Can bitcoin change society?

Bitcoin was launched in 2009 as an experimental digital encrypted currency with very unique properties that sets it apart from all other currencies in use today. Bitcoin is open-source, decentralized, impossible to counterfeit and rare, as the algorithm will only generate around 21 million bitcoins. The short video below succinctly explains some of its properties and advantages.



If you research bitcoin enough at some point you'll wonder how you can start mining this new crypto-currency yourself. It was in this search that I stumbled upon, Geir Harald Hansen, the creator of bitminter.com - a bitcoin mining pool made easy for beginners. Geir kindly and honestly answered a few of my questions regarding bitcoin. His thoughts on the potential success of bitcoin and comparison to current currencies, I thought were worth sharing below.

Can Bitcoin change society?

Take a look at the world economy. One financial crisis after another. Venezuela recently devalued their currency. The US is printing money faster and faster. Or rather they are creating crazy amounts of US dollars by typing a number into a computer. Fractional reserve banking. Banks too big to fail. The US and several other countries are effectively bankrupt as they will never be able to pay their foreign debt. Welcome to the circus. The entire world economy is just a giant ponzi scheme. Whether you are a scammer depends not on what you do, but on whether or not you work for a government. I can't decide whether it is funny or sad. Maybe it's both.

Part of bringing sanity to the economy is to use things that are actually in limited supply for currencies and stores of value. Environmentalists may not agree, but there are plenty of trees to make paper money from. Typing a number into a computer is not limited supply either. Gold, silver and bitcoin on the other hand are in limited supply. Perhaps something better than bitcoin will appear. But I'm pretty sure fiat money is not the future. I think society may soon be ready for a change. But most people still just do what the masses do. Anything that is not mainstream is "not real".

Many think Bitcoin is monopoly money. Actually it is US dollars, Euros, etc. that are printed en masse like monopoly money. Bitcoin is nothing like monopoly money. But this thinking is based on emotion, not logic. Fiat money is "real money" because this is how we've been doing things for hundreds of years. Anything that is different from the established way is wrong, silly, or not real. This way of thinking greatly slows down bitcoin adoption. But at the same time an increasing number of people are getting fed up with the current system, and "banker" has become a swear word. As the global ponzi scheme nears collapse and more people are adversely affected by it they will be less inclined to cling to it just because it's tradition.

Whether buying ASIC-based Bitcoin mining equipment will be profitable is anyone's guess. Anything related to Bitcoin is a gamble. Don't invest more than you can afford to lose. But do get involved with Bitcoin in some way or other. Years from now when people laugh about fiat currencies and how primitive the world used to be, you can say you took part in changing it. This could be an important moment in history.

Bitcoins can be exchanged with all currencies. At the date of this post 1BTC =  £17.64 = $27.30 = €20.34, could this be the digital gold rush?

If you want to find out more and/or get involved, check bitcoin.org

Time Banking

The elite

There is a corporate elite, a banking elite, a political elite, an academic elite... yet none of these elites have done anything to address the underlying key problem of the global economy. The money profit capitalist market economy has been good to elites for the past 40 years, but has systematically gutted the underlying economy so that most people now have no buying ability, and GDP cannot grow. Central banks create State money... banks create bank money... now it is time there is an institution to create jobs money so that available people can go to work doing things that we really need... food for the hungry, homes for the homeless, medical care for the sick, education for children, infrastructure, environmental remediation, and so on. A value seeking market economy would deliver a very different global society than one where the only metric is money profit and growth of wasteful excessive consumption.

By Peter Burgess, comment from Aljazeera.com

LucidTree.com - Awareness resource

The internet can be a place for entertainment, communication and commerce, but the most important role of the web, I think, is education. Never in history has so much valuable information been available to the masses but it's not always obvious where to find it.

For a long time I intended to build a website that aggregated some of this valuable information and presented it in a clear format. This has finally materialized in the shape of a free online movie library called LucidTree.com. It is currently only a seedling but the aim is to grow it into a hub of relevant information for those of us seeking a better understanding of ourselves, this planet and beyond.

Check out LucidTree.com and share it with friends and family. Contribute by sending suggestions/feedback using the contact form on the website.


Real revolution starts with learning...

Must watch: Four Horsemen

"23 leading thinkers – frustrated at the failure of their respective disciplines – break their silence to explain how the world really works." ~ www.fourhorsemenfilm.com



Watch the full movie here:

The bank for financial activists

If you're pissed of at the current corrupt and opaque banking system, why not vote with your wallet and  move your spare money to an ethical bank? Triodos is one of them (the only one I'm aware of) which is completely transparent and invests only in ethical businesses.

Become a financial activist and sleep better at night with the assurance that you're not indirectly supporting corrupt regimes, polluting technologies, greedy banks and corporations or even war.

Little girl teaches economics to 600 people

Someone hasn't been doing their homework and it's not this little girl. Although she talks specifically about the Canadian banking system, this is a pretty accurate description of how every banking system in the world is set-up. So here's our homework for today, to listen and learn.



To further research, check out The Money Masters or the Money as Debt three part documentary series. (It appears that these were produced with fairly modest budgets, but the information contained in them is, in my view, crucial and very enlightening to the inner workings of the banking system.) You should be able to find these in a video sharing site near you.

Introverts, you are OK.

An introvert being erm... introverted!

After the TED talk I posted a few days ago, this is the second article I find this week about introverts. This time The Guardian discovers that being quiet, shy and a "what if" thinker is not all bad.

We live with a value system that I call the Extrovert Ideal – the omnipresent belief that the ideal self is gregarious, alpha and comfortable in the spotlight.

Don't say!

Introversion – along with its cousins sensitivity, seriousness, and shyness – is now a second-class personality trait, somewhere between a disappointment and a pathology.

QUICK! Pass one of those extroversion pills before it's too late!

Velocity of speech counts as well as volume: we rank fast talkers as more competent and likable than slow ones.

"And then he was like 'Uh...' and I was like 'Duh!'"

Without introverts, the world would be devoid of Newton's theory of gravity, Einstein's theory of relativity, WB Yeats's The Second Coming, Chopin's nocturnes, Proust's In Search of Lost Time, Peter Pan, Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four, The Cat in the Hat, Charlie Brown, the films of Steven Spielberg, Google (co-founded by introvert Larry Page) and Harry Potter.

"Wassup with this list?! Steven makes cool movies, yeah? But the others didn't go to gigs not even nearly often enough. Specially that Chopin dude!"

"The glory of the disposition that stops to consider stimuli rather than rushing to engage with them is its long association with intellectual and artistic achievement. Neither E=mc² nor Paradise Lost was dashed off by a party animal."

"Booooriiing!!!"

A few things introverts are not: the word introvert is not a synonym for hermit or misanthrope. Introverts can be these things, but most are perfectly friendly.

Oh really?! Disturb my blog-ing time and you'll see.


In conclusion, we can all breathe a breath of relief - it's ok to be introverted as introverts are not sick people after all. Phew! I'll cancel my operation then.

Read the full article: Why the world needs introverts

Are you an introvert, extrovert or do you swing both ways? Do the Quiz: are you an introvert?

Capitalism humour by Calvin & Hoobes

This 20 year old Calvin and Hobbes comic, made by Bill Watterson, explains in simple terms the roots of the current economic crisis and the injustices concerning the ever growing Occupy movement. Click the image for larger version.

Calvin & Hobbes

Voices of the occupations

A compilation of a few voices from the various occupations dotted across the world.

New York City

Toronto

London

Occupy demands and solutions

We are the 99%

As the occupy movement gathers momentum more and more aware people start believing in the strength of their voices (specially if in unison with others) as we create a human microphone that is drawing the image of the future as we speak.

However, despite the movement's relative awareness and clear dissatisfaction with today's systemic problems, as a whole, it appears to still not have a very practical list of demands. As we grow, it's important that we draft a set of solutions that will not just try to remedy the superficial symptom temporarily. In order to do this we must find the very root of the rot and inoculate the system against the greed and corruption viruses, for good.

Following are a bunch of suggestions (by a well seasoned researcher), which I feel would serve us very well indeed from the moment they're implemented. If you agree with them, please help bring the focus of the occupy movement to these demands by spreading them far and wide. Thank you for caring.

