Bitcoin Songsheet: How Science Became A Fiat Hype Machine

ScienceThe real breakthroughs almost always come through experimentation, not through theory. Academics put angels on the head of a pin through theory, as increasingly, their elaborate theories lack testability. There are no practical engineering outcomes from their theories and they stay in their ivory towers collecting checks.Historically some effect is first used by an engineer to make something work. Most of the time the engineer does not understand why something works, just that it does. It's only after the engineering proves itself that theory comes in to give a better understanding of why. The modern scientific industrial complex has it backwards and tries to create theory first. This has historically not been kind to the theoreticians when they meet engineering reality.Many people know that the Wright brothers invented the airplane. Most of them are not aware that these were bicycle mechanics that experimented a ton. They weren't academic eggheads. There were academic eggheads that got funding to test their theories of flight who failed spectacularly in making a flying machine. The Wright Brothers took no funding and spent their own money experimenting. They were the ones successful in creating an airplane. Engineering is the fertile ground from which useful theories are made, not the other way around.Yet the fiat model of funding theory which hopes to create the desired engineering outcome continues. This is not because it works so well, but because there's a large rent-seeking class that wants to keep their positions in the Cantillon hierarchy.Fiat ScienceFiat science works from hype like the futurist writers mentioned earlier. They imagine futures which have little basis in reality — that is, experimentation. In my field of software this is called vaporware. Vaporware is non-existent software and they are promises without any results. Vaporware is always six months away. They just have to get X fixed, or implement some new exciting feature Y or redo the architecture for some critical reason. They just never ship.We call it vaporware because we never see evidence that the product works and fiat science is the same way. The breakthroughs always seem to be around the corner. Or there are claimed breakthroughs, just no actual products or real world evidence of those breakthroughs until some time in the future. Fiat science never ships.I'm sure somebody will read this article and send me some quantum computing "breakthrough" from some institution saying they made something useful. Let me tell you, vaporware is famous for demos. In software, if it doesn't ship, it doesn't exist and demos or partial results or whatever don't count.Trusted Third PartiesScience has become a trusted third party. They haven't had to ship and they operate as a monopoly, so they haven't had to deliver anything. Worse, because they can assume away any parts they can't figure out, they dismiss critical components as engineering problems and keep it at the theoretical level. They can't let experiment get in the way of their rent-seeking theories! Therefore, theories go further and further away from reality and we get what we have now.Fiat science is living on its reputation from 50 years ago. They've grown soft due to their rent-seeking, like a college professor with tenure. Debasement of reputation takes a very long time when it can be hidden so easily.Science Is Now PoliticsGiven that science has become largely rent-seeking, it's no surprise then that its purpose has morphed. Instead of seeking truth, it's now serving the needs of those that pay them: the government. Science is now political.I only need to say the words "climate change" to trigger lots of people. Whatever side you're on, you cannot deny that science has been used as a weapon in that political battle. But it's not just climate change, it's also other "promising technologies" like stem cells. This was promised as a fruitful field for science that would change everything if only those religious conservatives would get out of the way.15 years later, we can tell that embryonic stem cells really didn't add much. It was used as a weapon to bash the more conservative people than an actual fruitful avenue of research. Much like fiat education and fiat health care, the results serve the political ends rather than its stated intentions.Fiat science takes its lead from fiat economics, or Keynesianism. Keynesianism tried to rewrite the laws of economics to justify whatever it is they wanted to do. Fiat science is doing the same, borrowing on the banked reputation of engineers who did experiments from the past 200 years.Beware Of HypeHype is a form of propaganda and we should thus be very skeptical. Propaganda is the language of politics, not science. Much like Keynesian economics, hype is an attempt to distort reality for theft and authoritarian rule. Anything hyped is not so much science as it is wishful thinking at best.Hype is inversely proportional to relevance. This makes sense since if something really was revolutionary, hype wouldn't be necessary. People would profit from using it and crush competitors. The real sign that something is really revolutionary are the number of people in competing industries that are saying bad things about it. We can tell Bitcoin is revolutionary by the criticism of those from traditional finance, central banking and altcoins that are saying bad things about it. We don't need a hype man to pump us up.In a fiat economy, the incumbents will say these bad things because they want protection for their current industry. Being out-competed, they turn to rent-seeking. Airlines, universities and banks are examples of incumbents with large regulatory moats which protect their rackets. Unfortunately, it's difficult to distinguish which things are revolutionary and which ones are real scams without knowing the details, but that's why we need to dig deeper and not rely on propaganda from tech writers.In the end, the only thing that should be the judge is reality itself. Not authorities, trusted third parties, a majority of people or a majority of money. Don't tell me the theory. Ship.Ten Things Fiat Science Will Tell You SoonEating bugs is not only good for you but also much better for the environment.Owning things is psychologically harmful.Russia (or China or whatever enemy) is making a nanotech weapon that will kill everyone instantly, so we must nuke them first.Replacing your fully functioning arm with one made by a defense contractor is perfectly safe.Quantum computing threats mean that you should give the government all your data so they can protect it.We are quickly approaching peak air-travel.Climate change created a sea level rise in 2005 to sink Manhattan in a majority of multiverses.Water is a pollutant.A new theory of dark gravity explains the rotational velocity of certain types of galaxies.A promising cure for everything using the kidneys of conservative Christians is on the horizon.This is a guest post by Jimmy Song. Opinions expressed are entirely their own and do not necessarily reflect those of BTC