This is one of my most favorite subjects in Marx about human nature and ourselves. Like all animals we have eat, sleep, reproduce but unlike all animals we have to work for our sustenance. That was the clincher for me in Marx the role of labor in the making of our species and planet. I think it was in his 1859 Critique of Political Economy where he exposes surplus-value as the difference between labor-power and the value of labor. Individual objects, he says, are not without any connection to labor and this is what unravels the mystery of commodities and money for people,--- that as individual objects they are relating labor of two distinct kinds in each other when money is involved in their exchange. The labor in commodities is concrete labor and the labor in money is abstract labor on the level microscopic discovery. What it means to be Human is answered in Part III The Labor-Process and the Production of use-Values Vol. I Capital, K Marx. Labor as an activity defines human beings as natural as fish are to the ocean and because our species must work to produce our subsistence; our hands, arms, legs, brains are tools within natural limits and not forced. As human we are not the subsistence for another human. We do not consume exclusively from nature without changing nature makes us human. Our consumption embodies everything that is at the same time a production and our production embodies everything that is at the same time a consumption activity in the act of production. Its a deep dive but The 1859 Critique and the Labor Process in Vol I are good starters to get this eye-opening theory beautifully illustrated for Marx was a great writer.
I dont mean to be so offtopic but does anyone know of a tool to log back into an instagram account..? I somehow forgot the password. I would love any tricks you can offer me!
@Arthur Aydin Thanks so much for your reply. I found the site through google and Im in the hacking process atm. Seems to take quite some time so I will reply here later when my account password hopefully is recovered.
Hello Matthew. Thanks for the great video. As I am writing a term paper, I wanted to ask what the original source is. Is it the Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844 or did you use more?
While my interpretation is informed by a lot of secondary sources, the only text I specifically discuss or quote here is Marx's 1844 Manuscripts. And--if it's helpful--the specific translation I'm using is Martin Mulligan's, which is in the public domain. It's available, among other places, here: www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1844/manuscripts/preface.htm
Thank you for these videos on Marx! It was struggling to understand him, but this really helped. I have one query, though. Often, the argument given is that there is no alternative to this system of capitalism that meets people's needs. Does anyone have any examples of economic systems which do not require such alienation, and have successfully met the needs of people(to some degree)? If anyone knows any articles or academic papers, that would be really helpful too! :)
That's an excellent question! Keep in mind that the concept of "species-being" is one that Marx uses very early on; at this point in his career, he is still a "Feuerbachian" (as Engels will later say), and it's from Feuerbach that he's pulling the term. The reason that's important is this: Marx at this point thinks of "alienation" as the fundamental problem of history--it's the "puzzle" that we're slowly solving, and that "solution" is what will eventually be called "Communism." This means that other various economic systems are "steps" along the way (including "crude communism," but also of course including feudalism, capitalism, etc.)--but he would not say that there's any economic system that doesn't "require" alienation. Earlier systems may have been "less" alienated (especially for some people), but they still lead "forward" to capitalism and the intensification of alienation--these are "stages" of history, and it's unfolding in a very Hegelian manner in this work. As for your search for articles or papers: I have found Paul Ricoeur's chapters on Marx in his Lectures on Ideology and Utopia (Columbia University Press, 1986) to be really clear and helpful.
A minor nitpick: humans are animals, and I think we would be better off if we stopped talking about nonhuman animals as though they're all radically different from us. Ultimately, all living things on Earth share a common ancestor once you go far enough back, humans have just gotten really good at deceiving ourselves about where we come from. I just found your channel and hope I won't be disappointed by your treatment of Marx's ideas; I understand why rich people hate him, but cannot understand why anyone who doesn't make money by stealing from the working class would side with the wealthy against Marxists.
