Weber August 1 Reading

To me this reading has made me think a little bit more about religion and the way that it deals with inequality. Weber comes to the conclusion early on in the text that religions pre-decide what careers you take and what actions you make in life. To me this shows that Weber has turned the way of talking about inequality into something a little bit more than what Rousseau, Marx, Smith, and Durkheim. I interpreted this reading as Weber saying that the Protestants and Catholics seem to predestine what everyone should do, and because of this there is an inequality because they as man themselves cannot decide things for themselves.

Being raised in a religious family and very religious background this reading makes me think about some of the ways that my religion has been all "predestined" and meant to happen for a reason and I found that Weber is bringing up points that show this creates people as unequal. To me i feel like many of the points that he made are in modern society today.

Weber offers a fantastic look into an entirely new theory on inequality. While Rousseau, Smith, Marx, and even Durkheim looked at many aspects of life (i.e., religion) as a result of inequality, Weber sees the opposite.

Not knowing much about organized religion, it was interesting to see Weber's take on Protestantism and Calvinism and their ties to the present climate of inequality. Conversely, It was great to see Weber acknowledging throughout the piece that his take isn't necessarily the 'whole story' and that there are things that lack precise clarification.

Weber makes an interesting case regarding predetermined judgement regarding heaven and hell and this being looked upon in terms of financial (capitalistic) success. This is both a theory that one could argue is valid and possibly true to today.

Many people hold the belief that 'everything happens for a reason', therefore those who are financially successful might be looked upon as superior, or 'choosen' by a higher force or power, and therefore drive more people to try and succeed in gaining more capital. If one believes capital = purity, likely much of their life will revolve around a cycle of attempting to obtain capital.

The Protestant Ethic

I found Weber's reading for this weekend to be relevant to our modern society. His concept of the "spirit of capitalism" is based upon both historical and religious factors. It suggests that the entrepreneur or the capitalist pursue his "calling" and can feel a sense of moral solidarity in achieving success in the professional life. Weber both criticizes and supports different aspects of this, but what I found to be intriguing is the idea that economic pursuits can bring fulfillment to one's morality. Especially in our society today, the drive for economic success is extremely strong and at times, can result in immoral actions to achieve this.

I wonder what Weber's ideal entrepreneur would be like today and if it would even be possible to say that he was pursuing a "calling"? What is the modern day push for success if not religion? Weber writes, "Few people are sufficiently clear-sighted to be aware of the unusual strength of character that is required from this "new type" of entrepreneur if he is not to lose his sober self-control and face moral and economic shipwreck" (22). It is possible that as religious convictions begin to decrease in our modern life, our morals do as well. It may not be the direct cause, but could be part of the influence.

Comments for 7/28

Apologies for this being late, I had to stay late at work today.

Today's second reading made me reflect upon the nature of religion. We're used to associating it with elaborate godheads and intricate systems of belief with some form of ecclesiastical authority. But religion can also be a much broader topic, like Durkheim himself discussed in our earlier reading. In the past, religion was everything, and today individualism is no different. Its omnipresence in our commercial society is just as potent as the papacy in late Rome. And Durkheim goes so far as to suggest that our abhorrence when rights are disregarded is a positively modern notion, a profane offense against our new god. But this new god is not like the past gods who transcended human authority, rather it is a god composed of man, acting in accordance with Kant's Categorical Imperative. For Durkheim, the writings of Kant and Rousseau created a quasi-religious idol in the form of the idealized and individualized man, acting with respect to the collectivized interests of each self-determining fellowman in his society.
But, this god is no less artificial and necessarily evil than the past ones. Durkheim believes that the necessary inflexibility of the axioms of our individualized religion prevent us from treating our moral wounds; we cannot utilitarianly aid the whole without occasionally suspending the individual rights of the few.

What really stuck out to me while this ready was when Durkheim stated, "The trade guild is no longer a common refuge for all... a deep gulf was established between masters and journeymen" (292). This huge occurance took place and established the division in society and not just in labor. I mean, this distinguishment must have affected human daily life greatly. This development of a somewhat class system, I feel like, made each person work independently and gave them another aspect to defend. I mean, at this turnpoint one could easily be insulted if a higher class man decides to show off or brag about his success. A new group of people was formed because of this distinguishment. New relations were established which I would like to further discuss in class.

