The Rational Proof of God's Existence

[118118]

What I meant was that, by the end of the twentieth century, financial value was widely recognized to be independent of the material tokens that are used to represent it. The last vestiges of materiality have departed from it

Your not saying that money is the only material component of fv surely. What about labour?

 

[phildwyer]

Your not saying that money is the only material component of fv surely. What about labour?

FV is a *representation* of labour-power, it is not labour-power itself.

 

[phildwyer]

Why can't fv be explained by physical process? Why does something being malign and powerful imply that it is composed of another substance?

Are you seriously saying that it is conventional to think of fv as a spirit?

Obviously its not conventional today, although it was in the past. My aim is to show that this is nevertheless the most appropriate way of conceiving FV. Once I have established this, we will move on to consider what *kind* of spirit it is.

 

[118118]

FV is a *representation* of labour-power, it is not labour-power itself.

Do you have an argument for this. I don't seem able to make one out so far.

 

[Jo/Joe]

Er... consciousness, and the ability to imagine possibilities that comes with it?

I was asking Z Word how he can tell that reality is hallucinatory. Surely we need non-hallucinatory reference points to be able to define what is hallucinatory. It's gibberish.

 

[118118]

Referring to financial value he writes:

"It is clear that this mediator thus becomes a real God

I would think it more reasonable to think that Marx was equating fv with God because of the way we act towards it, not because it is some strange supernatural substance.
And not all metaphysical concepts are supernatural, many scientific concept are theoretical concepts which are analyzable with metaphysics, but are not considered supernatural.

 

[118118]

I was asking Z Word how he can tell that reality is hallucinatory. Surely we need non-hallucinatory reference points to be able to define what is hallucinatory. It's gibberish.

Hallucinations are described in the DSM as an incorrect inference to external reality. That would imply that to correctly define something as a hallucination a correct concept of reality is sufficient, which in this case Z Word says we have.

 

[gurrier]

What I meant was that, by the end of the twentieth century, financial value was widely recognized to be independent of the material tokens that are used to represent it.

Value, being an abstract concept, is always independent of whatever tokens represent it, whether the tokes be cowrie shells, blocks of salt, bars of gold, paper sheets, or binary codes.

The last vestiges of materiality have departed from it,

Not unless you can't translate financial value into material goods anymore. As far as I can see the fidelity of the financial value -> material goods relationship is as strong as it's ever been.

and value is now revealed as a purely imaginary, but nonetheless real and powerful, force.

Are the police who will imprison me if I misbehave with the tokens of value puerly imaginary?

It is also revealed to be pure representation, a system of signs that function independently of any material referents.

I think that this is a plausible conclusion if you analyse systems of value representation in isolation from their social context. However, I believe that 'value' merely expresses a power relationship. In my way of looking at the world, value tokens have always represented an ability to exert power over other people. All tokens of value have been signifiers of this underlying 'value'. From cowrie shells to blocks of salt, paper bills and binary sequences, I do not believe that there has been a fundamental change in the materiality or the abstract nature of value.

The manipulation of these financial signs is the motor of the postmodrn economy, and bigger fortunes are now made by this manipulation than by material production.

Not true. None of the world's richest people made their wealth through financial speculation.

I now want to return to the *four* qualities that, as I have argued, differentiate financial value from any other "idea," to the degree that it cannot by described as an "idea" (I see no difference between the terms "idea" and "construct" in this context, BTW). We shall discuss each in turn. Let us begin with the *power* of value, its efficacious force in the real world. Value is an instance of what J.L. Austin calls the "performative sign," it is a sign that *does* things. On these grounds, many philosophers of money have drawn an analogy between value and spirit, as for instance Karl Marx in On The Jewish Question. Note how Marx describes the imposition of exchange-value upon use-value (of which financial value is the instrument) as an *unnatural* imposition of sign upon essence. Referring to financial value he writes:

That's just silly. Love does things, fear does things, has power, etc. You can make the same assertion about any generalised abstraction.

So a capitalist economy is a *supernatural* economy, which works by imposing human concepts and signs on natural objects. The supernatural, or metaphysical if you prefer, force of value obscures the natural essence of things.

