Re: Re: Re: On natural science
On 2002.05.28 08:05 AM, Carrol Cox [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I can't find the or original post you are responding to. And where does the Marx quote come from? Carrol Sabri Oncu wrote: reads like Humean instrumentalism to me. Ian That should be your expertise so I make no comments about this. My only concern is with Marx's writing style. I find him very difficult to read. For example, this sentence: If, therefore, industry is conceived as the exoteric revelation of man's essential powers, we also gain an understanding of the human essence of nature or the natural essence of man. What exactly this sentence says, I am not sure. Maybe, partly because he wrote the original in German and this is a not-so-great translation and partly because to me English is a code I am decoding. Nevertheless, it is a difficulty I have to live with I suppose. Best, Sabri Sabri MIYACHI TATSUO Psychiatric Department Komaki municipal hosipital 1-20.JOHBUHSHI KOMAKI CITY AICHI PREF. 486-0044 TEL:0568-76-4131 FAX 0568-76-4145 [EMAIL PROTECTED] To understand Marx's term ,beginning with economic and philosophical manuscript may be better. In it Marx writes The outstanding achievement of Hegels Phänomenologie and of its final outcome, the dialectic of negativity as the moving and generating principle, is thus first that Hegel conceives the self-creation of man as a process, conceives objectification as loss of the object, as alienation and as transcendence of this alienation; that he thus grasps the essence of labour and comprehends objective man true, because real man as the outcome of mans own labour. The real, active orientation of man to himself as a species-being, or his manifestation as a real species-being (i.e., as a human being), is only possible if he really brings out all his species-powers something which in turn is only possible through the cooperative action of all of mankind, only as the result of history and treats these, powers as objects: and this, to begin with, is again only possible in the form of estrangement. We shall now demonstrate in detail Hegels one-sidedness and limitations as they are displayed in the final chapter of the Phänomenologie, Absolute Knowledge a chapter which contains the condensed spirit of the Phänomenologie, the relationship of the Phänomenologie to speculative dialectic, and also Hegels consciousness concerning both and their relationship to one another. Let us provisionally say just this much in advance: Hegels standpoint is that of modern political economy. [47] He grasps labour as the essence of man as mans essence which stands the test: he sees only the positive, not the negative side of labour. Labour is mans coming-to-be for himself within alienation, or as alienated man. The only labour which Hegel knows and recognises is abstractly mental labour. Therefore, that which constitutes the essence of philosophy the alienation of man who knows himself, or alienated science thinking itself - Hegel grasps as its essence; and in contradistinction to previous philosophy he is therefore able to combine its separate aspects, and to present his philosophy as the philosophy. What the other philosophers did that they grasped separate phases of nature and of human life as phases of self-consciousness, namely, of human life as phases of self-consciousness, namely, of abstract self-consciousness is known to Hegel as the doings of philosophy. Hence his science is absolute. Whenever real, corporeal man, man with his feet firmly on the solid ground, man exhaling and inhaling all the forces of nature, posits his real, objective essential powers as alien objects by his externalisation, it is not the act of positing which is the subject in this process: it is the subjectivity of objective essential powers, whose action, therefore, must also be something objective. An objective being acts objectively, and he would not act objectively if the objective did not reside in the very nature of his being. He only creates or posits objects, because he is posited by objects because at bottom he is nature. In the act of positing, therefore, this objective being does not fall from his state of pure activity into a creating of the object; on the contrary, his objective product only confirms his objective activity, his activity as the activity of an objective, natural being. Man is directly a natural being. As a natural being and as a living natural being he is on the one hand endowed with natural powers, vital powers he is an active natural being. These forces exist in him as tendencies and abilities as instincts. On the other hand, as a natural, corporeal, sensuous objective being he is a suffering, conditioned and limited creature, like animals and plants. That is to say, the objects of his instincts exist outside him, as objects independent of him; yet these objects are objects that he needs essential objects,
Re: Re: On natural science
On 2002.05.28 10:33 AM, Carrol Cox [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: miychi wrote: Sabri I want to add Marx's early article. Please read this Miychi, This does not come from an article, it comes from the 1844 Mss. which were never intended for publication, and exhibit a very undeveloped stage of Marx's thought. In just a few years he ceased to speak of human essence in such terms. It is probably best never to quote from Marx's writings of the early 1840s without giving your own careful interpretation of what you think he is saying. His words are simply too exploratory and unfinished to be very useful by themselves. And of course Sabri is quite right about the writing style in this passage -- it is more than difficult; it is almost unreadable. :-) But it should not be taken as representative of Marx's writing. Carrol Carrol I think 1844 manuscript has not deficit, Rather, It summarize Hegel's philosophy and critique philosophy in general. Rather he emphasize labor as human essence. It developed into later warks MIYACHI TATSUO Psychiatric Department Komaki municipal hosipital 1-20.JOHBUHSHI KOMAKI CITY AICHI PREF. 486-0044 TEL:0568-76-4131 FAX 0568-76-4145 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Re: American history and Race Theory 4
The presentation of the national colonial question in respect to the direct descendants of the slaves that Marx refer to as the Negro race, has been observed over a long period of time by generations of communist. The presentation of this question is much broader than simply the use of the word race in the ideological sphere. Race as a coherent theory by the section of Marxists, who Comrade Charles claims have a conception of race and a "race and gender" approach to American history, have battled over this question for eighty years. Society is formed on the basis of the unity of the productive forces and the production relations. From this materialist approach - not race or gender, it is easier to understand the national colonial question in respect to the African American people. The African American people are not a nation. The African American people, as a distinct historically evolved people have referred to themselves as Colored in one period of history; Negro in another, Black and Afro’s in still another and today refer to themselves as black, black Americans or simply African Americans. Thus my use of the terms Colored, Negro and African American indicates a quantitative reconfiguration in the production forces or the relations of production during the last two hundred years. Language and word sublates – are transformed to expressed a higher development or understanding that is riveted to the advance of science and production or quantitative and qualitative changes in relations of production. The African American people are not a nation. This must be repeated over and over because the color psychosis grips the Marxist