The modes of production shape the human nature and history, which is “nothing but the succession of the separate generations, each of which exploits the materials, the capital funds, the productive forces handed down to it by all preceding generations…” Marx synthesis how needs, which are conceptions of what it means to live both a necessary and full life, are shaped by presuppositions.
Nonetheless, needs also shape and modify the needs for future generations. Relating back to the example of the tribal family, their most basic and fundamental need is to acquire food and habitation. Tools —which are both manual tools and things like capitalism, modes of social organization, technology, physical implements, and socioeconomic relations — are created. So, a physical organization can help determine what exactly one’s needs are. When the family meets their first basic need, they have developed enough tools, such as slaves, to join other tribes and develop private
property.
Marx also illustrates how satisfying needs leads to a historical progression through his discussion of a feudal system of landownership. In this system, there is a “necessity for association against organized robber nobility, the need for communal covered markets…” In the feudal system, they have covered their initial needs through the creation of tools. These tools helped them develop further needs, largely as a consequence of their accumulation of capital. Consequently, the creation of tools to meet an initial need helps meet that specific need and establish a new one. When Marx claims that “slavery cannot be abolished without the steam engine and the mule and spinning-jenny, serfdom cannot be abolished without improved agriculture” one can conclude that ideas are not enough to change history. There is a relationship deeply entangled with technology. As Marx noted, “The multitude of productive forces accessible to men determines the nature of society, hence, that the “history of humanity” should always be studied and treated with relation to the history of industry and exchange.” The creation of tools helps solve a previous need while also producing a new need that will push for innovation. This new need is created through the availability of productive forces, technology, labor, and capital, which can as a result help a population progress economically, socially, and consequently historically.
Meeting needs leads to technological innovations dependent on the available modes of production in the period an individual is born into. Their desire to satisfy a need sparks innovation, which in turn creates bigger and greater needs. Future generations are then shaped by this different state. Their labor, needs, and in therefore economic and social life experience becomes different through its dependency on past generations. This cyclical process of having predetermined modes of production helps set precedent to which needs should be satisfied first. Through an effort of meeting that need, tools are developed, which in turn opens way for the creation of more needs. The innovation behind tools transforms an individual’s human nature. Overall, the digression of social, economic, and historical conditions shape humanity and the challenges they face. These challenges help individuals express who they their life and who they are. This chain is all a historical product that becomes a living history and establishes historical relationships that shape people’s expression of life.