I just sent one of your articles to Paul Barnett in the UK by way of introduction. He’s the CEO of the Enlightened Enterprise and we connected on LinkedIn He’s also the author of The Better Way on SubStack.
Very interesting. I have been pointing out for some years to anyone who will listen than money is information and that means that unlike matter/energy it can be created and destroyed at minimal "cost". More often than not the response is a blank stare. Great to find someone else who understands that and has made the effort to explore some of the implications. Some very good points in here I will want to refresh my memory on.
There are quite a few grammar oddities and autocorrect glitches, it would be good if you were able to sort them out.
I did see one or two still missed. Just read it today. Sorry I didn’t think to write down exactly where. Doesn’t matter because I have ideas on making this more accessible, I’ll continue when I finish the longer pdf.
Love this! I've long pondered what I call The (Reverse) Law of Monetary Thermodynamics:
"Monetary assets can only be created and destroyed, not changed in form."
(Note, "monetary assets" very much includes titles to real estate, vehicles, etc. — not just so-called "financial assets" for which there are offsetting, related liabilities on other balance sheets.)
I am not ready to accept that money as information forms a different class to any other form of information embedded in rules, norms, practices, heuristics etc; I understand your point that information is not tied to physical / energy assets. It is a fiction held aloft by common beliefs - it is a product of our imagination etc; But many non physical energy assets are the same. The energy required to create them is embedded in the neuronal firing of atoms. Nothing is without energy - even fictions conjured from our consciousness. Yes, digital money, like banknotes, has little energy value. Come the apocalypse we’ll be burning the banknotes or suspending mental worries about our (lost) digital wealth. But none of this means that because the physical, energy content of money is negligible that it doesn’t matter. Money is fungible & as long as we sustain the belief (neurons firing) that it can be exchanged for gold or crude oil or whatever, then it will keep trapping us in ever greater debts to our future. My own view is that this is a crime against our senses that will, of course, eventually be exposed. We all know the emperor is naked - why maintain this ludicrous lie? In the end, these promises against future energy must either be paid, cancelled or disappeared by raising all other prices. There is no alternative. Then we will surely tie money back to physical, embedded energy assets & never again allow it to inflate beyond our energy constraints. Prices will recover their informational power & monopolies will be collapsed as trees in the forest are collapsed within closed energy systems. The fiction of fiat money & an open system of energy creation has numbed our senses & made us all dopamine freaks. There’s more to life than this. Anything that offers *more* fiat, fictional money as the solution to our problems fills me with deep dread.
Lots in this I don’t follow. That’s my stupid. But it certainly reveals the close relationship of the topic to crypto theory. Something that will probably need more attention.
This is a very thought-provoking article and not being well-read in the associated fields my observations are necessarily general.
First, my general feeling was uncertainty about your personal stance on the issues affected by this analysis. I used to feel that the 'scientific' approach of being value-free was necessary to properly understand but experience has led me to believe that this is not just impossible but undesirable.
Second, I was struck by your assertion that our goal as humans was to reduce uncertainty and maximise control. While there has no doubt been such a desire on the part of some of those eager for controI from early on in human development I don't think this was true in general of populations across the world and in Europe only became a more widespread belief since the Enlightenment. It seems at odds with your other assertion that complete certainty is unachievable. Takin!g our cues from nature, it would seem more realistic to suggest that there may be no 'goal' as such but that some sort of dynamic equilibrium is the natural state.
I applaud your tackling of some of these thorny issues and the breadth of your thinking. I shall dive into the longer piece later!
wonderful analysis about the complex multi-ordered causes and effects of inflation. using game theory to understand complex systems is a breath of fresh air every time i see it <3 Its always interesting to see economics says things have to be specific ways despite only being that way for a impossible short period, like inflation, like wage growth, like housing supply when they are entirely socially imposed methods of handing information designed in manner to provide advantages for the existing powerful groups
I haven't read the whole post carefully (yet!) but have one question about "All information and systems have a real cost in energy and work to keep running." This is something I've pondered much and would love any feedback on.
An understanding from Cesar Hidalgo's Why Information Grows, in my wording (perhaps butchered):
A planet embodies information, or at least persistent information, to a greater extent than the same mass in gaseous (more entropic) form. (And, the planet "computes" in a very real if abstract sense: information (energy) comes in, is transformed, and radiated out.)
But the planet requires no energy to "keep it running." It maintains because of the laws of the universe: mass bends the space-time continuum, creating "gravity." No energy input required.
So, there is a difference between energy and information.
Information is related to the idea of entropy, which is how ordered and structured a system - how organized all of its parts are. At one end of entropy you have total disorder - chaos - and at the other, total order.
A closed system, left to itself, will become more disordered. It will rust and decay. This is the Second Law of Thermodynamics, which is that entropy tends to increase. This means there is a real cost in energy in maintaining the current state of order.
