Category: Thinking Money

Civilisational Wealth, Currency, Democracy 2.0, Economy 2.0, Thinking Money

Physical Money

Steve Kelsey 19 mins read

Money Design for the 21st century

Introduction

The current fiat[i] monetary system is disconnected from wealth creation. The financialization of an economy reduces wealth creation by diverting investment from wealth creation functions to financial operations, where the goal of increasing money via the trade of financial assets for profit, subsumes the goal of creating wealth[ii] [iii] [iv]. These distortions interrupt wealth creation limiting the rate of a civilizations’ development and limiting the probability space[v] of a civilizations’ long-term survival. To maximize wealth creation, we need an alternative system. read more

Civilisational Wealth, Democracy 2.0, Economy 2.0, Money, Thinking Money

Transactional Logic

Steve Kelsey 39 mins read

An Exploration of Imaginary Transactions

Steve Kelsey.  London.. 19th January 2022

Introduction

The transactional logic that determines the efficiency of wealth creation and the growth of our civilisation emerged at an early point in human history and has evolved into the complex system we see today. This model has evolved over time, becoming more complex and increasingly abstract as it has been applied to global scale activity, and now runs our world. There is nothing natural or inevitable about the transactional logic that controls wealth creation, it is the product of human thought just like any other invention. It has been very successful, but there is scant evidence throughout its long history its logical foundations have ever been put to the test. That there is a need for experimentation in transactional logic is certain. The current transactional logic artificially limits the efficiency of wealth creation and therefore limits the survivability of our civilisation at a time when we are facing major challenges. In this thought experiment I explore the logic of transactional models and the alternatives that might challenge this singular paradigm. read more

Civilisational Wealth, Economy 2.0, Thinking Money

Interesting times

Steve Kelsey 5 mins read

Its Sunday afternoon just before lunch on a shiny winters day in London. That’s not a conventional time to let revolution loose on the world, but it’s 2020 and as we have all learnt this year the unthinkable is just a thought away. So its time for an opening salvo on some of our supposedly foundational beliefs.

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Why do we have interest?

Interest has been with us since the pyramids and probably even before that. Danegeld earned interest. The Lombards of Old London Town charged eye watering levels of interest that made that new-fangled Bank of England’s rate of 8% seem practically socialist, if they’d had socialism back then. read more

Civilisational Wealth, Currency, Economy 2.0, Money, Thinking Money

Community Coin – a thought experiment

Steve Kelsey 10 mins read

In this thought experiment let’s speculate on what a civilisational wealth based economy might look like.

Civilisational Wealth is intelligence applied to base matter. Physics doesn’t have a definition of intelligence yet, nor a means of measuring intelligence as a physical quantity, and so we need to use an analogue. Although we can’t measure intelligence as a physical property we can measure energy intelligently applied to base matter. A unit of Civilisational Wealth is X energy intelligently applied to Y matter and is measured in Joules per Kg.

Work is the process of embedding intelligence in base matter. Work produces Civilisational Wealth. read more

Civilisational Wealth, Economics, Economy 2.0, Thinking Money

Economics for a civilised world – Part 4

Steve Kelsey 2 mins read

The Price Transformer

The price transformer determines how much of the imaginary wealth equates to the concrete value of real wealth. Price is established during a complex process which involves the following elements

  • The real wealth element, intelligence applied to base matter- conventionally defined as the manufacturing cost.
  • Plus the ‘market’ elements
  • The size of the market-  how many people need the product?
  • The perceived need- is the product an essential medicine or a toy?
  • The Supplier premium- is the supply rationed?
  • The Marketing premium- the price premium delivered by various psychological manipulations?
  • The Competitive premium, how dominant is the company manufacturing the real wealth element?
  • The state of the economy.
  • All of the market factors play a dominant part in setting the price to be paid for the wealth ‘on sale’.  They have no direct connection with the real wealth element of the price and some, e.g. the Marketing premium, are purely psychological. 

Today Brand and Marketing often play a controlling role in setting the price to be paid and can be responsible for the significant premiums that can be charged over the real wealth element.

