@ fd0bcf8c:521f98c0

Collapse.

It's a slow burn.

The LA Fires started decades ago.

Hemingway said, when asked how he went broke:

"Slowly, then all at once."

That’s how collapse happens. Slowly, then suddenly.

Campfire

Ever build one?

You gather wood. Stack the foundation. Set the fuel. Light it up.

If it catches, keep going. Got to stoke it. Feed it. Watch it. In time, the fire's good.

Process It takes time.

Time to gather, build and ignite.

People come at the end. When the flame's dancing.

Like Sunday dinner.

People gather when food's ready. But, only the cook was in the kitchen.

Slow

Societal collapse's similar.

It takes years.

Decades.

Centuries.

A slow cook.

When people notice, the meal’s made. By the time they smell the fire, the forest’s already burning.

People see collapse, but it fell long time ago.

LA

Water, ran dry. Power went out. Fuel stations, empty. Help wasn't on the way.

Politicians politicking.

Making feel-good promises. People believed them. All bad decisions. One after another. They voted for it.

In time, it adds up.

Then, it falls down.

Shift

Analog to digital I work in animation.

Started analog, paper and pencil. It went digital. Scanners, tablets and all.

Veterans, didn't see it coming. Die-hards, refused to acknowledge. They went out of work. Those who adapted—they run the shows now.

Lockdowns

2008, I started a studio.

100% remote. A virtual company.

Some laughed. Others got angry. Said it wouldn't work. They couldn't see.

2020 comes with lockdowns.

Everyone scrambles. Those already digital, thrived.

The rest, shutdown.

History

The Wheel We carried goods. Then came the wheel.

Movement exploded. Trade thrived. Cities rose.

Hunter-gatherers? Left behind.

Collapse wasn't sudden. It was quiet. A shift.

The new formed. The old faded.

Change was inevitable.

Gunpowder

War changed.

Castles crumbled. Swords became relics. Power shifted.

Empires that adapted, thrived. Those that didn't, vanished.

Adapt or die.

The Internet

Borders blurred. Knowledge spread. Walls fell.

Old industries resisted. New empires emerged.

Collapse? No. A new frontier.

Borderless commerce. Shrinking government.

Info and influence, moving fast.

Bitcoin

Money, redefined.

No banks. No middlemen. Just code.

Governments dismiss it. Institutions fear it. But change ignores permission.

A ledger, transparent. A system, unstoppable. Like the internet rewrote communication, Bitcoin rewrites money.

Each invention displaced the old world.

Each collapse brought new opportunity.

Repeats

Mayans Built pyramids. Charted the stars. Cities thrived.

Then, slow decline.

Deforestation. Drought. Conflict.

People scattered.

Cities abandoned.

By the time the Spanish arrived, the fall was old news.

Romans

Not a fall. A fade.

Corruption. Inflation. Invasions. Cracks formed.

The West crumbled. The East endured.

Rome never vanished. Its laws, language, culture? Still here.

Japan

Collapse? No. Reinvention.

Shoguns fell. Meiji rose. Feudal to industrial. War crushed it. Post-war rebuilt it.

The '90s?

A peak. Tech giant. Economic force.

Then, stagnation. Aging population. Debt. Decline.

Still here. Still strong. But no longer rising.

Rhyme

US

Once a colony. Then an empire.

England ruled. America rose. Industry boomed. The 20th century belonged to the U.S.

A superpower. Factories roared. Gold backed the dollar.

A nation built on sound money.

Then, fiat. Paper promises. The gold standard abandoned.

Inflation crept in. Prices rose. Debt piled up. Each decade, the dollar bought less. Wages stagnated. Savings eroded.

Easy money, easy people.

Debt fueled bubbles. Each crash, deeper. The system, fragile.

Wealth concentrated. Time and energy, lost meaning.

A quiet nihilism grew.

People worked more. Gained less. Purpose eroded. Culture followed.

A nation distracted, chasing illusions of prosperity.

Today

The debt's bigger. The politics, fractured. The system strains. The foundation shifts.

The old fades into new.

What's next?

Every collapse starts slow. Then, all at once.

Change

Collapse is change.

It's natural. We see it throughout history.

Like a campfire—fire consumes, but it also brings warmth. Like dinner—before the meal, there’s preparation, transformation. Like LA fires—destructive, painful, but from the ashes, renewal. Possibly.

"To decompose is to be recomposed. That's what nature does. Nature, through whom all things happen as they should, and have happened forever in just the same way, and will continue one way or another endlessly."—Marcus Aurelius

Collapse isn’t the end.

It’s transition.

Preparing

"The Romans were reluctant to acknowledge change, and so are we." —The Sovereign Individual

Florida has hurricanes.

Happens every year. The news reports. Satellites confirm paths. Some, listen and prepare. Others, don't.

The storm comes.

Those prepared, benefit. The rest, suffer.

Like the old animators. They resisted. Now, they’re gone.

Collapse has warnings. How to prepare:

Mindset

Stay calm. See the patterns. Change is constant. Opportunity hides in disruption. Zoom out. Fear distorts judgment.

Skill Development

Learn adaptability. Master digital tools. Understand money. Grow networks. Invest in knowledge, not just assets.

Philosophy

Think long-term. Collapse spans generations. Pass down wisdom. Build resilience. Grow beyond survival—thrive.

Action

Own less, know more. Create. Don’t just consume.

Be part of what’s next.

Conclusion

The fire’s already burning. You can tend it—or watch it burn everything down.

There's a saying:

"There are three types of people in this world: those who make things happen, those who watch things happen, and those who wonder what happened."—Pat Riley

Be the former.

---

Rare Passenger / block height 880 440

@ 6b3780ef:221416c8

We are excited to announce the finalization of our DVMCP specification update, which integrates the latest Model Context Protocol (MCP) version 2025-03-26 and other improvements. This article highlights the key points of this update, and the differences between our initial vision and the final specification, providing insights into how our ideas evolved during the drafting process.

