Appadurai, Arjun “The Ghost in the Financial Machine”. (2011).

(Contemporary finance as expecting something in return) Here we look into the force behind the obligation of return, and find that the obligation of return lies in the nature of the gift. Here is seems that the spirit is an implied moral character necessary in the finance world, as an obligation means nothing without trust of the others adherence. It is almost implied that the spirit of the giver transfers to the spirit of the receiver, as if to propose our trust within financial institutions. There is a system at work here.

The article notes that the capitalism discipline was inspired not by simple greed, but by rationalization. But Weber argues that rationalization is an insufficient source for committing to moneymaking. Weber argues that there is in fact “an irrational calling” to commit to the spirit of moneymaking.

The article also draws on Calvin and the idea that accumulation of wealth related to not being able to distinguish the saved and the unsaved? Accumulating wealth as if you are one of the elect, as in saved? By default then doesn’t this make money at the root of all evil?

“Calvinist spirit was crucial not to the ongoing, routinized evolution of capitalism but only to its originary moment (that moment which he identified more in the eighteenth than in the nineteenth century). After that moment, capitalism becomes a self-propelling machine that no longer requires the ascetical spirit of capitalism for its key players to be animated and motivated”, this passage when broken apart then means that the quintessential Calvinist, who is not a risk taker, makes a rational first decision that then leaves capitalism to no longer need that spirit, but instead self-propels. For me that suggests that the further capitalism propels from its initial rational base, the more it exists on risk, and the more its players are motivated by risk. Could rational choices be self propelling in the conversation of capitalism? Or does there have to be a risk? And can risk be self-propelling and have longevity if not started by a rational decision?

The absolute enemy of the systematic capitalist is the gaudy, adventurous type of entrepreneur that I believe comes from the result of always winning. Defying natural risk time and time again is not healthy. So what about defining the space of uncertainty? Exploiting uncertainty makes data the most valuable currency in the world, especially when the market is efficient and runs on efficiency.  Uncertainty has been forgotten. Risk has pushed uncertainty out of the picture, but how can one exist without the other?

Other world religions have not been able to start modern capitalism. Why? Proceduralism in the realm of salvation. Is he talking about moral laws? Moral laws versus magic? Faith in the market. So the market is God? And people are suffering at the mercy of consumerism in order to be saved by that same market? This is Ludacris.