movement - or rather the "Marxist with an authentic concept of race," and the people of our country. Bourgeois theories of race abound in the ideological realm, although no serious Marxist can lay claim to a division of homo-sapien-sapien into distinct biological-genetic qualitative differences. Further, the Marxist movement in our country was compelled under the tremendous prestige of Lenin and then Stalin to adopt the outer trappings of Marxism as a revolutionary science in the hands of the proletariat. The Negro National Colonial Question was forced down the resisting throat of the Communist Party USA by way of the 1928 and 1930 Comintern documents on this important question. The nation or national formation that evolved in the South of the United States of North America, is a historically evolved stable community of Colored people, along with the historically developed Anglo-American people, who lived in the old slave holding area of the South –the Black Belt, and the economically dependent area of the Southern USNA. This nation, which evolved from the specifics of slavery, is a historically evolved stable community of people formed on the basis of a common language, territory, economic life and psychological makeup manifested in a common culture. This is the classical Marxist definition of a nation written by Stalin, edited by Lenin and propagated by the Third Communist International. In our country there is also the Anglo American nation proper. The general frontiers of the Anglo-American nation are the Canadian frontier to the north to the Atlantic sea coast o the east; proceeding from the Canadian frontier south to the beginnings of the areas associated with the plantation belt in Delaware. The border region then proceeds west along the northern edge of the area associated with the plantation system. This line proceeds generally west and south in an inverted arc into Texas and south into the Gulf of Mexico. The western frontier proceeds south from the Canadian border along the Pacific Coast to the area generally associated with the struggles of the Mexican national minority. The border then proceeds in a northeasterly direction to the north of Denver, connecting to the Gulf of Mexico to the east of San Antonio, Texas. Within this national territory, there are numerous autonomous areas that belong to the Native Bands of peoples, whose economic, territorial and political rights have yet to be restored. The exact delineation of the frontier must be set by economic and population factors, which cannot be known today. The proletariat in power will address this issue. The military defeat of the various Native People in the USNA and the Western hemisphere creates a situation where the Americas can be divided into the general categories of Anglo and Hispanic America. These general areas represent a base of Anglo or Hispanic culture for the emergence of national culture that was conditioned by the evolution of history in each specific country. What complicated a mature Marxist understanding of the national colonial question are the incredible strength, overwhelming presence and determining power of USNA imperialism. The pressure of our imperialist bourgeoisie in the ideological sphere is unprecedented in human history. It is our attempt to unravel the
Re: Re: Re: On natural science
On 2002.05.28 08:05 AM, Carrol Cox [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I can't find the or original post you are responding to. And where does the Marx quote come from? Carrol Sabri Oncu wrote: reads like Humean instrumentalism to me. Ian That should be your expertise so I make no comments about this. My only concern is with Marx's writing style. I find him very difficult to read. For example, this sentence: If, therefore, industry is conceived as the exoteric revelation of man's essential powers, we also gain an understanding of the human essence of nature or the natural essence of man. What exactly this sentence says, I am not sure. Maybe, partly because he wrote the original in German and this is a not-so-great translation and partly because to me English is a code I am decoding. Nevertheless, it is a difficulty I have to live with I suppose. Best, Sabri Again I cite Marx's manuscript about natural science MIYACHI TATSUO Psychiatric Department Komaki municipal hosipital 1-20.JOHBUHSHI KOMAKI CITY AICHI PREF. 486-0044 TEL:0568-76-4131 FAX 0568-76-4145 [EMAIL PROTECTED] The natural sciences have developed an enormous activity and have accumulated an ever-growing mass of material. Philosophy, however, has remained just as alien to them as they remain to philosophy. Their momentary unity was only a chimerical illusion. The will was there, but the power was lacking. Historiography itself pays regard to natural science only occasionally, as a factor of enlightenment, utility, and of some special great discoveries. But natural science has invaded and transformed human life all the more practically through the medium of industry; and has prepared human emancipation, although its immediate effect had to be the furthering of the dehumanisation of man. Industry is the actual, historical relationship of nature, and therefore of natural science, to man. If, therefore, industry is conceived as the exoteric revelation of man's essential powers, we also gain an understanding of the human essence of nature or the natural essence of man. In consequence, natural science will lose its abstractly material or rather, its idealistic tendency, and will become the basis of human science, as it has already become albeit in an estranged form the basis of actual human life, and to assume one basis for life and a different basis for science is as a matter of course a lie. The nature which develops in human history the genesis of human society is man's real nature; hence nature as it develops through industry, even though in an estranged form, is true anthropological nature. Sense-perception (see Feuerbach) must be the basis of all science. Only when it proceeds from sense-perception in the two-fold form of sensuous consciousness and sensuous need is it true science. All history is the history of preparing and developing man to become the object of sensuous consciousness, and turning the requirements of man as man into his needs. History itself is a real part of natural history of nature developing into man. Natural science will in time incorporate into itself the science of man, just as the science of man will incorporate into itself natural science: there will be one science. Man is the immediate object of natural science; for immediate, sensuous nature for man is, immediately, human sensuousness (the expressions are identical) presented immediately in the form of the other man sensuously present for him. Indeed, his own sense-perception first exists as human sensuousness for himself through the other man. But nature is the immediate object of the science of man: the first object of man man is nature, sensuousness; and the particular human sensuous essential powers can only find their self-understanding in the science of the natural world in general, just as they can find their objective realisation only in natural objects. The element of thought itself the element of thought's living expression language is of a sensuous nature. The social reality of nature, and human natural science, or the natural science of man, are identical terms. It will be seen how in place of the wealth and poverty of political economy come the rich human being and the rich human need. The rich human being is simultaneously the human being in need of a totality of human manifestations of life the man in whom his own realisation exists as an inner necessity, as need. Not only wealth, but likewise the poverty of man under the assumption of socialism receives in equal measure a human and therefore social significance.
