[Xmca-l] Re: Contrasting 'use-value' & 'value'

[mike cole]

Same topic, Alfredo. Interesting synchronicity between Australia, Canada,
and the US.

mike

On Wed, Apr 19, 2017 at 5:42 PM, Alfredo Jornet Gil <a.j.gil@iped.uio.no>
wrote:

> Andy, could you give bit more on that distinction between word and
> utterance as it pertains to the ongoing discussion? I am interested. Also,
> I note that different participants in the thread have used the different
> terms, 'sign,' and 'utterance.'
>
> Alfredo
> ________________________________________
> From: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> on behalf of Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net>
> Sent: 20 April 2017 02:26
> To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
> Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: Contrasting 'use-value' & 'value'
>
> and as a further note of caution, the unit in "Thinking and
> Speech" is a word, not an utterance, and yet it is utterance
> which seems to be analogous to "commodity."
>
> Andy
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> Andy Blunden
> http://home.mira.net/~andy
> http://www.brill.com/products/book/origins-collective-decision-making
>
> On 20/04/2017 7:01 AM, Julian Williams wrote:
> > Michael/all
> >
> > I  go back a few posts (as ever being a bit slower than this list-serve
> > demands - let me do this before the discussion moves to 'binocular
> > vision') and challenge the metaphor of commodity/utterance: I can see it
> > has merit but also I want to look at the limitations.
> >
> > You say: 'the sign is to the verbal exchange what the commodity is to the
> > Commodity-exchange' … But I think I was asking for a characterisation of
> > the larger totality involved - e.g. The 'economy/mode of production and
> > its contradictions/collapse' and 'what - dialogue?'
> >
> > And I think Andy B agrees with you when he says 'both take an
> > artefact-mediated relation between individuals as the unit'… But suggests
> > he recognises my problem when he refers to 'its language' (or I might say
> > 'consciousness', 'discourse'  or maybe 'intercourse').
> >
> > But - as I argued in critique of the metaphor 'labour = learning', this
> > mapping only goes so far, and has certain dangers. The relation between
> > commodity/economy (and the mode of production) and utterance/discourse
> > (and the ideological super/infra-structure) is much more interesting in
> > the concrete relations of history. I refer to Marx (the German ideology)
> > and Volosinov.
> >
> > In reality the relation between commodity production and
> > 'sign-related/mediated' discourse (Marx calls 'intercourse') is
> > dialectical. Each 'mediates' the other in historical development, and
> even
> > in collective production-and-dialogue.
> >
> > Thus, I suggest, the 'exchange/use value' of an utterance/dialogic
> > exchange maybe ought to be examined in the ideological context of its
> > relationship with the 'whole' of social re/production where class power
> > becomes visible. I don't know how to do this, but the argument is there
> in
> > Bourdieu: the power relations between people are part of the
> > capital-mediated structure of relations in a field (including the field
> of
> > opinion/discourse), and this explains the forms of discourse that express
> > these power relationships and help to hold powerful positions in place in
> > the field. In this view it is not possible to identify the 'value' of an
> > utterance or a sign outside of this wider analysis… and an analysis of
> the
> > particular discursive/cultural field within its wider sociality.
> >
> > Sorry this is a bit prolix and so likely to provoke tangential responses:
> > I did not have time tonight to write a shorter more focussed post.
> >
> > Best wishes
> >
> > Julian
> >
> > Ps The separate discussion on mediation: this might be another thread. I
> > only want to note here that the mediation of the 'intercourse' through
> its
> > 'other' in the material form of 'production' (I call the economy above)
> > and vice versa does not involve a mediator 'between' the two, but is
> > purely hegelian in seeing the mediation of 'x' through 'not x' in a
> > totality.