Two Evils

In discussing the pathological forms that are born out of the division of labor, one sticks out of Emile Durkheim’s concepts. This form takes hold in the concept that as people specialize in his or her specific field that he or she becomes isolated from society as a whole. Durkheim links the division of labor to disintegration and also discusses the concepts of whether or not it is best to specialize or be what we discussed in class to be a “renaissance man.”

In thinking more on this, I think Durkheim raises a very well argued point in regards to how people will become overtly obsessed with one specific thing and isolate themselves from the rest of the field, but I also believe that this concept may just be a bit too extreme for me to fully accept. I stand behind what I said in class that without specialization those certain fields, such as medicine and history, would suffer from generalization and not be in the state it is today.

Ultimately, the division of labor suffers and thrives at the same time. Although people are specializing and finding isolation, they are also paving the way for the future and advancements in every field. We find ourselves “isolated” but also far more educated in every field. What is the lesser of these two evils?

Durkheim: Anomic Division of Labor

The first pathological form that results from the division of labor, according to Durkheim, is the anomic division of labor. This fairly common, negative aspect of the division of labor occurs when the individuals become isolated by their repetitive, specialized tasks, and forget that they are parts of the whole, i.e. society. Examples of this occur in industries and factories which detach workers from their employers. In order to fix this anomic division of labor, the conditions present in a state of organic solidarity must be determined. This state of interdependency would exist once the specialized workers became directly dependent on one another. This would form a complex division of labor strongly resembling an organism. The groups of people would act as organs engaging in repetitive, definite actions which contribute essential functions to the entire organism. When this state of organic solidarity is formed, problems such as anomie are rectified.

Division of Labor

Durkheim addresses the theory of specialization by relating it to scientific research. When scientists increasingly focused on one small problem within a division of science, they became increasingly isolated and closed-off from other scientific theories. Durkheim quotes Auguste Comte, who states that this division is harmful to science because it limits a person’s knowledge because they cannot consider science as a whole. Durkheim goes on to state that “the division of labor cannot therefore be pushed too far without being a source of disintegration” (294). This brings up a key point we have been examining in class- the theory of the Renaissance Man versus the specialized worker. Is it better to have a man able to complete many tasks, or a specialized worker who can efficiently get his one job done?

Durkheim does bring up that Comte was not calling for the complete destruction of the division of labor. Society does, however, need something to keep the unity that the division of labor has destroyed. According to Comte, this uniting force is government. Durkheim states that “the organ of government develops with the division of labour, not as a counterbalance to it, but by mechanical necessity” (296). We as a class must consider, is government enough to unify the people and have a successful society despite the isolation caused by the division of labor? Is government really only a “mechanical necessity” in a society that promotes the division of labor?

Moral Corporations or Corporate Morals?

When we see corporations, we first and foremost see an entity selling a product (for the most part). These entities may actually have brand names (Apple, Nike, Coca-Cola), but regardless of their characteristics, we look at their product and judge whether or not we should buy it. Because of this, obviously, said corporations are going to try to persuade us using advertising, which more often than not leads to flashy designs, catchy slogans, sex appeal, and...

...morals?

Granted, Durkheim's definition/idea of a corporation may not be exactly like what we see today, but nonetheless, his claim that, "if we deem [a corporation] indispensable it is not because of the services it might render the economy, but on account of the moral influence it could exercise" (xxxix) still rings true...sort of. Starbucks prides itself on its environmentally friendly production methods, social equality for employees, and charity work. Food producers make a point to show how animal-rights friendly they are (or at least claim to be), and even Microsoft, Apple, and Sony are trying to sell products by hyping social interaction and efficiency (in both man & machine). These companies, like almost every other major brand name, are selling us ourselves. Or at least what we want to be, and what we care about.

Are these things actually 'morals', in the strictest sense? Probably not. But when we see Wal Mart negotiating with workers for higher salaries or Starbucks tweeting about how many community service hours their employees worked, are they not trying to appeal to our humanity? Maybe they're not selling us a Mocha while saying it'll create world peace and wipe misogyny and racism off the face of the earth, but giving you a 10 cent discount on your drink when you bring in a reusable cup has got to factor into your sense of moral preservation somehow (granted, this just opens up the controversy if we can be morally aware without a financial stimulus, but let's conveniently avoid that topic for now...).

