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1/33. I just published “The Number Zero and Bitcoin”
Bitcoin represents the discovery of absolute scarcity for money, an unstoppable idea that is changing the world tremendously, just like its digital ancestor: the number zero. https://medium.com/@breedlove22/the-number-zero-and-bitcoin-4c193336db5b
Bitcoin represents the discovery of absolute scarcity for money, an unstoppable idea that is changing the world tremendously, just like its digital ancestor: the number zero. https://medium.com/@breedlove22/the-number-zero-and-bitcoin-4c193336db5b
2. Many believe that Bitcoin is “just one of thousands of cryptoassets." This is true in the same way that the number zero is just one of an infinite series of numbers.
3. In reality, Bitcoin is special, and so is zero: each is an invention which led to a discovery that fundamentally reshaped its overarching system—for Bitcoin, that system is money, and for zero, it is mathematics.
4. For most of history, mankind had no concept of zero: an understanding of it is not innate to us—a symbol for it had to be invented and continuously taught to successive generations.
5. Both math and money are possible without zero and Bitcoin, respectively—however both are tremendously more wasteful systems without these core elements. For instance, calculation in Roman numerals was extremely cumbersome:
6. Computation and record-keeping with a zero-based numeral system is easier, faster, and less prone to error. Like its distant progeny Bitcoin would later be, zero was an unstoppable idea whose time had come:
7. Zero has functions similar to money that make a numeral system more scalable, innovative, and convertible.
8. Zero is the “store of value” on which higher order of magnitude numerals can scale: giving us a numeral system capable of containing more meaning in less space, and supporting calculations in less time.
9. Zero is the “medium of exchange” between the positive and negative domains of numbers—it is only possible to pass into, or out of, either territory by way of zero.
10. With zero, we can easily convert fractions to decimals, which obsoletes the need for complicated conversions when dealing with fractions—the “unit of account” function of zero.
11. Zero arose from the bizarre logic of the ancient East. In Buddhism, the logical character of the phenomenological world is more complex than true or false. Buddhist logic is encapsulated in the tetralemma:
12. Importantly, zero gave us the concept of infinity: which was notably absent from the minds of ancient Greek logicians. In the Riemann Sphere, a three-dimensional, mathematical interpretation of the tetralemma, we find zero’s twin—infinity:
13. Zero and its twin infinity were problematic for the power-base of The Church, which was premised on a universe with no void and no infinity.
14. The Church’s claim to absolute sovereignty was critically dependent on the Aristotelean model of the universe, which was finite with Earth at its center. Standing as a symbol for both the void and the infinite, zero was a heretical concept:
15. Centuries later, a similar dynamic would unfold in the discovery of absolute scarcity for money, which is dissident to the dominion of The Fed—the false church of modernity.
16. As Christianity swept through the West, The Church relied upon the explanatory power of this Aristotelean philosophy as proof of God’s existence. Objecting to this doctrine was soon considered an objection to the existence of God and the power of The Church.
17. Although The Church would cling to Aristotle’s views for a few more centuries—it fought heresy by forbidding certain books and burning certain Protestants alive—zero marked the beginning of the end for this domineering and oppressive institution.
18. In a grand ideological shift that foreshadowed the invention of Bitcoin centuries later, zero became the idea that broke The Church’s grip on humanity, just as absolute scarcity of money is breaking The Fed’s stranglehold on the world today.
19. Zero was the smooth stone slung into the face of Goliath, a death-stroke to the dominion of The Church; felled by an unstoppable idea, this oppressive institution’s fall from grace would make way for the rise of the nation-state—the dominant institutional model in modernity.
20. Zero punched a hole and created a vacuum in the framework of mathematics and shattered Aristotelean philosophy, on which the power of The Church was premised.
21. Similarly, Bitcoin is punching a hole and creating a vacuum in the market for money; it is killing Keynesian economics—which is the propagandistic power-base of the nation-state (along with its apparatus of theft, the central bank):
22. Path-dependence protects Bitcoin from disruption, as the organic sequence of events which led to its release and assimilation into the marketplace cannot be replicated. Bitcoin’s money supply is absolutely scarce; a totally unique and one-time discovery for money:
23. The concept of absolute monetary scarcity goes against the wishes of entrenched power structures like The Fed: like zero, once an idea whose time has come is released into the world, it is nearly impossible to put the proverbial genie back in the bottle.
24. Unlike Bitcoin, no physical form of money could possibly guarantee a permanently fixed supply—so far as we know, absolute scarcity can only be digital.
25. For the same quantifiable reasons a zero-based numeral system became a dominant mathematical protocol, the absolute scarcity of Bitcoin’s supply will outcompete all other monetary protocols in its path to global dominance.
26. When Bitcoin’s inflation rate finally reaches zero in the mid 22nd century, the measure of its soundness as a store of value (s2f ratio) will become infinite; people that realize this and adopt it early will benefit disproportionately from the resultant mass wealth transfer.
27. Zero and infinity are reciprocal: 1/∞ = 0 and 1/0 = ∞. In the same way, a society’s wellbeing shrinks towards zero the more closely the inflation rate approaches infinity (through the hyperinflation of fiat currency).
28. Conversely, societal wellbeing can, in theory, be expanded towards infinity the more closely the inflation rate approaches zero (through the absolute scarcity of Bitcoin).
29. Zero arose in the world as an unstoppable idea that broke the dominion of The Church The resultant movement—The Separation of Church and State—reinvigorated self-sovereignty in the world, setting the individual firmly as the cornerstone of the state.
30. Rising from The Church’s ashes came a nation-state model founded on sound property rights, rule of law, and free market money (aka hard money). With this new age came an unprecedented boom in scientific advancement, wealth creation, and worldwide wellbeing.
31. In the same way, Bitcoin and its underlying discovery of absolute scarcity for money is an idea whose time has come. Bitcoin is the economic singularity:
32. Bitcoin is shattering the siege of central banks on our financial sovereignty; it is invoking a new movement—The Separation of Money and State—as its revolutionary banner; and it is restoring Natural Law in a world ravaged by a mega-wealth-parasite—The Fed.
33. Only unstoppable ideas can break otherwise immovable institutions: zero brought The Church to its knees and Bitcoin is bringing the false church of The Fed into the sunlight of its long-awaited judgement day.
Check out my appearance on the Bitcoin Echo Chamber podcast where I discuss this and other topics: https://anchor.fm/podcast-8f267c0/episodes/Discovering-Zero-and-Bitcoin-BEC0036-ec2jbn