The Journey from Concept to Specification

Last week, we shared our vision for updating the DVMCP specification to better integrate with the Model Context Protocol. After extensive drafting and feedback, we've finalized a specification that maintains our core vision while making important refinements to ensure optimal functionality, interoperability, and user experience. We are also improving the tagging of our specifications to make it more consistent, using the draft mcp:2025-03-26 rev1 tag to identify the version of the specification and the revision number we are in. We hope this will make the specification clearer and easier to track changes.

Key Changes in the Final Specification

Refined Event Kind Structure

In our initial proposal, we outlined a modular event structure with dedicated event kinds for server announcements (31316) and separate kinds for capability categories (31317, 31318, and 31319). The final specification maintains this approach but provides more detailed implementation guidelines.

Enhanced Ephemeral Events

One of the most significant refinements involves our approach to ephemeral events. The final specification clearly defines three ephemeral event kinds:

• Requests (25910): Client requests to servers
• Responses (26910): Server responses to client requests
• Notifications (21316): Status updates, progress information, and interactive elements

This approach provides a more efficient communication pattern while reducing unnecessary storage burden on relays.

Standardized Content Structure

While our initial vision mentioned separating Nostr metadata and MCP payloads, the final specification provides concrete implementation details:

• Content Field: Contains stringified MCP JSON-RPC messages, maintaining full compatibility with the MCP specification
• Tags Field: Contains all Nostr-specific metadata using standardized tag patterns

This clear separation ensures that both protocols can operate seamlessly together without compromising either protocol's integrity.

Comprehensive Protocol Flows

The final specification includes detailed protocol flows for:

1. Public Server Discovery: Finding servers through published announcements
2. Private Server Discovery: Direct connection to servers using the MCP initialization process
3. Capability Operations: Standardized patterns for listing, executing, and managing all capability types

These flows provide implementers with clear guidance on how to build compliant clients and servers.

Payment and Authorization

The specification now includes concrete implementations for payment handling and authorization:

• Payment Required Notifications: Using the ephemeral notification kind (21316) with specific tag patterns
• Authorization Flow: Leveraging Nostr's cryptographic properties for secure authorization

What Remained Consistent

Despite these refinements, our core vision remained intact:

1. Expanded Capability Support: The specification fully embraces MCP's complete capabilities framework, including tools, resources, and prompts
2. Modular Architecture: The separation of server announcements and capability listings improves maintainability and extensibility
3. Protocol Interoperability: The specification maintains compatibility with both Nostr and MCP

Implementation Status

With the specification now finalized, we're updating our reference implementations:

• DVMCP-bridge: Server-side implementation for exposing MCP capabilities through Nostr
• DVMCP-discovery: Client-side library for discovering and consuming MCP capabilities via Nostr

Community Involvement

We want to express our gratitude to everyone who provided feedback on our draft specification. Your insights helped shape a more robust and practical protocol.

Looking Forward

This specification represents a significant advancement in bridging the Nostr and MCP ecosystems. By providing a standardized way to discover, access, and utilize MCP capabilities through the Nostr network, we're enabling new possibilities for applications.

We invite developers to explore the final specification and begin building with our reference implementations. Together, we can create a more open, interoperable, and powerful ecosystem

The complete specification is available at 2025-03-26.md.

@ c3e23eb5:03d7caa9

CW 17 and CW 18 review

Aside from some administrative stuff, most of this weeks energy went into side-quests that were meant to quickly improve the tooling that we use, but ended up taking a lot of time instead.

I worked on - deploying a local git workflow runner for publishing packages without relying on github - modularizing the tollgate-basic repository - the janitor module

The janitor module

Now that our build pipeline is dockerized it takes us just a few minutes to package our code an publish it with NIP-94 events rather than 30 to 90 minutes of waiting for dependencies to download and compile. However, there are still multiple manual interactive steps with interruptions pauses in-between when deploying code changes to a router. This is where TollGate's janitor module comes in.

The janitor module is responsible for automating the update process of the OpenWRT package on the device. It listens for NIP-94 events on specified relays, verifies the events are signed by trusted maintainers, and downloads and installs suitable packages if they are newer than the currently installed version. The module ensures the integrity and security of the installation process by comparing the downloaded package's checksum with the file hash from the NIP-94 event. After installation, it updates the configuration files in such a way that the changes are minimally invasive in the user's interaction with the router.

I started off quickly thanks to roo code and the waterfall method. It took me just a few minutes of answering questions to create a rough outline of what needed to be built. Once I had the high level design document, I just typed test in a new roo code session and it implemented the whole thing with test cases in just one or two commits. However, it still had logic errors and it didn't build yet. Hence, my interest in the side quest.

Deploying local git workflow runner

Pushing to github just to find that there is a syntax error can be time consuming. What if we just trigger an actions runner (act) with a post-commit hook to package the code locally and publish it in parallel while we work?

It turns out that act is buggy and it only runs in specific docker containers. We use a bunch of different composite actions for uploading to blossom, generating NIP-94 events, publishing them and verifying that they were published successfully. It turns out that a lot of this stuff needs to be tweaked before it will run locally in the local container. I got quite far, but started regressing and ditched the branch at one point to refocus on the janitor which still needed attention.

Side side-quest

While struggling with the local workflow runner, I found myself putting go.mod files all over the place and I ended up treating files that were previously imported directly into main.go as separate modules. I thought this was neat and turned all the sub-directories of src/ into go modules before ditching the branch to re-focus on the janitor.

The janitor is ready!

Now I'm about half way through CW-18 and the janitor is merged into main. Abandoned branches that might include something worth salvaging include janitor and just_janitor. Perhaps we can still salvage something useful out of these branches.

