itself and the determination of the value of the commodity by the socially necessary labour time become a reality. That thereby the form of manifestation of value, the price, as a rule looks somewhat different from the value which it manifests, is a fate which value shares with most social relations. A king usually looks quite different from the monarchy which he represents. To desire, in a society of producers who exchange their commodities, to establish the determination of value by labour time, by forbidding competition to establish this determination of value through pressure on prices in the only way it can be established, is therefore merely to prove that, at least in this sphere, one has adopted the usual utopian disdain of economic laws.
>Secondly, competition, by bringing into operation the law of value of commodity production in a society of producers who exchange their commodities, precisely thereby brings about the only organisation and arrangement of social production which is possible in the circumstances. Only through the undervaluation or overvaluation of products is it forcibly brought home to the individual commodity producers what society requires or does not require and in what amounts. But it is precisely this sole regulator that the utopia advocated by Rodbertus among others wishes to abolish. And if we then ask what guarantee we have that necessary quantity and not more of each product will be produced, that we shall not go hungry in regard to corn and meat while we are choked in beet sugar and drowned in potato spirit, that we shall not lack trousers to cover our nakedness while trouser buttons flood us by the million – Rodbertus triumphantly shows us his splendid calculation, according to which the correct certificate has been handed out for every superfluous pound of sugar, for every unsold barrel of spirit, for every unusable trouser button, a calculation which “works out” exactly, and according to which “all claims will be satisfied and the liquidation correctly brought about.” And anyone who does not believe this can apply to governmental chief revenue office accountant X in Pomerania who has checked the calculation and found it correct, and who, as one who has never yet been caught lacking with the accounts, is thoroughly trustworthy.

thanks for sharing this, very nice. But what about this: money is a way of exchange so we can equate commodity A to a certain amount of money for example 1 coat = 20 $. The 20 $ is the equivalent-form. Now, when inflation takes place, the 20 $ ( the equivalent form) increases which means that now 1 coat=25 $ so because of the increase of the equivalent form, the value of comomodity A - the coat - increases too. Now, the equivalent form determines the value ( although not the use value) of commodity A.

thanks for sharing this, very nice. But what about this: money is a way of exchange so we can equate commodity A to a certain amount of money for example 1 coat = 20 $. The 20 $ is the equivalent-form. Now, when inflation takes place, the 20 $ ( the equivalent form) increases which means that now 1 coat=25 $ so because of the increase of the equivalent form, the value of comomodity A - the coat - increases too. Now, the equivalent form determines the value ( although not the use value) of commodity A.

There's a reason Althusser says first timers should skip the commodities, especially those unacquainted with Hegel. Your problems stem directly from misapprehension of the dialectic, as a method, form of thought, and fact of historical time.

>Has someone read Marx's capital?

Masturbation is a much more enjoyable waste of time.

waste of time? Marx was a fucking erudite genius go study him you troglodyte!

back to tumblr sweetheart

marx has been proven wrong multiple times

so which Hegel pieces should I read to be able to understand the commodities?

The Phenomenology and the greater Logic would be a good place to start.

by whom? in regards to what? according to what metric? you're a cad.

Who hasn't? I'm not saying that his proletarian revolution ideas are great, but his abstract philosophy of economy and society are brilliant. Besides, he is a well-read 19-th century writer who solves dilemma's that Aristotle couldn't solve and while doing this, he paraphrases Shakespeare, Dante and Homerus. Also, Marx's influence on today's philosophers and even on today's society are huge, you can't ignore Marx or put him away as some pretentious charlatan.

I dont see how a knolwedge of Hegel is needed to realize that the statement "exchange value does not contain an atom of use value" is nonsense.

I dont see how anyone could agree that just because two things are of equal exchange value they must have something "in common" other than their exchange value that is determined by the price which equalizes a demand and supply function.

Dont get me started on the falling rate of profit, Marxian economics has been a lesson into the kind of bullshit people can buy (Marx himself was a genious for his time, an orthodox Marxist today has a pea for a brain).

And for folks trying to spin how Marx was speaking of the EVs as natural prices that nominal prices swing around there is little swinging that happens in modern times so assuming a theory is good in so far as it explains the current world the LTV is useless.