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > On 18/04/2017 16:34, "xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu on behalf of
> > Wolff-Michael Roth" <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu on behalf of
> > wolffmichael.roth@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >> Larry, do not be confused. Take it with Bateson (Mind and Nature), and
> see
> >> Andy and Michael as two eyes. You then get this:
> >>
> >> It is correct (and a great improvement) to begin to think of the
> >> two parties to the interaction as two eyes , each giving a monocular
> view
> >> of what goes on and , together , giving a binocular view in depth. This
> >> double view is the relationship . (p.133)
> >>
> >> What is gained by comparing the data collected by one eye
> >> with the data collected by the other? Typically , both eyes are aimed at
> >> the same region of the surrounding universe, and this might seem to be
> >> a wasteful use of the sense organs. But the anatomy indicates that very
> >> considerable advantage must accrue from this usage. The innervation of
> >> the two retinas and the creation at the optic chiasma of pathways for
> the
> >> redistribution of information is such an extraordinary feat of
> >> morphogenesis
> >> as must surely denote great evolutionary advantage . (p.69)
> >>
> >> Michael
> >>
> >> ------------------------------------------------------------
> --------------
> >> ------
> >> Wolff-Michael Roth, Lansdowne Professor
> >> Applied Cognitive Science
> >> MacLaurin Building A567
> >> University of Victoria
> >> Victoria, BC, V8P 5C2
> >> http://web.uvic.ca/~mroth <http://education2.uvic.ca/faculty/mroth/>
> >>
> >> New book: *The Mathematics of Mathematics
> >> <https://www.sensepublishers.com/catalogs/bookseries/new-
> directions-in-mat
> >> hematics-and-science-education/the-mathematics-of-mathematics/>*
> >>
> >> On Tue, Apr 18, 2017 at 8:18 AM, Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net>
> wrote:
> >>
> >>> different trajectories, Larry.
> >>>
> >>> a
> >>>
> >>> ------------------------------------------------------------
> >>> Andy Blunden
> >>> http://home.mira.net/~andy
> >>> http://www.brill.com/products/book/origins-collective-decision-making
> >>> On 18/04/2017 11:44 PM, lpscholar2@gmail.com wrote:
> >>>
> >>>> Andy, Julian, Michael,
> >>>>
> >>>> My learning curve at this moment is in the way of Michael describing
> >>>> the
> >>>> back and forth double movement. That is both giving/receiving, both
> >>>> (expressing/listening) occurring WITHIN our relationship. This prior
> >>>> to or
> >>>> more primordial then taking the individual stance as primary and the
> >>>> relation as derivative.
> >>>>
> >>>> So... In this ‘spirit’ I will pose a question?
> >>>>
> >>>> Andy says: ‘artefact mediated relation BETWEEN INDIVIDUALS as a unit.
> >>>>
> >>>> Michael says: You remain with back-and-forth movement that is NEVER
> >>>> action but IS transcation. Here the back-and-forth ‘relation’ is the
> >>>> UNIT,
> >>>> and the individuals emerge from WITHIN this primordial double
> relation.
> >>>>
> >>>> Are Andy and Michael on the same trajectory, shifting the accent, or
> >>>> are
> >>>> imdividuals situated differently in the comtrasting notions of units.
> >>>>
> >>>> In particular does Andy ‘figure’ bridges whereas Michael ‘figures’
> gaps
> >>>> in the notion of BETWEEN.
> >>>>
> >>>> Pursuing my growing edge, going out on a limb
> >>>>
> >>>> Sent from my Windows 10 phone
> >>>>
> >>>> *From: *Andy Blunden <mailto:ablunden@mira.net>
> >>>> *Sent: *April 17, 2017 11:54 PM
> >>>> *To: *xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu <mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> >>>> *Subject: *[Xmca-l] Re: Contrasting 'use-value' & 'value'
> >>>>
> >>>> Julian/Michael,
> >>>>
> >>>> I remember getting very excited back in the early '80s when
> >>>>
> >>>> I spotted the symmetry between the first chapters of Capital
> >>>>
> >>>> and Marx's critique of algebra in his Mathematical
> >>>>
> >>>> Manuscripts. That lasted about a week. The symmetry between
> >>>>
> >>>> Vygotsky's analysis of speech and Marx's analysis of
> >>>>
> >>>> production is a strong one because both take an
> >>>>
> >>>> artefact-mediated relation between individuals as the unit.
> >>>>
> >>>> There is a symmetry at the level of the molar unit as well,
> >>>>
> >>>> which, so far as I know has been neglected. But this
> >>>>
> >>>> structural symmetry cannot usefully be taken too far. The
> >>>>
> >>>> "point" is that the unit is a unit of a whole, and the
> >>>>
> >>>> productive activity of a community is not the same as its
> >>>>
> >>>> language, which as Marx said "the philosophers are bound to
> >>>>
> >>>> make into an independent realm." Concretely, speaking is not
> >>>>
> >>>> producing. But like all human activities, both are subject
> >>>>
> >>>> to analysis by units of artefact-mediated actions.