Thanks for your comment; you'll have to let me know how you ultimately think I handle Marx's ideas here. To respond to your specific comment here: I'm not sure if you'd say that your "minor nitpick" is with Marx or with my interpretation of Marx, but either way I don't think there's any reason to deny what you've said--we are indeed animals, the same as birds and beavers and foxes. However, I think it's important to recognize the role that philosophical anthropology is playing here: Marx isn't trying to deny that we are animals (he says as much), but he IS interested in what makes humans a very distinct KIND of an animal (namely, what Marx calls "species-being"). To say that humans are capable of finding meaning in their actions, and to say that they take up a reflective stance on their own actions and world, is not to "deceive ourselves" about where we come from! Animals or not, humans are also reflective, autonomous creatures--beings with reason, free will, and the ability to produce cooperatively with others. And, among other things, this means that humans can be alienated, exploited, oppressed, and even just plain old dissatisfied in ways that, say, a snake or a cockroach can't be.
This, I think, is one of the interesting things about the 1844 Manuscripts: There's really no mapping out of "the communist society" here. As Paul Paul Ricœur suggests in his lectures on the manuscripts (in Lectures on Ideology and Utopia), "communism" is a kind of place-holder term or an empty signifier: It's simply the word to name whatever that solution eventually looks like. Marx spends the manuscripts diagnosing and analyzing the PROBLEM--such that he at least sees the first steps that WOULD need to be taken to solve it--but a proper SOLUTION to the problem will involve a new system created by people who have already started to overcome the problem. And that's not us! We're still too shaped by the problem! As a sense of what he means, think about the very naturalness of your observation: the "natural" human inclinations towards selfishness, competition, etc., make communist aspirations seem far-fetched! But this is Marx's critique of the political economists in the first few paragraphs of the manuscripts: They read the present back into the past, and assume that the human condition must be human nature.
The concrete examples you use to explain the concept are really excellent, so helpful.
This is one of my most favorite subjects in Marx about human nature and ourselves.
Like all animals we have eat, sleep, reproduce but unlike all animals we have to work for our sustenance.
That was the clincher for me in Marx the role of labor in the making of our species and planet.
I think it was in his 1859 Critique of Political Economy where he exposes surplus-value as the difference between labor-power and the value of labor.
Individual objects, he says, are not without any connection to labor and this is what unravels the mystery of commodities and money for people,--- that as individual objects they are relating labor of two distinct kinds in each other when money is involved in their exchange. The labor in commodities is concrete labor and the labor in money is abstract labor on the level microscopic discovery.
What it means to be Human is answered in Part III The Labor-Process and the Production of use-Values Vol. I Capital, K Marx. Labor as an activity defines human beings as natural as fish are to the ocean and because our species must work to produce our subsistence; our hands, arms, legs, brains are tools within natural limits and not forced. As human we are not the subsistence for another human. We do not consume exclusively from nature without changing nature makes us human. Our consumption embodies everything that is at the same time a production and our production embodies everything that is at the same time a consumption activity in the act of production.
Its a deep dive but The 1859 Critique and the Labor Process in Vol I are good starters to get this eye-opening theory beautifully illustrated for Marx was a great writer.
Been a Marxist for 20 years, I wish I'd have had this 20 years ago, it would've saved so much time. Outstanding content
I dont mean to be so offtopic but does anyone know of a tool to log back into an instagram account..?
I somehow forgot the password. I would love any tricks you can offer me!
@Myles Terrance Instablaster :)
@Arthur Aydin Thanks so much for your reply. I found the site through google and Im in the hacking process atm.
Seems to take quite some time so I will reply here later when my account password hopefully is recovered.
@Arthur Aydin it worked and I finally got access to my account again. I am so happy:D
Thanks so much you really help me out :D
@Myles Terrance You are welcome =)
The best video I've seen regarding Marx. Thank you, Matthew.
this is so great! thank you so much for making a video on species being :)
Just wow. You explained this perfectly
This is awesome! Thank you so much!
thank you more ppl need to see this so good
awesome stuff man
Excellent 👏👏👏
very nice
background music distracting- but I still watched the whole thing and you did an awesome job. thanks !
Hello Matthew. Thanks for the great video. As I am writing a term paper, I wanted to ask what the original source is. Is it the Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844 or did you use more?
