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Fast Company Publishes Article on “Death is Wrong” – Post by G. Stolyarov II

Fast Company Publishes Article on “Death is Wrong” – Post by G. Stolyarov II

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The New Renaissance Hat
G. Stolyarov II
February 24, 2014
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Earlier this month I was interviewed by Leanne Butkovic of Fast Company. The result is this article about Death is Wrong – which also mentions the new Indiegogo fundraiser. There is an extensive question-and-answer portion, where the answers were transcribed from our 50-minute Skype conversation.

This is great progress for spreading awareness of the book and increasing its cultural impact.

 

Join Us in This Project to Tell Children That Death is Wrong – Article by Eric Schulke

Join Us in This Project to Tell Children That Death is Wrong – Article by Eric Schulke

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The New Renaissance Hat
Eric Schulke
February 23, 2014
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Reaching and teaching our youth about the concepts of life and death that are presented in the new children’s book Death is Wrong will be one of the most critical things we can do for the Indefinite Life Extension Movement. Ideas and beliefs form and incubate so easily in the minds of children as they they seek to understand and make sense of their “new” world in which they are exploring. Sadly, the societal concepts of Life and Death take root very early in their development and grow into solid belief structures that become extremely hard to change.

We began a new fundraiser today to raise monies to help distribute a 1,000 copies of the book Death is Wrong, by Gennady Stolyarov II. Friends, this is a project that can go a long way in helping both our children and their parents in conceiving a world where death no longer has its hold. A thousand books might not seem like a lot in the grand scheme of things, but it can make a huge difference. These books will sit upon on the shelves of schools, public libraries, college campuses, among other venues, for years to come. They will be there when the inquisitive, young minds seek answers about Indefinite Life Extension. They will be added to the many educational tools available to our teachers and other educators.

In elementary school, I discovered priceless information in my library. I remember that the more I read, discovered, and learned about this world, the more excited I was to search the shelves for more gems of knowledge. I believe these books will aid thousands of kids to think and truly ponder the value and feasibility of indefinite life extension. Even if we only reach a fraction of our goal, say 30% as an example, it would prove invaluable to the 300 children whose hands this book would fall into.

Through this project, other children will be able to have these books delivered to their homes, where they will end up on their nightstands and bookshelves in their rooms; many of them becoming their most prized possessions. I often think back to some of the key books that shaped my life, which I had as a child.

Still, in other areas, this campaign will make it possible for more parents to have this book readily accessible, to impress the importance of indefinite life extension upon their kids.

There are many varied options for distribution of this book. Indefinite Life Extension Activists who wish to spread copies of this book will be able to make requests to the Author once the fundraiser has been completed.

Startup

The truth of Indefinite Life Extension is a blazing fire that is hard to put out. The more places it can be kindled, the faster we can set this world on fire with awareness of this vital cause.

When I was a child, I expressed a deep long-term anger over death, and was sure that somebody was going to tell me that something was going to be done about it. Nobody did. I remember how crushing that was to me. I felt betrayed by the world I found myself born into. Then over the years, my feelings of betrayal incrementally grew into the norm of society. Like a frog in a pot of water that was slowly being heated, I didn’t jump out right away. If books like Death is Wrong were available at the time, the adults who were around would have had more options on how to answer my questions, where to direct me, how to console me, and what to say; to encourage me to ponder life and death on my own and reach my own conclusions.

As the author, Gennady Stolyarov II, writes,

Death is Wrong fills an important void and inspires a new generation to join the struggle for a greatly increased longevity. Virtually everyone learns about death as a child, and the initial reaction is the correct one: feelings of bewilderment, horror, and outrage. Yet, there has been no resource to validate these completely correct and natural first impressions. Almost immediately, our young ones are met with excuses and rationalizations, so that they might be consoled and return to a semblance of normalcy. Over millennia of facing inevitable demises, humans have constructed elaborate edifices of rationalization, designed to keep thoughts of death from intruding upon their day-to-day lives.

Max Planck has said that,

A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents finally die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it.

It’s also fairly common sense. We all know that the older a person gets, the more likely they are to stay “buckled in” with the “safety” of their belief systems and various perspectives on life and death.

Our “opponents” will eventually see the light, too. With regards to this fundraiser, we are not concerned with opponents as much as we are with people who are simply uninformed; individuals who have not been given enough information and an opportunity to ponder indefinite life extension and its far reaching implications. It is our sole duty to inform people. If we were trapped in a cave with a crowd of people and we found a way out, it would be incumbent upon us to show them the way out too. Some won’t listen and some will blatantly choose not to leave, but at the very least, they had the knowledge and the option to escape.