> >>>>
> >>>> Andy
> >>>>
> >>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
> >>>>
> >>>> Andy Blunden
> >>>>
> >>>> http://home.mira.net/~andy
> >>>>
> >>>> http://www.brill.com/products/book/origins-collective-decision-making
> >>>>
> >>>> On 18/04/2017 7:01 AM, Julian Williams wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>>> Michael
> >>>>> In principle I am Ok with the idea of the unit that contains the
> >>>> essential
> >>>>
> >>>>> contradictions… but of what?
> >>>>> For Marx the whole point of commodity exchange/value is that it is
> >>>> the
> >>>>
> >>>>> beginning of an explanation of the 'economy', capitalism, and the
> >>>> labour
> >>>>
> >>>>> theory of value is the key to its collapse …
> >>>>> What is the equivalent 'point' of sign exchange in dialogue? And
> >>>> where
> >>>> is
> >>>>
> >>>>> the equivalent of the theory of value? I think the
> >>>> sensuous/supersensuous
> >>>>
> >>>>> is a distraction from the 'point'.
> >>>>> That’s my puzzle.
> >>>>> Julian
> >>>>> On 17/04/2017 21:49, "xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu on behalf of
> >>>>> Wolff-Michael Roth" <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu on behalf of
> >>>>> wolffmichael.roth@gmail.com> wrote:
> >>>>>> Hi Julian,
> >>>>>> the sign is to the verbal exchange what the commodity is to the
> >>>> commodity
> >>>>
> >>>>>> exchange--both the sensuous and supersensuous parts are there that
> >>>> Marx
> >>>>
> >>>>>> and
> >>>>>> Vygotsky are writing about. :-)
> >>>>>> Michael
> >>>>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
> >>>> --------------
> >>>>
> >>>>>> ------
> >>>>>> Wolff-Michael Roth, Lansdowne Professor
> >>>>>> Applied Cognitive Science
> >>>>>> MacLaurin Building A567
> >>>>>> University of Victoria
> >>>>>> Victoria, BC, V8P 5C2
> >>>>>> http://web.uvic.ca/~mroth <http://education2.uvic.ca/faculty/mroth/
> >
> >>>>>> New book: *The Mathematics of Mathematics
> >>>>>> <https://www.sensepublishers.com/catalogs/bookseries/new-dir
> >>>> ections-in-mat
> >>>>
> >>>>>> hematics-and-science-education/the-mathematics-of-mathematics/>*
> >>>>>> On Mon, Apr 17, 2017 at 12:11 PM, Julian Williams <
> >>>>>> julian.williams@manchester.ac.uk> wrote:
> >>>>>>> Michael and all
> >>>>>>> I am coming late to this discussion and maybe have been missing
> >>>> some
> >>>>
> >>>>>>> important thingsŠ but I want to see a few issues addressed by the
> >>>>>>> Functor:
> >>>>>>> Commodity => Sign: my skepticism follows to some extent the
> >>>> critique I
> >>>>
> >>>>>>> wrote of the mapping 'labor = learning' that you are familiar with:
> >>>> but
> >>>>
> >>>>>>> in
> >>>>>>> some ways I am even more skeptical of this metaphor. So:
> >>>>>>> Commodity to sign, is a unit of a totality as in 'economy' to ..
> >>>> 'Š?
> >>>> Š '
> >>>>
> >>>>>>> What ? Maybe 'dialogue/discourse'?
> >>>>>>> What is the 'value' that is exchanged in discourse, and how does it
> >>>>>>> ultimately realise its 'use value' in some sort of dialogic
> >>>>>>> 'consumption'
> >>>>>>> of useful understanding?
> >>>>>>> How does the producer of value 'labour' to produce it, and how is
> >>>> the
> >>>>
> >>>>>>> 'labour time' related to the 'exchange value' of the sign that
> >>>> results?
> >>>>
> >>>>>>> [Bearing in mind that the labour theory of value is Marx's
> >>>> essential
> >>>>
> >>>>>>> contribution.]
> >>>>>>> Then how does this work relate to devious studies: we already have
> >>>> the
> >>>>
> >>>>>>> work of Bourdieu who assigns cultural capital/value to symbolic
> >>>> power
> >>>> in
> >>>>
> >>>>>>> the cultural fieldŠ is there a connection here?