Janitor demo

Lets push some changes to a branch called multiple_mints: ``` c03rad0r@CobradorRomblonMimaropa:~/TG/tollgate-module-basic-go$ git commit -m "deploy new version (0.0.17)" [multiple_mints 8739654] deploy new version (0.0.17) 2 files changed, 218 deletions(-) delete mode 100644 src/janitor/HLDD.md delete mode 100644 src/janitor/LLDD.md c03rad0r@CobradorRomblonMimaropa:~/TG/tollgate-module-basic-go$ git push logged in as c03rad0r push: github.com/OpenTollGate/tollgate-module-basic-go.git over https... remote: push: a75cb40..8739654 multiple_mints -> multiple_mints push: Writing objects: 100% (4/4) 0.90 KiB | 0.00 MiB/s, done. To nostr://npub1c03rad0r6q833vh57kyd3ndu2jry30nkr0wepqfpsm05vq7he25slryrnw/nos.lol/tollgate-module-basic-go a75cb40..8739654 multiple_mints -> multiple_mints

```

As you can see, our tollgate is configured to listen for new NIP-94 events on the multiple_mints branch: root@OpenWrt:~# cat /etc/tollgate/config.json { "accepted_mint": "https://mint.minibits.cash/Bitcoin", "bragging": { "enabled": true, "fields": [ "amount", "mint", "duration" ] }, "min_payment": 1, "mint_fee": 0, "package_info": { "arch": "aarch64_cortex-a53", "branch": "multiple_mints", "timestamp": 1746094039, "version": "0.0.16+a75cb40" }, "price_per_minute": 1, "relays": [ "wss://relay.damus.io", "wss://nos.lol", "wss://nostr.mom" ], "tollgate_private_key": "8a45d0add1c7ddf668f9818df550edfa907ae8ea59d6581a4ca07473d468d663", "trusted_maintainers": [ "5075e61f0b048148b60105c1dd72bbeae1957336ae5824087e52efa374f8416a" ] }

As you can see here, the package has just been built and uploaded to blossom with a corresponding NIP-94 event published to the relays: ``` Verifying event d75a2ce307188bb5b8d6d17757876de64fdb1ae6855fc7400b2545cb6b916180 on relays: ['wss://relay.damus.io', ' wss://nos.lol', ' wss://nostr.mom/']

Checking relay: wss://relay.damus.io ✓ Event found on wss://relay.damus.io!

Event details:

{ "id": "d75a2ce307188bb5b8d6d17757876de64fdb1ae6855fc7400b2545cb6b916180", "pubkey": "5075e61f0b048148b60105c1dd72bbeae1957336ae5824087e52efa374f8416a", "created_at": 1746095500, "kind": 1063, "content": "TollGate Module Package: basic for gl-mt3000", "tags": [ [ "url", "https://blossom.swissdash.site/64dd86e18d9a71b7850b5ec70d18124528fafba51b5cc601812137d93a7fabec.ipk" ], [ "m", "application/octet-stream" ], [ "x", "64dd86e18d9a71b7850b5ec70d18124528fafba51b5cc601812137d93a7fabec" ], [ "ox", "64dd86e18d9a71b7850b5ec70d18124528fafba51b5cc601812137d93a7fabec" ], [ "filename", "basic-gl-mt3000-aarch64_cortex-a53.ipk" ], [ "arch", "aarch64_cortex-a53" ], [ "version", "0.0.17+8739654" ], [ "branch", "multiple_mints" ], [ "id", "glinet_mt3000" ] ] } ```

As we can see in the tollgate's logs, the janitor downloaded version 0.0.17 and placed the package in /tmp/. for a cronjob to install: Thu May 1 10:26:54 2025 daemon.info tollgate-basic[5244]: Starting Tollgate - TIP-01 Thu May 1 10:26:54 2025 daemon.info tollgate-basic[5244]: Listening on all interfaces on port :2121 Thu May 1 10:26:54 2025 daemon.err tollgate-basic[5244]: 2025/05/01 10:26:54.075883 Registering handlers... Thu May 1 10:26:54 2025 daemon.err tollgate-basic[5244]: 2025/05/01 10:26:54.076023 Starting HTTP server on all interfaces... Thu May 1 10:26:54 2025 daemon.info tollgate-basic[5244]: Connected to relay: wss://nos.lol Thu May 1 10:26:54 2025 daemon.info tollgate-basic[5244]: Subscription successful on relay wss://nos.lol Thu May 1 10:26:54 2025 daemon.info tollgate-basic[5244]: Subscribed to NIP-94 events on relay wss://nos.lol Thu May 1 10:26:54 2025 daemon.info tollgate-basic[5244]: Connected to relay: wss://nostr.mom Thu May 1 10:26:54 2025 daemon.info tollgate-basic[5244]: Subscription successful on relay wss://nostr.mom Thu May 1 10:26:54 2025 daemon.info tollgate-basic[5244]: Subscribed to NIP-94 events on relay wss://nostr.mom Thu May 1 10:26:55 2025 daemon.info tollgate-basic[5244]: Connected to relay: wss://relay.damus.io Thu May 1 10:26:55 2025 daemon.info tollgate-basic[5244]: Subscription successful on relay wss://relay.damus.io Thu May 1 10:26:55 2025 daemon.info tollgate-basic[5244]: Subscribed to NIP-94 events on relay wss://relay.damus.io Thu May 1 10:31:42 2025 daemon.info tollgate-basic[5244]: Started the timer Thu May 1 10:31:42 2025 daemon.info tollgate-basic[5244]: Started the timer, NIP-94 timestamp: 1746095500, config timestamp: 1746094039 Thu May 1 10:31:42 2025 daemon.info tollgate-basic[5244]: Current timestamp 1746094039, current version 0.0.16+a75cb40 Thu May 1 10:31:42 2025 daemon.info tollgate-basic[5244]: Intersection: [basic-gl-mt3000-aarch64_cortex-a53.ipk-0.0.17+8739654] Thu May 1 10:31:42 2025 daemon.info tollgate-basic[5244]: Right Time Keys: [basic-gl-mt3000-aarch64_cortex-a53.ipk-0.0.16+a75cb40 basic-gl-mt3000-aarch64_cortex-a53.ipk-0.0.17+8739654] Thu May 1 10:31:42 2025 daemon.info tollgate-basic[5244]: Right Branch Keys: [basic-gl-mt3000-aarch64_cortex-a53.ipk-0.0.16+a75cb40 basic-gl-mt3000-aarch64_cortex-a53.ipk-0.0.17+8739654] Thu May 1 10:31:42 2025 daemon.info tollgate-basic[5244]: Right Arch Keys count: 98 Thu May 1 10:31:42 2025 daemon.info tollgate-basic[5244]: Right Version Keys: [basic-gl-mt3000-aarch64_cortex-a53.ipk-0.0.17+8739654] Thu May 1 10:31:52 2025 daemon.err tollgate-basic[5244]: 2025/05/01 10:31:52.497802 Timeout reached, checking for new versions Thu May 1 10:31:52 2025 daemon.info tollgate-basic[5244]: Sorted Qualifying Events Keys: [basic-gl-mt3000-aarch64_cortex-a53.ipk-0.0.17+8739654] Thu May 1 10:31:52 2025 daemon.info tollgate-basic[5244]: Newer package version available: 0.0.17+8739654 Thu May 1 10:31:52 2025 daemon.info tollgate-basic[5244]: Downloading package from https://blossom.swissdash.site/64dd86e18d9a71b7850b5ec70d18124528fafba51b5cc601812137d93a7fabec.ipk to /tmp/64dd86e18d9a71b7850b5ec70d18124528fafba51b5cc601812137d93a7fabec.ipk Thu May 1 10:32:12 2025 daemon.info tollgate-basic[5244]: Package downloaded successfully to /tmp/ Thu May 1 10:32:12 2025 daemon.err tollgate-basic[5244]: 2025/05/01 10:32:12.994157 Verifying package checksum Thu May 1 10:32:13 2025 daemon.err tollgate-basic[5244]: 2025/05/01 10:32:13.003639 Package checksum verified successfully Thu May 1 10:32:13 2025 daemon.info tollgate-basic[5244]: New package version 0.0.17+8739654 is ready to be installed by cronjob

Now the config file reflects that we are running version 0.0.17: root@OpenWrt:~# cat /etc/tollgate/config.json { "accepted_mint": "https://mint.minibits.cash/Bitcoin", "bragging": { "enabled": true, "fields": [ "amount", "mint", "duration" ] }, "min_payment": 1, "mint_fee": 0, "package_info": { "arch": "aarch64_cortex-a53", "branch": "multiple_mints", "timestamp": 1746095417, "version": "0.0.17+8739654" }, "price_per_minute": 1, "relays": [ "wss://relay.damus.io", "wss://nos.lol", "wss://nostr.mom" ], "tollgate_private_key": "8a45d0add1c7ddf668f9818df550edfa907ae8ea59d6581a4ca07473d468d663", "trusted_maintainers": [ "5075e61f0b048148b60105c1dd72bbeae1957336ae5824087e52efa374f8416a" ], "update_path": null }

