History, Means of Production, Atomism

Marx's proposition, "by thus acting on the external world and changing it, man at the same time changes his own nature", has several important ramifications. It anticipates both the human Self-Determination thesis of Pragmatism and Existentialism, as well as the Ecological concept of the essential interaction of a species and its environment. But of most immediate relevance to his Economic doctrine, it implies that an apparent eternal truth may be historically contingent. So, in particular, the proposition challenges Social Atomism on the grounds that it is an expression of the predominating means of production, subject to supersession as industrialization collectivizes the labor-force. The result is an unprecedented collective-consciousness, in general, and class-consciousness, in particular, i. e. the superseding of Capitalism by Socialism.