Bitcoin, Personality And Development Part Two — Bitcoin Versus Nihilism
We made a case for how Bitcoin enhances the fidelity of each and how this results in playing much better “video games” on the road to ending up being much better versions of ourselves.In Part Two, we shall check out how Bitcoin enhances ones aim by focusing their attention, such that playing more significant– and maybe multiple– games ends up being possible.Fiat PsychologyOne can expect a world whose thus social and financial signals are mainly fake, to also exhibit falsities in other areas.Glaring examples are the positive impression and pill-popping movements so prevalent in contemporary psychology.”Attention, Focus And AimWe utilized the “blind home builder” example in Part One to illustrate how a high-fidelity instrument can change the outcome of an unbiased or goal. The complimentary market is a collection of individual, intersubjective “attentions” which thread together into a more complicated social fabric.The division of labor literally indicates that each of us can direct our attention in accordance with what we worth, while the rest is taken care of by others who are focusing on that which matters to them. Certainty is a base human requirement, and we will discover it one method or another.We will seek it through low-grade automobiles such as drugs that numb or distract us, through the false sense of certainty we get when were desperate to accomplish at the cost of all else, and believing in incorrect, snake-oil promises of getting rich which inevitably turns on us, e.g., $LUNA.Or, through higher-quality automobiles such as working on something were interested in, interested by or passionate about, whilst setting aside some of the excess item of our labor in a type that will not vaporize away across time.Here we challenge the case for Bitcoin once more.We should choose, and the capacity to do so sensibly is improved with a tool that can protect your future optionality.DistractionsBecause attention is expensive and we are mainly blind to the happenings around us, we are vulnerable to being distracted. Its worth keeping in mind here that as I said earlier, there are both emergent and deliberately-planned distractions.Emergent because there is so much sound and such a high time-preferenced orientation to modern life that people can no longer pay attention to anything any longer: Attention periods have actually notoriously dwindled down to seconds, so were bombarded by even more “if it bleeds it leads” messaging from the orifice of every homo-hystericus and media outlet surrounding us.
This is a viewpoint editorial by Aleks Svetski, author of “The UnCommunist Manifesto,”creator of The Bitcoin Times and Host of The Wake Up Podcast.The series continues. If youve not yet check out chapters one through three, you can discover them here, and naturally you can discover Part One of this chapter here: Bitcoin, Personality And Development– Bitcoin Is Self-Love Part OneQuotes without any source beneath are credited to Dr. Jordan B. Peterson.In Part One, we checked out worth, choices and actions. We made a case for how Bitcoin boosts the fidelity of each and how this leads to playing better “video games” on the road to progressing variations of ourselves.In Part Two, we will explore how Bitcoin improves ones goal by focusing their attention, such that playing more meaningful– and maybe multiple– games becomes possible.Fiat PsychologyOne can expect a world whose financial and therefore social signals are mainly phony, to likewise exhibit falsities in other areas.Glaring examples are the favorable illusion and pill-popping movements so common in modern psychology.”It is for such factors that an entire generation of social psychologists suggested favorable illusions as the only trusted path to mental health. Their credo? Let a lie be your umbrella. A more dismal, sorrowful, pessimistic approach can barely be thought of: things are so terrible that only delusion can conserve you.”In this downstream result of “fiat,” you are always a victim, i.e., its never ever your fault, you shouldnt feel discomfort, theres a quick repair offered and you should not ask a lot of questions.”No sir, the problem is not that your habits is out of positioning with what your soul desires and that you are acting out a depressing variation of what your life might be. Your issue is the lack of prozac and an absence of lies. Heres a prescription of [insert pharmaceutical substance], with a side of favorable illusion to numb you into a steady-state of nihilistic submission.”Fiat psychology develops lies upon lies to protect you from the ugly truth. That ugly truth might just be what you required to hear in order to enhance. Sure, it may harm your feelings, but thats what its supposed to do. Your worried system has developed to signal that youre transgressing your own values. It knows when youre “sinning,” and it informs you.Subduing it through chemicals and lies does not make the problem go away.It just makes you a weaker, more oblivious variation of yourself, who should one day face an even uglier truth.Fiat → NihilismNihilism is a sensation of hopelessness about the roadway ahead. It is a psychological symptom of high time-preference in which low-to-no worth is provided to the future, for it is treacherous and uncertain anyway, while today rises, presuming it even matters at all.With that in mind, hedonists a minimum of attempt to find pleasure in the minute, and are of a