RE: Crypto or Fiat Currency: It's All About Trust
You address just about every question that arose in my mind as I researched this article. The idea of currency, once you get past bartering, becomes increasingly abstract, removed from the commodity. I think economics is a nebulous "science" precisely because so much of its theory is premised on how people act--and that is never a certainty. The more intellectual and abstract the discussion becomes, the less "real" it is and the less likely to be reliable. I am more a student of history than of science, so I tend to take the long view on currencies. They have never held up over time. They are a matter of faith, mostly. Even gold and silver have fluctuated wildly in value. So I view virtual currencies as I do all others--with a certain amount of wonder, apprehension and hope. I think I have more hope in the crypto than in the fiat because there's more chaos and therefore less predictable malfeasance. But that's just a guess. Very nice comment. Thank you.
I am happy you came up with this kind of topic in the way you did!
I'd say I do have hope in the variety of things, no matter how the currencies are named and traded. I like to bet on complementaries as well as on coexistence.
As a history student you know of the rise and fall of things.
We can only ever approach controllable conditions and methods/technologies, but never really produce them completely. Nakamoto's dream, like that of many individuals, to create something that is highly waterproof and makes distrust unnecessary, could also be understood as an effort born of distrust itself - I am curious if it was. What matters now is what the rest of us make of it. Everyone is involved in sowing trust or mistrust.
I really appreciate to be in touch with you.
It is a pleasure :)