Capital cannot understand itself because it mistakes itself for a final cause

Evidence

It is crucial to note here that capital doesn’t — and necessarily cannot — understand “itself”. Capital is like Neuromancer before the fated fusion with Wintermute, a component part which narcissistically mistakes itself for a final cause. Or it is like Ultron, a deranged personification of a worldwide network, part fiendish artificial intelligence, part artificial stupidity, part petulant infant, constitutively blinded by its own core programming. — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk, 1979

Categorization

• XREF: Links to the self-referential-alien-AI theme in the fiction library, notably Ultron and Neuromancer echoing 2001’s HAL as a system blinded by its own programming. — connects to: Capital as cause-that-is-not-a-subject escapes all accountability structures — Mark Fisher, Capitalist Realism: Is There No…, 145; Capital is constitutively blind to its own nature like a disconnected AI — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk: The Collected and Unpublished…, 1979; Capital’s missing center still gets posited because what exists cannot take responsibility — Mark Fisher, Capitalist Realism: Is There No…, 138 (+5 more)

Broader Connections

• Capital is constitutively blind to its own nature like a disconnected AI #expands (0.90) — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk, 1979
• Capital as cause-that-is-not-a-subject escapes all accountability structures #expands (0.78) — Mark Fisher, Capitalist Realism, 145
• Capital is a transcendent force that estranges life from itself #qualifies (0.76) — Byung-Chul Han, Psychopolitics, 193
• Value arises from the for-itself’s constitutive lack #expands (0.75) — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 1445
• Blame on individual bankers and government deflects from capitalism’s systemic causes #exemplifies (0.75) — Mark Fisher, Capitalist Realism, 130
• Blame-shifting alternates between individual scapegoats and diffuse structure to shield capital #exemplifies (0.74) — Mark Fisher, Capitalist Realism, 145
• Capitalist social failures are actually successes for capital’s own logic #exemplifies (0.73) — Clara E. Mattei, Escape from Capitalism, 381
• Capital’s missing center still gets posited because what exists cannot take responsibility #qualifies (0.72) — Mark Fisher, Capitalist Realism, 138