higher energy. Nihilists are numb today and more numb tomorrow.”There will constantly be people much better than you– thats a cliché of nihilism, like the phrase, In a million years, whos going to understand the difference? The correct response to that statement is not, Well then, whatever is worthless. Its, Any moron can pick a frame of time within which nothing matters. Talking yourself into irrelevance is not a profound review of being. Its a low-cost trick of the logical mind.”Time preference is at the center of all human behavior. Most individuals either have not heard of the term, or think its “simply some economics lingo that does not concern my life.” But it does. It truly does. Economics is main to all life.The problem is many people have no idea what economics is, or why its important. Theyve been persuaded into believing its a science that utilizes mathematical models to understand how a society needs to be planned, how its resources need to be used and how well it is performing versus some conjured up measurements (gross domestic item, customer cost index, etc). The longterm, downstream effect of this kind of thing is a world in which an entire host of ultra-nihilist, vegan talking heads become very popular authors who anticipate a world where your sterile, useless presence will be anticipated by grey goo and intelligent machines.Free will? Who needs that when you have overall biometric surveillance?Economics? What do you imply? Why would the study of human action matter when people are just numbers on a spreadsheet?This is why.None of this is normal, nor healthy.To have ended up being so internally empty and externally emaciated is not something to be happy with. This bug-man is not an example however a caution of what humanity can degenerate into if we continue this path.This is why a relationship to the non-empirical is so required. A reacquaintance with value, or “quality,” as Robert Persig would state. How can we do this?It all starts with adjusting our aim, and refocusing our attention on “what matters.”Attention, Focus And AimWe used the “blind home builder” example in Part One to highlight how a high-fidelity instrument can alter the result of an unbiased or objective. Well expand on that here.”Our eyes are always pointing at things we have an interest in approaching, or investigating, or searching for, or having. We should see, however to see, we should aim, so we are always aiming.”Human action is a pursuit of ends we consider important, and in order to achieve these ends, we need to initially take objective and after that apply attention.In order to intend precisely, we need to have feedback. The exact same way our eyes triangulate visual feedback, costs and exchange are the feedback mechanism in a market, or the “social landscape,” so to speak.If somebody purchases what youve made, there is an implied worth there, along with details that what youre doing might simply be on the ideal track (barring any flukes). The reverse is also real. If no one buys your shit, youre being told by the market that youre either early, incorrect, late, incongruent and require to change, i.e., you need to aim better.Therein lies the value of “sin.” To sin means to fizzle. To know youve sinned is to have the opportunity to correct. How can one hit the mark in this day and age when the target is not only a chimera, but ones vision is blurred?Society becomes a culture of gamblers and madmen all in the pursuit to strike targets they can neither see nor assess, borne of their desperate need for survival.”The finest method to damage the capitalist system is to debauch the currency. By a continuing procedure of inflation, governments can seize, covertly and unnoticed, a crucial part of the wealth of their citizens. By this technique they not just confiscate, but they confiscate arbitrarily; and, while the procedure impoverishes lots of, it really enhances some.”As the inflation profits and the genuine worth of the currency fluctuates wildly from month to month, all long-term relations in between debtors and lenders, which form the ultimate structure of commercialism, become so absolutely disordered as to be nearly meaningless; and the process of wealth-getting degenerates into a lottery and a gamble.” — Comrade LeninWe see this sinfulness manifesting at all layers of society today. Desperate speculation on one end of the spectrum and helpless abandon on the other.In my recent check out to the United States I couldnt assist but feel the weight of hopelessness of the not-so-fortunate homeless beings littering the major highways. I felt it strolling into Walmart too. Otherwise “great” people, lost, puzzled, and under a continuously mounting pressure they understand not from where.You could see the opposite end of the spectrum in the current collapse of LUNA. People who had no organization “investing” got sucked into a Ponzi scheme through large desperation and worry of losing out. They are the same individuals who approach me at conferences and ask “what coin should I purchase?”Its awful. Its inefficient. Its wrong.Parker Lewis discussed this in a splendid piece for The Bitcoin Times in 2020; “Bitcoin is the Great Definancialization.”Of course Im mindful that each scenario is more complex– individuals are accountable for their own lot in life– much comes from the desperation and subconscious panic of being socially and financially blind.I would argue, as others have, that much might be corrected if upstream modifications