RE: Re: RE: Totalitarian (the word)
Title: RE: [PEN-L:26394] Re: RE: Totalitarian (the word) James Devone wrote: Plato's totalitarianism really only applies --to the extent that it really does -- to the Guardians (who are brainwashed, lack individual property, control over who they marry, etc.)... Shane Mage asks:So, you regard Socrates' prescriptions--equality between the sexes, abolition of private property and the patriarchal family, higher education, etc.--as prescriptions for *totalitarianism*? no. I thought it was clear that I don't like the word at all (since total control is impossible). My point was that the people outside the elite were not the subject of Plato's totalitarian restrictions. My point was _in comparison to the lower orders_. I don't think I'd call Plato's restrictions socialist, either. (BTW, of all the dialogues, my understanding from the experts is that it's clearest in the REPUBLIC that Plato is the mind behind Socrates.) JD
Re: Re: Race Theory 5
I might be biting off more than I can chew here: In relation to the post someone made about Negroes in the USA being a 'nation' and using the old 4 part definition of Stalin’s (common language, territory, economic life and psychological make-up ). I have never seen this applied to Black Americans in that way before. What "common economic life" do they have that's different from other citizens? (I mean that would justify a claim to a separate state). A separate language? territory? even the cultural differences I would have read as those of an ethnic minority which would give rise to claims to equality but not to a separate nation. Not that equality would occur without a revolution but that's the point isn't it that Blacks need to fight to overthrow the US ruling class alongside white workers not for a separate state. Is this a common understanding in the US left (this is a post from Australia) or am I missing something? Shane Reply The Marxist presentation of the National-Colonial Question requires the most militant defense of the standpoint of Marx in examining social phenomenon. The Leninist presentation of the question acknowledges not simply exploitation and exploited classes, but exploiting imperial peoples and exploited and oppressed peoples and nations. The African American people are not a nation. There are various nations and advanced national groups in America. In my opinion you pose the presentation of the national colonial question incorrectly and confuse the attributes of a national formation with the formation of the state as the historical product of the irreconcilability of class antagonism. The state as such emerged thousands of years before the emergence of nations. The nation or national formation that evolved in the South of the United States of North America, is a historically evolved stable community of Colored people, along with the historically developed Anglo-American people, who lived in the old slave holding area of the South –the Black Belt, and the economically dependent area of the Southern USNA. This nation, which evolved from the specifics of slavery, is a historically evolved stable community of people formed on the basis of a common language, territory, economic life and psychological makeup manifested in a common culture. This is the classical Marxist definition of a nation written by Stalin, edited by Lenin and propagated by the Third Communist International. In our country there is also the Anglo American nation proper. The general frontiers of the Anglo-American nation are the Canadian frontier to the north to the Atlantic sea coast o the east; proceeding from the Canadian frontier south to the beginnings of the areas associated with the plantation belt in Delaware. The border region then proceeds west along the northern edge of the area associated with the plantation system. This line proceeds generally west and south in an inverted arc into Texas and south into the Gulf of Mexico. The western frontier proceeds south from the Canadian border along the Pacific Coast to the area generally associated with the struggles of the Mexican national minority. The border then proceeds in a northeasterly direction to the north of Denver, connecting to the Gulf of Mexico to the east of San Antonio, Texas. Within this national territory, there are numerous autonomous areas that belong to the Native Bands of peoples, whose economic, territorial and political rights have yet to be restored. The exact delineation of the frontier must be set by economic and population factors, which cannot be known today. The proletariat in power will address this issue. Comrade in place of a common language you inject the concept of “A separate language?” What may I ask is the “separate” languages that distinguish the English from the Americans? In place of a historically evolved people that first evolved based on the specifics of slavery, you inject the concept of “an ethnic minority.” In posing the question incorrectly you are prevented from grasping the nation in the South, which is composed of the “historically evolved stable community of Colored people– black people, along with the historically developed Anglo-American people, who lived in the old slave holding area of the South – the Black Belt. The question of a common economic life is a conception of development from feudal economic and social relations to capitalist economic and social relation and must be posed free of a “Marxist concept of race.” . . What "common economic life" do they have that's different from other citizens? The common economic life that distinguishes the nation in the South from that, which arose, based the transition from manufacture to industry in the North was the system of slavery. The system of slavery was not feudal economic relations but production for the world market and consequently capital conversion with all its social consequences. This capitalist slavery constituted
Re: Re: Re: Price Discrimination on Internet
Rob Schaap wrote: G'day Sabri, But when you visit a website that dropped that cookie on your computer, the website has access to the cookie and can process that information on your computer. Why is this not also a violation of privacy according to the US law? I was under the (unusually optimistic) impression that cookies could in fact not do that. It records browser info, but doesn't penetrate your HD, I thought. Am I to be disillusioned yet again? yes and no. cookies are stored on your hard disk by the browser (not by the web server - the web server sends a cookie to your browser. its up to the browser and/or you to accept that cookie. if you use a browser like internet explorer that choice is often made for you by the browser). the information that is stored in the cookie can be any arbitrary text and is limited only by size. some particular clarifications: 1) while cookies are stored as files on your computer, that does not mean they are like software. a cookie cannot find things out about you by exploring your disk or watching what you do. its just a file (or part of a file), its not software. 2) information that is stored in the cookie can be personal info about you only if you have submitted that information in some way. if a cookie contains your date of birth, thats there because you provided that information somewhere in a web form or some such. 3) cookies can be and are used to track your behaviour. cookie info can be shared across sites and this is used not only for tracking your preferences/behaviour or customizing your content but also provide a means for those who have personal information about you (say amazon.com, your bank, etc) to share that information (unless prevented by law). 4) all of this is true in the ideal world. browser security holes can and often compromise the security of your system and the information on it. microsoft's tight integration of its various technologies (windows - explorer - VBscript/ActiveX/etc) often blurs the boundaries of the sandbox security model that avoids various security pitfalls. plug: for better control over the cookies stored on your system: http://www.mozilla.org/ -- mozilla release candidate 3 if you do choose to download and install mozilla, i will give you unlimited assistance with using it (to the extent that i can). --ravi
Re: Question about the economics of information
- Original Message - From: Sabri Oncu [EMAIL PROTECTED] The whole history of the Grateful Dead, not to mention the huge IT project my beloved, Lisa, is involved with is a big set of counterfactuals that makes the above seem too simplistic. Ian Of course it is was overly simplistic, as it was meant to be. It was just an abstraction based on my personal real life experiences. Reality, as I experienced it, is infinitely more complicated. = Sabri, apologies if I came across as terse in any way. I was simply trying to provide equally simplistic counterexamples which would explode a parable that's a staple of neoclassical price theory and information economics. Rob Schaap's observation on Richard Dawkins and the information content of a pair of trousers is very apropos as regards the topic at hand. If there's to be a genuine search for an alternative parable, where's the analysis of the relationships between information-knowledge-power and budgets? It would seem an alternative micro would be hobbled without a better theory of the firm. This would seem to imply the need to mix together the type of work done by Barbara Ehrenreich with the stuff done by Studs Terekel, Michael Burawoy, Harry Braverman, Louis Putterman --the list could go on-- and use those insights to look at software firms, air traffic control systems, trucking companies, hospitals, hardware stores etc.. The strategy would not only deal with the inadequacies of the current mythologies, but confront head on the drivel promulgated by the people who gave us Reengineering the Corporation and other such pieces of drivel. Then we could address the the issue of what kinds of norms are needed to address the problems inherent in using such concept pairs as 'asymmetric information' 'principal-agent' etc. that avoid dealing with the issues of power and domination. The 'point' would not be to make a fetish of power, but help students-workers-citizens think about those issues so that the desire to 'have' or 'exercise' power and domination within the institutions of production etc. are attenuated [leaving aside the issue as to whether they could ever be eliminated]. But if the theory fails so miserably in such a simple, but not necessarily unrealistic, situation, do we need to test it against real life? = Nay, replace it; as others have been saying in discussing how to teach alternative stories. By the way, among the implications of this is that perfect competition is not that ideal after all, of course, according to the neoclassical theory. === Perfect is one of the most abused, if not useless, terms in any language. Pass my feelings of solidarity to Lisa please. Best, Sabri = Will do and solidarity to you and, what the heck, solidarity to all on the list.. Ian
New model for common currency???
