{"id":606,"date":"2018-01-31T21:16:07","date_gmt":"2018-01-31T21:16:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ditext.com\/wordpress\/?p=606"},"modified":"2018-01-31T22:32:35","modified_gmt":"2018-01-31T22:32:35","slug":"a-bullshit-argument-against-the-writings-of-karl-marx-by-stefan-molyneux","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ditext.com\/wordpress\/2018\/01\/31\/a-bullshit-argument-against-the-writings-of-karl-marx-by-stefan-molyneux\/","title":{"rendered":"A bullshit argument against the writings of Karl Marx by Stefan Molyneux"},"content":{"rendered":"

I have mixed attitudes towards the videos by\u00a0Stefan Molyneux. On the one hand I\u00a0think he is an intelligent, articulate person\u00a0with an interesting stage presence, and\u00a0what he says, for the most part, seems\u00a0reasonable and acceptable. But, on the\u00a0other hand, he comes off as being\u00a0arrogantly cock-sure of himself and full of\u00a0himself, and in this regard, he is not at all\u00a0appealing. But enough of praise — all this\u00a0is ad hominem<\/em>, and, therefore, irrelevant.<\/p>\n

What is relevant is the examination of what\u00a0he claims. He claims to be an anarchist\u00a0and a capitalist, which makes him an\u00a0anarcho-capitalist. By this he means that\u00a0he wishes that society be run on the basis\u00a0of free exchange without government\u00a0interference. Now the model of such a\u00a0society would be any primitve tribe. But a\u00a0primitive tribe is not a capitalist society,\u00a0even though it has free trade. Free trade is not a sufficient condition for capitalism. The necessary condition for the existence of a capitalist society is the existence of a proletariat.<\/p>\n

Max Weber, in the 22nd chapter: “The Meaning and Presuppositions of Modern Capitalism” of General Economic History<\/em> (Wirtschaftsgeschichte<\/em>, 1923), translated by Frank H. Knight, 1927, lists six necessary conditions for modern or “rational” capitalism. What interests me, and on which I want to focus attention, is the 5th necessary condition, which is:<\/p>\n

“The fifth feature is free labor. Persons must be present who are not only legally in the position, but are also economically compelled, to sell their labor on the market without restriction. It is in contradiction to the essence of capitalism, and the development of capitalism is impossible, if such a propertyless stratum is absent, a class compelled to sell its labor services to live; and it is likewise impossible if only unfree labor is at hand. Rational capitalistic calculation is possible only on the basis of free labor; only where in consequence of the existence of workers who in the formal sense voluntarily, but actually under the compulsion of the whip of hunger, offer themselves, the costs of products may be unambiguously determined by agreement in advance.”<\/p>\n

Proletarians are people who do not\u00a0possess land nor have free access to land\u00a0for subsistence, and they are neither\u00a0slaves nor serfs. The question arise: How\u00a0is it that portions of the earth became the\u00a0property of some individuals? And the answer to this is given, among others, by Karl Marx in his various writings, particularly in Das Kapital<\/em>.<\/p>\n

I thought I could get an insight into\u00a0Marxism from a video by Stefan Molyneux.\u00a0But, no. Instead of examining the reasoning\u00a0of Karl Marx about this topic in Das Kapital\u00a0<\/em>\u00a0or in any other of his writings, Molyneux\u00a0attacks the character of the author — the\u00a0person Karl Marx. He launches a full-scale\u00a0ad hominem<\/em> attack.<\/p>\n

My reaction. What he\u00a0says about the life and character of Karl\u00a0Marx may all be true, but irrelevant<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

To make his ad hominem<\/em> seem plausible, he\u00a0argues by the following analogy.\u00a0 Suppose you were in a bookstore and\u00a0picked-up a copy of a diet book. On the\u00a0cover is a picture of the overly obese\u00a0author. Immediately you wonder.<\/p>\n

“If the diet works, why didn’t the author use\u00a0it on himself? Ah, maybe he did use it, but\u00a0it doesn’t work. Well, I am not going to\u00a0waste my time on this diet, which obviously\u00a0does not work. Or, wait, maybe the author\u00a0thinks obesity is OK; so he doesn’t apply it\u00a0to himself. Hmmm, he either sees no value\u00a0in dieting, or the diet does not work.\u00a0Obviously, this book is worthless.”<\/p>\n

The reasoning is an example of the genetic\u00a0fallacy<\/a>, specifically an ad hominem fallacy<\/a>.\u00a0The above reasoning for the dismissal of\u00a0the book is ultimately unreasonable. Suppose the author has a congenital condition that\u00a0leads to obesity which no diet can cure. So,\u00a0the fact that the author is obese does not\u00a0imply either that the author sees no value\u00a0in dieting, nor that the diet which he\u00a0recommends does not work.<\/p>\n

Using this fallacious reasoning for the dismissal of a book on dieting by an obese author, he tries to apply a similar line of reasoning about Karl Marx’s writings on the basis of Marx’s life and character. Thus, by a moral condemnation of Marx, he refuses to read or discuss what Marx wrote. Incredible!<\/p>\n

Most articles and books which I read, I have no idea about the identity of the author. And it doesn’t matter. I am able to judge the merit of their writing independently of any knowledge of the traits of the author.<\/p>\n