Cologne 07-Dec-2006

ME: In Fortune magazine Vol.164 no.11 from 11-Dec-2006 we read,
"'Diamonds are essentially worth nothing,' says Mordechai Rapaport,
whose Rapaport Group price list is the industry standard. It's all about
what they signify, he explains: In the case of a wedding ring, it's the
guy, not the one-carat diamond."

Here "natural consciousness" (Hegel PhdG) or "everydayness" (Heidegger
SuZ) is speaking with wonderful simplicity an ontically correct fact,
without realizing that it is simultaneously speaking an ontological
truth of the being of value.

"Diamonds are essentially worth nothing" means that _in themselves_
diamonds are worth nothing. They have no inherent worth. They are
worthless, nothing -- just like anything or anyone else is worthless in
themselves. Why? Because value, worth is in essence a "determination of
reflexion" (Reflexionsbestimmung, Hegel, Logik), a mirror relation and a
mirror play. In the first chapter of Capital Vol. I, Marx speaks of the
one commodity being the "value-mirror" (Wertspiegel) of the other.
Ultimately, this role of value-mirror is assumed by money. Value itself
has no substance (in labour or anything else). It is essentially a
mirror play that comes about in the play among things and among people.

It's who the guy is, his whoness as who-status, that is reflected in the
glittering one-carat diamond. The diamond and the guy serve each other
to reflect each other's value in a mirror relationship that reflects
also upon the new wife. Her value, too, is reflected in the diamond, and
mediated through the sparkling diamond, the newly married couple
reflects each other's value, i.e. their estimation of and for each
other, in a groundless mirror-play

Memo to future generations: Forget Heidegger's Technik-thinking if
you're looking for any phenomenological-ontological insight into value.

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_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_ Dr Michael Eldred -_-_-
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