updated 9d ago
Bitcoin Is Venice: Essays on the Past and Future of Capitalism
We do not mean that physical coins or notes depreciate, which would ironically have the opposite effect. We mean that the utility of the institution depletes with inflation.
from Bitcoin Is Venice: Essays on the Past and Future of Capitalism by Allen Farrington
Zach Kirshner added 8mo ago
Social capital is the productive potential of social networks to create value. It emerges from trust and the willingness to cooperate.
from Bitcoin Is Venice: Essays on the Past and Future of Capitalism by Allen Farrington
Zach Kirshner added 8mo ago
While Pax Romana was appreciated by many, it remained imposed by fiat and from a central point of failure. All roads lead to Rome, they said. So, what if Rome fell? So would the entire network. Top-down institutions depend on a constant projection of strength. Ironically, this is precisely what makes them brittle. They depend on a high flow, eventu
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Zach Kirshner added 8mo ago
The tragic irony of the totalitarian deceit is that the epidemic of widespread and unchecked selfishness against which the lying totalitarian proselytizes is unlikely to exist in any circumstances other than the deprivation caused by totalitarianism itself. Wealth comes from capital. The destruction of capital, whether from total coercion or total
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Zach Kirshner added 8mo ago
When we ponder the layout of ancient cities, we must acknowledge that they are the by-product of thousands of years of human tinkering. People came together in villages and tried different living arrangements. What worked, they copied and expanded. What didn’t work, they discarded. That is, if those experiments hadn’t already killed or disbanded th
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Zach Kirshner added 8mo ago
Perversely, irony relies on some remains of cultural capital in order to coherently express its destructive message. If elevated beyond commentary and analysis to its own pedestal of artistic value, its essence become desacralization and the making trite of deep truths we might prefer to respect and conserve.
from Bitcoin Is Venice: Essays on the Past and Future of Capitalism by Allen Farrington
Zach Kirshner added 8mo ago
But eventually we are left with nothing sacred, nothing we can take seriously. It all becomes a self-referential circle jerk of irony descending slowly into total relativism without an anchor; nothing to which to be relative; without a meaning; without a social truth in sight.
from Bitcoin Is Venice: Essays on the Past and Future of Capitalism by Allen Farrington
Zach Kirshner added 8mo ago
This is sacrifice and compromise personified: One can always create something trivially original on the grounds of trivial individualism. The challenge is to create something meaningful to others and true to oneself that manages to say something new, or at least newly, to infuse just enough individual creative spark as to manipulate the common pool
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Zach Kirshner added 8mo ago
An obsession with utility is high time preference and selfishness incarnate. It is a maximization of flow and a rejection of stock. It is a worship of consumption yet a disregard for investment. Scruton captures the essential long-termism of a proper appreciation of beauty wonderfully: “Put usefulness first and you lose it. Put beauty first and wha
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Zach Kirshner added 8mo ago