While my interpretation is informed by a lot of secondary sources, the only text I specifically discuss or quote here is Marx's 1844 Manuscripts. And--if it's helpful--the specific translation I'm using is Martin Mulligan's, which is in the public domain. It's available, among other places, here: www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1844/manuscripts/preface.htm
Thank you for these videos on Marx! It was struggling to understand him, but this really helped. I have one query, though. Often, the argument given is that there is no alternative to this system of capitalism that meets people's needs. Does anyone have any examples of economic systems which do not require such alienation, and have successfully met the needs of people(to some degree)? If anyone knows any articles or academic papers, that would be really helpful too! :)
That's an excellent question! Keep in mind that the concept of "species-being" is one that Marx uses very early on; at this point in his career, he is still a "Feuerbachian" (as Engels will later say), and it's from Feuerbach that he's pulling the term.
The reason that's important is this: Marx at this point thinks of "alienation" as the fundamental problem of history--it's the "puzzle" that we're slowly solving, and that "solution" is what will eventually be called "Communism." This means that other various economic systems are "steps" along the way (including "crude communism," but also of course including feudalism, capitalism, etc.)--but he would not say that there's any economic system that doesn't "require" alienation. Earlier systems may have been "less" alienated (especially for some people), but they still lead "forward" to capitalism and the intensification of alienation--these are "stages" of history, and it's unfolding in a very Hegelian manner in this work.
As for your search for articles or papers: I have found Paul Ricoeur's chapters on Marx in his Lectures on Ideology and Utopia (Columbia University Press, 1986) to be really clear and helpful.
@@MatthewLampert Sorry about the delayed reply, but thank you so much! The clarification was really helpful. I'll check out these chapters!
When will this guy talk about species-being?
A minor nitpick: humans are animals, and I think we would be better off if we stopped talking about nonhuman animals as though they're all radically different from us. Ultimately, all living things on Earth share a common ancestor once you go far enough back, humans have just gotten really good at deceiving ourselves about where we come from. I just found your channel and hope I won't be disappointed by your treatment of Marx's ideas; I understand why rich people hate him, but cannot understand why anyone who doesn't make money by stealing from the working class would side with the wealthy against Marxists.
Thanks for your comment; you'll have to let me know how you ultimately think I handle Marx's ideas here. To respond to your specific comment here: I'm not sure if you'd say that your "minor nitpick" is with Marx or with my interpretation of Marx, but either way I don't think there's any reason to deny what you've said--we are indeed animals, the same as birds and beavers and foxes. However, I think it's important to recognize the role that philosophical anthropology is playing here: Marx isn't trying to deny that we are animals (he says as much), but he IS interested in what makes humans a very distinct KIND of an animal (namely, what Marx calls "species-being"). To say that humans are capable of finding meaning in their actions, and to say that they take up a reflective stance on their own actions and world, is not to "deceive ourselves" about where we come from! Animals or not, humans are also reflective, autonomous creatures--beings with reason, free will, and the ability to produce cooperatively with others. And, among other things, this means that humans can be alienated, exploited, oppressed, and even just plain old dissatisfied in ways that, say, a snake or a cockroach can't be.
how can the communist society would deal with the absurdity.the boringness or our brains rewarding competitive tendency ...
This, I think, is one of the interesting things about the 1844 Manuscripts: There's really no mapping out of "the communist society" here. As Paul Paul Ricœur suggests in his lectures on the manuscripts (in Lectures on Ideology and Utopia), "communism" is a kind of place-holder term or an empty signifier: It's simply the word to name whatever that solution eventually looks like. Marx spends the manuscripts diagnosing and analyzing the PROBLEM--such that he at least sees the first steps that WOULD need to be taken to solve it--but a proper SOLUTION to the problem will involve a new system created by people who have already started to overcome the problem. And that's not us! We're still too shaped by the problem! As a sense of what he means, think about the very naturalness of your observation: the "natural" human inclinations towards selfishness, competition, etc., make communist aspirations seem far-fetched! But this is Marx's critique of the political economists in the first few paragraphs of the manuscripts: They read the present back into the past, and assume that the human condition must be human nature.