OP there is a reason noone gives a tit about Marxian economics, even the brightest minds of the day. Most known Marxists backpedal away from the LTV and say the modern economy has reached its imperialist monopoly stage where little Marxian economics is applicable although it does affect fundamentals (most of them unable to give an alternate explanation themselves, which has prompted some folks like Ronald Meek to write books explaining the background and possible modern adaptations of the LTV so the first response to it in the mainstream isn't "what are you smoking?").

Dont bother reading Hegel, unless you plan to read Kant first which if you don't I shouldn't even be wasting words on you. I've read your post and although I haven't gotten around to answering it (because smartphone typing) it is a good question.

Someone like you seems too logical and rigorous to enjoy let alone ever fully agree with Marx.

Id suggest Kant instead, anyway youll have to read him if you're planning to go hegel to marx.

If you have zero background in philosophy do NOT read anything more than hume and desecartes, start with the greeks if you like but not with the intention "this will help me understand Kant", it won't, see Kant's secod para in the prolegomena (when it starts after the notes, not sure if that is SS1) he clearly says that people for whom the history of philosophy is philosophy itself need to gtfo and drawing parallels between him and other philosophers has shit-all value in terms of elaborating or understanding his argument.

>Your problems stem directly from misapprehension of the dialectic, as a method, form of thought, and fact of historical time.

I'd like to see you respond to this in particular:

>Why is it that just because two things are of equal exchange value they must have something "in common" other than their exchange value itself (that is determined by the price which equalizes a demand and supply function)?

Im not even trying to back you into a corner, you'd probably change my life and opinion on Hegel if you can answer that.

Silly of me to assume you were reading Marx with the intention of checking practical applicability as opposed to internal consistency OP, sorry I got carried away.

Be warned it's a bitch to talk logical consistency with Hegelians.

logical consistency is a mirage

>I dont see how anyone could agree that just because two things are of equal exchange value they must have something "in common" other than their exchange value that is determined by the price which equalizes a demand and supply function.

>The difference between real value and exchange-value is based on a fact – namely, that the value of a thing differs from the so-called equivalent given for it in trade; i.e., that this equivalent is not an equivalent. This so-called equivalent is the price of the thing, and if the economist were honest, he would employ this term for “value in exchange.” But he has still to keep up some sort of pretence that price is somehow bound up with value, lest the immorality of trade become too obvious. It is, however, quite correct, and a fundamental law of private property, that price is determined by the reciprocal action of production costs and competition. This purely empirical law was the first to be discovered by the economist; and from this law he then abstracted his “real value,” i.e., the price at the time when competition is in a state of equilibrium, when demand and supply cover each other. Then, of course, what remains over are the costs of production and it is these which the economist proceeds to call “real value,” whereas it is merely a definite aspect of price. Thus everything in economics stands on its head. Value, the primary factor, the source of price, is made dependent on price, its own product. As is well known, this inversion is the essence of abstraction; on which see Feuerbach.

>Dont get me started on the falling rate of profit, Marxian economics has been a lesson into the kind of bullshit people can buy (Marx himself was a genious for his time, an orthodox Marxist today has a pea for a brain).

What Marx means by "profit" doesn't mean the type of "profit" (s’/(c + v)) that shows up on a corporate balance sheet, that doesn't even include the "wages bill" as part of capital invested, the full data in terms of presently-socially-necessary-labor-time-value / surplus-value theory of the capitals-system as totality simply doesn't exist... so trying to refute this tendency by "empirically refuting" with self reported capitalist metrics is missing the point.

Also a fall in the rate of return on industrial capital is a totally observable thing in the industrialized West which has been happening since the 70s. Check out Robert A. Peters (a graduate of the Wharton School of Business, so this isn't Marxist stuff) book from 1974 "Return On Investment"... its central thesis is that discounted cash inflows/outflows should be the measure of financial accomplishment. Return On Investment should be applied to a total enterprise e.g. all valuation is based on discounted future net receipts. If you view things like this it starts to make a little more sense. Industrial production has been becoming less and less profitable as we liberalize more.

I don't see how your post answers my first question though, it just goes on about ev being different from rv.
In volume 1 at the start when marx intoduces the notion of socially necesary labour being the same in goods with the same evs in that pre-captilasit society he has implied he is considering (i.e. he has not as of yet talked about evs drifting from rvs, a process which he unlike many modern Marxists actually bothered explaining), even in that context id still re-apply my question:

>Why is it that just because two things are of equal exchange value they must have something "in common" other than their exchange value itself (that is determined by the price which equalizes a demand and supply function)?

