The Importance of Commodities

A commodity is something, he says. Which meets a human want or need. And it satisfies human needs of whatever kind. In other words, whether I rise for example from the stomach or the imagination, makes no difference. He's not really interested in psychologizing about it. They can buy it because they want it, they need it, they desire it. The discovery of these ways and hence the manifold uses of things is the work of history. So also as the invention of socially recognized standards of measurement for the quantities of these useful objects. This then immediately leads him into the middle of the page 126 where he describes commodities as material bearers of exchange value.