[p2p-research] Profit Measures the Payer's lack of Physical Source Ownership

[Ryan Lanham]

On 2/15/10, Michel Bauwens <michelsub2004 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> hi ryan,
>
> I think you are starting to see marxism everywhere ... patrick extends the
> stallmanite notions to physical production ... but stallman is essentially a
> liberal, for markets and free enterprise ... I don't see the marxism in any
> of patrick's positions ..



Hi Michel:

A cost theory of value is generally a variation on a labor theory of
value--a core tenet of Marxism as I understand it.  These have been
articulated many times in many forms.

I don't get excited much about it either way.  One of my most respected
mentors, Gary Wamsley, plays with Marxism and its ideas rather regularly
though he says he is not a Marxist--seems like few want to stand up and
proudly proclaim the fact these days.  I'd guess in 1968 he could have been
recruited rather easily to the Marxist version of Kumbaya...the
Internationale?

I don't reject Marxism as a set of ideas because I am afraid of it, don't
understand it or because I adhere to some neo-national patriotism that
excludes Marxism as a reasonable possibility.  Quite the opposite.  I reject
it because I have read it and have found it simply not useful or accurate in
any way that merits further return.  I'm open to the prospect, but every
time I have returned it has all struck me as sillier than the last time.
Christians claim I'll gain insight from reading Leviticus...hasn't happened
yet.  Muslims claim I will know righteousness by reading the Koran...again,
no luck for me.  Marxism as science is always an interesting discussion, but
I don't see any veracity in it.  If others do, that's a world that works
just fine for a pragmatist.  I don't need consensus...I need the best we can
do under the circumstances where I get to have an idea and some appropriate
control over what "best" means.

I think anger management is a huge issue for nearly every human.  People who
tend to subscribe to Marxism I find to be generally profoundly angry about
the human condition to a point where they need solutions that are internally
coherent, rebellious, and feared.  It is a psychological way of being I
think.  People seek out Marxism.  I wouldn't at all be surprised if Marxists
have little bits of brain matter that are functioning in the same ways many
of the rest of us are not.  Hard core libertarian/capitalists are similar.
I understand neither of them very well.  But capitalists seem at least to
verge on the pragmatic.  Marxists rarely do in my experience.  It is always
a sort of theory that is almost science fiction-like in its distance from
what might possibly occur.  Another difference is that capitalists see many
realities they embrace as authentic and progressive toward what they want.
That is rare for Marxists.  I always hear...well, China isn't Marxist...or
Cuba or xxx isn't REAL Marxism...as if real Marxism might possibly come to
exist now or sometime in (Waiting for) Godot time.

I'll try to stop using the term Marxism.  You may well be right that I don't
know how to use it.  I wonder does anyone?  Was Marcuse a Marxist?  So much
of what he says seems to have nothing to do with Marx.  How about Eric
Hobsbawm?  I can't name a current Marxist...is Stallman one?  I wonder how
he would answer that.

Ryan
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