Now that can deploy new versions easily, lets use this tooling to deploy features that users requested :)

@ 08964cb5:51bf010f

«Reflexiones y Acción: Entre la Defensa del Patrimonio»

[English below][Deutsch unten]

Los recientes acontecimientos que han puesto en peligro mi patrimonio, así como los valores fundamentales que definen mi camino, me han llevado a tomar una decisión importante: iniciar una campaña de recaudación de fondos. Esta iniciativa no solo busca proteger lo que he construido con esfuerzo, sino también garantizar que pueda seguir adelante con proyectos y principios que son esenciales para mí.

Tu apoyo puede marcar una gran diferencia. Si deseas conocer más sobre esta causa o contribuir con tu solidaridad, te invito a visitar ›🔗 éste enlace.‹ "Reflections and Action: Safeguarding My Heritage"

---

“Reflections and Action: Safeguarding My Heritage”

The recent events that have jeopardised my assets and the core values that define my journey have led me to take a significant step: launching a fundraising campaign. This initiative aims not only to protect what I have built with hard work but also to ensure that I can continue moving forward with projects and principles that are essential to me.

Your support can make a real difference. If you’d like to learn more about this cause or contribute with your solidarity, I invite you to visit ›🔗 this link.‹

---

„Überlegungen und Handeln: Den Schutz meines Vermögens”

Die jüngsten Ereignisse, die mein Vermögen sowie die grundlegenden Werte, die meinen Weg bestimmen, gefährdet haben, haben mich dazu veranlasst, einen wichtigen Schritt zu gehen: den Start einer Spendenkampagne. Diese Initiative zielt nicht nur darauf ab, das zu schützen, was ich mit harter Arbeit aufgebaut habe, sondern auch sicherzustellen, dass ich mit Projekten und Prinzipien, die für mich unerlässlich sind, weitermachen kann.

Deine Unterstützung kann einen großen Unterschied machen. Wenn du mehr über diese Sache erfahren oder mit deiner Solidarität beitragen möchtest, lade ich dich ein, ›🔗 diesen Link zu besuchen.‹

@ 08964cb5:51bf010f

«Reflexiones y Acción: Entre la Defensa del Patrimonio»

[English below][Deutsch unten]

Los recientes acontecimientos que han puesto en peligro mi patrimonio, así como los valores fundamentales que definen mi camino, me han llevado a tomar una decisión importante: iniciar una campaña de recaudación de fondos. Esta iniciativa no solo busca proteger lo que he construido con esfuerzo, sino también garantizar que pueda seguir adelante con proyectos y principios que son esenciales para mí.

Tu apoyo puede marcar una gran diferencia. Si deseas conocer más sobre esta causa o contribuir con tu solidaridad, te invito a visitar ›🔗éste enlace.‹

---

"Reflections and Action: Safeguarding My Heritage"

The recent events that have jeopardised my assets and the core values that define my journey have led me to take a significant step: launching a fundraising campaign. This initiative aims not only to protect what I have built with hard work but also to ensure that I can continue moving forward with projects and principles that are essential to me.

Your support can make a real difference. If you’d like to learn more about this cause or contribute with your solidarity, I invite you to visit ›🔗this link.‹

---

"Überlegungen und Handeln: Den Schutz meines Vermögens"

Die jüngsten Ereignisse, die mein Vermögen sowie die grundlegenden Werte, die meinen Weg bestimmen, gefährdet haben, haben mich dazu veranlasst, einen wichtigen Schritt zu gehen: den Start einer Spendenkampagne. Diese Initiative zielt nicht nur darauf ab, das zu schützen, was ich mit harter Arbeit aufgebaut habe, sondern auch sicherzustellen, dass ich mit Projekten und Prinzipien, die für mich unerlässlich sind, weitermachen kann.

Deine Unterstützung kann einen großen Unterschied machen. Wenn du mehr über diese Sache erfahren oder mit deiner Solidarität beitragen möchtest, lade ich dich ein, ›🔗diesen Link zu besuchen.‹

@ fd78c37f:a0ec0833

Author: Taryn Christiansen

Introduction:

The future doesn’t look good for America. The economy is down, politics is in shambles, and, perhaps most devastating, the culture is split. The only agreement is that change is needed. This article aims to pave a road forward. Innovation drives the economy, and great innovations change and improve daily life. Joint efforts between public institutions and private enterprise, along with the energy and momentum generated by efficient and productive programs, can be orchestrated to cultivate national pride. But those programs need to have a noble purpose. Devotion toward technologies with the potential to transform and improve people’s lives should be the goal. Due to recent advancements in biotechnology, efforts should be directed there. Section 1 dives into the cultural divide. Section 2 outlines a way forward by examining the innovative process and how it can be implemented. Section 3 looks at the specifics of that implementation. Section 4 consists of concluding remarks about the future.

Section 1: A Divided Country

---

There are two competing visions dividing America. The Woke vision asserts that the United States was, and is, a fundamentally oppressive regime. The idea of a universal reason, the notion that human beings can attain progress in perpetuity through liberal democracy, science, and capitalism, is seen as nothing more than an ideological weapon used to coerce people into acquiescing to a hierarchy that benefits the few while exploiting the many – and so, out of principles of fairness and equity, the country has to be dismantled.

The Trumpian vision attempts to reaffirm American values. It aims to reestablish American exceptionalism and reinvigorate the American vision of prosperity and economic growth. It seeks to rekindle a sense of American greatness. But it does so cheaply. It is, in essence, the dying breath of a consumer culture fighting its own death. Like the first vision, it too rejects reason and discussion and the procedural processes necessary for liberal democracy. It perceives power as the proper political tool for achieving its objectives. It is not an attempt to restore the values that once characterized the country; it breaks from the American tradition in a radical direction toward a politics of entertainment.

