Intro thoughts go into millions of directions. Trying to capture at least some.ORBon Voyage (yes, in this French accent)))The key sentence of what our handsome lecturer said was that the capitalist society is a collection of commodities. As a starting point we dance from. Moreover, as we dance, we see its about commodities in action or motion, which he also mentions. Commodities (as if strangely existing mythical creatures) are moving around small communities, countries, markets... Travelers of the world, in a nutshell (kinda like this expression, as youve noticed)). What immediately appears in my mind is the image of a circle. It never ends and God knows when and from which point it started running around. It would have been a rather materialistic perception of the way inter-human relations function (in a global sense) if not for one thing commodities seem to be a broader notion than simply objects. We sell services (should we also name them commodities?) Also should it not be phrased as sell better exchange, in Marxs terms, assumingly. The key and the best question ever why? The driving force that moves commodities in the world is humans who need them to survive or want them for any possibly invented reason. People want (or need, in this context it kind of coincides) THINGS. Objects, services cars, yogurts, massages, airplane flights Some create, some consume. In any way, they make constant exchanges.How? Simple Its in most cases nice to keep difficult things simple, so not to betray this tradition: Lets assume in a simplified way: You want a book, you go to a shop (or an open-air market)), you exchange money for that object of your interest, you have it. Seems to be it. But no you get the book which may afterwards become a mobile thing too you give presents, you pass it down to next generations, etc. And from the opposite side the money you paid it goes to the hands of the previous owner (in quotes cause we cant really speak about owners of commodities, we better speak about their holders temporary or permanent, it seems to me) of the book. From there it moves on. Lets assume a very probable situation: the previous owner wants a meat chop. He goes to the supermarket and buys the meat. He gives the money he got from you and as a result of this exchange gets another commodity to enter the never-ending process of exchange. How? No. 2 Not simple. First of all, the commodity is not just the object. It was created by someone, it took someones labor, time, resources, invested money (which most probably had traveled there via some other previous chains of economic interactions) and so on. A book (as a commodity = as a mythic creature) has its past or background, as well as its origin. So, its not a linear economic relation btw the book seller and the book buyer. Its more like a tree with many branches. Moreover, depending on the previous life of this mythic creature (meaning its production, human labor etc) it is granted some value. HOWEVER, as far as I got this, this is not the final value as yet. The final value of a commodity is this + the assessment of how useful the thing is. In economic terms, its called demand and supply. If a demand is high for a particular commodity (lets say its an ABC book for kids studying their native language)), the previous holders can easily make use of it by rising the price. More-moreover, if its something rare (like an ABC book for Ukrainians wanting to master Georgian you know at least one such person. I reassure you, a really interested one but not so good at managing her time))), which means the supply is not sufficient since its already a rarity, and the demand is high, the price goes up. Well, Im not in a position (sorry for this, but just remembered your record position, preposition. I appreciate all of them a lot a lot a lot and still keep repeating sounds after you