I might be taking some liberties with Durkheim's theories here, but there is something afoot between corporations and our own sense of moral decency. The exposing of child labor or foreign sweatshops lead to a sales drop in clothing manufactures, and when embezzlement or fraud rears its ugly head within the walls of energy companies or banking institutions, we tend to think twice about doing business with them. Maybe corporations aren't quite the moral leaders that Durkheim makes them out to be (in theory, anyway), but there's some truth in the claim that they are just as susceptible to moral judgement as an individual human being...maybe even more so. But in that case, maybe it's about time we held them a little bit more accountable for their moral decisions, too.

ME & WE

“Two consciousnesses exist within us: the one comprises only states that are personal to each one of us, characteristics of us as individuals whilst the other comprises states that are common to the whole of society.

To me this sounds ALOT like Smith and Marx. The whole independence and interdependence working together for the common good? Yup this is Smith and Marx. I think that this is important because no matter how we may want to progress and how marx wants to get to a state of complete individualism... right now we will always have a mutual connection between all members of society that should not be threatened.

I like this quote because I enjoy the theme of being separate but together. I think it makes the world a little easier to consider when you put yourself into a vast working machine instead of looking at yourself as an individual part. But at the same time we are able to mold ourself into our own unique shapes that fit into society.

I think its interesting that Durkheim says that when the common conscience is disturbed than it is considered a crime. Does that mean if an individual is disturbed then it is not? or does that crime have to be big enough to be noticed by the society? Then isn’t that individual crime considered what we would consider petty crime?

Solidarity / class divisions

Durkheim seems to take an interesting and also different approach to the idea of ‘labor’ than past exposure to the subject. It appears that Durkheim believes labor is not simply a part of politics and economy – it has done much more for (or maybe rather ‘to’ instead of ‘for’) our society as a whole.

When Durkheim begins his introduction, ‘although the division of labor is not a of recent origin, it was only at the end of the last century that societies bean to become unaware of this law, to which up to then they had submitted almost unwittingly.

From this, we cannot gather the tone of Durkheim’s work – is praising our past, present, and future concepts of labor, or is this the root of evil?

Further reading shows us that Durkheim argues that the division of labor has changed our morals entirely and is the cause, at its root, of modern inequality. Additionally, Durkheim speaks of this idea of solidarity. My take on Durkheim is that he believes this may be some order of ‘control’ – what allows social order to be maintained (through people thinking and acting alike – a result of division of labor also).

Interestingly, there is some Marx in Durkheim – but not necessarily in an agreeing sense. I would say Marx attributes more inequality to class, whereas Durkheim thinks the disorder (and divisions) as an issue of modern society.

Social Solidarity?

Social Solidarity?

"...the economic services that it can render are insignificant compared with the moral effect that it produces, and its true function is to create between two or more people a feeling of solidarity." (17) This was the first line of text that really grabbed my attention. After reading through the entire text it has come to my conclusion that this solidarity and division of labor both brings people closer in society, yet also pulls them apart. To me solidarity means being separated and alienated from a society. This brings me to think that maybe it is like Karl Marx and his idea of alienation. I feel like they are similar because of the fact that alienation and solidarity seem as though they should go hand and hand with one another. Yet, it also seems that maybe Durkheim is trying to say that this social solidarity is what makes the social connections. He uses the example of a married couple and that the division of labor is also the division of sexes. To me, if I am not mistaken, he says that without this division of labor between the sexes were to go back to the natural sense, then it would go back to meaningless sexual relationships in order to reproduce. This all seems to resemble what we have been discussing in class over the past few weeks. If this division of labor were to go away completely we would not no how to have personal relationships because through this division of labor that has been created, we have created a dependence on others, which has created a division of labor based on sexes, which creates real relationships, like the marriage example. This all seems like it all connects and this is what I feel like i have taken out of the Durkheim reading. I may be completely wrong but this is what I feel connects these readings to what we have previously read.

Durkheim

Durkheim seems to have no issue claiming that the division of labour is in fact "the source of civilization"- in fact he even attributes it as necessary for intellectual development within society, something I am a little apprehensive to absolutely accept, but intrigued enough to consider. However, what I do appreciate about his introduction to the process of determining the role of civilization is his focus on the morality of our civilization, something that I felt was not addressed to the extent necessary by Marx (at least from the sections that i have been exposed to). While he writes that "the services that it renders in this way are almost entirely divorced from moral life, or at most have with it merely a very indirect and distant relationship", he still attempts to explain it with a measurement of morality on society- something I think is absolutely imperative when trying to analyze any aspect of society- be it its function or its flaws.