That's ridiculous. You seem to be applying a uniquely bizzare definition of supernatural here. As the word is commonly used, it does not mean 'imposing human concepts on natural objects'. For example, if I was to say "that bunny rabbit is cute" it would be 'imposing human concepts on natural objects' but very few people would see it as being 'supernatural'. Of course, the cuteness of the bunny would obscure its "natural essence" too. You are, once again, twisting the meaning of words to suit your conclusion.

The first obstacle to conceiving of value as a spirit is thus eliminated: it clearly *is* possible for nonmaterial entities to have material effects that transcend the volition of human agents.

Love/Fear/Hate/etc have material effects that transcend volition of human agents. Once again this assertion can be made about any abstract concept that is totalised across the species.

Note that Marx describes value and the spirits of religion as being equally real--or rather, equally *unreal.* They are real, or unreal, in the same way. Is financial value "real?" This is the next question we will consider.

* fastens seatbelt *

 

[nino_savatte]

FV is a *representation* of labour-power, it is not labour-power itself.

All I have to say is this

In a sense, Drucker[2] states that we have to choose between precapitalist deconstructive theory and neodialectic theory. The deconstructive paradigm of expression suggests that truth may be used to reinforce hierarchy, given that reality is equal to art. However, Marx suggests the use of textual socialism to challenge culture. The subject is interpolated into a Debordist situation that includes sexuality as a reality.

More gibberish to counter your gibberish. Even someone with a scant understanding of philosophy can see you're talking bollocks. You will deny it....of course.

 

[Pickman's model]

what the flying fuck has all this value fuckwittery to do with god and his/her non-existence?

 

[slaar]

what the flying fuck has all this value fuckwittery to do with god and his/her non-existence?

If only people would live phil alone, we might find out.

Or perhaps not.

 

[fractionMan]

what the flying fuck has all this value fuckwittery to do with god and his/her non-existence?

Something to do with value=the devil -> god. Or somesuch fuckballs.

 

[phildwyer]

More gibberish to counter your gibberish. Even someone with a scant understanding of philosophy can see you're talking bollocks. You will deny it....of course.

Nino, just shut up will you? Are you now going to post a random selection of postmodernist rubbish whenever you feel like it? All this will show is how incapable you are of telling sense from nonsense. Can't you see that even *Gurrier* has now deigned to talk some sense, and that you are left alone gibbering in the corner? Please. I have no problem if you want to argue properly about anything I say, but you obviously don't, you're just going to sit there like a great lump, muttering "heh these postmodernists don't half talk some shite, look here's another one, heh heh." Nino, *anyone* can do that. Its not clever. I suppose you might be dense enough to find it amusing, but no-one else is. In any case, no-one can accuse me of using jargon as obfuscation: I have scrupulously avoided using technical terms, at least until ViolentPanda recently attacked me for not giving sources, and the ideas I describe are readily accessible in ordinary language. *You're* the one who's always droning on about "have you read Foucault" blah blah, so don't even bother, you *bore.*

 

[Loki]

I'm still waiting for god. Where is he now?

 

[nino_savatte]

Nino, just shut up will you? Are you now going to post a random selection of postmodernist rubbish whenever you feel like it? All this will show is how incapable you are of telling sense from nonsense. Can't you see that even *Gurrier* has now deigned to talk some sense, and that you are left alone gibbering in the corner? Please. I have no problem if you want to argue properly about anything I say, but you obviously don't, you're just going to sit there like a great lump, muttering "heh these postmodernists don't half talk some shite, look here's another one, heh heh." Nino, *anyone* can do that. Its not clever. I suppose you might be dense enough to find it amusing, but no-one else is. In any case, no-one can accuse me of using jargon as obfuscation: I have scrupulously avoided using technical terms, at least until ViolentPanda recently attacked me for not giving sources, and the ideas I describe are readily accessible in ordinary language. *You're* the one who's always droning on about "have you read Foucault" blah blah, so don't even bother, you *bore.*

It's no worse than the random nonsense that you post here...is it? But I don't expect you to understand or to acknoweledge that give your obvious egomania.

Anyone can claim that they have "rational proof of God's existence". In your case it is nothing more than an elaborate windup to satisfy the needs of your pitiful ego.

Let's face it, there isn't much here in the way of substance either, though you would have us all believe that you have a vastly superior intellect to the rest of us. There is a word for people like you: sociopath.