Seigniorage earnings at the expense of independent unemployment/inflation goals? I don't think so. Diane May 25, 2002 New model for common currency Jacqueline Thorpe Financial Post Economist suggests central banks operate separately, with shared inflation goals... The central bank policy interest rate would be the same in all three countries; changes would be announced simultaneously by all three central banks, Mr. Carmichael said. Bank notes in the three countries could vary but they would be of equal value. For example, the existing U.S. dollar would continue to circulate in the United States while Canadian and Mexican versions of the dollar -- depicting Canadian prime ministers and Mexican presidents on one side -- would circulate primarily within Canada and Mexico. Any one of the three versions of the dollar would be legal tender in all three countries. This approach provides a share of seigniorage revenue (revenue governments gain by issuing currency -- about 0.3% of GDP in Canada) and still gives the central banks lender-of-last-resort responsibilities -- requiring them to provide liquidity during financial crises. http://www.nationalpost.com/financialpost/story.html?f=/stories/20020525/337604.html
Re: Question about the economics of information
Ian wrote: Sabri, apologies if I came across as terse in any way. Not at all. We need to figure out a way to add emotions to these e-mails. The other day I responded to an e-mail I received from my wife. She was asking me to add a few lines to an e-mail she was sending to a common friend. In my response I made a joke that costed me two days of tension at home. Her perception was that I was insulting her in the presence(!) of a friend and this was a perception of someone who knows me since 1983. There are serious problems with this medium. Best, Sabri
While we are speaking of internet: new controls in Turkey
BBC News, Tuesday, 28 May, 2002 Turkey tightens controls on the net By Dorian Jones in Istanbul Controversial new controls on the internet in Turkey have provoked protests from websites which fear they may be driven out of existence. The new measures are part of a new wide-ranging broadcasting law which place the internet under the same legislation as the rest of Turkey's media for libel and an offence called lying news. Under the new law, websites could face having to be officially registered and send copies of their material to the authorities. The measures have been condemned by much of the internet sector, from service providers to users, who warn that the whole future of the net in Turkey could be at stake. Impact on internet sector Savas Unsal, Managing Director of Superonline, Turkey's largest internet provider, is furious, describing it as a dirty law. There's not going to be a certain direction, no freedom of speech and this is going to impact the local content and local hosting services and eventually the whole internet sector, he said. They might easily put me and my chairman out of business. With around a million subscribers, Superonline has been part of the country's rapidly growing internet sector. Many burgeoning Turkish internet websites carry criticism of ministers, including material newspapers dare not publish. But Dr Oktay Vural, Minister of Transport and Communications, insists the measures are not intended to stiffle sites. There are no restrictions. It is only that there have been several things which have been forbidden by the law, he said. So if these actions were taken through the internet, then the regulations will cover for those actions only. We cannot be an eye in the chatrooms; that is not the aim of that law. Let's see what happens. I don't think it will affect the internet. I think time will show the truth, he said. Media controls The new law puts the internet under the control of Turkey's Supreme Radio and Television Board. According to Savas Unsal, that opens the door to the internet facing the similar restrictions as the rest of the country's media. A judge can tell you to bring a copy of your website whenever you update it to be approved by the local authorities, he said. The law is unclear what it actually covers. According to Fikret Ilkiz, media lawyer for the Turkish daily newspaper, Cumhuriyet, internet providers could be liable for prosecution for anything written, even in chatrooms. He also argues that the notion of lying news is too ambiguous. The biggest problem is that the law is very unclear. The law forbids fake or lie news. But what is this? he asked. The law doesn't define what it is. It just says it's forbidden. And this could apply to chatrooms. The way the law is now, it will be defined by many court cases. For now, there is great uncertainty. No one knows what is legal and what is not. It is chaos. 'Ambiguous law' Reaching a definition of the law by court cases could well be an expensive process for internet providers and users, with fines of up to $195,000 for each offence. But some critics of the law argue it is deliberately ambiguous. Much of Turkey's legislation governing the control of the media is characterised by catch all phrases. The internet until now has been largely exempt from such legislation. Such freedom has allowed it to become a powerful forum for criticising politicians. Many journalists publish articles on the internet which neither television nor newspapers dare print, due in part to existing legislation. The European Union, which Turkey aspires to join, has strongly condemned such legislation. This latest law has also drawn the ire of the EU, with officials calling for its repeal. That could well happen because Turkey's President Ahmet Necdet Sezer has sent the law to the Constitutional Court, accusing it of breaching the constitution. The court could take up to a year to make a ruling. In the meantime, the law remains in force. Internet slowdown The uncertainty created by the new legislation could prove most damaging of all to Turkey. Professor Haluk Sahin, who teaches media studies at Istanbul's Bilgi University, warns that Turkey risks repeating the mistakes of the past: A lot people in Turkey realize that Turkey must not make the mistake of 200 years ago, he says. Some 200 years ago, the Ottoman Empire missed the Industrial Revolution. Now, we believe that the internet, and computers in general, provide us with a second chance. A new train has arrived. Whether we embark on that train or not is up to us and the younger generations seem determined to do that. Unfortunately, the older generations and the politicians do not seem to be of the same mind, he said. Full at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_2006000/2006759. stm
On LETS
On 2002.05.29 03:18 AM, Diane Monaco [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Seigniorage earnings at the expense of independent unemployment/inflation goals? I don't think so. Diane May 25, 2002 New model for common currency Jacqueline Thorpe Financial Post Economist suggests central banks operate separately, with shared inflation goals... The central bank policy interest rate would be the same in all three countries; changes would be announced simultaneously by all three central banks, Mr. Carmichael said. Bank notes in the three countries could vary but they would be of equal value. For example, the existing U.S. dollar would continue to circulate in the United States while Canadian and Mexican versions of the dollar -- depicting Canadian prime ministers and Mexican presidents on one side -- would circulate primarily within Canada and Mexico. Any one of the three versions of the dollar would be legal tender in all three countries. This approach provides a share of seigniorage revenue (revenue governments gain by issuing currency -- about 0.3% of GDP in Canada) and still gives the central banks lender-of-last-resort responsibilities -- requiring them to provide liquidity during financial crises. http://www.nationalpost.com/financialpost/story.html?f=/stories/20020525/33760 4.html On national post's article assume central banks,so this new currency theory is within money's logic. But we already overcome money(common form of value) World wide. For example, in Argentina, Banks don't work so people exchange product by barter trade. In adding, LETS are used world wide. LETS has not function as money(measure of values, the medium of circulation,symbol of value, means of payment), so it doesn't lead to fictitious capital. It is only medium of exchange and don't need abstraction of labor such as money,or commodity. So we have already alternative currency. It is important factor to build association society. MIYACHI TATSUO Psychiatric Department Komaki municipal hosipital 1-20.JOHBUHSHI KOMAKI CITY AICHI PREF. 486-0044 TEL:0568-76-4131 FAX 0568-76-4145 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Racism and race are Marxist concepts
