| This question <68|68> overall <69|71> Hans: <67|76>. |
| Question 172: Give everyday examples of “material relations of persons” and “social relations of things.” |
| [70] Hans: Plagiarism Does Not Pay Off Either Last week, I put the previous questions and answers from all classes since Autumn 1995 up on my web page. I expect that it will enrich the discussion here if people browse around in these archives and therefore come to the present discussion with a better understanding. |
| However Hawken's [68] goes beyond learning from the past discussions. It is a collage of passages literally taken over from various submissions last year, without attribution. This is no longer taking one's inspiration from the material on the web, it is not even paraphrasing, about which I had to say something in [53], but this is plagiarism, which I do not tolerate in this class. |
| Hawken's first paragraph is is very similar in wording to my message [1998WI:132] in the Winter 1998 where I wrote: |
| Social relations between things are exchange relations, if this thing (money) can buy that thing, this means these things have a social relation with each other. |
| The statement Hawken feels he can make in his second paragraph is lifted from what I wrote in my grading remark to message [1998WI:166] last year: |
| Since material things have become the carriers of social relations, they have become too important. It is not the needs of the people but the profit needs of the firms that overburden our planet. |
| The third paragraph is a slight variation of Gussi's message [1998WI:129] last year: |
| An example of material relation of person is the relation between me an my dentist. I will continue our relation so long I want his help to fix my teeth. Our relationship will be there if he do a good job and as long as I live, he need to be there to maintain my teeth. However, this relation is not a relationship that I have with my friends, therefore I only see him one time every year to see if my teeth is healthy. I think this is what Marx's meant of social material relation of person. |
| And the opinion Hawken expresses in his last paragraph coincides word for word with my message [1998WI:148] last year: |
| The relationship between money and commodities makes up for the lack of a direct human relation between the members of society. Social relations of things and material relations of people complement each other. But ... this relationship ... is full of tension and potential conflict. They do have a connection, but an adversarial connection. They are two poles which battle with each other but which also need each other. |
| I will draw the necessary consequences. |
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