> >>>>>>> Best regards as ever
> >>>>>>> Julian
> >>>>>>> Ps I need to come back to you about Hegel (I am far from happy with
> >>>>>>> reading the 'Ideal' as a straightforward negation of the 'Real'
> >>>> implicit
> >>>>
> >>>>>>> in what you sayŠ) when I have thought about this a bit more -
> >>>> maybe in
> >>>>
> >>>>>>> 2018Š we should pick up!   :-)
> >>>>>>> On 17/04/2017 18:22, "xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu on behalf of
> >>>>>>> Wolff-Michael Roth" <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu on behalf of
> >>>>>>> wolffmichael.roth@gmail.com> wrote:
> >>>>>>>> Hi Larry,
> >>>>>>>> things become easier to think through if you do not take an
> >>>>>>> individualist
> >>>>>>>> starting point but a relational one---not "she has to produce . .
> >>>> ."
> >>>>
> >>>>>>> but
> >>>>>>>> look at what is happening in the exchange, where each giving also
> >>>> is
> >>>>
> >>>>>>>> taking, such that in a commodity exchange, you have double
> >>>>>>> giving-taking;
> >>>>>>>> in a verbal exchange, each speaking also involves listening and
> >>>>>>> receiving,
> >>>>>>>> and the receiving is for the purpose of giving (speaking,
> >>>> replying).
> >>>> As
> >>>>
> >>>>>>>> soon as you do this, you remain with back-and-forth movement, no
> >>>> longer
> >>>>
> >>>>>>>> action but transaction.
> >>>>>>>> The other interesting thing is that the Russian word znachenie,
> >>>>>>> translated
> >>>>>>>> as "meaning" (really, signification) also translates as "value"
> >>>> and
> >>>>
> >>>>>>>> "magnitude," and Il'enkov (2009) parenthetically adds "function"
> >>>> and
> >>>>
> >>>>>>>> "rôle". I am quoting from p. 178:
> >>>>>>>> Marx joins Hegel as regards terminology, and not Kant or Fichte,
> >>>>>>>> who tried to solve the problem of Œideality¹ (i.e., activity)
> >>>> while
> >>>>
> >>>>>>>> remaining Œinside
> >>>>>>>> consciousness¹, without venturing into the external
> >>>>>>> sensuously-perceptible
> >>>>>>>> corporeal
> >>>>>>>> world, the world of the palpable-corporeal forms and relations of
> >>>>>>> things.
> >>>>>>>>       This Hegelian definition of the term Œideality¹ takes in the
> >>>> whole
> >>>>
> >>>>>>>> range of phenomena
> >>>>>>>> within which the Œideal¹, understood as the corporeally embodied
> >>>> form
> >>>>
> >>>>>>> of
> >>>>>>>> the activity of
> >>>>>>>> social man, really exists ­ as activity in the form of the thing,
> >>>> or
> >>>>
> >>>>>>>> conversely, as the thing
> >>>>>>>> in the form of activity, as a Œmoment¹ of this activity, as its
> >>>>>>> fleeting
> >>>>>>>> metamorphoses.
> >>>>>>>>       Without an understanding of this state of affairs it would
> be
> >>>>>>> totally
> >>>>>>>> impossible to fathom
> >>>>>>>> the miracles performed by the commodity before people¹s eyes, the
> >>>>>>>> commodity-form of
> >>>>>>>> the product, particularly in its dazzling money-form, in the form
> >>>> of
> >>>>
> >>>>>>> the
> >>>>>>>> notorious Œreal
> >>>>>>>> talers¹, Œreal roubles¹, or Œreal dollars¹, things which, as soon
> >>>> as
> >>>> we
> >>>>
> >>>>>>>> have the slightest
> >>>>>>>> theoretical understanding of them, immediately turn out to be not
> >>>>>>> Œreal¹
> >>>>>>>> at
> >>>>>>>> all, but Œideal¹
> >>>>>>>> through and through, things whose category quite unambiguously
> >>>> includes
> >>>>
> >>>>>>>> words, the
> >>>>>>>> units of language, and many other Œthings¹. Things that, while
> >>>> being
> >>>>
> >>>>>>>> wholly
> >>>>>>>> Œmaterial¹,
> >>>>>>>> palpable-corporeal formations, acquire all their Œmeaning¹
> >>>> (function
> >>>>
> >>>>>>> and
> >>>>>>>> rôle) from Œspirit¹,
> >>>>>>> >from Œthought¹ and even owe to it their specific corporeal
> >>>> existence.
> >>>>
> >>>>>>>> Outside spirit and
> >>>>>>>> without it there cannot even be words; there is merely a
> >>>> vibration of
> >>>>
> >>>>>>> the
> >>>>>>>> air.