Racism and race are Marxist concepts by Waistline2 27 May 2002 15:45 UTC Mel P:Sorry to push this discussion to pen. Problems with my system and posting to Marxline. System was down but I most certainly relied to all our comments. Here is one of 5 articles written i refutation of the race theory as applied to African Americans and the history of the national colonial question as understood by my brand of Marxism. CB: This list has not been a part of this discussion, so you might want to give more background. The main point of contention between us is that you maintain that there is no category of race compatible with Marxism or historical materialism, and I say that there is. For a thread, (long thread !) related to your topic here, check out the Pen-L discussion of the Brenner thesis , Wood thesis and the history of capitalism, slavery, the primiitive accumulation of capital, etc. I would argue that slavery was integral to the primitive accumulation of capitalism, and that throughout capitalism: Capitalism = wage-labor x oppressed labor Within the category oppressed labor racially oppressed labor is a major component throughout the history of capitalism including up through today. ^^^ CB:What type of thing does Marx mean when he refers to a Negro ? A national colonial group ? Or does he mean a group whose skin is branded or whose skin is a brand ? A group defined by its land, language, history ? Or a physical characteristic, a phenotype ? Is not Marx using the concept of race when he refers to Negroes ? ^^^ Further Marx says, Where the capitalist outlook prevails, as on American plantations, this entire surplus value is regarded as profit . . . Capital Volume 3 page 804. Marx has a way with words. Comrade Charles please try and follow the logic or rather dialectic of the economic development that produced on the one hand a historically evolved people, not a race - (stop pause and consider), CB: Here's what occurs to me when I consider: What type of group is Marx referring to when he refers to a Negro ? Obviously, he _is_ referring to a race, contra your comment here. Lets stop here. Lets dwell on this some. Please focus your discussion on this point for a while, then lets move on to your other discussion. Right now I am focusing on your answer to this question. Charles Brown Reply. I cannot believe you asked what you ask CB: Why can't you believe it ? I say this consistently,and many other people do. Do you mean you disagree with it ? ^^^ -clip- Marx is referring to a class of slaves whose origins are traceable to continental Africa when he says â*Negro race.â Specifically, he is referring to the black slaves on the plantations of the American south. CB: Here you seem to admit that Marx is using the concept of race. A misunderstanding exists concerning what is meant by the words national-colonial question, which as such did not emerge as such until during and after the first Imperialist War. Marx could not have meant a â*national-colonial groupâ because this configuration in history occurs after his death. ^^^ CB: The issue remains whether the concept of race and analysis using the concepts of race and racism are compatible with a Marxist analysis. This use of a race concept by Marx in using the term Negro is some evidence for my side of the argument and against your side of the argument on this question. The fact that , for the sake of argument, the national-colonial question arises or is modified after Marx's lifetime does not mean that the concept of race becomes incompatible with historical materialism or Leninism and the analysis of the national-colonial question ( See for example _The World and Africa_ by W.E.B. Dubois). ^ -clip- All of this means, Comrade Charles that you seek to ground down the debate into defining a non-existence social phenomenon called race or the theory of race or the theory of biological â*phenotypeâ â your word, instead of grasping the class configuration that has characterized the development of a new people. ^^^ CB: You keep saying this or the equivalent, but I keep telling you that it is relating race and class, not grounding the debate or the analysis in race over class. Why do you keep acting like I don't say that ? As I have said to you several times, by this statement , you are arguing with a strawman. In other words, you just keep misrepresenting what I say on this, and then arguing with your false version of my argument. The type of group Marx is referring to in an economic category in which is contained a group of people. This is why Marx on Slavery as an economic category was quoted extensively. You state that Marx is referring to a so-called biological factor when everything I quoted from Marx is clearly a description of economic logic. Thus you adopt the
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Canadian Health
Medical Reform Group P.O. Box 40074, 280 Viewmount Avenue, Toronto, Ontario M6B 4K4 Canada May 28, 2002 YOUR MONEY AND/OR YOUR LIFE: FOR-PROFIT CARE DEADLY PROPOSITION In a shattering finding reported today in the Canadian Medical Association Journal, top health researchers from McMaster university report that, in comparison to private not-for-profit hospitals, private for-profit hospitals lead to an increased number of deaths. The authors took extraordinary care to avoid bias, said MRG spokesperson Dr. Ahmed Bayoumi, himself a health researcher. The studies span a 15 year period, look at death rates in over 38 million patients in 26,000 hospitals, and the findings are consistent. The results are clear and unequivocal: if Canada moves to private for-profit provision of care, death rates will increase. While most Canadians think of our hospitals as public, they are actually private not-for-profit institutions owned by communities, religious institutions, regional health authorities, or their boards of directors. Thus, the study results are directly applicable to the Canadian scene. Another MRG spokesperson, Dr. Rosana Pellizzari, provided an explanation for the results.Typically, investors expect a 10-15% return on their investment. Private for-profit hospitals must pay taxes, while private not-for-profit hospital do not. Finally, not-for-profit hospitals can accept tax-free donations, while for-profit hospitals cannot. All this money must be extracted from patient care. This means less skilled personnel, including doctors, nurses and pharmacists. Care suffers, and death rates increase. Federal and provincial governments must act now to stop the drift toward deadly, for-profit care. The results suggest that if Canada switched from private not-for-profit hospitals to private for-profit hospitals, the result would be over 2,000 additional deaths each year, Dr. Bayoumi concluded. This is in the range of the number of Canadians who die each from colon cancer, motor vehicle accidents, and suicide. Switching to for-profit hospital care would have the impact of creating a new cancer. It represents reckless driving for Canadian health care, or even national suicide.