As for our children, our children will listen. Let us not leave them behind to die. Let us fan this spark of knowledge in their minds that will grow into the raging infernos of passion and activism for this earth-changing cause that is waiting to become a reality. As this knowledge is disseminated throughout the world, the more people will rally to its cause. Let’s start now, before it’s too late.

Carrara Marmor Steinbruch - Carrara marble stone pit 10

The movement for indefinite life extension continues to move forward through various individuals, projects and organizations. We must continue chipping away. As each bit of momentum picks up, we will soon be able to look back and see that the steep side of this mountain is gone. We will have made it to the other side. Please consider giving to this cause and spreading this important information to our youth and their parents and educators.

Eric Schulke was a director at LongeCity during 2009-2013. He has also been an activist with the Movement for Indefinite Life Extension and other causes for over 13 years.

Thanks go to Jason Shields for his work in editing this article.

Help Teach 1000 Children That Death is Wrong – Indiegogo Fundraiser

Help Teach 1000 Children That Death is Wrong – Indiegogo Fundraiser

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Help me teach 1000 children that death is wrong.

I have partnered with the Movement for Indefinite Life Extension to initiate an ambitious new Indiegogo fundraiser to get 1000 copies of Death is Wrong to children, free of cost to them, by using my ability to obtain highly discounted paperback copies on Createspace. My goal is to raise $5,000, which will enable me to order and ship 1000 copies to longevity activists throughout the United States.

Support this campaign to help create the next generation of scientists, technologists, futurists, philosophers, and advocates of indefinite life extension!

 

Homeschooling’s Secular, Rational Benefits – Video by G. Stolyarov II

Homeschooling’s Secular, Rational Benefits – Video by G. Stolyarov II

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Mr. Stolyarov explains why homeschooling is an excellent educational approach for freethinkers, as it facilitates the development of an individual learner’s faculties, rather than teaching to the average student or to the lowest common denominator. In this brief video, Mr. Stolyarov refutes common fallacies about homeschooling and discusses the extensive options available to parents who homeschool their children.

Charity, Compulsion, and Conditionality – Video by G. Stolyarov II

Charity, Compulsion, and Conditionality – Video by G. Stolyarov II

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Libertarians’ opposition to coercive redistribution of wealth does not mean that they are opposed to charitable giving that improves people’s lives.

In this video, Mr. Stolyarov analyzes why private charities are more effective in benefiting their intended recipients than programs which involve coercive redistribution of wealth. Paradoxically, it is the extreme conditionality of many coercive welfare programs that leads them to be less effective than the voluntary decisions of diverse individuals and organizations.

References

– “The Costs of Public Income Redistribution and Private Charity” – James Rolph Edwards – Journal of Libertarian Studies – Summer 2007
– In Our Hands: A Plan To Replace The Welfare State (2006) – Book by Charles Murray

Majoritarian Processes versus Open Playing Fields – Video by G. Stolyarov II

Majoritarian Processes versus Open Playing Fields – Video by G. Stolyarov II

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Putting innovation to a vote is never a good idea. Consider the breakthroughs that have improved our lives the most during the 20th and early 21st centuries. Did anyone vote for or ordain the creation of desktop PCs, the Internet, smartphones, or tablet computers?

It is only when some subset of reality is a fully open playing field, away from the notice of vested interests or their ability to control it, that innovation can emerge in a sufficiently mature and pervasive form that any attempts to suffocate it politically become seen as transparently immoral and protectionist.

All major improvements to our lives come from these open playing fields.

References
– “Putting Innovation to a Vote? Majoritarian Processes versus Open Playing Fields” – Essay by G. Stolyarov II
– “Satoshi Nakamoto” – Wikipedia
– The Seasteading Institute

Putting Innovation to a Vote? Majoritarian Processes versus Open Playing Fields – Article by G. Stolyarov II

Putting Innovation to a Vote? Majoritarian Processes versus Open Playing Fields – Article by G. Stolyarov II

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The New Renaissance Hat
G. Stolyarov II
February 4, 2014
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Putting innovation to a vote is never a good idea. Consider the breakthroughs that have improved our lives the most during the 20th and early 21st centuries. Did anyone vote for or ordain the creation of desktop PCs, the Internet, smartphones, or tablet computers? No: that plethora of technological treasures was made available by individuals who perceived possibilities unknown to the majority, and who devoted their time, energy, and resources toward making those possibilities real. The electronic technologies which were unavailable to even the richest, most powerful men of the early 20th century now open up hitherto unimaginable possibilities even to children of poor families in Sub-Saharan Africa.