Inc or Bitcoin Magazine." /> ScienceThe real breakthroughs almost always come through experimentation, not through theory. Academics put angels on the head of a pin through theory, as increasingly, their elaborate theories lack testability. There are no practical engineering outcomes from their theories and they stay in their ivory towers collecting checks.Historically some effect is first used by an engineer to make something work. Most of the time the engineer does not understand why something works, just that it does. It's only after the engineering proves itself that theory comes in to give a better understanding of why. The modern scientific industrial complex has it backwards and tries to create theory first. This has historically not been kind to the theoreticians when they meet engineering reality.Many people know that the Wright brothers invented the airplane. Most of them are not aware that these were bicycle mechanics that experimented a ton. They weren't academic eggheads. There were academic eggheads that got funding to test their theories of flight who failed spectacularly in making a flying machine. The Wright Brothers took no funding and spent their own money experimenting. They were the ones successful in creating an airplane. Engineering is the fertile ground from which useful theories are made, not the other way around.Yet the fiat model of funding theory which hopes to create the desired engineering outcome continues. This is not because it works so well, but because there's a large rent-seeking class that wants to keep their positions in the Cantillon hierarchy.Fiat ScienceFiat science works from hype like the futurist writers mentioned earlier. They imagine futures which have little basis in reality — that is, experimentation. In my field of software this is called vaporware. Vaporware is non-existent software and they are promises without any results. Vaporware is always six months away. They just have to get X fixed, or implement some new exciting feature Y or redo the architecture for some critical reason. They just never ship.We call it vaporware because we never see evidence that the product works and fiat science is the same way. The breakthroughs always seem to be around the corner. Or there are claimed breakthroughs, just no actual products or real world evidence of those breakthroughs until some time in the future. Fiat science never ships.I'm sure somebody will read this article and send me some quantum computing "breakthrough" from some institution saying they made something useful. Let me tell you, vaporware is famous for demos. In software, if it doesn't ship, it doesn't exist and demos or partial results or whatever don't count.Trusted Third PartiesScience has become a trusted third party. They haven't had to ship and they operate as a monopoly, so they haven't had to deliver anything. Worse, because they can assume away any parts they can't figure out, they dismiss critical components as engineering problems and keep it at the theoretical level. They can't let experiment get in the way of their rent-seeking theories! Therefore, theories go further and further away from reality and we get what we have now.Fiat science is living on its reputation from 50 years ago. They've grown soft due to their rent-seeking, like a college professor with tenure. Debasement of reputation takes a very long time when it can be hidden so easily.Science Is Now PoliticsGiven that science has become largely rent-seeking, it's no surprise then that its purpose has morphed. Instead of seeking truth, it's now serving the needs of those that pay them: the government. Science is now political.I only need to say the words "climate change" to trigger lots of people. Whatever side you're on, you cannot deny that science has been used as a weapon in that political battle. But it's not just climate change, it's also other "promising technologies" like stem cells. This was promised as a fruitful field for science that would change everything if only those religious conservatives would get out of the way.15 years later, we can tell that embryonic stem cells really didn't add much. It was used as a weapon to bash the more conservative people than an actual fruitful avenue of research. Much like fiat education and fiat health care, the results serve the political ends rather than its stated intentions.Fiat science takes its lead from fiat economics, or Keynesianism. Keynesianism tried to rewrite the laws of economics to justify whatever it is they wanted to do. Fiat science is doing the same, borrowing on the banked reputation of engineers who did experiments from the past 200 years.Beware Of HypeHype is a form of propaganda and we should thus be very skeptical. Propaganda is the language of politics, not science. Much like Keynesian economics, hype is an attempt to distort reality for theft and authoritarian rule. Anything hyped is not so much science as it is wishful thinking at best.Hype is inversely proportional to relevance. This makes sense since if something really was revolutionary, hype wouldn't be necessary. People would profit from using it and crush competitors. The real sign that something is really revolutionary are the number of people in competing industries that are saying bad things about it. We can tell Bitcoin is revolutionary by the criticism of those from traditional finance, central banking and altcoins that are saying bad things about it. We don't need a hype man to pump us up.In a fiat economy, the incumbents will say these bad things because they want protection for their current industry. Being out-competed, they turn to rent-seeking. Airlines, universities and banks are examples of incumbents with large regulatory moats which protect their rackets. Unfortunately, it's difficult to distinguish which things are revolutionary and which ones are real scams without knowing the details, but that's why we need to dig deeper and not rely on propaganda from tech writers.In the end, the only thing that should be the judge is reality itself. Not authorities, trusted third parties, a majority of people or a majority of money. Don't tell me the theory. Ship.Ten Things Fiat Science Will Tell You SoonEating bugs is not only good for you but also much better for the environment.Owning things is psychologically harmful.Russia (or China or whatever enemy) is making a nanotech weapon that will kill everyone instantly, so we must nuke them first.Replacing your fully functioning arm with one made by a defense contractor is perfectly safe.Quantum computing threats mean that you should give the government all your data so they can protect it.We are quickly approaching peak air-travel.Climate change created a sea level rise in 2005 to sink Manhattan in a majority of multiverses.Water is a pollutant.A new theory of dark gravity explains the rotational velocity of certain types of galaxies.A promising cure for everything using the kidneys of conservative Christians is on the horizon.This is a guest post by Jimmy Song. Opinions expressed are entirely their own and do not necessarily reflect those of BTC Inc or Bitcoin Magazine." />