Japan Inc to suffer its first ever net loss: Survey
Hindustantimes.com May 25, 2002 Japan Inc to suffer its first ever net loss: Survey AFP Tokyo , 25-05-2002 Japanese listed firms are expected to suffer a combined net loss for the fiscal year ended March 2002, the first time corporate Japan bled red ink as a whole, according to a survey released on Saturday. The Nihon Keizai Shimbun curried out the survey covering 1,416 publicly traded firms, or 78 per cent of the total, which have already announced their earnings results for the last fiscal year. The poll excluded financial firms and those listed on the three stock markets for emerging firms, the business daily said. According to the survey, 30 per cent of the companies in Japan are posting losses due to the information technology slump and losses stemming from restructuring measures. The aggregate group net loss of the surveyed firms came to 131 billion yen ($1.05 billion), compared with a profit of 6,118 billion yen for the previous fiscal year. Because ailing general contractors are set to release their fiscal 2001 earnings next week, the earnings for all the listed firms are likely to reach several hundred billion yen in group net loss, it said. Manufacturers suffered a 96 per cent plunge in group net profit last fiscal year due to the introduction of fair-value accounting, which has forced them to book paper losses on securities holdings. The decline was also due to weak demand for information technology products, it said. Non-manufacturers ended up with a 300 billion yen group net loss compared with a profit of 2,155 billion yen a year earlier. For the current fiscal year, the companies surveyed forecast a return to the black with a profit of 8,601 billion yen. Send your feedback at [EMAIL PROTECTED] ©Hindustan Times Ltd. 1997. Reproduction in any form is prohibited without prior permission.
Re: Racism and race are Marxist concepts
CB: This list has not been a part of this discussion, so you might want to give more background. The main point of contention between us is that you maintain that there is no category of " race" compatible with Marxism or historical materialism, and I say that there is. For a thread, (long thread !) related to your topic here, check out the Pen-L discussion of the "Brenner thesis" , "Wood thesis "and the history of capitalism, slavery, the primiitive accumulation of capital, etc. I would argue that slavery was integral to the primitive accumulation of capitalism, and that throughout capitalism: Capitalism = wage-labor x oppressed labor Within the category "oppressed labor" racially oppressed labor is a major component throughout the history of capitalism including up through today CB There is no such thing as "racially oppressed labor," as a material category. What you express is a bourgeois ideological category and rationale to explain colonial entrapment and the consequent brutal political oppression of non-sovereign peoples and their exploitation through imperial capitalist relations. The point of contention is the Marxist presentation of the National Colonial Question as it applies to the African American people. One can always reduce discourse to "he say - she say" but I have presented rather lengthy and detail explaining to at least describe the basis of my assertion while you present Eric Foner and nothing whatsoever to justify or explain the so-called Marxist conception of race. The reason for this is that you were born into a mess of crap, that actually took shape before both of us were born. Talk about the sins of the father and reparations. Every generation must pay reparations from the past. I do recognized that you and I represent a historic pole within the specific framework of the communist/Marxist movement, while many revolutionaries lack any conception of the complexity of the national-question in respects to our people. You state that you "would argue that slavery was integral to the primitive accumulation of capitalism," and this is the historic position of the right-wing of the CPUSA. The material quoted by Marx makes clear the character of slavery in the South. "That is the secret." The primitive accumulation of capital has nothing to do with the character of slavery in the South. The historic position of the CPUSA - and I am by no means a "hater" or baiter of the Party whose glories struggles I embrace as a part of my own, is that feudal economic relations existed in the South. Consequently, slavery was a form of primitive accumulation of capital. This makes no sense to anyone that examines what Marx means by the primitive accumulation of capital. An aspect of the historic contention that split the party on the "Negro Question" is the position later adopted by the party that the movement in the South is a continuation of the bourgeois democratic revolution and democracy as an abstraction and their program called for the complete elimination of the remnants of feudal economic relations. Not feudal-like social relations, but feudal economic relations. This is the theoretical underpinning of James Allen's 1936 book "Reconstruction." (I hope I am not challenged on this because I have not seen the book in twenty-five years but know I have it in the basement of my second wife home. Communist will given away any and everything except their good books and ink pens. ) Once the position is taken that feudal economic relations existed in the South the only way to explain slavery is as a form of primitive accumulation of capital. This of course is incorrect. Slavery as an economic institution was a form of capitalist production relations. There was no feudalism in the American south. "I would argue that slavery was integral to the primitive accumulation of capitalism," is the historic position of the CPUSA and has no meaning without being specific. Marx describes the primitive accumulation of capital in precise terms. I would argue that the primary form of primitive accumulation of capital on this land mass was the wholesale murder of the Native peoples and the taking of there land. I would argue this as a primary thesis because slavery itself underwent transitions and Marx speaks of American slavery after it enters the vortex of capitalist relations. "The so-called primitive accumulation of capital," according to Marx "therefore, is nothing else then the historical process of divorcing the producer fro the means of production. It appears as primitive, because it forms the pre-historic stage of capital and of the mode of production corresponding with it." "the pre-historic stage of capital" is what compels me to place primary emphasis on the expropriation of the Native peoples. Further, there were no concrete feudal economic relations in America. I concede that the slave trade played a role in the primitive accumulation of capital but slavery in the American
Re: On perspective
Part 3 of 3 DRAFT OF PROGRAM, Anarcho-Syndicalism Reply to Comrade MIYACHI TATSUO Capital has both internal limits -- surplus value and profits come from unpaid living labor; and labor-replacing technology drives the amount of living labor towards zero; and external limits -- we live on a planet with finite resources and a geographically finite market. The general crisis of capital -- capital colliding with its internal and external limits -- has been and will continue to be the inescapable theme of the world economy today. A crisis is an interruption. The interruption taking place in the heads of the world workers is rooted in the economy and the need for a cooperative society. If we cannot figure out the way to explain to the workers and a new generation of communist the framework in which we formulate strategy and tactics then all is lost. “All” of course is never lost and Bolshevikism is alive. With a world economy on the verge of crisis, the American people and indeed the world proletariat, are unprepared ideologically. There is awareness that something is wrong and a compassion for the poor but very little sense of class identity. People are increasingly anti-government but not anti-capitalist. Any large-scale economic disruption that happens before the development of class identity on a broad and organized basis would give the Jesse Venturas and Pat Buchanan’s in our country free rein to capture the economic discontent with their dangerous ideologies. History proves that, when things get objectively worse and worse, people don't automatically get more and more ideologically revolutionary. Sharp economic crisis and social disruptions haven't yet hit in the US. But when they do, they will throw more people into motion and most of these people will follow the path of habit and take up the solutions offered by the forces of reaction. People will respond to these economic and social convulsions with their political backwardness and the ideological rot the ruling class hands them to fight out the questions of the day and petty bourgeois theories of race -- unless they have taken up the ideological and political weapons of class to fight for their actual interests. Consciousness lags behind the economic reality, but it catches up in leaps. Things will move faster in both directions, that is, towards both class identity and unity and towards fascism and reaction. Therefore, now is the time to prepare for the convulsions that will rock society and draw more people into struggle and debate. This moment holds both great danger and great opportunity. Objective conditions are bringing our country to a fork in the road. People will determine which route our country takes. 