On the other hand, attempts to innovate through majority decisions, either by lawmakers or by the people directly, have failed to yield fruit. Although virtually everyone would consider education, healthcare, and defense to be important, fundamental objectives, the goals of universal cultivation of learning, universal access to healthcare, and universal security against crime and aggression have not been fulfilled, in spite of massive, protracted, and expensive initiatives throughout the Western world to achieve them. While it is easy even for people of little means to experience any art, music, literature, films, and games they desire, it can be extremely difficult for even a person of ample means to receive the effective medical care, high-quality formal education, and assurance of safety from both criminals and police brutality that virtually anyone would desire.

Why is it the case that, in the essentials, the pace of progress has been far slower than in the areas most people would deem to be luxuries or entertainment goods? Why is it that the greatest progress in the areas treated by most as direct priorities comes as a spillover benefit from the meteoric growth in the original luxury/entertainment areas? (Consider, as an example, the immense benefits that computers have brought to medical research and patient care, or the vast possibilities for using the Internet as an educational tool.) In the areas from which the eye of formal decision-making systems is turned away, experimentation can commence, and courageous thinkers and tinkerers can afford to iterate without asking permission. So teenagers experimenting in their garages can create computer firms that shape the economy of a generation. So a pseudonymous digital activist, Satoshi Nakamoto, can invent a cryptocurrency algorithm that no central bank or legislature would have allowed to emerge at a proposal stage – but which all governments of the world must now accept as a fait accompli that is not going away.

Most people without political connections or strong anti-free-enterprise ideologies welcome these advances, but no such breakthroughs can occur if they need to be cleared through a formal majoritarian system of any stripe. A majoritarian system, vulnerable to domination by special interests who benefit from the economic and societal arrangements of the status quo, does not welcome their disruption. Most individuals have neither the power nor the tenacity to shepherd through the political process an idea that would be merely a nice addition rather than an urgent necessity. On the other hand, the vested and connected interests whose revenue streams, influence, and prestige would be disrupted by the innovation have every incentive to manipulate the political process and thwart the innovations they can anticipate.

It is only when some subset of reality is a fully open playing field, away from the notice of vested interests or their ability to control it, that innovation can emerge in a sufficiently mature and pervasive form that any attempts to suffocate it politically become seen as transparently immoral and protectionist. The open playing field can be any area that is simply of no interest to the established powers – as could be said of personal computers through the 1990s. Eventually, these innovations evolve so dramatically as to upturn the major economic and social structures underpinning the establishment of a given era. The open playing field can be a jurisdiction more welcoming to innovators than its counterparts, and beyond the reach of innovation’s staunchest opponents. Seasteading, for example, would enable more competition among jurisdictions, and is particularly promising as a way of generating more such open playing fields. The open playing field can be an entirely new area of human activity where the power structures are so fluid that staid, entrenched interests have not yet had time to emerge. The early days of the Internet and of cryptocurrencies are examples of these kinds of open playing fields. The open playing field can even occur after a major upheaval has dislodged most existing power structures, as occurred in Japan after World War II, when decades of immense progress in technology and infrastructure followed the toppling of the former militaristic elite by the United States.

The beneficent effect of the open playing field is made possible not merely due to the lack of formal constraints, but also due to the lack of constraints on human thinking within the open playing field. When the world is fresh and new, and anything seems possible, human ingenuity tends to rise to the occasion. If, on the other hand, every aspect of life is hyper-regimented and weighed down by the precedents, edicts, compromises, and traditions of era upon era – even with the best intentions toward optimization, justice, or virtue – the existing strictures constrain most people’s view of what can be achieved, and even the innovators will largely struggle to achieve slight tweaks to the status quo rather than the kind of paradigm-shifting change that propels civilization forward and upward. In struggling to conform to or push against the tens of thousands of prescriptions governing mundane life, people lose sight of astonishing futures that might be.

The open playing fields may not be for everyone, but they should exist for anyone who wishes to test a peaceful vision for the future.  Voting works reasonably well in the Western world (most of the time) when it comes to selecting functionaries for political office, or when it is an instrument within a deliberately gridlocked Constitutional system designed to preserve the fundamental rules of the game rather than to prescribe each player’s move. But voting is a terrible mechanism for invention or creativity; it reduces the visions of the best and brightest – the farthest-seeing among us – to the myopia of the median voter. This is why you should be glad that nobody voted on the issue of whether we should have computers, or connect them to one another, or experiment with stores of value in a bit of code. Instead, you should find (or create!) an open playing field and give your own designs free rein.