However, an open system that has energy flowing into it, as with the sun shining on the earth, information can persist and increase.
With an entire ecosystem like a planet, which is an open system, energy is flowing in all the time, and this energy drives biological information systems and interactions. Sunlight is converted to energy and stored, and used to drive biological information processes in living organisms. The chemistry of DNA, and interactions of biological signals and commands are all informational.
Because there is an inflow of energy, you can have persistent information, as well as new and more complex information. Organisms make copies of themselves, which requires energy. You can combine things and they can become more complex.
The other thing is that information is about more than just sending news, or telling a story. Commands are also a kind of message. Codes, rules, instructions, designs, goals, strategies and games are all also kinds of information.
There are two great books that explain a lot of these concepts. Grammatical Man by Jeremy Campbell and Cybernetics by Norbert Weiner.
Thanks. I think I understand all that pretty well. (I've just downloaded Grammatical Man!) But on my little example, I was imagining a dead planet that embodies more (persistent) information than the same mass in gaseous form. It's more ordered. It seems to require no energy to "keep it running," to maintain that order. Any help? Thx.
Thanks so much. I have to admit that I was a little disappointed at the end to learn that now I have to read an even larger pdf! I’m only average intelligence and limited interest in all this. There are machines in my shop waiting to be rebuilt and welding jobs unfinished.
After reading Breaking Free of Neoliberalism I felt that we have a lot of work to do in terms of selling ideas to the public. It’s the same thing here. All of you guys have to polish these gems so they shine. I suggest getting help from YouTube creators. We need graphics and sound in tight short bursts. Robert Reich has some great content.
Unfortunately the left doesn’t have billionaires funding content. It might be pessimism but it seems like we are running out of time. Looking at Mark Carney policy statements I see an almost Chretien submission to the Neoliberal agenda.
I’m just reading the Alex Himelfarb book right now. Wow, love it. He quotes Dougald at least once so far. Then I will read this. Many ideas and we have so little time to stop what seems inevitable right now. But we are developing the language and talking points to fight with.
Thanks for this excellent article! You have found a very useful way to describe and explain both information and economics.
I’d like to connect you with a change maker in the UK of course dealing with similar challenges. Are you interested?
Absolutely!
I just sent one of your articles to Paul Barnett in the UK by way of introduction. He’s the CEO of the Enlightened Enterprise and we connected on LinkedIn He’s also the author of The Better Way on SubStack.
I am very glad you said that because my great fear is that it just won't be understood.
Thank you very, very much.
Very interesting. I have been pointing out for some years to anyone who will listen than money is information and that means that unlike matter/energy it can be created and destroyed at minimal "cost". More often than not the response is a blank stare. Great to find someone else who understands that and has made the effort to explore some of the implications. Some very good points in here I will want to refresh my memory on.
There are quite a few grammar oddities and autocorrect glitches, it would be good if you were able to sort them out.
I've run through the document and sorted it, and reuploaded. Thanks!
I did see one or two still missed. Just read it today. Sorry I didn’t think to write down exactly where. Doesn’t matter because I have ideas on making this more accessible, I’ll continue when I finish the longer pdf.
Will do and thank you.
Love this! I've long pondered what I call The (Reverse) Law of Monetary Thermodynamics:
"Monetary assets can only be created and destroyed, not changed in form."
(Note, "monetary assets" very much includes titles to real estate, vehicles, etc. — not just so-called "financial assets" for which there are offsetting, related liabilities on other balance sheets.)
I am not ready to accept that money as information forms a different class to any other form of information embedded in rules, norms, practices, heuristics etc; I understand your point that information is not tied to physical / energy assets. It is a fiction held aloft by common beliefs - it is a product of our imagination etc; But many non physical energy assets are the same. The energy required to create them is embedded in the neuronal firing of atoms. Nothing is without energy - even fictions conjured from our consciousness. Yes, digital money, like banknotes, has little energy value. Come the apocalypse we’ll be burning the banknotes or suspending mental worries about our (lost) digital wealth. But none of this means that because the physical, energy content of money is negligible that it doesn’t matter. Money is fungible & as long as we sustain the belief (neurons firing) that it can be exchanged for gold or crude oil or whatever, then it will keep trapping us in ever greater debts to our future. My own view is that this is a crime against our senses that will, of course, eventually be exposed. We all know the emperor is naked - why maintain this ludicrous lie? In the end, these promises against future energy must either be paid, cancelled or disappeared by raising all other prices. There is no alternative. Then we will surely tie money back to physical, embedded energy assets & never again allow it to inflate beyond our energy constraints. Prices will recover their informational power & monopolies will be collapsed as trees in the forest are collapsed within closed energy systems. The fiction of fiat money & an open system of energy creation has numbed our senses & made us all dopamine freaks. There’s more to life than this. Anything that offers *more* fiat, fictional money as the solution to our problems fills me with deep dread.
