I recently changed my political party affiliation to “unaffiliated.” If, like me, you are tired of the corrupt, rotting two-party system and its stranglehold on our politics, BE THE CHANGE YOU WANT TO SEE IN THE WORLD. Let’s starve that beast. People usually react with “well then you can’t vote in the primaries.” I think this is a psy op. Even if there’s no independent candidate in a given race, if enough people become independent/unaffiliated, primary candidates will have to take the independent bloc seriously if they want to win a general election. If the independent bloc is tiny and immaterial, primary candidates can focus solely on throwing increasingly extreme red meat to the most vocal, engaged members of their respective partisan tribes. This doesn’t mean you can’t or shouldn’t still financially support candidates from either party who are furthering values/policies you support. It also doesn’t mean you can’t or shouldn’t ultimately vote for one of them. I just think making being independent your home base is important. There are sooo many people who, in private and in public, wish there was a viable third party (or multiple viable alternative parties). But we’ve all been told formally stepping outside of the two-party system is playing spoiler, a waste of time, a waste of a vote, etc. And so nothing changes. But the sheer number of folks who want another way should translate to actual political power. Elections shouldn’t be decided by a handful of voters in 3 states. Rather, independent voters/thinkers should wield the influence that their numbers warrant. Both #bitcoin and #nostr are third way technologies, which bring together heterodox groups and new coalitions of folks who may differ on some issues but who agree on the fundamental importance of things like sound money and free speech. We have more points of agreement than disagreement. And I think we can all agree that the two-party system is a downward spiral.

Still-life with Knausgaard. Early morning reading is my church.

#coffeechain

Gm #nostr

This is awesome View quoted note →

Yes, as soon as she’s old enough she’ll be on #nostr to talk about books and post coffeechain gm photos of Tom waits. Some things go without saying. View quoted note →

My 2.5 year-old daughter 🥹

American Pastoral - Philip Roth

The fiat system tends inevitably toward hyperfinancialization. A #bitcoin system, widely adopted, inevitably tends toward definancialization. Hyperfinancialization erodes and suffocates culture. Definancialization gives culture room to breathe, grow, and flourish.

Gm #nostr

So when I was in undergrad, my thesis was on negative vs positive freedom in David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest. It dug into the idea that in modern America we have lots and lots of negative freedom (freedom FROM external constraints) but a pretty shallow, if not nonexistent, cultural conception of positive freedom (self-determination, self-autonomy, self-actualization…basically okay no one’s telling you what you can and can’t do now how do you find fulfillment in your externally free state). The two concepts can be kind of roughly analogized to having a thousand channels and no one telling you what to watch (negative freedom) but you have to pick something to watch, knowing your time is scarce and irretrievable (positive freedom). The interplay of these concepts underpins Wallace’s famous commencement speech at my alma mater. Everybody worships something, and in America you’re mostly free to worship what you want (negative freedom), but how to choose wisely what one devotes oneself to is the issue (positive freedom). For those who don’t know, the unifying plot point in Infinite Jest is the existence of a film (the “Entertainment”) that is SO entertaining that those who watch it basically lose interest in doing anything else and feel compelled to keep watching it over and over until they die. Some terrorists want to disseminate the film in America because Americans are, they argue, uniquely susceptible to this film. The reason for this susceptibility is the subject of an ongoing conversation between two characters (Marathe and Steeply) which is essentially an extended, though fragmented, discussion of negative vs positive freedom. Wallace wrote this book before social media. These days I think of the Entertainment through the lens of addictive, incendiary social media algorithms. One could argue we’ve died a kind of cultural/spiritual death as the result of these technologies. One question I think worth considering is how much has social media, as well as state co-option of mainstream media, degraded our negative freedom (in addition to obviously degrading our positive freedom)? #bitcoin and #nostr are both mostly negative freedom technologies. But there are very interesting ways of looking at them from a positive freedom perspective. They are tools to combat the seemingly implacable and ubiquitous cultural forces that impede our ability to pursue positive freedom. Bitcoin, as sound money, can allow adopters to sort of buy back their time, clearing space to pursue more abstract things like self-actualization, fulfillment, etc. The more I think about Infinite Jest the more I want to figure out a way to merge negative freedom bitcoin culture with an under-discussed, under-explored positive freedom bitcoin culture. If we’ve died a kind of cultural/spiritual death as the result of things like addictive social media, endemic entertainment, mainstream media, etc., my hope is we can have a revival, a renaissance, and a Cambrian explosion of art and culture through the advancement of technologies like #bitcoin and #nostr. Negative freedom is only one half of what we need to be flourishing, productive individuals pursuing our respective highest purposes. We need positive freedom too. Anyway, more to come.

Gm #nostr

“What was the freedom to which the adult human being rose in the morning, if each act was held back or inspired by the overpowering ghost of a little child?” -Delmore Schwartz

#coffeechain

Gm #nostr

RIP to the legend #tunestr

This is somewhat embarrassing to admit. I’m the kind of guy who can quote you Shakespeare all day but couldn’t write a line of code with a gun to my head. I’m woefully nontechnical. It took me a long time to wrap my humanities brain around the tech of #bitcoin, and almost a half decade later I’m still learning everyday. The tech of #nostr, candidly, is even more intimidating to me. But I’m also in awe of it and all the builders working on it. I’m always thinking man, I wish I could contribute more, but I just don’t have the skills! But then I realized, the biggest contribution I can make to Nostr is just to bring my whole, weird, uncensored self to it, to bring my life energy, my thoughts, and my passions to it. And if we all do that, whether we’re technical or not, this is gonna be a wondrously alive place. Anyway, Friday night thoughts. You’re all great and truly inspiring. Gn.

This is a real front page headline on a major mainstream media news site. Not an Onion article.