24. Tactics, which argue that social revolution, begins after taking over political power, is from lasting revolution theory that bourgeois revolution beginning in feudal system makes to last to proletariat revolution. The tactics succeeded in Russia revolution 1917, after that USSR established, and it formed 3rd international, thus encourage worldwide communist movement. In response that bourgeois class maintain its system by socialization of integument of valorization. Actually, the Leninist were able to seize political power – the authority of the state, as the culmination of 25 years battling opportunism in the labor movement in Russia and defeating the various petty bourgeois trends in the working class movement. Lenin's July 4, 1920, Theses On the Fundamental Tasks of the Second Congress of the Communist International summarize the demands place on the communist as leaders of the working class movement. The social revolution begins in the economy as the result of the injection of a new qualitative “substance” and the resultant reconfiguration of the productive forces constitutes an era or leap to established the predominance of the new quality over the old, and this entail the battle between classes and the struggle for power. At each quantitative stage of this process – in the past, a cyclical crisis has emerged as capital fought to reorganize itself and the communist fought to win over the workers to their class interest. The communist could not and cannot exceed the limitations of the class consciousness of the workers, who they are charged with educating in the art of the class struggle. Association principle usually is grasped as mutual aid and its altruist consisted of filling up other’s lack. Instead of political will unity as priority, front line of association movement which fills up other’s lack de-reify capitalist system globally, thus ring the funeral of capitalism. “Political will unity” is understood to mean the organization of the communist into a compact mass, pursuing a common strategic line of approach in the various social movements. The “political will unity” of the communist is always the priority because it is the communist that are the advanced detachment of the working class; its leader
Charles and Race Theory 2
Charles and Race Theory 2 by Waistline2 27 May 2002 16:00 UTC Melvin, The shortest answer to all you say in these many, many posts is that race is a historical category. Basically, my answers will focus on that. You are wrong when you assert, argue, assume, insist, write at length, that race is only a biological and not a historical category. It is a historical category masquerading as a biological category. Charles CB: Yes, your specific interpretation of Marxism may prohibit you, but not all interpretations of Marxism, including Marx's own interpretation of Marxism do not prohibit Marxists from speaking of race as an authentic concept of a Bolshevik strategist and tactician. As I have pointed out to you several times, in _Capital_ he gives a specific strategic and tactical pronouncement using race as an authentic concept; Labor in white skin will not be free while labor in Black skin in branded. You have not responded to this. It is a devastating critique of your claim that race is not an authentic concept for Marxism. Respond to this: MARX HIMSELF USES RACE AS AN AUTHENTIC CONCEPT CRITICAL TO THE AMERICAN WORKNG CLASS STRUGGLE AND STRATEGY. Reply Marx uses the word â*niggerâ and this does not make him a racialist or chauvinist. Marx use of the words â*Negro raceâ does not create a theory of race. In fact, Marx use of the words Negro race is equivalent to the words African American people as a historically evolved people and is not an â*authentic conceptâ of race. CB: If you are saying that Marx is just using Negro as slang, but not in a scientific or serious sense in the passage you quoted or the one's I quoted, then I disagree with you. Marx is serious when he recognizes that the working masses in the U.S. and elsewhere are divided based on skin color ,which equals race. He is serious and empirically accurate. It is true that Marx did not have the benefit of the refutations of the biological concept of race that came after his lifetime. But Marx is rigorous enough to restrict himself to race as a historical and not biological category. This is what I have said all along on this thread, and what you ignore and misrepresent. Race is a valid historical category, and a valid historical materialist category. It is an aggravated form of nationality. You do not seem to cognize that in what I say. You keep ignoring it and attributing to me something I am not saying. The shortest answer to all you say is that race is a historical category. Basically, my answers will focus on that. You are wrong when you assert, argue, assume, insist, write at length, that race is only a biological and not a historical category. It is a historical category masquerading as a biological category. The issue before us is the framing of the â*Negro Questionâ as a modern national colonial question not simply â*Labor in white skin will not be free while labor in Black skin in branded,â â as was the case prior to 1865. CB: Do you agree that for Marxists, a modern national colonial question is a derivative of Marx and Engels's discussion of national questions, as when they say Workers of all Countries , Unite ? Or do Marx and Engels teach us nothing about the national colonial question, and it just pops up totally new after their lifetimes ? ^^^ â*MARX HIMSELF USES (The words Negro) RACE AS AN AUTHENTIC CONCEPT CRITICAL TO THE AMERICAN WORKNG CLASS STRUGGLE AND STRATEGY before the rise of modern imperialism and in the context of latifundia slavery. Nowhere does Marx use race as an authentic concept. Repeat: No where does Marx use race as an authentic concept. ^^ CB: Are you saying that there _is_ an authentic concept of race in analysis of the latifundia slavery ? Or not ? If not, then the difference with Marx is not that he is discussing latifundia slavery as opposed to modern imperialism, but that there just isn't any authentic concept of race whether in relation to latifundia slavery or modern imperialism. Again , race is an authentic historical category both in relation to capitalist slavery and post slavery capitalism. It is valid not only with respect to the U.S. with Black and Red people , but it is global in relation to the many peoples of Asia . It operated in the consciousnesses of U.S. workers who were willing to fight wars in Korea and Viet Nam, et al. Where Marx uses the words â*Negro raceâ and Eric Foner uses the words â*racial harmonyâ radically different conceptions of reality are being expressed. Marx us of the words â*Negro Raceâ means the class of citizens that were slaves in the Southern portion of America. CB: You are going to have to argue this. You can't prove by assertion that when Marx uses Negro he doesn't mean race or , as you put it, authentic race. Eric Fonerâ*s use of the words â*racial harmonyâ means all
Re: Charles and Race Theory 2
On Marxline you wrote"
Melvin,
The shortest answer to all you say in these many, many posts is that "race" is a historical category. Basically, my answers will focus on that. You are wrong when you assert, argue, assume, insist, write at length, that race is only a biological and not a historical category. It is a historical category masquerading as a biological category.
