OK. Yes, I'm slightly familiar with the Marxist origins of the term. And yes, I'm wasting e-ink and your time talking about things, here, when I could go read a bunch of Marx and Marx commentary. But even in what little I've read, there remains a conflation along the same lines we've covered, here.
There's some sense that workers are abstracted away from the thing being made (or the returns/royalties/satisfaction with a job well done, whatever). So, the separation of production into "means" versus whatever other parts is, rhetorically, intended to convey that separation ... e.g. the assembly line worker makes a tiny bit of an automobile and, hence, loses any sense of contextual integration ... the worker's *identity* is orthogonal to car-making. To me, this has absolutely nothing to do with ownership, money, or even production. It has more to do with one's understanding of groups, collective behavior, and unconsidered consequences ... a lack of ability to think about *extensions* of our selves. So, when a teenager throws fireworks out into a dry forest, that's the exact same thing as what you describe in (3) below ... our ill-described separation of "means of production" from other forms of property. A nomad may not feel the need to *own* some parcel of land or the plants/animals within it in order to feel connected to that land. So why would a worker feel disconnected from the produce of the machine in which she's a cog? On 11/19/19 11:05 AM, Steven A Smith wrote: > Thanks for circling around on this one. I had not forgotten the frayed > thread I left with you on this, but as you suggest, might be lacking the > tools/perspective to explain. I take this to mean that your questions > are requiring me to think deeper/differently. > > 1) I *don't* think I am using the term "ownership" in the sense of "to > own someone" or "pwn", though I suspect others (this may be > generational) might. > > 2) I struggle with the distinction between a very simple, vernacular > sense of "ownership" of physical objects and perhaps (small regions) of > real property and a *larger* sense as we find it in modern culture, > particularly in the context of capitalism as it has emerged in the > industrial (and beyond) period. > > 3) "means of production", in my lexicon is derived from the social/labor > movements that arose in response to the capitalism as developed around > industrialization. I believe it's frailty is derived from the question > of "a commons". When capital "owns" the "means of production", it > means that through the leverage of it's technology it has an "unfair" > advantage in exploiting the commons. In fact, one might note that a > commons only remains viable as a commons if it is NOT exploited. > > Your example of Hearst is well taken... but framed by "the commons", > whether it is spectrum (FCC) or right-of-way (cable/phone/??? > franchises) a key point is that when a single (or small-number of) > entity takes effective control of said commons, there is a risk which > suggests responsibilities which may or may not be accounted for. -- ☣ uǝlƃ ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com archives back to 2003: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/ FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove
