The evolution of Critical Thinking’s evidence based narrative continues here at outersite.org. It is co-creative research and analysis in action. Currently, innovative thinking about money is taking shape and this article documents some of the understanding arrived at so far.
In 2017, the Islamic Economics Journal of King Abdulaziz University requested and published Critical Thinking’s response to Bernard Lietaer’s paper on Reform Proposals in the Monetary System for Attaining Global Economic Stability.
9. Thinking differently
Doing the same thing over and over again while expecting a different result is a sign of insanity. By any measure, our political economy is psychopathic, running roughshod over people’s lives without so much as a pause.
If we’re prepared to challenge everything we think we know and examine the political economy based on knowledge which is now freely available, we will find our thinking changes.
Orthodox economics discounts the significance of money, even though everything is ruled by it. Renegade economics or thinking that challenges orthodoxy has begun to take notice of money, particularly usury, one of the three fundamental flaws referred to in the paper above but, thus far, has failed to explore the fundamental nature of money.
Furthermore, there is widespread ignorance of Divine Wisdom and its fundamental antipathy to current forms of money. To put it simply, money, in current forms, runs counter to universal or natural law.
In publishing the last three papers on tokenisation, we’ve described the current monetary environment that governs current attitudes and behaviour. We also put forward some ideas as to how we can transform the monetary environment to bring it into line with Divine Wisdom – this notion is implicit but not properly explained. In order to validate these ideas, we need to fully understand money, how it is created, controlled and the effect that it has. That we’ve done with regard to existing systems of money but it’s not enough. We need to understand the Taxonomy of Money.
This is very much work-in-progress and will, no doubt, be refined over time but sharing this at this time is essential. The COVID-19 trojan and the disruption it’s caused have presented us with an unprecedented opportunity to change our monetary environment and, as a consequence, our living reality and future.
Taxonomy of Money
What is money?
1. Money is related to human activity and represents transactional relationships.
2. Money today (and throughout history) is Exogenous, i.e. external to transactions or relationships. Money is provided by an external third party.
3. Money is rationed according to the short-side principle. Those who create and distribute money exert power over those who need it and determine the Monetary Exchange Value for goods and services. Many, who are denied adequate access to money, are consequently denied access to the means to life. The resulting competitive environment (arising from competition for money) has created and exacerbated the many problems we humans face today.
4. Endogenous Money or Tokens, i.e. integral money, are integral to transactional relationships. Tokens are created at the time of transaction by parties to the transactions, thus facilitating economic participation for all. Endogenous Tokens are collaborative and will provide access to the means to life for all – inclusive.
5. The exchange value of Endogenous Tokens is determined by their Use Value
6. Use Value reflects all human activity: Production, Distribution and Consumption. N.B. There is no value in production or distribution without consumption.
7. To accommodate the transition from Monetary Exchange Value to tokenised Use Value, there is need for “hybrid” money to satisfy the current requirements of the Old (competitive) Paradigm and Endogenous Tokens for the New (co-creative development) Paradigm.
8. Co-creation of the new, tokenised environment requires co-creative research and analysis to reach a shared understanding of why a new approach to money is required and to optimise implementations of both hybrid and Endogenous Tokens.
9. The monetary environment determines attitudes and behaviour which is why endogenous tokenisation of transactions will eliminate or dramatically reduce many of the problems we collectively suffer today. Endogenous Tokens will foster co-creative development of a collaborative, mutually supportive political economy that delivers peace and prosperity.
The fabricated “crises” (first terror, then climate, followed by induced mass migration and now COVID) have created a growing sense that fundamental change is essential to the survival of our species. People have already adapted to a strange “new normal” through progressive behavioural conditioning. They are responding to the current structure based on the ideology of destruction that took root 2,500 years ago.
While ideology can, by itself, change behaviour (think of religious, political and economic ideology), it is the resulting structure that is the primary driver of change. If people can adapt their attitudes and behaviour, in days (they adapted to the new “pandemic” regulations abruptly), on a false premise (COVID on top of all the other fabricated “crises”), they can become open to embracing and adapting to a structure founded on Divine Wisdom. The real crisis is the political economy but it is already changing.
Alternative distributed money systems are evolving, largely driven by greed fostered under the current monetary systems. These are providing the foundations or building blocks, as described in the three papers on tokenisation, for a new distributed structure or paradigm. However, the primary and most fundamental foundations to a new paradigm are:
- a shared understanding. Already such understanding is being shared among more people daily and is thus taking root. The essential prerequisite for positive change is: perceptions need to match reality and then the reality will change.
- This shared understanding is generating innovative ideas to bring the monetary environment into line with Divine Wisdom.
These ideas need to take shape in the form of exploration and experimentation of different implementations of tokenisation. News of success and failure should be shared widely to facilitate the co-creative development of an optimal monetary environment. The essential shared characteristic of such experiments is that they must foster the application of Divine Wisdom based on love, to eclipse the current structure based on fear, greed and destruction.
Once this experimentation and exploration takes sufficient hold, people will abandon current monetary systems to embrace Endogenous Tokens to co-create a political economy in which everyone can participate and thrive.