 

[nino_savatte]

I'm still waiting for god. Where is he now?

He won't be showing up anytime soon. After more than 50 pages of this crap it is obvious -even to the blind - that phil is simply using this as a means to feed his ego.

 

[phildwyer]

Just shut up, Nino. This thread is too important to be derailed by your gloomy, bitter and twisted muttering. I simply cannot understand what drives you to spend all this time and effort on a thread you claim to despise. Day in, day out, you're here--sniping, muttering, grumbling, the making the air noxious with the stench of your envy and despair. Why do you do it? What's in it for you? Can't you go off and do something you actually enjoy, pull the wings off some flies or something? Watch the raindrops race down your window-pane? Find some other way of filling your empty days, please. We're on serious business here.

 

[Batley]

I'm still waiting for god. Where is he now?

I'm here. I need this trying to work out whether I exist or not. You have your answer.

Now fuck off and mind your own business.

 

[nino_savatte]

Just shut up, Nino. This thread is too important to be derailed by your gloomy, bitter and twisted muttering. I simply cannot understand what drives you to spend all this time and effort on a thread you claim to despise. Day in, day out, you're here--sniping, muttering, grumbling, the making the air noxious with the stench of your envy and despair. Why do you do it? What's in it for you? Can't you go off and do something you actually enjoy, pull the wings off some flies or something? Watch the raindrops race down your window-pane? Find some other way of filling your empty days, please. We're on serious business here.

"This thread is too important"? How so? It is important in your imagination and nowhere else. It is an annexe of your enormous ego. As for "envy and despair" again, that is another product of your ego's imagination. Only in your mind do these things exist. As for me "despising" this thread...again this is in your imagination. There is no "serious business" here, it is just you and your tiresome pseudo-philosophical excursions - all of which lack the integrtiy to hold themselves together and if anyone disagrees with you or points out the weaknesses in your dodgy arguments, you treat them to abuse. That is egomania.

What's the matter phil, am I getting too close to the truth? I think I am. Anyone who spends his/her time on this forum pondering the "nature" of 'God' obviously has far too much time on their hands. How much time have you spent here on this pointless exercise?

 

[Wee Beastie]

Reducing god to your meager rational explanations surely undermines it? Why would you want a rational explanation anyway? All it does is reduce whatever god is to something explained by you when surely it is incomprehesible beyond our wildest imaginations.
Julian Huxley said: "there is no reason why the universe is perfect; there is, indeed, no reason why it should be rational."

 

[In Bloom]

Reducing god to your meager rational explanations surely undermines it? Why would you want a rational explanation anyway? All it does is reduce whatever god is to something explained by you when surely it is incomprehesible beyond our wildest imaginations.
Julian Huxley said: "there is no reason why the universe is perfect; there is, indeed, no reason why it should be rational."

Yep, just ignore all that horrible "logic" nonsense and maybe it'll just go away.

 

[phildwyer]

Reducing god to your meager rational explanations surely undermines it? Why would you want a rational explanation anyway? All it does is reduce whatever god is to something explained by you when surely it is incomprehesible beyond our wildest imaginations.
Julian Huxley said: "there is no reason why the universe is perfect; there is, indeed, no reason why it should be rational."

There are two aspects to God: the hidden and the revealed. In Christianity, for instance, this is expressed as the relation between the "Father" and the "Son." As you say, we can know nothing of God "in Himself" other than the bare fact of His existence. But we *can* know God as He reveals Himself to us, in the course of history. Such an experience of God, however, is inevitably *mediated,* or "accomodated" to our finite and earthly understandings.

To counter your Huxley quote, I offer two famous alternative viewpoints. Hegel: "the rational is the real." This does *not* mean that perfect rationality exists, but that what actually exists is unreal, because it is irrational. And Marx: "the issue of whether mankind can attain to objective truth is not a theoretical but a *practical* question." In other words, the obstacles to rationality are human inventions which can be removed. Marx thought that the primary such obstacle, in his day, was our fetishization of alienated labour-power in the form of financial value. His diagnosis is even more apt today.

 

[phildwyer]

1. Value, being an abstract concept, is always independent of whatever tokens represent it, whether the tokes be cowrie shells, blocks of salt, bars of gold, paper sheets, or binary codes.

