Both the nation-state and the traditional corporation are on extinction notice. If the developer community returns to its roots, it can usher in the hive-mind age.
The problem with Bitcoin is it is too slow to adapt. My mother and grandmother are not using it. We need to swarm better ways right now. More decentralized, transparent, systems like Bitcoin but that can be adopted faster. My mom would join a swarm for her community or for political causes. Max, we are starting an academy for swarming, and would love for you to join. You don't see it yet how it can be implemented, and we want to show you. https://joshketry.substack.com/p/human-swarm-intelligence-the-most
The point of the 2017 article is that bitcoin was the FIRST example of a human hivemind supercomputer -- because it used fully decentralized programmable incentives -- not that it is the future or won't be supplanted. Otherwise, I remain skeptical but open about swarm intelligence.
I worry about cheap to produce energy and global supply chains which both underpin all other activity.
If (and that's a big if) energy and supply chains can be maintained in some way that is affordable for the end consumer then... the above scenario has a chance of materializing at some level.
The other thing that bugs me is that at the end of the day... Bitcoin and tokens are not material goods or backed by something tangible. Not a problem while the world continues to live with one foot in fantasy land, but when things get tough, people want reality and hard goods.
Tokens could be backed by available directly usable energy resources without the need to mine a coin. Instead of this simple notion, crypto miners burn through massive amounts of energy to produce a token. That never really made any sense to me.
Governments used to issue currency at low cost until the central banks took over and turned this simple process into a profit making business by essentially printing debt.
A return to government issued currency would be a start, but not likely to happen, so I guess I'm on board with the decentralized experiment.
I would never argue that bitcoin is the perfect technology nor the perfect money, but I would argue that it is a tremendous proof-of-concept. I would also invite you to reconsider the notion that bitcoin is not backed by something tangible. Consider that in one sense it is (it uses proof of work and mining to enhance its security, so is backed by energy, with is tangible). But if proof of stake systems turn out to be as secure and limit the seigniorage problems of pre-minting, then that's great! Bitcoin can evolve. It's competitors can evolve. The ecosystem will evolve. That said, this idea of "backing" is an artifact of goldbuggery that no longer exists on earth. Even government-issued commodity-backed currencies come with problems (though I'd take that over what we have, any day.) So we have to ask.... "Compared to what?" Until that new "what" exists, innovators are creating new systems all the time.
Thanks for replying. I know this topic can get into extreme pro and con camps pretty quick. I am all for anything that can keep the game of life ticking along even if we have to use a few magic tricks here and there.
And, as you say, that's what money has become really. Currency backed by anything ended long ago. The BRICS appear to be attempting to establish something along those lines... good luck with all that!
We essentially live in a system that went off the reality rails a long time ago. Some say since we stopped hunting and gathering and started large scale farming and city life. And we've been heading for a major implosion ever since. The global self-organizing superorganism that we've become appears to have other ideas though and isn't that easily defeated by logical economic roadblocks by the look of things.
Central banks have managed to keep this train going far longer than many of us thought was possible. The system is showing the usual signs of implosion again and again we have to wait and see if it's possible to patch things this time.
And some readers took that proposal the wrong way and said I was advocating for an authoritarian centralized solution as put forward by technocrats 100 years ago which wasn't the case but some simple rules would have to be followed as with any shared system.
Crypto mining burns available energy to create a token by crunching an algorithm. It is not based on or backed by available energy (without burning said energy) which would be the far more sensible option.
In the digital age, you don't even have to mine raw materials to make physical coins or paper notes (even though some people are understandably attached to these). All you need to do is establish the amount of available energy that a country or region has (since this underpins absolutely everything else that we do) and base your currency on that. The number you come up with is tied to the amount of available usable energy. That's it. No need for token mining etc.
Governments used to do this based on the amount of gold they held but available energy would be far more relevant to a modern economy.
So again, crypto is not backed by energy reserves at all. It burns vast amounts of energy to create a digital ephemeral token that relies on faith alone. Which is pretty much what we've been doing for decades anyway. Just printing our way out of each slump until it doesn't work anymore (pushing on a string).
Bitcoin and all other crypto are far removed from anything tangible. Mining a token that purely relies on others having the same faith in that token that you have is akin to millions of people running video game pcs with expensive components and the latest morpg to mine in game tokens to be spent in the gaming marketplace. Does it work? Absolutely! Is it "backed" by anything in the real world... absolutely not. Just pull the plug. Where have the tokens gone? Even if you have a record of them on your hardware it's easy to lose them or for something else to go wrong. If no one else accepts these tokens they are worthless.
So why do I still entertain the idea of crypto at all? Because it still holds the promise of decentralizing the production of these tokens of exchange even with the logical issues I have with the way they are produced and their ability to survive any kind of real world problems.
Governments can either ban crypto or fully embrace them. For that to happen, central banking power would have to dwindle for some reason. I don't think these powerful institutions (based on fraud by the way) will allow themselves to be replaced that easily.
What is more likely is that we suffer some kind of economic turmoil and a new system based on available energy and production capacity rises up in its place. In other words, a return to tangible real world values.
I have wondered about a system pegged to energy sources or similar commodities, particularly if that system can be created without needing trusted third parties, who can almost never be trusted.
Yes... I guess that's the problem. We don't really have much control over the infrastructure side of things and all the central hubs that our activity tends to flow through, whether that be on the Internet or through an airport, there are always chokepoints.
Hopefully we can find a way to exert more control over these infrastructure elements maybe by pushing back on all the nonsense that tends to concentrate there.