Long ago, the country believed that the human capacity for reason – the ability to see the world clearly under the light of truth, unencumbered by bias or prejudice, free from instinct and emotion – was the torch that carries posterity forward. The founders believed the Bill of Rights and The Constitution enshrined eternal truths that reason alone made accessible. John Locke, an influential figure for the founders, stated that the primary purpose of government is to protect individuals' natural rights. We are all free and have the right to live the life we wish to live. But government is needed to ensure others do not interfere with those rights. What binds us is not a religion or creed but the mutual opportunity for each individual to form their own beliefs, to live out their own conceptions of the good. While fundamental, we will see that it is not enough. A collective purpose is necessary.

Now, the Woke vision sees this older view as wholly mythological – and for good reason. For example, there was a time when black people did not know they were descendants from Africa or the Caribbean and not naturally disposed slaves. People’s various histories and genealogies were stripped away, creating a space by which their humanity could be taken and they could be exploited. They were purposefully and intentionally cast into the shadows of history, and the culpable thought themselves perfectly justified. There was a time when moral and historical narratives depicting a grand destiny of white people conquering the West were considered to be true and that the genocide of Native peoples was not only acceptable but in fact necessary, and therefore legitimate. It has been a titanic and creative effort by great individuals and collective coalitions to get America to become self-conscious of its heinous blunders. Some of the best art and ideas of the twentieth century were born out of those efforts. The beginnings of liberation are born out of the ability to imagine a horizon beyond one’s current circumstances. And that ability for many people has been forged by courageous and heroic predecessors. But the spirit of those movements and their development into the Woke vision is a sign that it has lost its creative potential.

The Woke vision asserts that values like reason and rights are the remains of a colonial legacy. However, by negating them and failing to replace them with new values, deconstructive forces are all that remain. The country has historically failed (as well as succeeded) in living up to what reason and rights demand. But that doesn’t mean they aren’t the proper path forward. The assumption here is that they are, and they have to be creatively reinterpreted.

And the Trumpian vision fails as well. But it is worse because it never did, nor will it ever have any real creative potential. It is highly destructive. We can think about this in the following way.

The nineteenth-century German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche believed a single, fundamental drive governs all of organic life: the will to power. Life, in a constant struggle, perpetually strives to expand and overcome itself repeatedly. From the brute force of two animals fighting for scarce resources to the highest manifestation of human potential, such as moral systems and inspiring artwork, all are produced from the same vital energy and source: the effort to attain power and mastery over a chaotic world.

As society develops and moves away from a state of nature, the will to power transfigures itself through a sublimative process that demands the individual to repress particular instincts and act according to the strictures and constraints formulated and instituted by the collective. As Freud observed in his Civilization and Its Discontents, the push and pull between primitive and ancient instincts and civilization’s repression of them create inextricable tensions. The Yale historian Marci Shore makes an incisive observation of Trump as a symbolic figure using this context and its language: he is the release and outpouring of those repressed instincts – the license to overthrow the restraints placed on the individual. Trump is the embodiment of brute force, a blind ego striving to assert itself over the world, adopting whatever means are available to achieve its aim. He is an eruption of the repressed Hobbesian state of nature, which expresses “a perpetual and restless desire of power after power that ceaseth only in death.” This is a destructive instinct, and we would be wise not to find out what follows.

Section 2: Unity Through Innovation

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So, what is the solution? The country needs a ballast point. It needs national pride. Without a shared sense of identity and purpose, a sense of belonging to a larger community bound by a set of values, the country will continue to unravel. Regardless of the philosophical-level disputes and disagreements on fundamental principles that divide left from right, a collective identity needs to emerge. This article argues that, like the founders, we should turn to our institutions. We should look at how our institutions can facilitate needs by enabling individuals with the creative energy and tenacity to bring about new technologies and innovations that will transform the economy and standards of living. But not just new gadgets and services like iPhones and DoorDash but new technologies with the potential to enable people to live more fulfillingly and purposefully. New vaccines to eliminate unruly diseases, new therapies to mitigate the effects of debilitating illnesses, novel pharmaceuticals with competitive prices and cheaper means of production, and innovative mechanisms to empower people with disabilities to live as they are only able to imagine should play a major part in the mission that characterizes the country. That is a purpose to be proud of. Institutions like the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) should act as bows, shooting forward the individuals and companies striving to reach that mark.

There’s a lot of talk about government efficiency and the need to be more fiscally responsible. Those are good things. But efficiency needs to have a purpose. There must be a goal that efficiency works to achieve. We should not wish to live without regulatory institutions. For example, people like Balaji Srinivasan are wrong to think we’re better off in an FDA-free society. The goal should be to harness those institutions, conduct more research and development, and utilize resources more effectively to achieve the results we want as a country. Just as we should strive to continue and expand our role in the AI race, we should also aim to maintain and further develop our leadership in biotech.