1. An end to creating money out of thin air on computer screens and charging interest on it (fractional reserve lending).
2. An end to governments borrowing fresh-air money called ‘credit’ from private banks and the people paying interest on this ‘money’ that has never, does not and will never exist. Governments (and that concept must change radically) can create their own currency – interest free.
3. An end to private banks issuing non-existent money called ‘credit’ at all and thus creating ‘money’ as a debt from the very start.
4. An end to casinos like Wall Street and the City of London betting mercilessly on the financial and commodity markets with the lives of billions around the world.
5. An end to all professional lobby groups that earn their living and their clients’ living from corrupting the professionally corruptible – vast numbers of world politicians and the overwhelming majority on Capitol Hill.
6. An end to no-contract government in which mendacious politicians can promise the people they will do this and that to win their support and then do the very opposite after they have lied themselves into office (see Obama).
7. An end to the centralisation of power in all areas of our lives and a start to diversifying power to communities to decide their own lives and thus ensure there are too many points of decision making for any cabal to centrally control.

99% too big to fail

Inspired by this years' Arab spring revolutions and sparked by the Occupy Wall Street protest, which started over a month ago, last Saturday 15th of October were launched synchronised protests in over 1500 locations worldwide! Many of which turned into full-time, long-term camps or occupations. There are currently over 100 cities in the United States alone and many other locations elsewhere.

The languages are many but the voice is the same. The 99% (referring to wealth inequality as owned by the 1% richest) is shouting; enough economic corruption and corporate greed! Following are a few pictures, of the Occupy London crowd, expressing the general sentiment permeating the global movement.

Occupy Wall Street Heroes

2nd time I've fought for my country. 1st time I've known my enemy.

The 99% are growing louder and larger everyday.

Scientists under attack

Scientists Under Attack is an investigation into the scientists researching the health impacts of Genetically Modified Food. This film is recommended for all those who love nature, and for everyone who eats. View the trailer here and buy the film here.

"When scientist Arpad Pusztai reported that genetically modified (GM) foods caused serious health problems in rats, he was a hero at his prestigious UK institute — for two days. But after two phone calls (apparently) from the Prime Minister’s office, he was fired, gagged, and mercilessly attacked.

When UC Berkely professor Ignacio Chapela discovered GM corn contamination in Mexico, he too faced a firestorm of distortion and denial that left him struggling to salvage his career. Find out how the biotech industry “engineers” the truth and what they are trying to hide from you."

The unheard voice of the riots

When politicians claim there's something wrong with society, are they referring to the symptomatic riots or the real underlying problem?

While the political class chooses to worship the bankers and the elite and ignore the voices of those that are hurting and feel they have nowhere to turn to, the problem will not be solved. Here, an indignant Londoner speaks his mind and heart out, and gives his first hand view on the underlying problems that triggered the riots.

Regardless of time and age, history appears to keep repeating itself as if patiently trying to teach us a basic lesson; the bigger the inequality, the bigger the unrest... maybe one day we'll get it.

Zeitgeist III: Moving Forward

The original Zeitgeist: The Movie (2007) is said to be the most watched online documentary ever. With over an estimated 200 million views, it joins the dots between religion, the 9/11 "attacks" and the economic system in a way unexpected to many and still unacceptable by some. This controversial documentary inspired The Zeitgeist Movement, a grass-roots social movement of activists. 

In 2008 Peter Joseph released the sequel, Zeitgeist: Addendum, which focuses in more depth on the intrinsic flaws of the monetary system and introduces The Venus Project, the birth child of Jaques Fresco, an engineer and self-educated inventor in many fields. At the end, The Zeitgeist Movement is formally introduced.

Today is an epic day for many as Peter Joseph steps up the tempo again. The third movie of the controversial Zeitgeist series has just released. Zeitgeist III: Moving Forward can be download or watched online for free. The full 2 hours and 41 minutes documentary film is available below. Are you ready?

TED: Ken Robinson's humourous talks on education

TED talks have become famous all over the world. The following videos have been around the internet quite a bit but it's not everyday we come across something funny and worth hearing so here it is one of my favourite speakers, Ken Robinson. Enjoy the following two talks, the first from 2006 and the second from 2010, as Ken discusses and proposes changes to the education system.

("Clicka" em View Subtitles para selecionar legendas em Português.)

Bertrand Russell: In praise of idleness

Bertrand Russell [1872 – 1970]

Ever had the feeling that work is overrated? That you live for the weekends, which never seem long enough and that Monday mornings are like torture? Have you ever wondered how wonderful it would be to have more time for yourself and all the things you would do with that valuable spare time? If you have had the fortune, or misfortune, of having a full-time job long enough, chances are, that these questions have crossed your mind. Or possibly not, since we have been taught to accept that the present lifestyle of over working is fair and even necessary for one's survival.