2. Not unless you can't translate financial value into material goods anymore. As far as I can see the fidelity of the financial value -> material goods relationship is as strong as it's ever been.

3. Are the police who will imprison me if I misbehave with the tokens of value puerly imaginary?

4. I think that this is a plausible conclusion if you analyse systems of value representation in isolation from their social context. However, I believe that 'value' merely expresses a power relationship. In my way of looking at the world, value tokens have always represented an ability to exert power over other people. All tokens of value have been signifiers of this underlying 'value'. From cowrie shells to blocks of salt, paper bills and binary sequences, I do not believe that there has been a fundamental change in the materiality or the abstract nature of value.

5. Not true. None of the world's richest people made their wealth through financial speculation.

6. That's just silly. Love does things, fear does things, has power, etc. You can make the same assertion about any generalised abstraction.

7. That's ridiculous. You seem to be applying a uniquely bizzare definition of supernatural here. As the word is commonly used, it does not mean 'imposing human concepts on natural objects'. For example, if I was to say "that bunny rabbit is cute" it would be 'imposing human concepts on natural objects' but very few people would see it as being 'supernatural'. Of course, the cuteness of the bunny would obscure its "natural essence" too. You are, once again, twisting the meaning of words to suit your conclusion.

8. Love/Fear/Hate/etc have material effects that transcend volition of human agents. Once again this assertion can be made about any abstract concept that is totalised across the species.

I have numbered your points for convenience.

1. Yes, value has always been independent of the tokens which represent it. But what's interesting is that people haven't always *known* this. Until three or four hundred years ago, it was universally believed that gold and other specie were identical with value. The progressive de-materialization of money in our own time has revealed the real truth about financial value, which is that it does not exist in any material form.

2. Only a fraction of the financial value that allegedly exists could be translated into material form. There is simply not enough "stuff" in the world to match the amount of value. Economists abandoned the myth that value referred to, and could theoretically be translated into, a material form when they dropped the gold standard.

3. No, the police are clearly not imaginary. This is why I say that value has *real* power and effects, and this is one of the reasons why it is unlike any other idea. It is a *coercive* power, it *forces* us to believe in it.

4. Value does not "express" a power relationship, it is *part* of such a relationship. That relationship is between value and the labour-power which it represents. These exist in a state of logical contradiction and dialectical antithesis: they are hostile to each other. Note that this opposition is independent of the class antagonism of bourgeoisie and proletariat. That antagonism was only one historical manifestation of the fundamental contradiction between value and labour-power.

5. You're wrong, but it is of no importance. My point is that value can be, and increasingly is, produced without any material production taking place. This happens in financial speculation, but we see the same tendency even within industry. The rise of "brands," for instance, shows how value inheres in ideas more than in matter: corporations like Nike don't actualy *produce* anything, they outsource the processes of production. All they "do" is promote the brand.

6. There are many differences between value and all other abstract ideas. I mentioned its coercive power above: no policeman will arrest you for failure to believe in love. To recap the rest of my differentiations: (a) value is human life; (b) value can take material form; (c) value is uniquely malign; (d) value can reproduce. None of these is true of any other "idea."

7. There is no difference between belief in financial value and belief in spirits. These categories are ontologically identical. Value is a supernatural concept in a way that love is not because of the real, coercive power that it exercises. It is not merely an abstraction from nature, it is also an imposition *on* nature. It changes and distorts the natural essence of *all* things in a uniquely systematic manner. I don't have the edition handy, but you're probably aware of the famous passages in the 1844 Manuscripts in which Marx describes the supernatural force of value: "all that is solid melts into air" and so forth?

8. Quite apart from the other differences, love, hate, fear etc. are not "totalized accross the species." They take very different forms in different cultures. This is not true of financial value (again as opposed to money), which is everywhere and always the same. It is the only truly universal idea in the world: another reason why it is so unique as not to qualify as an idea at all.

 

[nino_savatte]

For what? I was insulting your philosophical abilities. It's what most other people on the thread have been doing for days in case you haven't noticed

He only notices certain posters: particularly those who challenge his ego.

 

[phildwyer]

He only notices certain posters: particularly those who challenge his ego.

