Is bitcoin Stage Orange?

[jpcatrib]

I've just watched the Stage Orange episode.

 

I live in Brazil and work for the government dor 5 years and identify myself as a libertarian since 2015.

As far as Spiral Dynamics goes, of course, a great piece of me is still in Stage Orange.

 

In the last 2 years that I have been following actualized.org, I consider that I have gone beyond the Stage Orange a little bit: I started to meditate; I have done some retreats; I started to recognize the limitations of rationality and science; I abandoned atheism and started to study spirituality and non-duality; I began to realize that money would not bring me happiness and then I need a purpose greater than myself.

 

In this search for purpose I discovered a passion for the technology that drives bitcoin and I've been studying for months, trying to quit my government job to devote myself to it. For obvious reasons, this episode made me thoughtful.

 

In addition, I am already putting into practice virtually all of Leo's recommendations to transcend Stage Orange, except, obviously, "recognizing the limitations of capitalism."

 

I mean, in my view (I can not speak for all the libertarians), capitalism is not the way to solve all the problems in the world. I recognize that it really is responsible for causing various problems.

 

But I think the State's way of solving problems is not valid. I do not think world problems can be solved through force or authority. Actually I think that state regulations simply make this problem worse, especially because people in power tend to be easily corruptible. For me, the State itself is a source of authority, which is closer to Stage Blue.

 

Actually, I think the way to solve problems is by raising people's consciousness by making them ascend in the Spiral Dynamics stages, not by brute force.

 

So, Is Bitcoin Really Stage Orange?

• I don't understand exactly why Leo put bitcoin on this list, although obviously almost all of the users are predominantly Stage Orange.

• I mean, in my understanding, there are ways to approach bitcoin like Stage Green:

○ I really believe that it is a way to help people without access to basic banking services have access to a global payment network, which does not require any type of credentials to enter, nor does it have any barriers.

○ It is a possibility for people to defend themselves against government-inflicted inflation, or even confiscation (in the history of Brazil, there are a lot of examples).

• I recognize that the technology is at an extremely embryonic stage, so that there are several Ponzi schemes and pump and dumps, but I genuinely believe in the potential of technology to the point of wanting to make it my life purpose.

 

Anyway, I don't want to make this post a political discussion, I just want to share my vision and really want to know other points of view, to discover possible blindspots of mine, specially at that moment that I am changing career. Also, I'll start reading the books that Leo indicated, to take the other point of view.

[Revolutionary Think]

I think Bitcoin represents the idea of gambling and easy money both which sound stage orange to me. 

[Leo Gura]

@jpcatrib I posted a video on my blog around Xmas 2017 about the amazing potential of Bitcoin for democratizing society in the future. In that sense, Bitcoin could become a Green technology.

But there is also a lot of currency manipulation and gambling that goes on with BItcoin. People mining for Bitcoin hoping become overnight millionaires. That is a very Orange phenomena.

Bitcoin is similar to the internet as a whole: it has a huge democratizing influence, but with this democratization comes all kind of vulgarity, manipulation, and nonsense.

On the one hand the internet gave us Wikipedia, on the other hand it gave us porn and 4chan. Technology almost always tends to be a mixed bag, requiring nuanced sorting of wheat from chaff and wise application.

In the hands of a fool, any tool become dangerous. And every stage of the Spiral will try to use new technology to entrench and defend itself.

Stage Blue terrorists will not hesitate to use stage Orange nuclear weapons if they can get their hands on them.

[Mondsee]

@jpcatrib I just wanted to say props to your openmindedness and willingness to acknowledging the pros and cons of your position. I have some good libertarian friends, but I gotta say: they’re all stubborn as hell with their ideas about capitalism. Guess they’ll be stuck there for much longer than you.

[SaaraSabina]

Bitcoins are backed up by the same out of air debt based currency with an exponentially growing - compound interest. There's nothing democratic with privately owned banks who control the entire payment infrastructure and the money. 

We need to move away from this collectivelly materialistic orientation into a intellectually emotionally orientation in order for anything in the world to change for the better and that's only possible if your willing to start by example.  

[ChimpBrain]

I have no idea where it will end up, but as I'm sure you already know, it was created in response to some of the problems with stage orange after the 2008 housing market collapse.  I'm pretty optimistic about the possibilities of cryptocurrencies in general, but I'm pretty optimistic about everything concerning technology.  I guess that's the orange in me speaking too lol

[mostly harmless]

On 25.6.2018 at 3:30 AM, jpcatrib said:

So, Is Bitcoin Really Stage Orange?

I also think that the ideal of the original developers to take away the power over money from banks/governments to people. Likewise, smart contract platforms will enable decentralised self-governing organisations to replace banks, insurance companies, social networks... dis-intermediation: the elimination of middle-men. People who have been siphoning wealth from society by positioning themselves at nodes of the economy, will need to get new jobs. The speculation with crypto as an asset class is a different story. That is clearly orange.  

I assume that the trustless society will change how people act. This has started before crypto: Since eBay, people where I live have become much more willing to trust others.

Ultimately, I think, having money at all seems like a preliminary step. I is necessary until people only take as much as they need. As long as you have people who want to live in a palace and own a private jet, you need means to restrict access to resources. I got to say that it seems silly to me. Squirrels in the forrest don't own territories where they force other squirrels to give them 50% of their nuts so they accumulate nuts for 1,000 years. Developing distributed ledger technologies requires a lot of effort and advanced skills. All this to set up an elaborate system to manage a world full of people too immature to handle resources responsibly –for now. It's kind of funny. it is necessary until it's not.

Edited June 28, 2018 by mostly harmless