[FRIAM] means of production take 2

[glen∈ℂ]

Yes, I am most definitely concentrating on the *right* to destroy (my *claim* over something), not merely the ability to destroy something that others may have claim/right to/over. So, your text below is largely unrelated to my sense of "right to destroy". The mere *ability* to deprive another is NOT what I'm talking about.

Suicide is an important case. If anyone can lay an unarguable claim to *anything*, surely it must be their own body. Hence, suicide should always be legal. But but but but, consider my case, where I've lived with Renee' for so long and have even "survived" cancer, if I think about my extended self ... the full extension of "me" into the world, if I kill myself, I will be doing damage not only to her psyche, but to her ability to pay the mortgage, her ability to retain some friendships, go with me on business trips, etc. Add to that, the idea that my society facilitated my education, my skill set, etc. So, I have a duty to participate and "give back". So suicide is dereliction of duty as well.

Those extensions of my body into her life (and others' lives), muddies my *right* to my own body ... There's a strong argument that I do not own my body.

It's these *extensions* that I think are being implied by the division of production into modes, means, and relations. And, what's worse, is that even though I've inferred this from you (and Marcus), you won't recognize it when I repeat it back to you. 8^)

On 11/19/19 8:02 PM, Steven A Smith wrote:
> I'm not sure if you are distinguishing "right to destroy" from "ability
> to destroy".   This leads us back to the language you referenced earlier
> of "owning someone".   Mutual Assured Destruction implied *that* kind of
> ownership.   The handful of nation-states with enough nuclear capability
> to destroy *any* other in *some sense* owned all of the others, but this
> feels like a fairly perverse sense of "ownership".
> 
> Perhaps I can concede that the only model of "ownership" of something
> that does NOT depend on social convention is the ability to deprive
> others of the use of same by others.   The ability to destroy the
> utility of that object is an extreme form of depriving its use by
> others.   This also opens my curiosity about whether the limit to the
> ability to destroy something limits the ability to "own" it in your
> model, in the sense that while I can burn my house and garden down and
> "salt the earth" to make growing anything possible (for some time), the
> earth itself cannot really be destroyed (though I suppose I could dig a
> deep hole and remove the earth).   Does this imply a limit to how much I
> *own* this home/property?   I would contend that my "ownership" depends
> a lot more on the social/legal convention of those around me (including
> the bank and the tax collector) than it does on my ability (or not) to
> destroy it.
> 
> My maunderings about ownership tend to be focused on trying to
> understand which aspects are unequivocal and which are not.  The notion
> of destructionability as ownership is perhaps the most unequivocal.
> Simply denying access to others (holding tight, placing inside of a safe
> bolted to the bedrock, building a castle around, etc.) and therefore
> "use" would be slightly more equivocal, with depending on the
> generosity/agreement of others yet more with "force of law" somewhere in
> between?
> 
> My interest is mostly based in trying to understand what
> "post-Capitalism" might look like, especially from the inside.