You are absolutely wrong. I assert that race is an ideological category existing in the superstructure without a material reality.
Comrade, what I write at length about is a summation of the development of the African American people on the one hand and the political reality that shape the current history of America.
In everything I write the approach is the changes in the means of production - quantitative expansions, what creates the framework for the assertions of the African American people. You speak of race but cannot define race because it is not a historical category. The words "historical category" means a material relationship that developed over along period of time, i.e., historically.
It is true that ideological forms developed from the prehistoric but these forms at best express and "relect" - in quotes material relations.
The question is not "right or wrong" unless you are talking about the standpoint of the Marxist methodology.
Present the exhaustive exposition on race and prove me wrong.
I examined and present every fundamental juncture in the evolution of the African American peoples, the nature of Reconstruction; the mechanization of agriculture, their further proletarianization in the heart of Anglo-American and you present some nonsense about a theory of race.
Expound the race theory and prove your Marxist mantle.
Comrade there is no short answer to the national-colonial question in American and I write as a voice of the Anglo-American proletariat. There is no such thing as race in material reality. Race is a category of the ideological superstructure.
I should tell you what my mother told me as a child: a shortcut ("The shortest answer to all you say") is the long way around and not worth the trouble.
Race is not a historical category. Race is an ideological category historically evolved by the bourgeoisie.
Melvin P
SEC is investigating Halliburton
Top Financial News 05/28 22:43 Halliburton Says SEC Is Investigating Its Accounting (Update3) By Daniel Taub Dallas, May 28 (Bloomberg) -- Halliburton Co., the world's second-largest provider of oilfield services, said the Securities and Exchange Commission is investigating a change in accounting practices made while Vice President Dick Cheney ran the company. The company received a letter from the SEC informing it of the investigation into how it treated cost overruns on construction jobs, Chief Financial Officer Doug Foshee said in an interview. Halliburton said the investigation probably stems from a New York Times article last week that said the company altered its accounting practices in 1998 so it could report as revenue more than $100 million in disputed construction costs, and didn't disclose the change to investors for more than a year. A growing list of energy companies, including Dynegy Inc. and Halliburton rival Baker Hughes Inc., have had their financial statements probed by regulators since the collapse of Enron Corp. last year. Halliburton shares have tumbled 59 percent in the past year, partly on concern about rising asbestos claims. There were some business-driven changes that prompted them to change their accounting, said Fred Mutalibov, an analyst with SWS Securities who rates Halliburton shares strong buy and doesn't own them. And the amount affected was immaterial to their total revenue. Foshee declined to provide a copy of the one-paragraph letter. Halliburton said it expects to receive a formal request for documents or a subpoena in the next few days. Cheney Cheney was Halliburton's chief executive officer from 1995 to August 2000. He also served as the company's chairman from 1996 to October 1998 and again from February to August 2000. Arthur Andersen LLP was Halliburton's auditor at the time of the change. The accounting firm today is on trial in Houston for destroying Enron audit records that government investigators believe might reveal whether fraud led to the energy trader's demise. Halliburton fired Andersen on April 17. Halliburton said the accounting change involved recording revenue and accounts receivable when it expected such items to be collectible from its customers. The company has continued this accounting treatment of similar items since 1998 and has never recorded a profit on a job where an unapproved claim or change order has been recorded in revenue. Halliburton said it told the SEC that it will cooperate with the investigation. A spokeswoman for Cheney couldn't immediately be reached for comment. Energy Woes Dynegy Inc. Chief Executive Officer Charles L. Watson resigned today after investigations of the company's trading and accounting contributed to a 62 percent drop in its stock this year. Watson departed after the company disclosed bogus electricity trades with CMS Energy Corp., whose CEO resigned Friday. The top two traders at Reliant Resources Inc., which did similar round- trip trades with CMS, also have quit. Halliburton settled 30 asbestos cases in New York for an undisclosed amount today. It had three asbestos-exposure verdicts totaling $152 million in 2001. Shares of Dallas-based Halliburton rose 25 cents to $19.35. The announcement was made after the close of regular U.S. trading.
Re: Question about the economics of information
On Tue, 28 May 2002, Sabri Oncu wrote: Not at all. We need to figure out a way to add emotions to these e-mails. The other day I responded to an e-mail I received from my wife. She was asking me to add a few lines to an e-mail she was sending to a common friend. In my response I made a joke that costed me two days of tension at home. Her perception was that I was insulting her in the presence(!) of a friend and this was a perception of someone who knows me since 1983. Oy, do I know that the hard way. But this is why smiley faces were invented -- they indicate the presence of a joke the way a question mark indicates the presence of a question. By signalling tone of voice. They look dumb and make you feel obvious (since not signalling a joke is a fundamental rule of good joke telling). But it's much better than sleeping in the doghouse. And after you write a few billion of them they begin to fade out and look like punctuation marks. Maybe some day they'll get stylized they way hieroglyphs became letters. )) Michael