Cryptocurrencies as a Single Pool of Wealth – Video by G. Stolyarov II

Cryptocurrencies as a Single Pool of Wealth – Video by G. Stolyarov II

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Mr. Stolyarov offers economic thoughts as to the purchasing power of decentralized electronic currencies, such as Bitcoin, Litecoin, and Dogecoin.

When considering the real purchasing power of the new cryptocurrencies, we should be looking not at Bitcoin in isolation, but at the combined pool of all cryptocurrencies in existence. In a world of many cryptocurrencies and the possibility of the creation of new cryptocurrencies, a single Bitcoin will purchase less than it could have purchased in a world where Bitcoin was the only possible cryptocurrency.

References

– “Cryptocurrencies as a Single Pool of Wealth: Thoughts on the Purchasing Power of Decentralized Electronic Money” – Essay by G. Stolyarov II

– Donations to Mr. Stolyarov via The Rational Argumentator:
Bitcoin – 1J2W6fK4oSgd6s1jYr2qv5WL8rtXpGRXfP
Dogecoin – DCgcDZnTAhoPPkTtNGNrWwwxZ9t5etZqUs

– “2013: Year Of The Bitcoin” – Kitco News – Forbes Magazine – December 10, 2013
– “Bitcoin” – Wikipedia
– “Litecoin” – Wikipedia
– “Namecoin” – Wikipedia
– “Peercoin” – Wikipedia
– “Dogecoin” – Wikipedia
– “Tulip mania” – Wikipedia
– “Moore’s Law” – Wikipedia

– The Theory of Money and Credit (1912) – Ludwig von Mises

The Rational Argumentator Now Accepts Dogecoin Donations

The Rational Argumentator Now Accepts Dogecoin Donations

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The New Renaissance Hat
G. Stolyarov II
January 20, 2014
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I am pleased to announce that, in addition to accepting Bitcoin donations, The Rational Argumentator now also accepts donations in Dogecoin, the world’s first meme-based cryptocurrency. This broadening of donation options is motivated by the desire to encourage the further evolution of decentralized media of exchange, and also by the fact that Dogecoin is presently easier to mine than Bitcoin, thereby facilitating easier entry into the cryptocurrency arena for those who wish to mine rather than purchase cryptocurrencies. Besides, as I pointed out in my recent and fast-spreading article, “Cryptocurrencies as a Single Pool of Wealth”, the purchasing power of Bitcoin and all other similar cryptocurrencies is closely connected, as long as there is free exchange among the cryptocurrencies.

You can donate using the code on the sidebar widget. Here are the donation codes for both Bitcoin and Dogecoin, for your convenience.

Bitcoin: 1J2W6fK4oSgd6s1jYr2qv5WL8rtXpGRXfP

Dogecoin: DCgcDZnTAhoPPkTtNGNrWwwxZ9t5etZqUs

Much cryptocurrency of either kind will be appreciated.

Dogecoin_logo

Cryptocurrencies as a Single Pool of Wealth: Thoughts on the Purchasing Power of Decentralized Electronic Money – Article by G. Stolyarov II

Cryptocurrencies as a Single Pool of Wealth: Thoughts on the Purchasing Power of Decentralized Electronic Money – Article by G. Stolyarov II

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The New Renaissance Hat
G. Stolyarov II
January 12, 2014
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The recent meteoric rise in the dollar price of Bitcoin – from around $12 at the beginning of 2013 to several peaks above $1000 at the end – has brought widespread attention to the prospects for and future of cryptocurrencies. I have no material stake in Bitcoin (although I do accept donations), and this article will not attempt to predict whether the current price of Bitcoin signifies mostly lasting value or a bubble akin to the Dutch tulip mania of the 1630s. Instead of speculation about any particular price level, I hope here to establish a principle pertaining to the purchasing power of cryptocurrencies in general, since Bitcoin is no longer the only one.

Although Bitcoin, developed in 2009 by the pseudonymous Satoshi Namakoto, has the distinction and advantage of having been the first cryptocurrency to gain widespread adoption, others, such as Litecoin (2011), Namecoin (2011), Peercoin (2012), and even Dogecoin (2013) – the first cryptocurrency based on an Internet meme – have followed suit. Many of these cryptocurrencies’ fundamental elements are similar. Litecoin’s algorithm is nearly identical to Bitcoin (with the major difference being the fourfold increase in the rate of block processing and transaction confirmation), and the Dogecoin algorithm is the same as that of Litecoin. The premise behind each cryptocurrency is a built-in deflation; the rate of production slows with time, and only 21 million Bitcoins could ever be “mined” electronically. The limit for the total pool of Litecoins is 84 million, whereas the total Dogecoins in circulation will approach an asymptote of 100 billion.