Can we find truth in a metaphor?

I found this weekend's Durkheim reading to be very fascinating. It seems that Durkheim is claiming that the division of labor has influenced much more than political economy. Yes, it does further our intellectual motivations and capacity for production but has a strong influence on humans' lifestyle choices, beliefs, and identity as a modern society. The division of labor has created the modern inequality among men and women. He writes, "in those distant times woman was not at all the weak creature that she has become as morality has progressed" (Durkheim 18). Only through the division of labor did this inequality continue to widen and even altered the concept of the relationship or the marriage.

While the division of labor creates a separation, it also binds us together, increasing our dependence on one another, and for Durkheim this is the source of "social solidarity". Out of this desire to achieve some sort of solidarity come manifestations such as law and religion. It is wrong to say that religion has shaped some of our laws or vise versa? Is it wrong for humans to allow these rules to define what is moral or immoral?

I also saw a lot of elements from Marx's work in the Durkheim reading, such as Marx's idea of "self-alienation". Durkheim makes a religious reference to the Pentateuch writing, "punishment was determined only by the judge who applied it" (Durkheim 51). I found it very relevant to Marx by showing the power that is in the hands of the "alien" or the "judge". It seems that humans do need these metaphors to determine what is moral and not. After all, these metaphors are the basis for all structures of our society on a collective and individual level. I think there is definitely truth in that.

Zola passages

And some passages from the Zola that I mentioned- perhaps all-too relevant soon, considering the way politics is going.

L'Assommoir
Émile Zola


Chapter 7:

Father Bru hardly heard what she said but talked on, half to himself.

"I can't get any work to do. I am too old. When I ask for any people laugh and ask if it was I who blacked Henri Quatre's boots. Last year I earned thirty sous by painting a bridge. I had to lie on my back all the time, close to the water, and since then I have coughed incessantly." He looked down at his poor stiff hands and added, "I know I am good for nothing. I wish I was by the side of my boys. It is a great pity that one can't kill one's self when one begins to grow old."

"Really," said Lorilleux, "I cannot see why the government does not do something for people in your condition. Men who are disabled—"

"But workmen are not soldiers," interrupted Poisson, who considered it his duty to espouse the cause of the government. "It is foolish to expect them to do impossibilities."



Chapter 10


Gervaise pitied Father Bru from the bottom of her heart; he lay the greater part of the time rolled up in the straw in his den under the staircase leading to the roof. When two or three days elapsed without his showing himself someone opened the door and looked in to see if he were still alive.

Yes, he was living; that is, he was not dead. When Gervaise had bread she always remembered him. If she had learned to hate men because of her husband her heart was still tender toward animals, and Father Bru seemed like one to her. She regarded him as a faithful old dog. Her heart was heavy within her whenever she thought of him, alone, abandoned by God and man, dying by inches or drying, rather, as an orange dries on the chimney piece.



Chapter 13

She sank lower day by day. As soon as she got a little money from any source whatever she drank it away at once. Her landlord decided to turn her out of the room she occupied, and as Father Bru was discovered dead one day in his den under the stairs, M. Marescot allowed her to take possession of his quarters. It was there, therefore, on the old straw bed, that she lay waiting for death to come. Apparently even Mother Earth would have none of her. She tried several times to throw herself out of the window, but death took her by bits, as it were. In fact, no one knew exactly when she died or exactly what she died of. They spoke of cold and hunger.

Some relevant (and amusing) videos

Reading Marx = taking the red pill?

Manifestoon = an amusing take on some Manifesto basics

Forget Something?

In the Karl Marx reading one idea particularly stood out to me. The self rejected idea of using use value as a common element between commodities. After fiddling with that idea, he moves on to say that labor time is what’s necessary to produce commodities. What I understood from this may be very off topic, but I still want to go through and put it out there.
When reading about this, I thought of all of the men and women, and even children who spent hours upon hours producing over and over again. And that production was always a good thing, it sometimes resulted in over-production. It left all those people wondering “Did I waste hours, days, and months of my life just to end up in over production and receive low wages?” Marx may have written a great book about society from a major economic point of view, but all that comes to my mind is the peoples’ suffering.
I wish he went more in depth about how all this capitalism and industrialization affected all of those families from a social perspective. Maybe he does, but I truthfully don’t see it between all of that economic talk. Now, I’m not saying that what he’s written isn’t worthy. It is, many people follow by his theory and learn from his writings.
I’d really like to discuss the urban living families of this time.