Are you one of those strange unfaithful to themselves human beings that would look at logicl trivialism (google) is plausible?

as*

>logical trivialism

the first move when faced with such an apparently irrefutable conundrum would be the historicizing operation: what is it about the present conditions of production that trivialism appear possible? and moreover, what does that appearance say about how we relate to each other and the world?

hegelian thinking will always exceed "logic" because the latter does not account for history.

>Why is it that just because two things are of equal exchange value they must have something "in common" other than their exchange value itself (that is determined by the price which equalizes a demand and supply function)?

Why do you question this? Isn't it obvious that that commodity A and commodity B have something in common, for they are equal? And this common thing is the amount of labor.

Are you the same guy? Im wondering how a hegelian approaches this given the stress he put on knowing hegel to understand the infamous first chapter.

And no I don't think it is obvious, I can elaborate more after I get up, hit me with a mail from a throwaway on my throwaway [email protected] though I would like that incase this thread dies which it might given lit is awfully quiet in marxist threads that decide to talk specifics and aren't polworthy.

I'm guessing you're not expecting me to disagree and leading me on so you can see and then dismantle my arguments, desu I can't see why you would say this is obvious.

You're mistaking what that "=" sign means when Marx is going through the simple forms of value. That equal sign is not representing that the magnitude of value in commodity A is equal to the magnitude of value in commodity B.

It's a relationship in which two commodities necessarily come together in a way in which one commodity can represent the value of another commodity.

When Marx says that 1 coat is the relative-form of value and that 20 yards of linen is the equivalent form, he is saying that the value of the use-value coat is being expressed, represented by the 20 yards of linen.

And you have to study the value-forms in their whole movement. The point is to determine why money is a necessity in generalized commodity exchange, given that only money can be the necessary universal equivalent form of value for a whole world of use-values.

You're getting the false impression that the "=" here allows the value relationship to run in both directions in the same manner, that 20 yards can equal 1 coat and 1 coat can equal 20 yards. The relationship is rather one of distinctive poles of value, with the value relationship being that a particular commodity's value can only be represented in the body of another commodity--which is what value is, a way in which particular commodities are related to one another.

The simple-form and later the expanded-value form are insufficient because of this polarity and directionality. These two things are what drive value towards its necessary expression in money, rather than in any assortment of accidentally related goods. With money, all commodities can be compared against one another immediately in their given price.

I will email you with the theory of exchange value of Aristotle in combination with Marx. Great to have Marxist discussions.

xoxo

No the value of b increases relative to all other commodities it's isn't hard to understand

So this is a famous Marxist economic theory?
>1 coat = 2 hammers which means that there is something that 1 coat and 2 hammers have in common, for they are exchangeable, and this common thing is labor
Pretty sure it is a demand. You can put a shitton of labor into a goodie that nobody needs and you will get nothing for it.

>Pretty sure it is a demand.
>You can put a shitton of labor into a goodie that nobody needs and you will get nothing for it.

o dear, please study Marx before thinking you can understand his theories. Let me explain it to you, for it seems that you don't have any knowledge about the great Marx. There are two values within a commodity: the use- value and the value. To paraphrase Marx: "The usefulness of a thing makes it a use-value.". When something has become a use-value, the amount of labor-time socially necessary to produce this commodity determines its value. When a commodity is not useful for mankind, it can never become a use-value. It can only become a use-value if useful labor is present. To paraphrase Marx again: 'When one waives the particular form of the productive activity - which means of its capacity and useful labor - the only thing that remains is expenditure of human labor power"

Ok I get that, but what about if we see money as the equivalent form ? see post:

Great explanation, thanks. But the thing that I still don't understand is that one moment 1 coat = 20 yard linen and the next moment because of increasing productivity if the linen, 1 coat=15 yard linen. When we agree on the fact that the equivalent form is just a way if expressing the value of commodity A, we can also agree on the fact that the value of commodity A has decreased for there is less linen to trade with commodity A. So commodity A's value decreases because of extern factors? In this hypothetic situation, we only use the simple value-form where we only exchange one commodity with another. But even when we look at the complete value-form, where the equivalent consists of all the equivalents which can be exchanged against commodity A, there has been some changes going on. Because the equivalent form of linen has been changed from 20 linen to 15 linen the complete value-form - all the possible equivalents- has also changed, because the linen, on eof the many equivalent forms, has changed. Does this mean that the value of commodity A has changed?

