Alan Kerr
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@LBirdOk I’m not SPGB either.Without 'automation-for-the-bourgeoisie’, what automation would you have to discuss at all?
@Tim KilgallonThe post has everything to do with the title of this discussion, Marx and Automation.Are you following the discussion?Since MBellemare and Steve-San Francisco both want you to throw Marx’s explanation over-board.So a post seeks their alternative to Marx’s explanation.Don’t you want to know of their alternative?How else can we discuss this topic properly?Now will you Tim please help remind MB and SF to explain what if not the market is shifting total labour around in a way that keeps us alive?So far, no one on here has set out to spoil this discussion.
@LBirdYour comment goes beyond (adds to) SPGB Object and Principles. And yet your comment still does not go as far as The Socialist Preamble. Will you go as far as The Socialist Preamble?With The Socialist Preamble, we have a way to explain. If The Preamble is wrong then please explain. Please explain, for instance, the rise of automation. Can you do that and show where the Preamble has got it wrong?
@LBirdThank you,This matters for this discussion Marx and Automation and Michel Luc Bellemare. I thought I made it clear how I agree with The Socialist Preamble to the SPGB Object.PreambleCapitalist ownership is a hindrance to production.The small capitalist enterprise is a hindrance to production compared to that of the big capitalist.The big capitalist enterprise is a hindrance to production compared to Socialist Production.That’s the same view which Lenin rejected in practice.Lenin thought that backward Russia alone 1918 could skip capitalist steps and move to Socialist Production.Engels 1) saw how the Russian Revolution was on its way 2) took the same view as here in The Socialist Preamble.The class struggle depends on economic steps.Engels was a thinker who came to this way to think independently.
@MBellemare1) Michel we are getting the picture of how you see the world. But you answer a question which I did not ask. You answer this question.“@Alan Kerr, So who or what is moving labor around in order to keep us alive?”I did not ask that.Sorry but you do need to get the question.We have private ownership of the means of production. No one owner knows what other owners are doing. So I asked you this.“No Michel,“You need to show who or what is shifting labour from where we have too much, to where we have not enough first. That’s before you argue as if the market is no longer doing that job.“When were you thinking of showing this?”Not for the first time your answer is rather about individual motive.But see how I ask of total labour. It’s a social question. Can you answer?…2) It’s not that I’m rushing you at all. But also did you miss a question here?https://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/forum/general-discussion/marx-and-automation?page=28#comment-43041
@MarcosPlease feel free to contact me at Academia.eduMy username there is currently Satan The Devil.https://www.academia.edu/s/c67a68d306/draft-the-students-marx-book-reviewdocx?source=linkThis is in case mod suspends you here.
@MBellemareCrusoe can catch fish in his hands at low-tide.Or, Crusoe thinks of how to make a new tool, a fish-trap.Crusoe could bait and check the trap at low-tide for fish.Crusoe must choose to trap or not.How does Crusoe choose?
@Steve-San FranciscoWho or what is shifting total sunlight around in a way that keeps trees alive?“A well-known scientist (some say it was Bertrand Russell) once gave a public lecture on astronomy. He described how the earth orbits around the sun and how the sun, in turn, orbits around the centre of a vast collection of stars called our galaxy. At the end of the lecture, a little old lady at the back of the room got up and said: "What you have told us is rubbish. The world is really a flat plate supported on the back of a giant tortoise." The scientist gave a superior smile before replying, "What is the tortoise standing on?" "You're very clever, young man, very clever," said the old lady. "But it's turtles all the way down!"(Stephen Hawking’s book A Brief History of Time)At least the little old lady did give an answer.If not the market then who or what is shifting total labour around in a way that keeps us alive?
@MBellemareYou are complicating your answer. “1. The logic of capitalism decides”That reads like saying that the market decides.If the rest of your comment is saying, the market is not your answer then we are still waiting for your answer.I’m sorry but what you give instead of an answer is so long and full of things that I can’t agree with that I would need more than a short reply. That would take us away from the question.We have private ownership of the means of production. No one owner knows what other owners are doing. So who or what is shifting total labour around in a way that keeps us alive?