But we need a new of what the historian Gary Gerstle calls political order to achieve this. Political orders are “a vision of the good life that sells important constituencies on the virtues of a way of doing politics. The New Deal order and the Neoliberal order—which are, in a sense, the reverse of each other—illustrate this.”

It is common in America to see the world through the lenses of The New Deal and Neoliberal political orders for resolving issues in the country. The latter is to let the market decide, and the former is to create government programs to achieve some conception of the good. The former is, more or less, a libertarian solution and was very popular during the 1980s. The latter took form in what is known as progressivism, and it found popular expression during the 1930s and 1940s in FDR’s New Deal programs. The basic distinction separating these two political orders is between the right and the good.

Rights are the norms of obligations and constraints necessary for us all to coexist while simultaneously maintaining what many believe is the principal value of liberal democracy: freedom and liberty (these terms will be used interchangeably). Rights are not in the business of prescribing definite ways of life or enforcing particular ends for people to pursue. Rights preserve the conditions for freedom, and people are free to choose what to do with that freedom insofar as their decisions do not infringe on another person’s right to do so as well. Freedom, then, is the absence of coercion. By having that freedom, each is allowed to exercise their powers and capabilities according to their own discretion.

In the American context, by virtue of being a human being, we are said to be endowed with inalienable rights. And those rights both protect each individual from external coercion and provide a license for certain kinds of action. I am protected from being forced to say certain opinions and adopt particular beliefs. And I have the license to speak my own opinions, expound my own beliefs, and give voice to my own personal conscience. I am protected from forced association with people whom I do not wish to associate with, from the coercion to vote for a particular candidate, from being disallowed to protest, and from adopting ends I do not agree with or value. And, of course, that means I have a license to associate with whom I wish, vote for whoever I like, protest legislation I dislike, and adopt the ends I truly value. We are all free, and we all are obligated and constrained to preserve the conditions for us all to exercise that freedom mutually.

But if that is what rights are, how does a society ensure a distribution of goods and services for everyone to enjoy and partake in? After all, a right to free speech isn’t going to ensure anyone that they will have meals for nourishment, clothing for warmth, shelter from harsh conditions. The response comes from Adam Smith: economic freedom. Everyone has a natural propensity to “truck, barter, and trade” in order to improve their condition. And by the very nature of voluntary exchange, each party benefits. By an individual living his life according to his own interests, values, and ends, he “promote(s) an end which has no part of his own intention.” The invisible hand of the market promotes the ends held by other individuals, allowing everyone to live as they see fit and to coexist harmoniously with the community. By having the political freedom of rights and the economic freedom to exchange, people cooperate spontaneously and organically. That is the spirit of the neoliberal political order.

A conception of the good is different, and its meaning can be disclosed through the great liberal philosopher Voltaire’s likely apocryphal statement, “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.” What Voltaire disagrees with is not someone’s right to speak but of what they are saying, and we can imagine the person to be voicing their conception of the good, their values and ends that they believe characterize the good life, the life we ought to live, and Voltaire disapproves of it. The good is concerned with the proper ends that should be prioritized in order to flourish. Socrates famously declared the unexamined life is not worth living. Well, he’s espousing a conception of the good. It is a life of the intellect, a life of rational reflection and deliberation aimed toward self-knowledge. Are one’s beliefs consistent? Does one’s actions contradict what one truly believes? Is one aware of what one truly believes? And does one have the desire to discover the truth? These are Socratic questions, and a life devoted to answering them is a Socratic one.

Now, if there is a universal conception of the good life, if human beings have particular ends that define what it means to be a human being, and if failing to fulfill those ends implies a failure to realize one’s human potential for flourishing, then rights do not secure such outcomes. Rights only ensure individuals are free to pursue such ends if they wish. And given the contingency of life, that is to say that, because people are born into conditions they did not choose but were instead thrown into them, and because some individuals are born into wealth and advantage and some are born into poverty and disadvantage, some have the privilege to achieve the ends characterizing a good life and some do not. And that is unfair. And so, government programs, central planning, and economic stewardship can be used to enable and empower the underprivileged to achieve what others are better positioned to do. This is the spirit of the New Deal political order.

The mistake is to think the appropriate social, cultural, and political issues can be resolved by only one of these political orders. It is not one or the other. Both of these political orders capture powerful intuitions about how society should best function and operate, and there should be a synthesis between them.

Now, it is common knowledge that innovation drives economic growth. As capital becomes more efficient and fewer inputs are required to produce more outputs, the economy expands. In Matt Ridely’s book, Innovation: How It Works, he demonstrates beautifully the often messy and non-rational character of the innovative process.

At the heart of that process, he says, is serendipity. As frustrating as it is to human nature, the innovative process cannot be intelligently designed into a precise instrument capable of reproducing all the wonderful fruits that result from it. There is something inherently unpredictable about it, something unruly. It is organic and spontaneous. It demands the determination of individuals willing to fail over and over again until enough experience, insight, and gradual, often painstaking, progress results in the desired effects.