Marx Response

The concept that stuck out to me most while reading the Marx was the concept of “estranged labor.” I was thinking of how strange it was for people to create things for the good of the whole rather than for him or herself, but at the same time it seems to be what sets humans apart from the rest of the animal kingdom.

The concept of community is one that has grown from colonies and packs into states and countries and has come to be the basis for all that we know as humans today. We all work together, particularly in a democracy like the United States, in order to better form the democratic state. It isn’t to the degree of a communist state, but there is something inertly American in the concept of a factory that we have all come to terms with. We all work in order to pay taxes and to better ourselves in the strange class system that is the hidden whisper of the country. As much as America promotes the concept of being able change our place in society, it seems like something that is impossible to actually change.

In reading Marx many aspects of communism in our country became inertly apparent. The concept of all of us working for the better of the whole and the better of our own niche within society is something that I find to be strangely inherent in the way we live. We are so often put into sects but it is generally without any sort of acknowledgement. We also don’t seem to have a problem with working for the concept of the whole. It is in our human instinct to often work for the better of the whole, even if we aren’t realizing it while it is happening.

Y’see, I had never really seen it that way. But it oddly makes perfect sense.

Marx Response for July 21

According to Marx, there are four key aspects of a commodity, which he defines as “…an object outside us, a thing that by its properties satisfies human wants of some sort or another.”(303) The four attributes are: Use-Value, (Actual) Value, an Exchange Value, and the Price given to the product. The use-value of a commodity is “independent of the amount of labor required to appropriate its useful quantities”. (303) It is simply the usefulness of that item. The Real Value of a commodity is the worth of that item based on the value derived from the consumption of a product or service. Exchange-Value is the value of the commodity pertaining to the market in which it is present (Marx believes the only way that this value can be determined is by the amount of labor time put into the commodity.) The price given to the commodity is the cost of production plus the average rate of profit.

Wealth By Means Of Boredom

Marx's claim that wealth is not based on surplus labor time, but on "disposable time outside that needed in direct production, for every individual and the whole society" (285), is a claim that I can understand, but I also see potential contradictions for such a measurement of wealth. To say that wealth is measured by the amount of time we do not have to spend working seems a largely subjective definition. The means by which I live could be satisfactory, and I could work only 6 hours a day and feel no need to work in excess. However, someone could also work the same amount and live in the same circumstances and feel the need to grow 'wealthier' (in this case, potentially only work 5 hours a day, or 4, or 3, etc).

Here, it seems that Marx's definition of wealth hinges not only on subjective opinion of social contentment, but on the lack of inequality within such circumstances. If Person A works 5 hours a day but is unhappy with their job, and Person B works 5 hours day but is extremely pleased with their job, can we say that they are both equally wealthy merely because they have 19 hours to spend doing whatever they wish? Likewise (and perhaps a better example), if Person A's 19 disposable hours are of objectively (or subjectively) greater value that Person B's 19 disposable hours, how can we say that they are equally wealthy when one clearly finds more value in their free time than the other?

At first glance, this is the major problem I have with Marx's theories on wealth: that of subjectivity. Granted, there could be an objective standard in which disposable hours equate to wealth (and in fact, I believe Marx to have such an objective form of measurement in mind), but I do not believe that this theory could function if put into practice. Wealth in general seems based on personal fulfillment of desire (of money, of commodities, of social interaction, etc) and not a systematic means of calculating wealth via time available to pursue one's own interests.

