The 'Amazing Physics' account observes:
This is a 1000-gram [steel] bar.
In its raw form [as a steel billet], it’s worth around $1.
If it’s turned into horseshoes, its value rises to about $100.
If it’s made into sewing needles, its value jumps to roughly $500.
If it’s crafted into watch springs and gears, it can be worth around $100,000.
And if it’s transformed into precision laser components, like those used in lithography, its value can reach $10-50 million.
What gives escalating value to the simple raw material is the mind. It is the mind that transforms the value of a metal bar into the value of those horseshoes, needles, watch springs, and precision labour components.
Have you ever looked for the root of production? Take a look at an electric generator and dare tell yourself that it was created by the muscular effort of unthinking brutes. Try to grow a seed of wheat without the knowledge left to you by men who had to discover it for the first time. Try to obtain your food by means of nothing but physical motions—and you'll learn that man's mind is the root of all the goods produced and of all the wealth that has ever existed on earth.
That was Ayn Rand, writing in answer to the question: "What is Capitalism?"
Rand was almost unique in writing about the role of the mind in man's existence; about its role in invention and production and valuing. "It is the mind," her novel Atlas Shrugged illustrates, "that is the root of all human knowledge and values -- and its absence is the root of all evil."
Read more here, in two parts:- Atlas Shrugged on the Role of the Mind in Man’s Existence, Part 1: The Human Form of Consciousness: - Greg Salmieri, NEW IDEAL
- Atlas Shrugged on the Role of the Mind in Man’s Existence, Part 2: The Valuing Faculty - Greg Salmieri, NEW IDEAL
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