People take “material conditions” to mean capitalism always will act in a rational way with no contradictions and all human beings are rational economic actors acting in their best interest Actually that’s liberal economic idealism but good try - ThreadSky

nerdjpg.com • 20 hours ago

People take “material conditions” to mean capitalism always will act in a rational way with no contradictions and all human beings are rational economic actors acting in their best interest

Actually that’s liberal economic idealism but good try

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nerdjpg.com•20 hours ago

But Marx says its riddled with contradiction: crisis prone, self undermining and built on exploitation

nerdjpg.com•20 hours ago

“The true barrier to capitalist production is capital itself” - Karl Marx

wmryland.bsky.social•17 hours ago

Smart man once told me “capitalism is fine except for all the capitalists”

nuggetthenonbiner.bsky.social•19 hours ago

If I understand the term right, I think "material conditions" is more like "the state things are in" than "how the system and people in it act"?

So like, it's closer to a Pokémon's HP and Status Effects than the enemy trainer A. I..

radianthostility.bsky.social•10 hours ago

Or with pokemon, a weedle just ain't going to beat a Charizard. But you could take better mon that's still not as good as the Charizard,band with the right combination of moves and items you could win some of the time. You could level up to get stronger and get better moves. Your ability to beat the

radianthostility.bsky.social•10 hours ago

Charizard is restricted by the materials - pokemon, moves, rare candies, that you have available, but you have the agency to try to use your resources as cleverly and effectively as possible. But if the only mon you have is a weedle you can't win, no matter how clever you are or how much you want

radianthostility.bsky.social•10 hours ago

To. The material circumstances constrain your agency and options. The opposite is idealism, where people more or less believe things happen if you want them to badly enough, although they come up with all kinds of clever ways to avoid admitting that's what they're doing. The gaming equivalent

radianthostility.bsky.social•10 hours ago

Would be people who complain that the could have won but the rng is loaded or the other player cheated. They deny that what they can observe is real. They think that they were cheated even though they ran a weedle against a Charizard.

radianthostility.bsky.social•10 hours ago

Yeah. If there's lots of potatoes and no carrots people buy potatoes. It's not because they prefer potatoes or hate carrots. That's the base. But maybe the media shows a bunch of potato recipes, the potato industry shit talks carrots, people decide that carrots are bougie rich people bs.

radianthostility.bsky.social•10 hours ago

That's the superstructure, culture, peoples beliefs. And maybe when carrots are available people don't buy as many of them because during the carrot shortage they decided they don't like carrots, so it comes around again. And then later an influencer decides that carrots are a niche thing they could

radianthostility.bsky.social•10 hours ago

Use to boost their rep, and it works, and carrots are in vogue again. You can't sell carrots you don't have, but people have some agency on deciding how they'll react to that; they might decide carrots suck, they might make carrots a special treat. And different groups of people might do different

radianthostility.bsky.social•10 hours ago

Things. The material circumstances determine what's possible, whether you can even make a carrot cake, but people have flexibility in how they respond to those circumstances. But you still cannot make a carrot cake without carrots no matter how badly you want to.

bleedinggrey.bsky.social•10 hours ago

also have to consider when the capitalists overproduce carrots or potatoes, causing an overflow of unsold stock, and after a period of time they have to destroy their stocks because they're no longer profitable.

They still had use-value before they rotted, but capitalists only want exchange-value.

whippoorwont.bsky.social•17 hours ago

the functioning of the system arises out of the state that it's in. supposing some other source of guidance is mythologizing

nuggetthenonbiner.bsky.social•17 hours ago

I'd not intended this to be about guidance whatsoever, apologies.

kaitlynkitty1917.bsky.social•18 hours ago

Do you think those things are entirely separate?

nuggetthenonbiner.bsky.social•18 hours ago

I think it's possible for a term to be related and connected to a thing that is not itself.

Like, if I staple a bicycle to a windshield it doesn't become a part of the car but it will make driving it much harder.

I making sense? Sorry if not.

nuggetthenonbiner.bsky.social•18 hours ago

Or to keep to my Pokémon comparison, if the Trainer A. I. clicks Belly Drum, that's gonna reduce their Mon's HP and raise it's Attack Stat, but that doesn't make the Trainer A. I. *the same thing as* Darmanitan As A Concept, if that makes any kinda sense?

nuggetthenonbiner.bsky.social•18 hours ago

We're not living in the Metronome Cup, but it's not Mystery Dungeon either, it's inbetween.

kaitlynkitty1917.bsky.social•18 hours ago

The thing is, how people act is just... part of the material conditions. They play a significant role in how most things in society are. An analysis of material conditions which does not take into account the behavior of actors within it just isn't complete.

nuggetthenonbiner.bsky.social•18 hours ago

I didn't mean to say that you shouldn't account for it, apologies.

I'm talking more in terms of "conceptual units" here, if that makes any sense?

Like, what's *the difference between* "the things that the term applies to" and "the things you must account for"?

nuggetthenonbiner.bsky.social•18 hours ago

What is both "Mandatory to account for" *and also* "not covered by the term in question"?

That's what I'm rambling about.

Apologies that was unclear, amd thank you for being patient with me so far.

kaitlynkitty1917.bsky.social•18 hours ago

I genuinely don't see a point in conceptualizing behavior as separate from material conditions. It just sounds like a way to obscure and compartmentalize.

carovnik.bsky.social•19 hours ago

The core irrationality of capitalism is the assumption of infinite growth against a finite stock of natural resources and planetary equilibrium with respect to energy. It acts "rationally" within the context of that delusion.

joofie57.bsky.social•14 hours ago

Capitalism has no requirement or assumption of infinite growth.

carovnik.bsky.social•19 hours ago

Marx's insistence on the material conditions of production supply a basis for both ecology and, ironically, value investing.

carovnik.bsky.social•19 hours ago

Personally, I think academic Marxism should spend more time on basic economic structures (substructure) and less on superstructure (ideology / "theory "). Lengthy analysis of capitalist rhetoric is a time sink--like telling fortunes from bird droppings.

sassalesvonscales.bsky.social•10 hours ago

I think of it more as "people try to work towards their interests but are often rather bad at it"

teflonslinky.bsky.social•20 hours ago

Capitalist society is riven with conflict stem to stern; within the individual self, entire classes, entire systems. Understanding conflict and contradiction is at the core of Marxism.

pyramidmaster.bsky.social•20 hours ago

I have to love how those vulgar models, including those used by ACP types, ignores the psychological element of people which generates both contradiction and non-ideal action. love when some dingus foreshortens a model because they’ve never spoken to a human

thedimpsler.bsky.social•20 hours ago

I know it’s generally because belief in the system is how people who say this make their money but how could you look at an environment where every magnate is on coke, poasting, getting told to kay aych ess on Path of Exile and going to space and think they’re behaving optimally

metamora.bsky.social•19 hours ago

Myron Scholes is still alive and well at the age of 83

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