Observations on the human condition
How Tokenised Money-Market Funds Magnify Systemic Risk and Accelerate Extraction at the Top by Alex Nikolov Following on from Alex’s articles, Borrowed Stability and The Forest of the Order, he expands his critique of stablecoins and the measures granting BlackRock extraordinary privilege and power. I. The Next Act in the Stable Circus In a previous … Read more
There is something I should say at the outset. I have been using artificial intelligence to help my writing with increasing frequency since starting to explore what it can and can’t do about a year ago. I don’t particularly worry about what people think, but I am aware of the perception risk: that articles assisted … Read more
My article linked below appears (page 13) in Issue 68 of The Light, a free, independently distributed monthly paper that asks the questions the mainstream won’t. This edition carries sharp structural analysis worth reading alongside it: Rusere Shoniwa traces the managed transition of global capital through the BRICS framework, while Escape Key dissects how the … Read more
Following on from yesterday’s post on The forest of the Order, Alex explains the current noise around Stablecoins ignores the obvious: stablecoins are neither “stable”, nor innovative or revolutionary but merely intensification of the extractive logic of the money paradigm. There is an alternative coordination layer which is both innovative and evolutionary which is what … Read more
On the Gifts and Costs of Living Through Symbols,and Possible Ways Forward by Alex Nikolov Our recent weekly WiseValue discussions have been exploring symbology; Alex published the following article on LinkedIn. There is also a 20 minute podcast. We are born clean! We are born innocent! Then we are claimed by theorder of symbols and … Read more
Book Review. A review of John Macgregor, The Mechanics of Changing the World: Political Architecture to Roll Back State & Corporate Power — by Clive Menzies John Macgregor’s The Mechanics of Changing the World arrives at a moment when the literature on democratic decline is long on diagnosis and short on remedy. His stated ambition … Read more
How the Water Flows A message arrived recently in a group I’ve been part of for years — people doing serious, unglamorous work on land rights, monetary reform, the mechanics of power. Someone had shared a publication. Someone else objected, forcefully: the editor holds views I find indefensible, the paper has carried content that is … Read more
A Short Story Her father’s voice came through the wall before she reached the bottom stair. Not talking to her. Talking to the radio, or to himself, which was the same thing at this hour. Poison, he was saying. Complete and utter poison. Don’t give it the time of day. Mira pulled her sleeve over … Read more
The last article asked a simple question: who benefits from your hatred? It traced the structural mechanics of managed conflict — the pilpul of opposing narratives, the harvesting of fear, the money system that makes war its most profitable product. That is the ground level view, and it is necessary. But there is a larger … Read more
There is something almost unbearable about watching people celebrate the death of other people’s children. Yet across the world, on every side of every current conflict, that is what is happening — on screens, in comment sections, in living rooms. People who would describe themselves as decent, compassionate human beings are finding themselves flooded with … Read more
How structural analysis, vindicated across a decade, points toward what comes next I. How the conclusions were reached There is a particular quality to analysis that arrives at uncomfortable conclusions before those conclusions become comfortable to hold. It cannot claim the authority of consensus, because consensus has not formed. It cannot cite peer review, because … Read more