Ridley observes that so many of these innovations require the rich air of freedom to stimulate the instinct for exploration and discovery. Freedom nourishes and sustains that instinct, allowing it to grow and flourish. People must be free from unnecessary regulations and constraints to focus their creative energy on projects that demand endless hours of trying countless imaginative possibilities – and failing until something works. There’s always a tremendous amount of risk-taking. People need to be free to take them.

People also need to be free to collaborate with others who are also devoted to discovering a solution to seemingly intractable problems. The division of labor, where individuals specialize in a particular task and coordinate with others who do the same to maximize efficiency and productivity, is essential to the process. There’s a reason, as Ridley notes, that many innovations take place in cities, where individuals freely associate and influence one another.

Freedom also allows room for mistakes. Ridley documents many cases where innovation is the result of a mistake, not an intentional plan of action. Innovations can often begin with an intention that has nothing to do with the innovation itself. A deliberate decision leading to a breakthrough discovery can be entirely unrelated, even frivolous. Take the example of Louie Pasteur, one of the key discoverers of germ theory. He was inoculating chickens with cholera from an infected chicken broth when he left for vacation, leaving his assistant, Charles Chamberland, to continue the experiments. Charles, for whatever reason (perhaps he thought the whole idea was crazy), forgot about his responsibility and went on vacation. When both returned, they injected a chicken with the stale broth.

It made the chicken sick but did not kill it. And so he injected the same chicken with a much more virulent cholera strain that typically and easily killed chickens – and it failed. The chicken lived. Vaccines, an innovation on inoculation, emerged. Funny enough, a similar incident occurred with Alexander Fleming. Known for being sloppy, Fleming carelessly left out a culture plate of staphylococcus and took off for vacation for a couple of weeks. When he returned, he discovered a mold had grown that was resistant to the bacteria.

Penicillin was soon developed. All this is to say that, along with Ridley, “Innovation is the child of freedom and the parent of prosperity.”

But government has also been integral to many inventions and innovations that would later revolutionize the economy and, therefore, daily life itself. Mariana Mazzucato’s book The Entrepreneurial State makes a persuasive case for the significance of public institutions in the innovative process. When the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), initially known as ARPA until 1972, was established in 1958 in response to the launch of the Soviet satellite Sputnik in 1957, it aimed to promote ‘blue-sky thinking’ for technological initiatives. Meaning that the goal was to invest in riskier research that potentially would yield long-term gains despite not having any immediate or obvious returns on investment. DARPA pursued “ideas that went beyond the horizon in that they may not produce results for ten or 20 years.”

What makes DARPA a successful agency is its decentralized model. The philosophy is: "Find brilliant people. Give them resources. Get out of their way." DARPA hires talented and competent experts to run programs autonomously, providing them the discretion to pursue projects highlighted by their expertise, which are often considered risky. This model enables experts to connect with other researchers, facilitating collaboration and the creation of highly efficient and productive divisions of labor. And again, these are projects that likely wouldn’t find market interest because of their niche or unexplored nature. There isn’t an immediate and conspicuous payoff. And so the connected but separate-from-government model of DARPA provides scientists with a wide degree of latitude, and that freedom allows them to engage in the innovative process of trial and error and risk-taking.

Technologies developed by DARPA included ARPANET, the precursor to the internet; early GPS technology; the beginnings of autonomous vehicles; speech recognition; personal computing; and early AI.

Other agencies have also been foundational in technological advancements (for example, the National Science Foundation (NSF) provided critical grants to facilitate what would become Google’s search engine algorithm). But the DARPA model is what is most interesting here.

If government programs like DARPA can be leveraged to spur more innovation, particularly in areas such as biotech, and these innovations can drive economic growth by being put into the hands of entrepreneurs, investors, and small, medium, and large firms, then this demands national effort and attention. If successful, it is a project worthy of national pride.

So, government programs and spending, if properly structured, can yield high returns on investment if people are given the freedom to explore, try things out, and make the mistakes necessary for the innovative process to be carried through. And we can look to a recent example where the absence of the efforts potentially could have been disastrous. The story of the COVID-19 vaccines is one where the lack of zeal for exploration and breakthrough discoveries could have hindered the development of mRNA research, leaving it underdeveloped when it was needed at a critical moment.

Section 3: Covid-19, The Imperative For Research and Development, and The Institutional Framework

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To start, Peter Theil is popular for remarking that innovation in many industries has grown stagnant. Energy, manufacturing, and transportation, for example, haven’t seen much progress in the past half-century.

Computation, on the other hand, has surpassed the imagination. The innovations have not been in atoms but in bits. As Theil puts it, “We wanted flying cars; instead we got 140 characters.” And Ridley writes, “If cars had improved as fast as computers since 1982, they would get nearly four million miles per gallon, so they could go to the moon and back a hundred times on a single tank of fuel.” Unfortunately, we still have to visit the gas station and pay those exorbitant prices.