Use-value and exchange-value

In Capital Volume I, Marx discusses the concept of use-value verses exchange-value. According to Marx, use-value is inherent in a commodity while exchange-value is subject to change based upon an ever-changing market. This concept is very similar to Adam Smith’s natural and market price. Smith stated that the natural price of a commodity is static while the market price is subject to change based on supply and demand (see Volume I, Book I of the Wealth of Nations, page 63).
Marx goes on to further examine commodities in a social context. He states that there are “material relations between persons and social relationships between things” in a capitalist society (321). Marx believes that only when this social exchange occurs do objects gain exchange-value. He believes that this exchange allows commodities to have exchange-values separate from their use-values. I think it is important to also consider Marx’s idea of “material relations” that exist between people in a capitalist society. This relationship seems to once again point out the social alienation of the worker that we have discussed in regards to previous excerpts by Marx. How is it that inanimate objects can have social relationships while each individual worker has material relationships with his fellow man?

7/21 Response to Marx

The very first passage assigned informed us that workers receive wages in the form of sustenance, and that all of our capitalist and economic system depends on the fact that there exist a surplus between the amount of work in a day and the actual value of keeping the worker alive. As heartless as this seems, it's also true. Marx tells us that if the cost of keeping a worker alive were equal to the labor they did each day, the employer would gain nothing from the employment, and the system would collapse; "capital would not exist." Surplus value, for Marx, arises from the process of producing capital, not from its equivalent value-producing labor. For Marx, capitalism is the excessive production of excess labor in order to create profits. This, in turn, forces the laborer to labor much more than is necessary for his survival in order to churn profits for his employers.

The next passage goes on to inform us of an Anti-Smith claim, namely that 'real wealth' does not come from the direct labor time of a product's producers, but rather the entire market process and context in which that product is produced, with the employees becoming merely "watchmen" in a product's production. This abstraction of labor and wealth from Smith's correlation between the two is a result of the technology and science that Marx was able to identify in the economy which Smith had no access to.

In Das Kapital, Marx tells us that the use-value of a commodity exists independent of the labor put into the product, an important revelation about the nature of use-values. Although labor has gone into a product, labor becomes abstracted as "general human labor" in the final result, unlike the way of the craftsman of old. For Marx, the only value which can be expressed is the exchange value of an item.

The last point I will address is the notion of homogeneous labor. Marx claims "The total labour-power of society, which is embodied in the sum total of all the values of all commodities produced by that society, counts here as one homogeneous mass of human labour-power, composed through it be of innumerable individual units. Each of these units is the same as any other..."
This is fascinating, no longer do we have masons and artisans whose labor is of higher value than a prole, rather we have a large homogeneous group of completely identical workers, one of which is no better than the other. This struck me as having a slightly contradictory notion, however. In capitalism, a system which often has great disparages in wealth, the workers actually become equal. How is it that a system which creates an equality of labor can create an even larger gulf of luxury between the top and the bottom of the social pyramid? These questions will be answered.

Marx mentions, "Private property has made us so stupid and one-sided that an object is only ours when we have it -- when it exists for us as capital, or when it is directly possessed, eaten, drunk, worn, inhabited, etc. -- in short, when it is used by us." (87). This sentence made me think of materialism. Mere objects (e.g. designer bags, big flat-screened televisions, etc) and activities (e.g. dining in a 5-star restaurant, traveling to an exotic location for vacation, etc.) in life has come to define us as humans. Judgement is made by your physical appearance-- what/ who you are wearing. It's the first thing people take in to account -- when you're meeting a new acquaintance, when you're being interviewed for a prospective job.

These materials we purchase transform one's appearance instantly. It is similar to how Marx explains the power of money. Money can change ugliness into beauty and idiocy into intelligence. We all work hard in order to gain the money to purchase the materials to change our lives. We lose ourselves into these meaningless items. We work hard to obtain our wishes to change our realities from "poverty" to splendor. Marx mentions it briefly on page 104. It makes me think of the saying, "Money doesn't buy happiness". So many people say that... but we are all living in a world where our minds circulate only around money. If we don't have money, we stress and worry. When we do have money, we laugh and relax.

So... does money buy happiness...? Happiness seems to be defined by our current society as luxury goods...

Is it worth losing our true selves to work to gain money... in order to obtain what society calls happiness?

Production for fellows - not ourselves

While I found Marx’s theories sometimes hard to grasp (just due to the depth of his thoughts), I will elaborate on the aspect I found most relative to my life, as well as interesting. Marx’s concept of “estranged labour” was of particular interest to me. When I began reading, while simply attempting to understand his ideas, I started to feel a strong relation to Marx’s opinions. A particular example was given that bettered my understanding and helped me take a stance on the issue as well, “Admittedly, animals also produce. They build themselves nests, dwellings, like the bees, beavers, ants, etc. But an animal only produces what it immediately needs for itself or its young. It produces one-sidedly, whilst man produces universally” (76).