> >>>>>>>> Michael
> >>>>>>>> -----------------------------------------------------------
> >>>>>>> ---------------
> >>>>>>>> ------
> >>>>>>>> Wolff-Michael Roth, Lansdowne Professor
> >>>>>>>> Applied Cognitive Science
> >>>>>>>> MacLaurin Building A567
> >>>>>>>> University of Victoria
> >>>>>>>> Victoria, BC, V8P 5C2
> >>>>>>>> http://web.uvic.ca/~mroth
> >>>> <http://education2.uvic.ca/faculty/mroth/>
> >>>>
> >>>>>>>> New book: *The Mathematics of Mathematics
> >>>>>>>> <https://www.sensepublishers.com/catalogs/bookseries/new-
> >>>>>>> directions-in-mat
> >>>>>>>> hematics-and-science-education/the-mathematics-of-mathematics/>*
> >>>>>>>> On Mon, Apr 17, 2017 at 8:31 AM, <lpscholar2@gmail.com> wrote:
> >>>>>>>>> I am attempting to follow Wolff-Michael¹s trajectory as
> >>>> presented in
> >>>>
> >>>>>>> his
> >>>>>>>>> article (A Dialectical Materialist Reading of the Sign). On page
> >>>> 149
> >>>>
> >>>>>>> he
> >>>>>>>>> attempts to clarify the difference between sign complex
> >>>> Œuse-value¹
> >>>> &
> >>>>
> >>>>>>>>> sign
> >>>>>>>>> complex Œvalue¹.
> >>>>>>>>> His methodology is to read Marx Œsubstituting¹ the word ŒSIGN¹
> >>>>>>> (implying
> >>>>>>>>> sign complex) FOR Œcommodity¹ and intuites this method will be
> >>>>>>>>> generative.
> >>>>>>>>> Here is his realization through the method of re-reading as
> >>>> (trading,
> >>>>
> >>>>>>>>> translation, transposition) as I am carried along.
> >>>>>>>>> a) USE-VALUE: Œnatural signs¹ such as animal footprints are
> >>>>>>>>> useful/functional to the hunter inherently; they do NOT have
> >>>> Œvalue¹
> >>>>
> >>>>>>>>> (exchangeble value) though they do have use-value for the hunter
> >>>> or
> >>>>
> >>>>>>>>> hunting
> >>>>>>>>> party in finding game.  Similarly a sign complex can be useful
> >>>> and
> >>>>
> >>>>>>> the
> >>>>>>>>> product of human labour without being Œvalue¹ (exchangeable).
> >>>> Someone
> >>>>
> >>>>>>>>> who
> >>>>>>>>> satisfies HER needs through her product produces Œuse-value¹ but
> >>>> NOT
> >>>>
> >>>>>>>>> Œvalue¹.
> >>>>>>>>> b) VALUE: (exchangeable). To produce SIGNS (complexes), she has
> >>>> to
> >>>>
> >>>>>>>>> produce
> >>>>>>>>> not only Œuse-value¹ but use-value FOR others. She has to produce
> >>>>>>>>> Œsocietal¹ use-values.... To be/come (exchangeable) SIGN, the
> >>>> product
> >>>>
> >>>>>>>>> HAS
> >>>>>>>>> TO BE TRANSFERRED to another, FOR whom the SIGN complex
> >>>> Œconstitutes¹
> >>>>
> >>>>>>>>> use-value.
> >>>>>>>>> The production of signs that produce no Œvalue¹ that is
> >>>> exchangeable
> >>>>
> >>>>>>> FOR
> >>>>>>>>> others leads to personal notes often having NO use-value to
> >>>> others.
> >>>>
> >>>>>>> To
> >>>>>>>>> trans/form use-value to BE come Œvalue¹ requires exchangeability
> >>>>>>> under
> >>>>>>>>> lighting various forms of SIGN (complexes).
> >>>>>>>>> Apologies to Wolff-Michael if my echoing his re-reading
> >>>> methodology
> >>>>
> >>>>>>>>> garrbled the trans/mission?
> >>>>>>>>> I offer this because it helps clarify my reading of Œuse-value¹ &
> >>>>>>>>> Œvalue¹
> >>>>>>>>> (exchangeable)
> >>>>>>>>> My morning musement
> >>>>>>>>> Sent from my Windows 10 phone
> >>>>
>
>
>