In conventional economics, price is given great significance, defining the value of a product to the consumer. However, price is entirely subjective and breaks any objective link between real wealth and the market. We have seen this systematic mutation of reality before. read more

Civilisational Wealth, Economics, Economy 2.0, Money, Thinking Money

Economics for a civilised world – Part 3

Steve Kelsey 2 mins read

Money = Imaginary Wealth

Money is potential or imaginary wealth (iW). Money is variously described as a credit or an IOU for resources or the labour that converts resources into wealth. Note that the terms ‘resources’ and ‘labour’ are a convention and are colloquial synonyms for matter and energy intelligently directed by the labourer.  

Money is an invention and has no objective reality. it cannot be assigned a value until until it is converted to real wealth. This is counter to the convention where money is believed to denote value, but money has value only in relationship to real wealth. Money was reinvented many times all over the world. Money is a form of virtual wealth that can be traded for the real thing  at a future date. In this sense money is future wealth, but to be realised the virtual wealth has to be accepted by any provider of real wealth. The acceptability is governed by the wealth provider being able to repeat this process with a third party. Elaborate systems have evolved to ensure that virtual wealth maintains its value over time relative to real wealth.  read more

Civilisational Wealth, Economics, Economy 2.0, Thinking Money

Economics for a civilised world -Part 1

Steve Kelsey 2 mins read

A physics based economic model starts with a physical definition of wealth.

Wealth is the product of applying intelligence to base matter. This process raises base matter to a level of functionality that satisfies a need. Clay becomes brick, bricks build cities. Iron oxide becomes steel, the steel becomes machines. Our civilisation is based on trillions of transformations of this type. 

We cannot measure intelligence as a physical effect, but we can measure the amount of intelligently directed energy employed to embed intelligence in base matter.

We can therefore define wealth in physical terms using read more

Civilisational Wealth, Economics, Economy 2.0, Thinking Money

Economics for a civilised world – Part 0

Steve Kelsey 3 mins read

Economics is an evolving discipline. During my lifetime economics has transitioned from post-war Keynesianism, through the emergence of Neoliberalism in the 80’s  and now stands at a new evolutionary juncture with competing theories and and beliefs. But there is one common thread that links these theories together and that is their focus on money rather than wealth.

Irrespective of theoretical foundations, all economic models concern themselves with fiscal and monetary policy. Fiscal policy focuses on the governments ability to create and distribute money, Monetarist policy focuses on the private creation and distribution of money. But money is a concept with no physical reality. Wealth, by contrast, is entirely about physical reality. Wealth surrounds us in the cities we live in, the products we use, the services we enjoy. But modern economics has little to say about the creation and distribution of wealth. Modern economics makes assumptions that wealth is an end goal, a product of the economic system, but views wealth through the abstract medium of money. read more

Civilisational Wealth, Money, Thinking Money

A Physics based Economics

Steve Kelsey 11 mins read

The search for a physics based economic model, a thought experiment.

We start by defining wealth as intelligence applied to base matter. There is no physics-based way of measuring intelligence, so we use an analogue, the amount of intelligently directed energy applied to base matter.

W = M+E

We can therefore define a unit of wealth with a fixed physical definition. e.g. I Joule/kg is one kilogram of matter embedded with one joule of intelligently directed energy. 1000 Joule/kg is one kilogram of matter embedded with 1000 Joules of intelligently directed energy.

The energy intelligently applied to base matter ranges from the hand manufacture of a single item to the intelligently directed energy used in mass manufacture. read more

Civilisational Wealth, Economics, Economy 2.0, Thinking Money

Civilisational Wealth

Steve Kelsey 8 mins read

Wealth is the application of intelligence to matter.  

The more intelligence we can add to base matter the greater its value. The more widely we can distribute intelligence applied to base matter the greater wealth a civilisation has. The measure of a civilisations wealth is the amount of intelligence it has applied to base matter and how widely this is distributed.

It follows that, for any well managed society, any activity that increases the  intelligence embodied in matter, has high value.

It follows that any activity that inhibits the accumulation of intelligence or the application of intelligence to base matter or rations the distribution of enhanced matter reduces a civilisations wealth. read more