This concept of going to work, or school, to eventually provide some sort of service to mankind is much different than an animal who spends it’s life providing for itself and it’s children – not it’s fellows. Marx speaks of the concept of things being ‘alien’ – my understanding is that because we are producing for others, we are losing drive/desire/tangible feelings towards what we do.

This accounts for that striking difference between the ‘home’ and ‘work’ life we have discussed previously. The home life is how we relieve ourselves from the stress and demands of our work lives. My understanding of the reading is that Marx thinks of this as a negative consequence, therefore a negative practice, and while my opinion is not fully formed, I can’t help but think he has posed an interesting and fact-based argument.

Money = Power

Money is power is the cliche of all cliches, but Marx proves that it is true and agrees with it. He says that money has the ability to make the less talented have more of the talented ( this made me think of Britney Spears ) After many other comparisons, he also says that Money has the power to bind society. Thinking about this connections is kind of scary because the way that money has soooo much power over individuals and the mass society. He's right money is power and whoever accumulates the most money has the most power.

He uses Shakespeare to describe two properties of money that he agrees with:

1. It is the visible divinity.

- by this to me he means that to touch power is made available by money and with this money you can do anything which I feel America has illustrated for us by the corrupt law system, corrupt politics and the corrupt society that is willing to trade their morals for a higher monetary status

- Karl Marx summarizes this by saying,"That which I am unable to do as a man,... I am able to do by means of money" (Marx, 104)

2.) "It is the common whore, the common pimp on people and nations."

- This made me laugh and really stood out to me because it is soooo true on different levels (3)

~it's overused by everyone

~it enslaves humans & their desires

~filled with corrupt ways

Marx 7/18

Marx’s writings over the theory of alienation were very interesting to me. They relate to the way that the real world has become so involved in their work and making a living that they have forgotten about anything, and everything else going on around them. The four theories of alienation were both easy to understand and yet difficult because it was hard to place how they all tied together. I understood that the first one was about how you didn’t own what you made, but the second theory about how you were forced to be with these people and not the ones you chose to be with was to me confusing. To me this reading described that man is 1) forced to work 2) once you work you will slowly lose all freedoms that you had before you worked such as freedom to think, and make your own relationships. This quote to me explained this, "As a result, therefore, man no longer feels himself to be freely active in any but his animal functions----eating, drinking, procreating, or at most in his dwelling and in dressing up, etc.;and in his human functions he no longer feels himself to be anything but an animal." (74). Marx to me related back to Rousseau with this quote and how Rousseau talked about the savage man and the natural state. This to me confirms what Rousseau was saying about how there is no going back to the complete natural state and the Marx proved this by saying that we as man have become so obsessed and into our work that we have lost all but the simple things in life like eating and drinking.

Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts 1844

In reading the section in the Marx-Engels Reader on Estranged Labour, I found some interesting points of comparison to some of our previous readings. Marx states that there is an estranged relationship between man and his labour that causes man to lose himself in nature. To "alienate" himself. As a result, he writes that "labour is external to the worker, it does not affirm himself but denies himself, does not feel content but unhappy, does not develop freely his physical and mental energy but mortifies his body and ruins his mind. The worker therefore only feels himself outside his work, and in his work feels outside himself" (74).

This alienation has caused man to feel bound to the "alien" who requires his labour, pulling him away from his natural activity. Is our labour truly pulling us away from our "savage man"? This is a question that Rousseau also points to discussing how "our industry deprives us of the force and agility that necessity obliges him to acquire. If he had had an axe, would his wrists break such strong branches?" (40). As we invest ourselves more into our product of labour, we lose ourselves, and the poorer our internal selves become according to Marx. I find it difficult to compare the benefits of being able to sustain oneself with natural physicality and being able to operate machinery that has created some of the most advanced methods of production. Is it possible to say one is better than the other in a modern, commercial society?

The "self-alienation" that has resulted from labour, and the products of labour seems very negative. I think that there are other factors that can off-set this negativity. People work out of necessity. Necessities that are as simple and natural as eating, drinking, and providing a home for a family. Wouldn't this bring man back to a more natural state? Maybe labour seems inorganic because we are comparing it to a state of nature for savage men. We are not living in the original state of nature. It is difficult to see this "self-alienation" objectively because we are living in it.