If that were the case, I certainy wouldn't have noticed *you.* For you do not challenge anything. You do not *discuss* anything. You just sit there, stolid and immoble, like the old drunk in the pub corner, muttering and snarling your bitter, jealous misanthropy at the passers-by. Alone among posters here, you have not contributed even *one* constructive comment to this thread. Not *one,* ever. On the contrary, you have freely admitted that you hope to disrupt this thread, and that you will be delighted if you can prevent it from achieving its aim. You have unabashedly spoken of the low, mean pleasure you will feel if you manage to stop this discussion. Why would this bring you such satisfaction? What are you so afraid of? Why can't you just go away and leave us in peace?

 

[nino_savatte]

If that were the case, I certainy wouldn't have noticed *you.* For you do not challenge anything. You do not *discuss* anything. You just sit there, stolid and immoble, like the old drunk in the pub corner, muttering and snarling your bitter, jealous misanthropy at the passers-by. Alone among posters here, you have not contributed even *one* constructive comment to this thread. Not *one,* ever. On the contrary, you have freely admitted that you hope to disrupt this thread, and that you will be delighted if you can prevent it from achieving its aim. You have unabashedly spoken of the low, mean pleasure you will feel if you manage to stop this discussion. Why would this bring you such satisfaction? What are you so afraid of? Why can't you just go away and leave us in peace?

Don't you ever get fed up with the sound of your own voice? Evidently not. Even this post is typical of your style: a stream of mindless invective that betrays the innermost workings of your diseased mind. A raving egomaniac whose true reason for starting this thread is masked by the veneer of academia.

In case you hadn't noticed, I have contributed but given your fondness for exaggeration and blinded by the beauty of your own rhetoric, you haven't noticed. Now why am I not surprised?

You are still no closer to providing "proof" of "God" (an abstract concept that requires reification) existence. In case it had escaped your attention: only those who actually believe in the existence of such a concept are capable of accepting it...even then, you would still have a tough time convincing even the most hardened religious fanatic, since their idea of 'God' is likely to differ from the ideas that you are currently regurgitating.

This is priceless

You just sit there, stolid and immoble, like the old drunk in the pub corner, muttering and snarling your bitter, jealous misanthropy

I would suggest it is you who is the auld pub drunk. Much of what you have posted here conforms to the incoherent rantings of a man who has read one or two philosophical tracts and who simply must impress all and sundry with pearls of his "wisdom". Of course when no one wants to play his wee game, he becomes abusive. If you had a glass in your hand you'd bury it in the face of anyone who dares to challenge you.

What is "immoble" btw?

 

[phildwyer]

In case you hadn't noticed, I have contributed but given your fondness for exaggeration and blinded by the beauty of your own rhetoric, you haven't noticed. Now why am I not surprised?

You're right, I haven't noticed your contribution. What did you contribute, and when did you contribute it? Kindly contribute it again, and I will respond to your contribution. I don't usually allow re-contributions, but I will make an exception in your case. We await your contribution.

 

[Loki]

I don't usually allow re-contributions

Love it.

 

[nino_savatte]

You're right, I haven't noticed your contribution. What did you contribute, and when did you contribute it? Kindly contribute it again, and I will respond to your contribution. I don't usually allow re-contributions, but I will make an exception in your case. We await your contribution.

I'll do nothing of the kind...I'm not here to satisfy the needs of your ego. Who do you think you are? GOD?????

Ever read any Foucault, phil? How about de Certeau?

I find it funny the way you haven't noticed anyone taking the piss out of you but when you are an egomaniac you are blind to these things. I'll bet you think your shit doesn't stink.

 

[phildwyer]

I'll do nothing of the kind...I'm not here to satisfy the needs of your ego. Who do you think you are? GOD?????

Ever read any Foucault, phil? How about de Certeau?

Quelle surprise. Nino fails to make contribution shocker. Nino responds with bizarre and irrelevent inquiries as to his interlocutor's knowledge of Foucault shocker. Actually, that reminds me--what *is* it with you and Foucault? You ask this question--"ever read Foucault?"--of loads of people, in various different contexts, but you never say why it's important. What are you thinking of? I have indeed read *all* of Foucault, so I might be able to help you out here. What is it that bothers you about the baldie frog?