No Michel,You need to show who or what is shifting labour from where we have too much, to where we have not enough first. That’s before you argue as if the market is no longer doing that job.When were you thinking of showing this?
Hello Michel,You say“It may be that both the socio-economic phenomena, the one I outline and the one Marx outlines, are part of one mechanism by which capitalists can shift gears. (That is where my thinking is at with this socio-economic analysis).I am not on this forum to argue whether I am right or wrong, whether I have understood Marx correctly or Not!I am here to explore, constructively, our contemporary socio-economic situation, specifically, these areas. Not to get Marx regurgitated at me, verbatim. Because my socio-economic analysis does not fit his analysis. My analysis is not suppose to fit Marx's analysis verbatim, we are living in two different eras, two different types of capitalism.I would like to hear from others on this forum where my socio-economic analysis overlaps with Marx's analysis, instead. Where are our points of agreement, rather than our points of disagreement.”(Your comment 255)To help so we can agree I have no problem in thinking of two different types as parts of one big capitalist mechanism. That’s just what any consistent socialist reads into the SPGB Object.“PreambleCapitalist ownership is a hindrance to production.The small capitalist enterprise is a hindrance to production compared to that of the big capitalist.The big capitalist enterprise is a hindrance to production compared to Socialist Production.”(The Socialist Preamble to SPGB Object)Again to help so we can agree please: 1) Think of the average rate of profit for small type. 2) Think of average rate of profit for big type. 3) Add the two rates and divide by two.Now we are on same page with average rate of profit overall.Or we can split the whole down the line of sheep and goats. On one side crooked traders. On the other side put honest traders if you can find honest ones. Or we can think of lying thieving idle bosses and management teams. We both know how we can quote chapter and verse on all that from Marx.When we think of different parts, we can always add and divide for the average.We always have our way back onto the same page with Marx.But here our search for truth boils down to this. Which way to produce wins in the end? Is it the way which is best at cheating? Or is it rather the way which saves and does not waste human labour hours?
Michel Luc Bellemare found that Marx’ labour theory must be wrong.“… Because, if you were correct, @DJP@Marcos@Kerr, capitalism would have ended a long, long time ago! The death knell of capitalism would have sounded decades and decades ago. The fact that you cannot even admit fault with Marx's analysis is fatal to your understanding of Marx, it means you good folks are fetishizing Marx into a religious opiate…”See Michael’s claim here.https://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/forum/general-discussion/marx-and-automation?page=23#comment-42832Steve-SanFrancisco also found that Marx’ labour theory must be wrong and for the exact same reason.See Steve’s conundrum here.https://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/forum/general-discussion/marx-and-automation?page=21#comment-42803It’s time to criticize Michael’s claim. This will solve Steve’s conundrum at the same time.We will use The SPGB Object.But if we were to just stare at The SPGB Object in the wrong way (as Adam Buick still does I think) then it would not help.Yes, we do need to stare at The SPGB Object but in the right way.For this, we need my same letter which we discussed here.https://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/forum/general-discussion/marx-and-automation?page=18#comment-42749That same letter adds a new Preamble to The SPGB Object.Here is the Preamble which we need:Capitalist ownership is a hindrance to production.The small capitalist enterprise is a hindrance to production compared to that of the big capitalist.The big capitalist enterprise is a hindrance to production compared to Socialist Production.(Taken from my same letter)Now note how what is happening is confirming Marx’ labour theory. We do clearly hear the death knell of small capitalist firms. The big firms are killing them off. The seeds of the big capitalist firm grow in the small capitalist firm. The seeds of Socialist Production grow in the big capitalist firm.
Michel Luc Bellemare is busy revising all of his old notes now. That’s because before he considered as if price was “arbitrary”. But our society is also a way to shift labour from where we have too much, to where we have not enough. And we have private ownership of means of production. So the market is our one way to achieve this. So we know that “socially necessary labour” must in the end, rule average prices. If not, the system could not work at all.Do all here get this point now? If not then please speak up. Then to be clear we can discuss this point some more.