Back in 1937, Bertrand Russell had a different opinion and in his essay 'In praise of idleness' he points out the advantages, not just to the individual but to the society as a whole, of a four hour work day. Although, a bit aged in its vocabulary and the current affairs of the time, his core thought remains just as valid (if not more) today. The following is a compilation of what I see as the most relevant bits, of which you can read in full here.

I think that there is far too much work done in the world, that immense harm is caused by the belief that work is virtuous, and that what needs to be preached in modern industrial countries is quite different from what always has been preached.

I want to say, in all seriousness, that a great deal of harm is being done in the modern world by belief in the virtuousness of work, and that the road to happiness and prosperity lies in an organized diminution of work.

First of all: what is work? Work is of two kinds: first, altering the position of matter at or near the earth's surface relatively to other such matter; second, telling other people to do so. The first kind is unpleasant and ill paid; the second is pleasant and highly paid. The second kind is capable of indefinite extension: there are not only those who give orders, but those who give advice as to what orders should be given. Usually two opposite kinds of advice are given simultaneously by two organized bodies of men; this is called politics. The skill required for this kind of work is not knowledge of the subjects as to which advice is given, but knowledge of the art of persuasive speaking and writing, i.e. of advertising.

To this day, 99 per cent of British wage-earners would be genuinely shocked if it were proposed that the King should not have a larger income than a working man. The conception of duty, speaking historically, has been a means used by the holders of power to induce others to live for the interests of their masters rather than for their own. Of course the holders of power conceal this fact from themselves by managing to believe that their interests are identical with the larger interests of humanity.

The war showed conclusively that, by the scientific organization of production, it is possible to keep modern populations in fair comfort on a small part of the working capacity of the modern world. If, at the end of the war, the scientific organization, which had been created in order to liberate men for fighting and munition work, had been preserved, and the hours of the week had been cut down to four, all would have been well. Instead of that the old chaos was restored, those whose work was demanded were made to work long hours, and the rest were left to starve as unemployed.

The idea that the poor should have leisure has always been shocking to the rich. In England, in the early nineteenth century, fifteen hours was the ordinary day's work for a man; children sometimes did as much, and very commonly did twelve hours a day. When meddlesome busybodies suggested that perhaps these hours were rather long, they were told that work kept adults from drink and children from mischief. When I was a child, shortly after urban working men had acquired the vote, certain public holidays were established by law, to the great indignation of the upper classes. I remember hearing an old Duchess say: 'What do the poor want with holidays? They ought to work.' People nowadays are less frank, but the sentiment persists, and is the source of much of our economic confusion.

If the ordinary wage-earner worked four hours a day, there would be enough for everybody and no unemployment -- assuming a certain very moderate amount of sensible organization. This idea shocks the well-to-do, because they are convinced that the poor would not know how to use so much leisure.

The wise use of leisure, it must be conceded, is a product of civilization and education. A man who has worked long hours all his life will become bored if he becomes suddenly idle. But without a considerable amount of leisure a man is cut off from many of the best things. There is no longer any reason why the bulk of the population should suffer this deprivation; only a foolish asceticism, usually vicarious, makes us continue to insist on work in excessive quantities now that the need no longer exists.

For ages, the rich and their sycophants have written in praise of 'honest toil', have praised the simple life, have professed a religion which teaches that the poor are much more likely to go to heaven than the rich, and in general have tried to make manual workers believe that there is some special nobility about altering the position of matter in space, just as men tried to make women believe that they derived some special nobility from their sexual enslavement.

Manual work is the ideal which is held before the young, and is the basis of all ethical teaching.

In the West, we have various ways of dealing with this problem. We have no attempt at economic justice, so that a large proportion of the total produce goes to a small minority of the population, many of whom do no work at all. Owing to the absence of any central control over production, we produce hosts of things that are not wanted. We keep a large percentage of the working population idle, because we can dispense with their labor by making the others overwork. When all these methods prove inadequate, we have a war: we cause a number of people to manufacture high explosives, and a number of others to explode them, as if we were children who had just discovered fireworks. By a combination of all these devices we manage, though with difficulty, to keep alive the notion that a great deal of severe manual work must be the lot of the average man.

to the actual worker. If you ask him what he thinks the best part of his life, he is not likely to say: 'I enjoy manual work because it makes me feel that I am fulfilling man's noblest task, and because I like to think how much man can transform his planet. It is true that my body demands periods of rest, which I have to fill in as best I may, but I am never so happy as when the morning comes and I can return to the toil from which my contentment springs.' I have never heard working men say this sort of thing.

