Cryptocurrencies: The Return to Renaissance

Someone asked me before - what's with my need to learn all sorts of stuff? Being a jack of all trades, but master of none. Not an optimal strategy. 

That question was posed 4 years ago. And yes, he was right. Not being highly specialized to fit into the rigid reputation systems in the Old World didn't do me any financial good. I can be specialized as long as I want to. But I won't do it just for money. So over the years I find myself to be a minimalist. Lesser commitments than most.

Perhaps I overlooked wealth creation, regrettably so that my financial buffer got affected lately. Taxes, taxes, and taxes. Good thing I have some cryptos and a lucky dog friend. So I have started a few simple projects, mostly with some crypto-elements that are easy enough to implement.

It will take time. Is it my time?

If it's my time, then it's anyone's time.

In recent years, I think the general public is beginning to realize that rigid specialization isn't the best way forward. More jobs are getting automated. People getting displaced day by day. Unions can't save them. It is economically incompatible. Nothing is being done fast enough to fix problems. Even political memes are signalling a crisis on the legitimacy of authority - the "father figure". If there are governments, then where is the "mother figure"? Something is in the wind.

The existential threat can be very real for some. I have been mentally prepared since post-university. And now my body is ready. Ready to leave my 9-5. Maybe soon I can let go. I will let go.

There will be an impending renaissance, the revival of the human spirit. Soon anyone can be polymaths.

Not to solely compete, but to collaborate at the same time.

So what are polymaths? Stumbled upon that word when I was reading randomly on Wikipedia. The article detailed the spirit of the times during the 14th-18th century Renaissance. Learning is the core theme, and polymaths are just learners. Classic Renaissance goes way back even before its time. Take a look at the Islamic Golden Age. We have notable figures like Ibn Sina, Leonardo Da Vinci, Gallileo Gallilei, and the likes. These people do it all. Mathematics, sports, the arts and the sciences. Creativity in full force.

The urge for such personal diversity came from the idea that we are limitless in our potential and that we should develop ourselves as much as possible. Or if it sounds too imposing, then do nothing. And doing interesting, fun stuff is just the same as doing nothing. You get what I mean. I strongly think that it should be encouraged. It's just a simple humanist concept that I think is empowering and respectful to the mind, body, and soul. A choice for freedom.

I still have ways off from being a polymath, but I know a few people who are akin to polymaths and also have the right skills to survive a zombie apocalypse. But it was never really about putting time into knowing-it-all. Perhaps being a polymath was somewhat easier back in the days, given that the body of human knowledge was much smaller, magnifying the perception of knowledge. Less fundamental concepts were thoroughly fleshed out. Permutations of ideas were much smaller in quantity. But now? The market is saturated.

The market is much tougher now to accomodate to porous, independent organizations. Great value is rare.

It's almost impossible to be an individual polymath in this day and age where avenues for originality have been completely sapped dry by the overly-efficient specialized market. For example, to understand quantum physics these days would require much more comprehension. It is an accumulation of fundamental understanding of the various sciences. This calls for a collective of polymaths, whereby groups of people from different disciplines come together to achieve common goals. No one person ever invented the thing that we call the CPU.

The modern polymath is someone who would be able to facilitate translation and cooperation between disciplines. Acquire a certain understanding of how things work. And how things can work together. Learn whatever - philosophy, politics, movies, the arts, the sciences, skateboarding. Just grab onto whatever that grabs you and spend some time with it. Everything is permitted.

Those well-known figures of the Classic Renaissance knew that money is a nothing, thing. Just tokens to access resources. And they knew that value is the abstract representation of resources for human fullfilment. So these folks from Classic Renaissance do just about anything. So to piggyback on our ancestor's shoulders - we can now create cryptocurrencies to represent different values. Human values shouldn't just limit themselves to USDs and Pounds, but a whole web of them. A matrix of values running on a world computer.

If this isn't the democratization of value creation in the broadest sense, then I don't know what is.

The return to renaissance is (re)distributing itself, and soon to be available worldwide.

---kevinwong([email protected])---photo: tomorrowland---