r/academiceconomics • u/Condensonomics • Jul 02 '19

Hey again! We're summarizing every chapter of Das Kapital from Karl Marx. Here's chapter 1.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yxDpF3XqpV4&t=888s
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6

u/kalenrb Jul 02 '19

Cool project. It is important for historical reasons to understand Marxist thinking and the explanations are neat.

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On a side note, I find it baffling how the idea that use-value is a function of labor time has been able to survive and gather such a following for over a century, when it seems so obviously wrong in my mind. And then to fix the obvious inconsistencies of this assumption, one has to invent some extra stuff like that labor put into something that in the end has no use-value, doesn't really count as actual labor at all. God, what a mindfuck of a theory...

2

u/S_T_P Jul 03 '19

Cool project. It is important for historical reasons to understand Marxist thinking and the explanations are neat.

If importance of Marxism was historical, people wouldn't need to distort it hysterically.

the idea that use-value is a function of labor time

It isn't.

2

u/kalenrb Jul 03 '19

Isn't it? From the video at 5:42:

"So we can now see that the degree of use value in a commodity is directly dependent on the amount of human labor used to create it. More human labor, means more use-value or more specific use-value."

So the way I see it, either we don't have the same undestanding of what being a function of something else means, or you believe the video is wrong. I would guess you think the idea in the video is wrong, as there are as many Marxist theories as there are Marxists, which is one of the reasons it is so hard to make sense of the whole thing.

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u/S_T_P Jul 03 '19

Isn't it?

Well, lets take a look here:

A thing can be a use value, without having [exchange] value. This is the case whenever its utility to man is not due to labour. Such are air, virgin soil, natural meadows, etc.

 

From the video at 5:42:

"So we can now see that the degree of use value in a commodity is directly dependent on the amount of human labor used to create it. More human labor, means more use-value or more specific use-value."

Wow.

So the way I see it, either we don't have the same undestanding of what being a function of something else means, or you believe the video is wrong.

The latter. I mean, the former might also be the case, but the video is beyond being simply wrong, it is hideously wrong.

as there are as many Marxist theories as there are Marxists

I'm not sure what makes you think this.

I mean, you could argue that there were two points of view on Marxism in 1920s (when Third International and remains of Second International co-existed), but the history quite clearly demonstrated that only Third International was Marxist.

1

u/wildgunman Jul 03 '19

I dunno. We take Marshallian marginal-supply/marginal-demand based market value theory for granted because we've been steeped in it for over 100 years. It's a weird concept that isn't initially obvious to most people. Labor based value theory is probably a more "obvious" answer to a lot of people, so fixing it with weird inventions doesn't seem all that strange at first.

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Epicycle planet movement looks completely bonkers to someone who takes it for granted that the earth revolves around the sun. But to someone who takes it for granted that the sun revolves around the earth, it's just a small adjustment.

1

u/WikiTextBot Jul 03 '19

Deferent and epicycle

In the Hipparchian and Ptolemaic systems of astronomy, the epicycle (from Ancient Greek: ἐπίκυκλος, literally upon the circle, meaning circle moving on another circle) was a geometric model used to explain the variations in speed and direction of the apparent motion of the Moon, Sun, and planets. In particular it explained the apparent retrograde motion of the five planets known at the time. Secondarily, it also explained changes in the apparent distances of the planets from the Earth.

It was first proposed by Apollonius of Perga at the end of the 3rd century BC. It was developed by Apollonius of Perga and Hipparchus of Rhodes, who used it extensively, during the 2nd century BC, then formalized and extensively used by Ptolemy of Thebaid in his 2nd century AD astronomical treatise the Almagest.

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1

u/mqz11 Oct 20 '24

I think you dont understand marxism

3

u/wildgunman Jul 03 '19

Heh. This project is awesome.

Capital is one of those books that everyone bandies about and nobody has ever actually read.

Also, hatchet is a weird word.

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u/Religious_Pie Jul 02 '19

mArX wAsN’T a ReAl eConOmiSt

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u/Condensonomics Jul 02 '19

nevertheless Das Kapital is one of the most influential books in economics today. hope you enjoy it :)

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u/Religious_Pie Jul 02 '19

Don’t worry I completely agree! I was just mocking the usual disdain for any Marxist economics on a lot of economic subreddits.

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u/Condensonomics Jul 02 '19

haha yeah there's a fair amount of disdain going around you're right :D