Lots in this I don’t follow. That’s my stupid. But it certainly reveals the close relationship of the topic to crypto theory. Something that will probably need more attention.
This is a very thought-provoking article and not being well-read in the associated fields my observations are necessarily general.
First, my general feeling was uncertainty about your personal stance on the issues affected by this analysis. I used to feel that the 'scientific' approach of being value-free was necessary to properly understand but experience has led me to believe that this is not just impossible but undesirable.
Second, I was struck by your assertion that our goal as humans was to reduce uncertainty and maximise control. While there has no doubt been such a desire on the part of some of those eager for controI from early on in human development I don't think this was true in general of populations across the world and in Europe only became a more widespread belief since the Enlightenment. It seems at odds with your other assertion that complete certainty is unachievable. Takin!g our cues from nature, it would seem more realistic to suggest that there may be no 'goal' as such but that some sort of dynamic equilibrium is the natural state.
I applaud your tackling of some of these thorny issues and the breadth of your thinking. I shall dive into the longer piece later!
wonderful analysis about the complex multi-ordered causes and effects of inflation. using game theory to understand complex systems is a breath of fresh air every time i see it <3 Its always interesting to see economics says things have to be specific ways despite only being that way for a impossible short period, like inflation, like wage growth, like housing supply when they are entirely socially imposed methods of handing information designed in manner to provide advantages for the existing powerful groups
Do you follow Jason Smith?? https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=infotranecon
I haven't read the whole post carefully (yet!) but have one question about "All information and systems have a real cost in energy and work to keep running." This is something I've pondered much and would love any feedback on.
An understanding from Cesar Hidalgo's Why Information Grows, in my wording (perhaps butchered):
A planet embodies information, or at least persistent information, to a greater extent than the same mass in gaseous (more entropic) form. (And, the planet "computes" in a very real if abstract sense: information (energy) comes in, is transformed, and radiated out.)
But the planet requires no energy to "keep it running." It maintains because of the laws of the universe: mass bends the space-time continuum, creating "gravity." No energy input required.
Love to hear any thoughts.
So, there is a difference between energy and information.
Information is related to the idea of entropy, which is how ordered and structured a system - how organized all of its parts are. At one end of entropy you have total disorder - chaos - and at the other, total order.
A closed system, left to itself, will become more disordered. It will rust and decay. This is the Second Law of Thermodynamics, which is that entropy tends to increase. This means there is a real cost in energy in maintaining the current state of order.
However, an open system that has energy flowing into it, as with the sun shining on the earth, information can persist and increase.
With an entire ecosystem like a planet, which is an open system, energy is flowing in all the time, and this energy drives biological information systems and interactions. Sunlight is converted to energy and stored, and used to drive biological information processes in living organisms. The chemistry of DNA, and interactions of biological signals and commands are all informational.
Because there is an inflow of energy, you can have persistent information, as well as new and more complex information. Organisms make copies of themselves, which requires energy. You can combine things and they can become more complex.
The other thing is that information is about more than just sending news, or telling a story. Commands are also a kind of message. Codes, rules, instructions, designs, goals, strategies and games are all also kinds of information.
There are two great books that explain a lot of these concepts. Grammatical Man by Jeremy Campbell and Cybernetics by Norbert Weiner.
Thanks. I think I understand all that pretty well. (I've just downloaded Grammatical Man!) But on my little example, I was imagining a dead planet that embodies more (persistent) information than the same mass in gaseous form. It's more ordered. It seems to require no energy to "keep it running," to maintain that order. Any help? Thx.
Thanks so much. I have to admit that I was a little disappointed at the end to learn that now I have to read an even larger pdf! I’m only average intelligence and limited interest in all this. There are machines in my shop waiting to be rebuilt and welding jobs unfinished.
After reading Breaking Free of Neoliberalism I felt that we have a lot of work to do in terms of selling ideas to the public. It’s the same thing here. All of you guys have to polish these gems so they shine. I suggest getting help from YouTube creators. We need graphics and sound in tight short bursts. Robert Reich has some great content.
Unfortunately the left doesn’t have billionaires funding content. It might be pessimism but it seems like we are running out of time. Looking at Mark Carney policy statements I see an almost Chretien submission to the Neoliberal agenda.
I’m just reading the Alex Himelfarb book right now. Wow, love it. He quotes Dougald at least once so far. Then I will read this. Many ideas and we have so little time to stop what seems inevitable right now. But we are developing the language and talking points to fight with.
I didn't know. Which book is that?
sorry been off. Alex Himelfarb - Breaking Free of Neoliberalism. I enjoyed this book.