Reflections on the nature of money
A follow-up on my previous post, to take a step further into money design.
See my previous post about the libre currencies (june and G.A.M.E), if you haven’t already read it:
People who are interested in currencies generally assume that we use a currency when we have a minimum of trust in it (notably the trust that we can use it later for purchases), which is quite true (except in cases where we use a currency because we have no choice: this is sometimes the case with fiat currencies, which have legal value and an armed and judicial arm to force their use if necessary).
But I wonder if the basic problem is not this: why should we trust a currency at all?
I can only see two possible answers to this question, which can be advantageously combined:
either we like its design and we think it is absolutely good to use it, no matter what the ins and outs (and on that matter, I tend to value only one type of currency: untraceable currencies - but this is because I place freedom above everything else, so it is a personal choice),
or we give a positive value to the people who use it (we can take the example of a national currency, in a hypothetical context where we would trust our compatriots to go in a direction that seems good to us).
The frequent concern expressed about the G.A.M.E (Garden of All Manners of Exchange) is the risk of cheat from the users. But this concern only makes sense when we try to place our trust only in the currency, not in its users. And in fact: the possibility of cheating exists in all currencies!
Let's take the case of the june, which I know very well and from which I have recently distanced myself:
do I trust its design? As a free currency, quite a bit, but with a reserve, because I see that the principle of universal dividend incites behaviors that I personally disapprove of, however its mathematics appeals to me and its potential as a fair currency too. As a cryptocurrency, not at all, mainly because of its lack of privacy by design, which to me is inexcusable. The fact that it is computer dependent is also a big minus that I was hoping to see improved for 2023 (and the new version of the june) but this will not be the case, quite the contrary.
do I trust its users? Partially: some of them are friends, others potentially mortal enemies (oh yeah) and I have no particular enthusiasm for the june community in general, only some groups whose values and actions I respect (and it saddens me that they can, through the use of the june, make public without thinking about it data that can be used against them in the end).
In the case of the G.A.M.E, my satisfaction is twofold because:
to this day, I only use it to trade with people I positively value
its design is simple, efficient and easy to make very confidential (in addition to being economical and ecological)
In the case of the euro, I don't trust its design at all and only partially trust its users.
So there is a problem here, which trust in a currency alone simply cannot solve: that of happily using a currency because it is also used by people and for projects to which we attach a positive value.
As such, only currencies whose use (or non-use) has no impact on their use in a global way are satisfactory (for fractal reasons as to the use, i.e. no matter the scale considered). It may sound like a strange idea, but this is the case with G.A.M.E: the fact that scattered groups use it among themselves is neither positive nor negative for its use, and there could be 40 users or 40 million users in the world, it would not change its value or its principle.
In other words, if Lionel in Timbuktu uses the G.A.M.E and Martine in Perpignan also, while both cannot stand each other, it doesn't change anything, because they don't favor or hinder each other's projects by the simple fact of using the G.A.M.E. This property is only allowed because the G.A.M.E has no other function than to account for exchanges: it sets no limits, no rules for creation or exchange, no floor, no ceiling.
This is not the case of the june, whose number of users has a direct impact on its creation, whose computer needs require servers and people to take care of them, and whose mathematical rule imposes an almost immutable rhythm of creation, weighted by life expectancy, all linked by a web of trust whose rules impose a particular growth that can prevent a person from joining the currency as a member.
This is not the case with the euro either, whose monopolization by some often harms others.
In fact, there is no way that a currency by its very design can be used only for things we value, simply because it is a relative notion, it is a matter of opinion.
In this regard, it is interesting to observe that in the june economy, people trade with this currency often because they trust it, its design seems virtuous enough to them to use it as is. However, the latter does not prevent people from doing anything with it: intelligence agencies to monitor its users, the state to think about a tax on the universal dividend (why not, since the data is public, it would be easy to know who has paid its levy and who has not), to irrigate an economy of child trafficking, etc. The june is not able to prevent any of this.
The currency alone can at best only offer opportunities by its design, but a currency alone is in reality worthless: it is its users who determine everything.
Therefore, as there will never be a currency for which we are sure that it benefits the better, since this remains relative, as said before, the only way to use a truly virtuous monetary system is for it to be based both on the mutual esteem of its members, and not on the trust that is given to it, and on a design that remains invariant in all circumstances (no matter how many people use it, when and where), i.e. a design that actually maximizes the autonomy of the uses.
And at the moment, the only solution that corresponds to this approach of money that I know is the G.A.M.E, and if I insist so much on its characteristics, it is because I think that looking for a perfect monetary solution in itself is in reality an insoluble problem, which makes us forget the determinant in favor of the afferent. For the question of monetary choice is necessary but not sufficient when one wishes to embody values through an autonomous economy.
And as the Shadoks say, if there is no solution, then there is no problem, so it was worth putting money back in its place!