Bitcoin-coins Namecoin_Coin Dogecoin_logoLitecoin_Logo

The deflationary mechanism of each cryptocurrency is admirable; it is an attempt to preserve real purchasing power. With fiat paper money printed by an out-of-control central bank, an increase in the number and denomination of papers (or their electronic equivalents) circulating in the economy will not increase material prosperity or the abundance of real goods; it will only raise the prices of goods in terms of fiat-money quantities. Ludwig von Mises, in his 1912 Theory of Money and Credit, outlined the redistributive effects  of inflation; those who get the new money first (typically politically connected cronies and the institutions they control) will gain in real purchasing power, while those to whom the new money spreads last will lose. Cryptocurrencies are independent of any central issuer (although different organizations administer the technical protocols of each cryptocurrency) and so are not vulnerable to such redistributive inflationary pressures induced by political considerations. This is the principal advantage of cryptocurrencies over any fiat currency issued by a governmental or quasi-governmental central bank. Moreover, the real expenditure of resources (computer hardware and electricity) for mining cryptocurrencies provides a built-in scarcity that further restricts the possibility of inflation.

Yet there is another element to consider. Virtually any major cryptocurrency can be exchanged freely for any other (with some inevitable but minor transaction costs and spreads) as well as for national fiat currencies (with higher transaction costs in both time and money). For instance, on January 12, 2014, one Bitcoin could trade for approximately $850, while one Litecoin could trade for approximately $25, implying an exchange rate of 34 Litecoins per Bitcoin. Due to the similarity in the technical specifications of each cryptocurrency (similar algorithms, similar built-in scarcity, ability to be mined by the same computer hardware, and similar decentralized, distributed generation), any cryptocurrency could theoretically serve an identical function to any other. (The one caveat to this principle is that any future cryptocurrency algorithm that offers increased security from theft could crowd out the others if enough market participants come to recognize it as offering more reliable protection against hackers and fraudsters than the current Bitcoin algorithm and Bitcoin-oriented services do.)  Moreover, any individual or organization with sufficient resources and determination could initiate a new cryptocurrency, much as Billy Markus initiated Dogecoin in part with the intent to provide an amusing reaction to the Bitcoin price crash in early December 2013.

This free entry into the cryptocurrency-creation market, combined with the essential similarity of all cryptocurrencies to date and the ability to readily exchange any one for any other, suggests that we should not be considering the purchasing power of Bitcoin in isolation. Rather, we should view all cryptocurrencies combined as a single pool of wealth. The total purchasing power of this pool of cryptocurrencies in general would depend on a multitude of real factors, including the demand among the general public for an alternative to governmental fiat currencies and the ease with which cryptocurrencies facilitate otherwise cumbersome or infeasible financial transactions. In other words, the properties of cryptocurrencies as stores of value and media of exchange would ultimately determine how much they could purchase, and the activities of arbitrageurs among the cryptocurrencies would tend to produce exchange rates that mirror the relative volumes of each cryptocurrency in existence. For instance, if we make the simplifying assumption that the functional properties of Bitcoin and Litecoin are identical for the practical purposes of users, then the exchange rate between Bitcoins and Litecoins should asymptotically approach 1 Bitcoin to 4 Litecoins, since this will be the ultimate ratio of the number of units of these cryptocurrencies. Of course, at any given time, the true ratio will vary, because each cryptocurrency was initiated at a different time, each has a different amount of computer hardware devoted to mining it, and none has come close to approaching its asymptotic volume.

 What implication does this insight have for the purchasing power of Bitcoin? In a world of many cryptocurrencies and the possibility of the creation of new cryptocurrencies, a single Bitcoin will purchase less than it could have purchased in a world where Bitcoin was the only possible cryptocurrency.  The degree of this effect depends on how many cryptocurrencies are in existence. This, in turn, depends on how many new cryptocurrency models or creative tweaks to existing cryptocurrency models are originated – since it is reasonable to posit that users will have little motive to switch from a more established cryptocurrency to a completely identical but less established cryptocurrency, all other things being equal. If new cryptocurrencies are originated with greater rapidity than the increase in the real purchasing power of cryptocurrencies in total, inflation may become a problem in the cryptocurrency world. The real bulwark against cryptocurrency inflation, then, is not the theoretical upper limit on any particular cryptocurrency’s volume, but rather the practical limitations on the amount of hardware that can be devoted to mining all cryptocurrencies combined. Will the scarcity of mining effort, in spite of future exponential advances in computer processing power in accordance with Moore’s Law, sufficiently restrain the inflationary pressures arising from human creativity in the cryptocurrency arena? Only time will tell.