There is something, I think, to be said for the fact that depreciation is (in economic terms) not merely a fact of physical wear-and-tear. Indeed, to be strict, it's not a fact of wear-and-tear at all. It's a matter of its relative position as a good. As we all well know, prices are set - more or less - by the amount a buyer is willing to pay for something against how much a lesser is willing to part for it for.
Let us say I buy a watch. It becomes much degraded, because I am careless and dyspraxic. There is then - this is quite drastic - a nuclear apocalypse, and I am the only person in the world left with a functioning watch. (I was happily ploughing through the Reichstagsakten of 1594 and never noticed anything was going on.) It is now considerably more valuable than it was when I bought it, not less - despite the physical wear-and-tear. All of the survivors want it, and will give quite a lot for it.
That's the first chunk of supply and demand in play. Depreciation happens in part because of this. Supply increases. The number of cars, books, and watches goes up. Perhaps the number per capita is static, perhaps not; even if not, new stuff gets added. This car's got better crash protection. That one's got better crash protection and a touchscreen! Wait, get this: better crash protection, touchscreen, AND...
I am not so sure hearts are in a market of this sort. Hearts are, to my mind, essentially unique. They can't be bought and sold. No more copies of each heart will be made. One and done. Perhaps they change, beat in new rhythms, over the course of a life - no, certainly they do. That's part of the charm. Yet because they aren't in a market with each other, there's not a question of relative depreciation, nor of competition with new features. My heart's got no gadgets or gizmos yours doesn't.
It can certainly feel like we are selling our hearts to the world in different ways at times. Whether it's on the dating market, where we must shine them up, or even in the labours of the heart (domestic, retail, commercial, therapeutic, friendly...), there can be so much pressure. It builds up. The heart must be better, squeakier-clean, more exciting, more open, more friendly. It seems to compete with so many other hearts - and how can my heart possibly compete with his, when he seems so much more skilled at love? Or hers, when she has done so much good? Or...
I really have two responses to that feeling. The first is secular in its thrust, the second basically religious.
To say that we treat hearts as commodities would be enough to convince some economists, but I'm not so sure. We can't trade one for another. We don't even really, truly choose those hearts we want - never mind our own! We don't go to a marketplace of hearts to select the one that fits us best, we are struck by hearing another heart beat an easy polyrhythm with ours. We are not free buyers or sellers. Our own hearts, for as much as we can control them, are fashioned by too much else to be traded in any real sense. We cannot quite make commodities of them, not really.
I suppose I also believe that if there were a market of hearts, it would already be glutted. All hearts have nothing at all on the Sacred Heart. It is an asymmetry so utter there is no earthly analogy to make. That asymmetry does not quite make our hearts empty or valueless, however. No: it exalts them because our hearts are in the same image as His heart is and was and shall ever be. A little of its glory is in all of our hearts. That on which His glorification and joy and love shine, nothing shall ever be able to price - but all may value.
Hopefully that's neither too rambly nor irrelevant.
yes, depreciation because of wear-and-tear is more intuitive for our lizard brains, but even an item that's really 'as good as new' can depreciate from t to t* for any number of extrinsic reasons – aggregate demand drops at t* in a recession, more or higher-quality items of the same kind are available at t* etc. But what would it be for there to be more hearts or more demand for hearts? (Evidently population growth is not the real issue here – supply and demand curves would simply move in sync.) For what is buying hearts a metaphor, or with what are they bought?
Exactly so - and it's absolutely correct to point out that not only can depreciation reverse, as I've talked about, but it can apply to things we wouldn't intuitively think it does. By the way, may I presume the username is a Watership Down reference?
'Ladies,' tweeteth the Elon, 'it's time to start thinking about whether the guy you're dating has post apocalyptic warlord potential.' If ever a small round critter has such potential, this rabbit does.
What else can be used yet retain its value? If you had a Cockney (or some other aitch-dropping) accent, your answer might do double duty as the one I'm thinking of. Commenting on another of your essays (excuse me this pompous self-citation), I suggested an analogy between people and works of art. The analogy seems to obtain here too. The Aeneid has lost no value after two thousand years of being used – read, quoted, remembered, wept over, translated, adapted, discussed, studied. Perhaps, indeed, one might think precisely the contrary. Perhaps the Aeneid _has_ lost value of a certain sort (even if not value of another sort) in recent times, but precisely for being used less, or less well. And one might think that this goes for hearts too.
had a great time reading this! lovedreally liked the overarching metaphor, and i really enjoyed hearing your thoughts on love! hope you're doing well!
Thank you so much Liam, you’re always so generous with your words :)
There is something, I think, to be said for the fact that depreciation is (in economic terms) not merely a fact of physical wear-and-tear. Indeed, to be strict, it's not a fact of wear-and-tear at all. It's a matter of its relative position as a good. As we all well know, prices are set - more or less - by the amount a buyer is willing to pay for something against how much a lesser is willing to part for it for.