The problem with Bitcoin is it is too slow to adapt. My mother and grandmother are not using it. We need to swarm better ways right now. More decentralized, transparent, systems like Bitcoin but that can be adopted faster. My mom would join a swarm for her community or for political causes. Max, we are starting an academy for swarming, and would love for you to join. You don't see it yet how it can be implemented, and we want to show you. https://joshketry.substack.com/p/human-swarm-intelligence-the-most
The point of the 2017 article is that bitcoin was the FIRST example of a human hivemind supercomputer -- because it used fully decentralized programmable incentives -- not that it is the future or won't be supplanted. Otherwise, I remain skeptical but open about swarm intelligence.
Certainly an interesting vision of the future.
I worry about cheap to produce energy and global supply chains which both underpin all other activity.
If (and that's a big if) energy and supply chains can be maintained in some way that is affordable for the end consumer then... the above scenario has a chance of materializing at some level.
The other thing that bugs me is that at the end of the day... Bitcoin and tokens are not material goods or backed by something tangible. Not a problem while the world continues to live with one foot in fantasy land, but when things get tough, people want reality and hard goods.
Tokens could be backed by available directly usable energy resources without the need to mine a coin. Instead of this simple notion, crypto miners burn through massive amounts of energy to produce a token. That never really made any sense to me.
Governments used to issue currency at low cost until the central banks took over and turned this simple process into a profit making business by essentially printing debt.
A return to government issued currency would be a start, but not likely to happen, so I guess I'm on board with the decentralized experiment.
I would never argue that bitcoin is the perfect technology nor the perfect money, but I would argue that it is a tremendous proof-of-concept. I would also invite you to reconsider the notion that bitcoin is not backed by something tangible. Consider that in one sense it is (it uses proof of work and mining to enhance its security, so is backed by energy, with is tangible). But if proof of stake systems turn out to be as secure and limit the seigniorage problems of pre-minting, then that's great! Bitcoin can evolve. It's competitors can evolve. The ecosystem will evolve. That said, this idea of "backing" is an artifact of goldbuggery that no longer exists on earth. Even government-issued commodity-backed currencies come with problems (though I'd take that over what we have, any day.) So we have to ask.... "Compared to what?" Until that new "what" exists, innovators are creating new systems all the time.
Thanks for replying. I know this topic can get into extreme pro and con camps pretty quick. I am all for anything that can keep the game of life ticking along even if we have to use a few magic tricks here and there.
And, as you say, that's what money has become really. Currency backed by anything ended long ago. The BRICS appear to be attempting to establish something along those lines... good luck with all that!
We essentially live in a system that went off the reality rails a long time ago. Some say since we stopped hunting and gathering and started large scale farming and city life. And we've been heading for a major implosion ever since. The global self-organizing superorganism that we've become appears to have other ideas though and isn't that easily defeated by logical economic roadblocks by the look of things.
Central banks have managed to keep this train going far longer than many of us thought was possible. The system is showing the usual signs of implosion again and again we have to wait and see if it's possible to patch things this time.
I, like many others, have put a considerable amount of faith in alternative decentralized systems of exchange. All I was asking for was that it be pinned to available energy sources as I outlined here... https://www.tsubion.com/energy-is-the-currency-of-life-money-should-be-based-on-it/
And some readers took that proposal the wrong way and said I was advocating for an authoritarian centralized solution as put forward by technocrats 100 years ago which wasn't the case but some simple rules would have to be followed as with any shared system.
Crypto mining burns available energy to create a token by crunching an algorithm. It is not based on or backed by available energy (without burning said energy) which would be the far more sensible option.
In the digital age, you don't even have to mine raw materials to make physical coins or paper notes (even though some people are understandably attached to these). All you need to do is establish the amount of available energy that a country or region has (since this underpins absolutely everything else that we do) and base your currency on that. The number you come up with is tied to the amount of available usable energy. That's it. No need for token mining etc.
Governments used to do this based on the amount of gold they held but available energy would be far more relevant to a modern economy.
So again, crypto is not backed by energy reserves at all. It burns vast amounts of energy to create a digital ephemeral token that relies on faith alone. Which is pretty much what we've been doing for decades anyway. Just printing our way out of each slump until it doesn't work anymore (pushing on a string).
Bitcoin and all other crypto are far removed from anything tangible. Mining a token that purely relies on others having the same faith in that token that you have is akin to millions of people running video game pcs with expensive components and the latest morpg to mine in game tokens to be spent in the gaming marketplace. Does it work? Absolutely! Is it "backed" by anything in the real world... absolutely not. Just pull the plug. Where have the tokens gone? Even if you have a record of them on your hardware it's easy to lose them or for something else to go wrong. If no one else accepts these tokens they are worthless.
So why do I still entertain the idea of crypto at all? Because it still holds the promise of decentralizing the production of these tokens of exchange even with the logical issues I have with the way they are produced and their ability to survive any kind of real world problems.
Governments can either ban crypto or fully embrace them. For that to happen, central banking power would have to dwindle for some reason. I don't think these powerful institutions (based on fraud by the way) will allow themselves to be replaced that easily.
What is more likely is that we suffer some kind of economic turmoil and a new system based on available energy and production capacity rises up in its place. In other words, a return to tangible real world values.
I have wondered about a system pegged to energy sources or similar commodities, particularly if that system can be created without needing trusted third parties, who can almost never be trusted.
Yes... I guess that's the problem. We don't really have much control over the infrastructure side of things and all the central hubs that our activity tends to flow through, whether that be on the Internet or through an airport, there are always chokepoints.
Hopefully we can find a way to exert more control over these infrastructure elements maybe by pushing back on all the nonsense that tends to concentrate there.
I keep forgetting to mention this... the petrodollar would be the closest thing we've had to money tied to energy.