Education on Money?

One point I got out of the readings by Adam Smith is ---

Increase in population --> High Wages --> Increase in National Wealth.

Is it because children are going in to the work force at a young age, so that's why population correlates with national wealth? If so, it seems the children/ people during the mercantile system weren't especially smart... The children are forced to start work at a young age to help out in raising the family, so they are forced to do the same repetitive tasks every day. Performing the same tasks over and over again every day doesn't allow their brains/ ideas/ thoughts to grow. Also, in order to survive, they had to work many hours of the days which doesn't allow the children to have time to educate themselves.

It seems the only form of education that parents of the poor have possibly considered is apprenticeship and that isn't basic education, but a specific education of a trade. However, mentioned in Smith's writings, very few actually enter apprenticeships because it doesn't show an immediate return. The mercantile system is all about survival and being an apprentice of a trade doesn't allow one to survive as well as a normal workman. However, wouldn't the apprentice, in the long run with hard work and determination, be able to make more money in than a normal workman? It seems the people of this age mainly looked at the present and rarely considered the future.

In our modern society now, one change from the people in the mercantile system is we do consider our futures. We are required to go to school and gain an education. We go to school just for our futures. Our futures in what though? In the end, it seems... we're all just preparing ourselves with education because we hope to make a better living. We hope to be able to make big money and live leisurely-- that is the future we try to aim for. Has the past, our history made us like this? To only consider money?

Are we educated to only think about money? Is that society's main lesson....?

Competition

I thought that it was interesting that Smith touched upon competition because personally I though competition was always a good thing. I though t it made the economy flourish and the choices for consumers vast. I never really considered how this could be a real problem. I now see how this is still part of our society the way that when a franchise is started larger companies buy them out with fear of the becoming too large and taking them over. This can be applied to the store Macy's how it bout out many department stores in order to regulate the competition. I agree with Smith when he said that "retraining the competition in some employments to a smaller number than would otherwise be disposed to enter them, occasions a very important inequality in the whole of the advantages and disadvantages of the different employments of labour and stock" ( 146). This regulation of competition can be detrimental because is can lead to corruption to make sure the competition stays regulated. I Don't Know .... I feel like this connects to the natural way things happen because by creating a policy like Europe that regulates the Competition, higher or lower, it reinforces that there really is no liberty in the way we function any more. I may be wayyyyyyyy off with this (...most likely) but I feel like the government shouldn't be involved with the manner in which companies compete.

Priestley Johnson

Adam Smith Response for 7/14

After reading the assignment, I found this idea that Smith presents about how wealth increases in a nation particularly interesting.
"The increase of revenue and stock is the increase of national wealth. The demand for those who live by wages, therefore, naturally increases with the increase of national wealth, and cannot possibly increase without it" (pg.78)
I believe that this passage describes the increase of wealth within a nation very well, and can lead the reader to visualize this as a cycle in which revenue and stock, demand for laborers, wages of laborers, and wealth, all effect each other. I find this especially interesting because it displays this interdependence that arrived with modern society. And while it may be assumed or thought by the general public that the "masters" or bosses hold the majority of the power, this cycle displays how they're dependency of each other is equal, but the difference is that the laborers need of their masters is much more immediate given the laborers lack or savings/supplies.

Adam Smith Response

I found Adam Smith’s famed theory of an “invisible hand” to be a particularly interesting section of his book. This concept basically backs up the idea that the economy is a self-sustaining entity. “By preferring the support of domestick to that of foreign industry, he intends only his own security; and by directing that industry in such a manner as its produce may be of the greatest value, he intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention. Nor is it always the worse for the society that it was not part of it. By pursuing his own interest he frequently promotes that of the society more effectually than when he really intends to promote it.” (456) Smith uses this metaphor to describe how the average worker supports the economy simply by thinking in his own self-interests. In his eyes, this is a win-win situation in which both the individual and the society as a whole profit from. The individual attempts to become wealthy, but the only way that this can be accomplished is if he/she exchanges what he/she produces or owns. Smith goes on to say that these people are even more beneficial to society than those who intentionally attempt to support it. “I have never known much good done by those who affected to trade for the public good.” (456)