into its minimal description
s*—would be a very useful thing. But as we will see, such a program is impossible. … The problem here is that there is no program
k that can compute algorithmic entropy.
K(s) is an uncomputable function” (Schumacher 2015, pp. 241-7).
Since there is no algorithm that would reduce complex labor to simple labor, time cannot be a measure of abstract labor. However, different activities and their results can be reduced to a common equivalent, if not through the concept of time, then through the concept of cultural bits. Exchange value is measured not by the duration of time but by the amount of cultural bits contained in a set of use values. Use values are socially necessary existence values; exchange values is the socially necessary amount of cultural bits embodied in these values. Hereinafter, by value we mean exchange value in the context of use values, unless otherwise specified. Meanings became value as episodic exchange has turned into regular one, as small communities cohered into larger societies, as social necessity evolved.
According to the principle of least action, changes in the socially necessary multiplicity of existence values are linked to changes in the socially necessary mass of these values. We call this relationship between the set and the mass of existence meanings ordered by preferences the allocation of meanings. It takes activity to reproduce meaning, it takes meaning to reproduce activity. Value is the allocation of the only truly limited resource people have—their actions and results, that is, meanings—between competing goals. As an allocation of meanings, value has two sides: the side of benefits (meanings gained) and the side of costs (meanings expended). The socially necessary set and mass of meanings are determined not by some average but by the best alternative allocation that is foregone:
“In economics, the cost of an event is the highest-valued opportunity necessarily forsaken. The usefulness of the concept of cost is a logical implication of choice among available options. Only if no alternatives were possible or if amounts of all resources were available beyond everyone’s desires, so that all goods were free, would the concepts of cost and of choice be irrelevant” (Alchian 1968, p. 404).