Let us say I buy a watch. It becomes much degraded, because I am careless and dyspraxic. There is then - this is quite drastic - a nuclear apocalypse, and I am the only person in the world left with a functioning watch. (I was happily ploughing through the Reichstagsakten of 1594 and never noticed anything was going on.) It is now considerably more valuable than it was when I bought it, not less - despite the physical wear-and-tear. All of the survivors want it, and will give quite a lot for it.
That's the first chunk of supply and demand in play. Depreciation happens in part because of this. Supply increases. The number of cars, books, and watches goes up. Perhaps the number per capita is static, perhaps not; even if not, new stuff gets added. This car's got better crash protection. That one's got better crash protection and a touchscreen! Wait, get this: better crash protection, touchscreen, AND...
I am not so sure hearts are in a market of this sort. Hearts are, to my mind, essentially unique. They can't be bought and sold. No more copies of each heart will be made. One and done. Perhaps they change, beat in new rhythms, over the course of a life - no, certainly they do. That's part of the charm. Yet because they aren't in a market with each other, there's not a question of relative depreciation, nor of competition with new features. My heart's got no gadgets or gizmos yours doesn't.
It can certainly feel like we are selling our hearts to the world in different ways at times. Whether it's on the dating market, where we must shine them up, or even in the labours of the heart (domestic, retail, commercial, therapeutic, friendly...), there can be so much pressure. It builds up. The heart must be better, squeakier-clean, more exciting, more open, more friendly. It seems to compete with so many other hearts - and how can my heart possibly compete with his, when he seems so much more skilled at love? Or hers, when she has done so much good? Or...
I really have two responses to that feeling. The first is secular in its thrust, the second basically religious.
To say that we treat hearts as commodities would be enough to convince some economists, but I'm not so sure. We can't trade one for another. We don't even really, truly choose those hearts we want - never mind our own! We don't go to a marketplace of hearts to select the one that fits us best, we are struck by hearing another heart beat an easy polyrhythm with ours. We are not free buyers or sellers. Our own hearts, for as much as we can control them, are fashioned by too much else to be traded in any real sense. We cannot quite make commodities of them, not really.
I suppose I also believe that if there were a market of hearts, it would already be glutted. All hearts have nothing at all on the Sacred Heart. It is an asymmetry so utter there is no earthly analogy to make. That asymmetry does not quite make our hearts empty or valueless, however. No: it exalts them because our hearts are in the same image as His heart is and was and shall ever be. A little of its glory is in all of our hearts. That on which His glorification and joy and love shine, nothing shall ever be able to price - but all may value.
Hopefully that's neither too rambly nor irrelevant.
yes, depreciation because of wear-and-tear is more intuitive for our lizard brains, but even an item that's really 'as good as new' can depreciate from t to t* for any number of extrinsic reasons – aggregate demand drops at t* in a recession, more or higher-quality items of the same kind are available at t* etc. But what would it be for there to be more hearts or more demand for hearts? (Evidently population growth is not the real issue here – supply and demand curves would simply move in sync.) For what is buying hearts a metaphor, or with what are they bought?
Exactly so - and it's absolutely correct to point out that not only can depreciation reverse, as I've talked about, but it can apply to things we wouldn't intuitively think it does. By the way, may I presume the username is a Watership Down reference?
'Ladies,' tweeteth the Elon, 'it's time to start thinking about whether the guy you're dating has post apocalyptic warlord potential.' If ever a small round critter has such potential, this rabbit does.
What else can be used yet retain its value? If you had a Cockney (or some other aitch-dropping) accent, your answer might do double duty as the one I'm thinking of. Commenting on another of your essays (excuse me this pompous self-citation), I suggested an analogy between people and works of art. The analogy seems to obtain here too. The Aeneid has lost no value after two thousand years of being used – read, quoted, remembered, wept over, translated, adapted, discussed, studied. Perhaps, indeed, one might think precisely the contrary. Perhaps the Aeneid _has_ lost value of a certain sort (even if not value of another sort) in recent times, but precisely for being used less, or less well. And one might think that this goes for hearts too.
On hearts, a poem by the Australian poet Gwen Harwood:
Boundary conditions
"At the sun's incredible centre
the atomic nuclei
with electrons and light quanta
in a burning concord lie.
All the particles that forge
light and matter, in that furnace
keep their equilibrium.
Once we pass beyond the surface
of the star, sharp changes come.
These remarks apply as well
to the exploding atom bomb,"
said Professor Eisenbart
while his mistress, with a shell
scored an arrow and a heart
in the sand on which they lay
watching heat and light depart
from the boundaries of day.
"Sprung from love's mysterious core
soul and flesh," the young girl said,
"restless on the narrow shore
between the unborn and the dead,
split from concord, and inherit
mankind's old dichotomy:
mind and matter; flesh and spirit;
what has been and what will be;
desire that flares beyond our fate:
still in the heart more violence lies
than in the bomb. Who'll calculate
that tough muscle's bursting size?"
Tongues of darkness licked the crust
of pigment from the bowl of blue.
Thought's campaniles fell to dust
blown by the sea-wind through and through.