were made– and I do not mean “political” ones, but the traditional “fix the cash, fix the world.”FocusVision and focus are naturally pricey. Intentionally (or through lack of knowledge) obfuscating the signaling mechanism essential for making valuation (in a social sense) only makes it more expensive, and eventually useless.Obfuscation strengthens both nihilism and desperation. You begin to doubt yourself when youre seeing absolutely nothing but a mirage on a routine basis. In time this continuous self-doubt changes into fear– worry of your own capabilities and fear of the world around you.When individuals run from such a frame of mind, they can not and will not operate as mature, conscious, accountable humans. They begin to regress; à la modernity.Focus is the precursor to attention. Robert Breedlove discussed it at the recent Market Disruptors conference in Dallas, and called it another “deep response” to the “What is cash?” question.Everything on the planet conspires to attract attention.”This is partly since vision is pricey– psychophysiologically expensive; neurologically costly. Extremely little of your retina is high-resolution fovea– the very main, high-resolution part of the eye, used to do such things as recognize faces.”Attention is directed or focused energy and intent. Its expensive, due to the fact that it represents in some sense our social currency. The free enterprise is a collection of individual, intersubjective “attentions” which thread together into a more complicated social fabric.The department of labor actually implies that each of us can direct our attention in accordance with what we value, while the rest is taken care of by others who are focusing on that which matters to them. In this way, we collectively fill each others blind areas.”Youre blind to everything else (and theres a great deal of whatever else– so youre extremely blind). And it needs to be that method, because there is much more of the world than there is of you. You must shepherd your restricted resources thoroughly. Seeing is very hard, so you must pick what to see, and let the rest go.”No one guy, think group, entity or tank can ever see it all. Nor must they attempt to. Our collective strength comes from diverse viewpoints.Diversity (in the practical and natural sense, not the political marxist sense) comes from the truth that were all seeing clearly within our own dimensions. As things weave together, the lovely tapestry of the complimentary market generates intricate human civilisation.The PanopticonOn the opposite end of the “visual” spectrum is the main, particular eye which allegedly “sees all.”It is arguably the height of evil.Why? Focus, vision and attention are costly since as weve established. There is excessive to be participated in to at as soon as, so for any “Eye of Sauron” to preserve the illusion of control, it should reduce the complex into something direct and empirical. This can just be done through conformity, and obviously, like a lawnmower that chops whatever down to size, conformity can only take place by force.The “unholy trinity” of the State, as we will check out in Part Three of this chapter, depends on such force and conformity in order to produce fixed, inorganic structures that are an affront to the vibrant nature of life.Its mindless advocates believe that in its absence of an all-seeing, all-controlling “state” apparatus, all progress would unexpectedly stop and humanity would vanish into a puff of smoke.”If the government didnt build the roads, we would all perish.”This is naturally absurd.If anything, the “evil triad” of the State halts progress since it conspires to direct, supervise, micromanage and manage it. Dont think me? If youre an employer or moms and dad, go dominate the shoulder of your staff member or child, enjoy them every minute of the day and see just how much genuine progress they make.Progress And AttentionThe following 2 quotes by Dr. Peterson illustrate a stunning aspect of the human condition and give us an answer to why there is never ever an “end state” of being or an outright optimums to wealth, as the Marxists would have you think:”We are always and simultaneously at point a (which is less preferable than it could be), moving towards point b (which we deem better, in accordance with our explicit and implicit values).”…”Even when pleased, temporarily, we remain curious. We live within a structure that defines today as eternally lacking and the future as eternally much better.”They describe why we as human beings are always striving, reaching, growing, adapting and evolving, and they likewise discuss why there can be no natural monopolies in a society. Things change and the old will wear down while the vibrant and new will grow.With that in mind, there does exist a line between the healthy desire to grow, and the blind chase for a grass believed greener somewhere else. The latter is exacerbated when youre enjoying your savings disappear like ice on a hot day. In such a state, youre no longer developing by virtue of curiosity, but through desperation. Youre in a consistent state of angst about the future.This is why savings are required for not only stability, but peace of mind. Certainty is a base human need, and we will discover it one method or another.We will seek it through low-quality lorries such as drugs that numb or sidetrack us, through the false sense of certainty we get when were desperate to attain at the cost of all else, and thinking in false, snake-oil