You might be confused since Marx's theories are absurd and no economists take them seriously.
If after reading the webpage below you still don't understand LTV (top kek) then give up, go do something else: write poetry, play computer games, whatever. You'll know when you finally understand LTV (top kek) because you'll immediately think "this is complete bullshit".
dreamscape.com/rvien/Economics/Essays/LTV-FAQ.html
This other webpage explains things rather simply, but it contains links to more detailed refutations:
socialdemocracy21stcentury.blogspot.com/p/the-labour-theory-of-value-as-presented.html
For further reading I would check out Karl Marx and the Close of His System by Eugen von Bohm-Bawerk.

>Marginalism makes any more sense
>socialdemocracy21stcentury

ay

excuse me, we PoM do not appreciate your wealthist slurs

>Marx's theories are absurd and no economists take them seriously
>implying that we should take our contemporary capitalistic economist seriously

I seriously doubt your first statement. Let's take a look at the list of Marxian economists:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Marxian_economists

Also, your first statement implies that we shouldn;t take Marx seriously, so who should we take seriously? The capitalist economics who obstinately maintained that the economic growth of the 90's and even the beginning of the 21th century was so great that it was not possible that anything could go wrong and that it was absolutely impossible that the largest economic crisis since the late 20's would take place? Why don't we all focus on them! That'd be great! Let's focus on the majority of (liberal) capitalistic economics who caused the economic crisis of 2008.

i like your links, very interesting.

>he faces the problems of defining labour value in cases of joint production, where it is possible that the labour value of a commodity might be undefined, nil, or negative.

Very funny and adorable how this man tries to undermine Marx's theory. A very brave attempt, but now let's get serious and let's not pay attention to someone who claims to have read Marx's capital but clearly didn't understand a thing of it. Even in the situation of joint production, the production can be reduced to homogeneous abstract socially necessary labour time. In this way, we can determine the value. And this brings me to his earlier statement:

>Marx faces the problem of reducing all heterogeneous human labour to a homogeneous abstract socially necessary labour time unit, but does not properly explain how this happens

O dear, again a very adorable attempt. Let's take a look at Marx himself. To paraphrase him: 'Labor is the use of a simple labor, which is present in the physical organism of every human being, without any special human development'. This is what heterogeneous human labour is, and now that we know this, all heterogeneous human labour can be reduced to a homogeneous labor and once we know the abstract socially necessary labour time, we can determine the value. The reducing from heterogeneous labor to homogeneous labor doesn't need an explanation, for it is very clear.

I bet you believe in logical monism an think that classical logic is the correct one.

I don't know what you mean by correct so I can't answer.

>You're getting the false impression that the "=" here allows the value relationship to run in both directions in the same manner, that 20 yards can equal 1 coat and 1 coat can equal 20 yards.

I dont agree with you. In chapter 1, when Marx introduces the exchange value ant the relative value form and equivalent form, he literally says that when the value of commodity B increasis, because of increasing productivity, the value of commodity A decreases. He also says, after he has explained the simple relative value form and wants to introduce the complete value form, that 20 el linnen=1 coat can be flipped: 1 coat= 20 yard linen. I agree with you that commodity B is just the embodiment of commodity A, but they can be flipped and, even commodity B is just the appearence form, it can by changing, determines the value of commodity A.

*and
Well if you believe that trivial logics are incorrect and that classical logic isn't and you're logical monist, correct would mean not incorrect.

>taking capital seriously

Of all the legitimate crap that Marx wrote, his economic writings are the crappiest and have been refuted a long, long time ago.

You can be a marxist/socialist ebin meme all you want, but dont try to base it on marx economic writings.

By definition, trivialists believe that the sentence "Trivial logics are incorrect" is true.

Yes?

