Free-Man's Perspective

Most people still have the idea… the image… that the “Dark Ages” were filthy and grotesque, like a Monty Python film.

Not only is that false, but the people of the Dark Ages should be held in high regard. They’re the people who, for the first time in human history, killed slavery on a civilizational scale. They also created free market capitalism. And so, the prosperity that we enjoy to this day exists thanks to the people and ideas of the Dark Ages.

If that sounds crazy to you, you should probably listen.

Among the most important scientific findings of the 20^th century were those of Dr. Robert Sapolsky. His work was becoming an interesting but fairly straightforward study, until a freak accident turned it into a human turning point. (Don’t stop listening half-way through or you’ll miss it!) Sapolsky’s findings show that the kind of progress we dream about is unquestionably possible. That puts the burden back on us, of course… and that scares a lot of people… but let there be no more question, we CAN step into a better age.

One objection to the cryptosphere… to free cyberspace… is that it’s only for super-smart people, and not for average people. And that’s flatly false.
Building the cryptosphere requires technical expertise, but populating it – filling it with people and commerce and human decency – is for all who will.
And by daring to enter, you make yourself functionally smarter!

It seems that right on the heels of a beautiful new vision, old fears come charging back to our minds, defending their positions. And so this episode explains why and how we will succeed. There’s really no doubt about the general outcome. The only uncertainty is the timing.

Cryptography has changed the world over the past few decades. Without it there would be no Internet commerce, no VPNs, or Tor, or Bitcoin, or Wikileaks, or the Snowden revelations, or BitTorrent. But however impressive the results, it’s the power of the crypto vision that has driven them… and a revelation it is. Those who grasp it are often changed for life.

 

 

(Originally published in 2019.)

A few years ago I wrote an article on status, to rather mixed reviews among the online commenters. Today I’m going back to status, “doubling down,” as people like to say these days. Continue reading “Status Revisited”

Buckminster Fuller’s advice for building a better world was to create a new model that makes the old model obsolete, and the Parallel Society podcast is dedicated to just that. We cover cryptocurrency, biohacking, private space flight, homeschooling and much more.

 

 

Culture has always been the antagonist of conscience.

Once we see ourselves as part of a larger entity… once we identify with it… we feel a necessity to conform to it. If we don’t, we lose the existential crutch that larger entities offer us. And, partly as a result of living with that collective identification, most of us are emotionally unprepared to stand alone before the world. Continue reading “Culture Versus Conscience”

I can still remember the first time someone told me that they believed in the Calvinist doctrine of “the depravity of man.” It shocked me. To complain about human behavior I very well understood; there’s plenty of bad behavior in the world. But to flatly call the human species depraved… hopelessly unredeemable… that was, and remains, obscene to me. Continue reading “We Have No Idea How Good We Can Get”