pledges of getting abundant which undoubtedly turns on us, e.g., $LUNA.Or, through higher-quality automobiles such as dealing with something were interested in, fascinated by or enthusiastic about, whilst setting aside a few of the excess item of our labor in a form that will not vaporize away across time.Here we face the case for Bitcoin when more.We must select, and the capacity to do so sensibly is enhanced with a tool that can maintain your future optionality.DistractionsBecause attention is pricey and we are mainly blind to the happenings around us, we are susceptible to being distracted. This is the shadow side of focus.Dr. Daniel Simons popular “selective attention test” made clear that when people are involved or spellbound by what theyre doing, they tend to miss the elephants and the gorillas in the room.Modernity conspires to do this to you. Deliberately and unintentionally. Individuals are today so hectic trying to endure, trying to make enough money to pay for skyrocketing rates for products at the grocery store and gasoline station that they have no energy left to notice the crimes being committed by those at the helm of this sinking ship we call “modern society.”2500-page expenses filled with meaningless expenses are provided and gone by government bureaucrats on an impulse, due to the fact that theyre too long to read. Obviously none of these “agents” care in the first place since theyre not the ones paying $25 million on “bias training” in healthcare. You are.These parasites are gaslighting and pickpocketing you at the same time. Theyre making fun of you behind your back since youre stupid enough to trade the valuable product of your labor for money they just create out of thin air.What a deal.While you work, labor, sweat and sacrifice, well just be over here investing everything and making things up as we go.Its not surprising that anybody with at least half a brain is desperate to gamble their escape of the rat race, going after the next Ponzi to the moon on Conbase, Robinhood or some other shitcoin casino. Its worth keeping in mind here that as I stated previously, there are both emergent and deliberately-planned distractions.Emergent due to the fact that there is so much sound and such a high time-preferenced orientation to contemporary life that people can no longer focus on anything anymore: Attention spans have famously diminished down to seconds, so were bombarded by even more “if it bleeds it leads” messaging from the orifice of every homo-hystericus and media outlet surrounding us. Speak about a downward spiral.Then obviously there are the intentional, more clandestine efforts to psyop everyone into succumbing to “the current thing.”These are conspiracies undoubtedly, and as with any attention-seeking apparatus, they conspire to obtain your attention.The question is, what will you do when affronted? Will you, in desperation, react? Or will you stand your ground and protect your attention?From personal experience, considering that discovering Bitcoin, Ive been far more selective with my time and attention. I am far less prone to succumb to the present thing, and more positive and positive about the long-term trajectory humanity is on.Yes, I too, like you, need to sustain the entire clown world sitcom, but I have the space to sit, to wait and to “take stock,” as we discussed in Part One.This has actually enhanced my life substantially, and it can yours too.In ClosingNotwithstanding all of the malevolence present worldwide today, a large part of what we do not desire comes as an outcome of being concentrated on the incorrect thing.Its true that were all here to evolve and grow as people, and part of that is the triumph over the parts of ourselves that no longer serve us. Triumph or simply separation? Either way, its moving on from that stage.Bitcoin does not “repair that” because that does not require fixing. Progress by meaning will mean that were always leaving a part of ourselves behind on the journey of life.We are, and will constantly retool as we grow, adjust and become either more complex or easy versions of ourselves.A Bitcoin basic simply makes this process more accurate, more exact, more sincere, more rewarding.”If your life is not working out, possibly it is your present understanding that is insufficient, not life itself. Perhaps your worth structure needs some severe retooling. Perhaps what you desire is blinding you to what else might be.”As we apply our objective and attention toward ends we deem are of quality or worth, we will move towards them. This main truth of life is something that every main organizer and administrative statist appears to think human beings are not capable of doing on their own.Luckily for us, we no longer have to listen to them, or play by their dumb rules. Thank goodness for #Bitcoin.”There is absolutely nothing wonderful here– or absolutely nothing more than the already-present magic of awareness. We only see what we focus on. The rest of the world (whichs the majority of it) is hidden. If we start targeting at something various– something like I want my life to be much better– our minds will start presenting us with new information, derived from the formerly concealed world, to help us in that pursuit.”This is a guest post by Aleks Svetski, author of “The UnCommunist Manifesto,”, founder of The Bitcoin Times and Host of The Wake Up Podcast. Opinions expressed are completely their own and do not always show those of BTC Inc or Bitcoin Magazine.