How adorable, another guy who hasn't read capital but still thinks that somebody in this world would be happy to hear his pretentious, mistaken views. A-D-O-R-A-B-L-E! I'm telling ya. Now, let's be honest: have you actually read capital? And if you have: are you smart enough to understand it? Or was it just too hard for you ( that's not a shame, it was also too hard for Winston Churchill) and now you're trying to blame it all on Marx's 'crappy' writings. Now tell me, which substantive points of capital have been refuted? And by whom? Don't talk shit and if Marx is too hard for you, why don't you try to read Harry Potter instead! Other reasons why Marx is a genius, see my other post:

>You can be a marxist/socialist ebin meme all you want, but dont try to base it on marx economic writings.
>implying that someone can be a marxist without having read capital

no comment.

>his economic writings are the crappiest and have been refuted a long, long time ago

You = clueless moron

>davidharvey.org/reading-capital/

Marx's major error was that the State cannot equalize value, since the supply at any given moment is finite, and demand can exceed that amount, and demand for a limited product causes a higher value.

Or the 'thing in common' is the subjective valuation between buyer and seller regarding their respective goods. They've determined an equivalence in value, end of story.

>if you believe that trivial logics are incorrect
I dont know what you mean by incorrect so i cannot answer

>Implying everyone that reads capital does so and comes out agreeing with everything Marx said in it.

The exchange value of commodity a has changed relative to the exchange value of commodity b--mutatis mutandis, the exchange values of all commodities have changed relative to commodity b. The socially necessary labor time imbued in commodity a has not changed, and the alteration in commodity b in this regard has had no effect on commodity a.

>Pretty sure it is a demand.
Nah bro, not sure if you're trolling but modern economists would consider that view equally retarded. Consensus is that prices are determined by both demand and supply while a theory of some kind of natural price that this demand/supply price revolves around is not really relevant anymore.
Supply and demand themselves (and it gets a bit complicated here if you want to dissect things as much as Marx did) are determined by the willingness and ability to buy/sell, the willingnes bit usually being linked with utility. That's the way it's usually spun but quoting a marxian author vaguely:

The components of price in moden economics are largely considered to just be payments to different means of production, the question of how a means of production creates this price is irrelevant as such.

that's not what I'm implying: all I'm saying, is that it is not possible for one to be a marxist without having read capital. And if you have read capital, and you don't agree with Marx all the time, you can still be a marxist. But I think it is very hard to present yourself as a follower of a certain ideology, for example marxism, for it is almost impossible for some one to agree 100 % with the certain ideology.

>ideology is like an opinion you can be in agreement with

o bb gurl u r in over ur hed

>he disagrees with Marx theories on labour and capital therefore he hasnt read Capital

Typical religious crap

Have YOU read anything but Marx related to economics?
Other than Ricardo that is.

moron. Are you implying that if someone calls him or herself a marxist, he or she should agree with everyhting Marx ever said?

nope. Let's look at the comparison of Aristotle:

5 benches = 1 house

Do you really think that the subjective valuation of the two commodities is equally high??

Don't you think that if he thought he'd disagree on Marx's ideas, he should read them, perhaps? And then, after reading them and after studying them, he can maybe tell his opinion

No, not at all. I am 'implying' you don't understand the contextual meaning of the term 'ideology'.

If I want to sell my house for five benches, yes, obviously.

There's no exchange (hence no price) without an agreement in subjective valuation.

what is there not to understand about?

You're illiterate.

I understand what you're saying, but when we use your terms of value, the only thing we get is a subjective value. Look at the following situation:

some one wants so sell his house for 3 benches and another person wants to pay 3 benches for the house (keep the comparison of Aristotle in mind 5 benches=1 house). In this particular situation, 3 benches are equal to 1 house, but this is just a subjective value that occasionally occurs. What this means, is that the person who wants to sell his house has got ripped off, because he sold his house for 3 benches, while the socially value - determined by the socially necessary amount of labor to produce a commodity - is higher: the socially values shows that 1 house=5 benches.

Who's illiterate?! You were the one who said that one can be a marxist, but one should never read capital. Troglodyte!

This post is nonsensical

>while the socially value - determined by the socially necessary amount of labor to produce a commodity - is higher

This is completely superfluous to the scenario. If I decide to sell my house for three benches even though I could have fetched 5 benches or 10 benches or 2000 benches--the 'socially necessary labor time' imbued in either my house or in the benches has no bearing on my decision to sell at that price point at that time. We can get a general idea of what a house is worth relative to benches if we look at all trades of houses and benches and average them. Again, no reference to 'socially necessary labor time' is needed. It is a metaphysical pinion.

'No'.