It will be said that, while a little leisure is pleasant, men would not know how to fill their days if they had only four hours of work out of the twenty-four. In so far as this is true in the modern world, it is a condemnation of our civilization; it would not have been true at any earlier period. There was formerly a capacity for light-heartedness and play which has been to some extent inhibited by the cult of efficiency.

The notion that the desirable activities are those that bring a profit has made everything topsy-turvy.

The pleasures of urban populations have become mainly passive: seeing cinemas, watching football matches, listening to the radio, and so on. This results from the fact that their active energies are fully taken up with work; if they had more leisure, they would again enjoy pleasures in which they took an active part.

University life is so different from life in the world at large that men who live in academic milieu tend to be unaware of the preoccupations and problems of ordinary men and women; moreover their ways of expressing themselves are usually such as to rob their opinions of the influence that they ought to have upon the general public. Another disadvantage is that in universities studies are organized, and the man who thinks of some original line of research is likely to be discouraged. Academic institutions, therefore, useful as they are, are not adequate guardians of the interests of civilization in a world where everyone outside their walls is too busy for unutilitarian pursuits.

In a world where no one is compelled to work more than four hours a day, every person possessed of scientific curiosity will be able to indulge it, and every painter will be able to paint without starving, however excellent his pictures may be. Young writers will not be obliged to draw attention to themselves by sensational pot-boilers, with a view to acquiring the economic independence needed for monumental works, for which, when the time at last comes, they will have lost the taste and capacity. Men who, in their professional work, have become interested in some phase of economics or government, will be able to develop their ideas without the academic detachment that makes the work of university economists often seem lacking in reality. Medical men will have the time to learn about the progress of medicine, teachers will not be exasperatedly struggling to teach by routine methods things which they learnt in their youth, which may, in the interval, have been proved to be untrue.

Above all, there will be happiness and joy of life, instead of frayed nerves, weariness, and dyspepsia. The work exacted will be enough to make leisure delightful, but not enough to produce exhaustion. Since men will not be tired in their spare time, they will not demand only such amusements as are passive and vapid. At least one per cent will probably devote the time not spent in professional work to pursuits of some public importance, and, since they will not depend upon these pursuits for their livelihood, their originality will be unhampered, and there will be no need to conform to the standards set by elderly pundits. But it is not only in these exceptional cases that the advantages of leisure will appear. Ordinary men and women, having the opportunity of a happy life, will become more kindly and less persecuting and less inclined to view others with suspicion. The taste for war will die out, partly for this reason, and partly because it will involve long and severe work for all. Good nature is, of all moral qualities, the one that the world needs most, and good nature is the result of ease and security, not of a life of arduous struggle. Modern methods of production have given us the possibility of ease and security for all; we have chosen, instead, to have overwork for some and starvation for others. Hitherto we have continued to be as energetic as we were before there were machines; in this we have been foolish, but there is no reason to go on being foolish forever.

O estado da agricultura biológica em Portugal

O seguinte programa da Biosfera é dedicado á agricultura biológica, especificamente em Portugal. Descobre o porquê e a sua importância para além das vantagens para a saúde humana. Este é provávelmente, até ao momento, o relatório Português mais aprofundado acerca deste tema.

Documentário "O Futuro da Alimentação"

O Futuro da Alimentação ou "The Future of Food" (legendado em Português) explora um pouco a história da evolução da agricultura no ultimo século, expõem o sistema de agricultura industrial currente e os seus problemas ambientais (incluíndo o da saúde humana), sociais e económicos. Explica também como o processo da modificação genética funciona na criaçāo de organismos transgénicos e os riscos que os acompanham. Conclui com uma breve explicação da importância do movimento de agricultura biológica. Um verdadeiro "abre-olhos".



Estão disponíveis mais filmes acerca deste assunto na Videoteca extensiva da Plataforma Trangénicos Fora.