>no reference to 'socially necessary labor time' is needed

Of course this is necessary. The exchange value can only arise, if the socially value is determined. This socially value is determined by a certain amount of labor and once we know this value we can transform the vallue into subjective valuation. The exchange value is just an expression of the real value of the use-value. We can;t have exchange value when we don;t have socially value which is determined by the socially necessary labor time.

Let's say I simply found the house. It was unoccupied, I know nothing of who built it, it was simply there. The same for the fellow with the benches, they were just scattered about and he nicked them. Are we now incapable of making this exchange? Our property might as well have dropped out of heaven, so far as the labor time invested in it is concerned.

Better example and omne that tripped up ricardo is wine, it increases in exchange value with age despite people not maintaining it. This would be true even in a pre-capitalist society i am sure anyone would agree so this rise in price could not be attributed to redistributed surplus or whatever.

Btw the houses and benches were obviously made and as such embody labour which determine their value marxists will say, we live in a universe where things do not fall out of the sky, they must be made and it is man's nature as a producer of things that is the lifeblood of his identity as a humanbeing and seperates him from other animals, marx said.

Yeah, I know what Marx said about human nature, I don't care about all that. I'm wondering how socially necessary labor time had any bearing on the exchange in the scenario I laid out.

yeah, good luck with orthodox marxists trying to think outside of marxist abstractions and actually forced to tackle a concept of economy that doesnt rest on a permanently static system in equilibrium based on fundamental "Forms"

>Let's say I simply found the house.

Finding something doesn't make it your "property".

The country in which I found the house has sophisticated 'squatting' laws that bequeath ownership of a domicile to anyone in continuous, uncontested occupancy for a given period of time. Likewise, ownership of moveables is assumed by possession.

Now answer the question.

Property is the civilizational equivalent of "THAT'S NOT FAIR MOM! THAT'S MINE!!!! I DON'T CARE MOM!!! MOM!!! MOM!!! IT'S MINE MOME!!! YOU BOUGHT IT FOR ME MOM!!!! MOM THAT'S NOT FAIR!!!!! I DON'T CARE ABOUT THE CONSEQUENCES OF THROWING A FIT OVER INANIMATE OBJECTS THAT DON'T MATTER!!!! MOM!!!!!"

It's a bad habit that will eventually go away.

Not sure what you're asking. The exchange is governed by the laws applicable to the locale in which it occurs.

If you haven't been following the conversation, don't butt in.

Whatever point you're trying to make, it's not coming through.

'Socially necessary labor time is unnecessary to explain exchange equivalence' was the 'point'.

>implying that people don't treat "property" much better than "public property"

Most humans don't make rational choices unless they have their own skin in the game. Autists and Aspergers might be an exception but most humans are naturally tribal greedy assholes who manipulate surpluses of material goods for the social benefit of their tribe.

The concept of property is intimately related to the concept of responsibility and the concept of a self-responsibility.

Necessary but not sufficient.

Neither. Again, if you can't be bothered to follow the conversation refrain from entering it.

>most humans are naturally tribal greedy assholes who manipulate surpluses of material goods for the social benefit of their tribe.

Source on this universally?

>The concept of property is intimately related to the concept of responsibility and the concept of a self-responsibility.

Source on this?

Sorry, you're just wrong.

Great. Next!

>most humans are naturally tribal greedy assholes who manipulate surpluses of material goods for the social benefit of their tribe

oh, that's true
it kind of fascinates me what people think when they gather charity for american war vets, who are already very well paid, that's leaving aside that they are basically adventurers who went aboard to kill some people for money and , bawww, some of them were hurt, it's when hundreds million people on the earth starve

Further, the myth of success is "all men for themselves" is ridiculous and antiquated. It's the direct opposite, nothing points to this, there's growing evidence its the exact opposite.

Kropotkin's ideas of mutual aids, as well as 19th century initial Marxist analysis of history, tends to be surprisingly on the money most of the time. In history and anthropology.

If we're to regress to vague unprovable arguments of "human nature", it's more that "human nature", as a social genus from social organisms, have more in common than the concept of mutual aid than the concept of Randism, or other 19th century individualist nonsense. Not just in humans, generally in life outside of it, outside of mammals as well.

does Marx have any value to me? would it benefit me or empower me to understand him?

not everything is about you lol. In fact it isn't.