But biotech has gained momentum in the past decade. The COVID vaccines are an extraordinary example of this. But they wouldn’t have been ready to come to market without the previous three decades of research and development invested in them. And that research and development almost didn’t happen because people lacked the vision and the willingness to embrace the risk that great technological discoveries, inventions, and innovations always require.

Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson’s book Abundance tells this story very well. Katalin Kariko, one of the discoverers of mRNA’s therapeutic capabilities, had enormous difficulty securing funding for her research as an assistant professor at the University of Pennsylvania. Those with power thought it too risky, that it didn’t show enough promise, and allocated most resources to DNA research at the time, believing it to be the more auspicious investment. Nevertheless, as so many pioneering figures have done before her, Kariko maintained her vision of unlocking mRNA’s potential for saving lives.

By sheer luck, by the fortune contained in everyday decisions that would lead to saving millions of lives several decades later, Kariko met a colleague who was researching HIV vaccines at the time, Drew Weissman, at a Xerox machine in 1997. He would be pivotal in her research. She is a biochemist, and he, an immunologist. Each provided the knowledge and expertise the other was lacking, and that was essential to their respective goals. Through the serendipity of deciding to walk to a different department to make copies at the time and place she did, Kariko encountered an opportunity to make strides in her research.

Together, however, the two still managed to collect barely enough funding. “The NIH,” which is the largest public funder of biomedical research, “rejected practically all of their grant applications.” They couldn’t get others to have the same foresight. Even after a breakthrough, where they were finally able to send mRNA information into cells without causing horrible inflammation, those in power still blinked. Fortunately, private investment supplied the gust they needed to keep their research going, and two companies created to pursue mRNA research, Moderna and BioNTech, facilitated the vaccine’s development. When Covid spread, enough progress had been made. The FDA, which has set a poor precedent for getting products to market when it matters most, streamlined the approval process and made the vaccine available.

The key features of this story are the following. The first is the lack of risk-taking by institutions and agencies whose aim should be to provide resources to those striving to innovate and push technological progress forward. The second is the lack of coordination to establish intentional environments to converge the paths of those who have the determination, discipline, and vision to bring innovation to fruition. Imagine if Kariko and Weismann didn’t meet; picture Kariko choosing to make copies somewhere else or at a different time. The future may have been radically different. And thirdly, and more optimistically, the FDA served a vital role when it mattered. As a public institution responsible for promoting the public good, they served admirably.

These three parts – funding research, coordinating talent, and the institutions facilitating the results – should coalesce into an optimally functioning whole. Researchers who are trying to shape and influence an unforeseeable future should be encouraged and rewarded. Those who possess powerful and novel ideas, along with the imagination and determination to bring them to life, should be in direct contact with one another. Their paths should cross – intentionally. And lastly, institutions should follow the FDA’s example. Slow regulatory regimes, lengthy processes and paperwork, licensing barriers, and stifling restrictions should be streamlined and transformed into facilitators for technological development and the introduction of powerful and revolutionary technologies into the market.

More funding should be devoted to riskier research. Those with novel and fresh ideas with the potential to disrupt current scientific knowledge and produce a breakthrough should be sought out. It is estimated that roughly 2-5% of the NIH’s current budget of $45 billion is allocated to high-risk research. That should be increased. Programs like the High-Risk, High-Reward Research Program, which includes awards to innovative researchers and ideas, should take on a more robust role and budget than it currently does.

Furthermore, approximately 80% of the NIH budget is allocated to extramural research programs, which are external programs conducted outside of the institution itself. A larger portion of those who receive that funding should be based on their potential for innovation. Currently, as Klein and Thompson observe, the process of obtaining a research grant, which involves extensive paperwork and minutiae, is bureaucratic, cumbersome, inefficient, and time-consuming. A significant amount of energy that should be allocated toward advancing research is spent on securing the funding to do it.

Submitting an application, going through the two review processes, and being approved takes typically nine months to a year. And most fail, leading many scientists to have to apply numerous times in a year. And those doing the review process aren’t necessarily looking for cutting-edge proposals; they’re looking for what fits bureaucratic standards. Of course, this is contentious, but Kariko's story demonstrates its reality. Ridley offers another example. When Francisco Majica made critical advancements in CRISPR technology, it took him “more than a year to get his results published, so sniffy were the prestigious journals at the idea of a significant discovery coming from a scientific nobody.” Institutions must do a better job of trying and supporting novel and unexplored ideas, regardless of who or what they originate from. For example, biotech DAOs do not currently receive funding from government institutions, such as the NIH, due to the traditional legal framework used to distribute resources. Regulatory and legal changes should be implemented to maximize their potential. If there is too much emphasis on process, on bureaucratic procedures and standards, fruitful and rich opportunities suffocate.

The NIH budget also allocates funds to intramural research programs, which are internally connected to the NIH itself. These research programs account for roughly 10% of the NIH’s total budget. A highly promising model to adopt is the DARPA model articulated in Section 2. The NIH should adopt something similar. It should allocate resources to decentralized programs to bring together the best scientists to generate breakthrough ideas. Those programs should be spaces where scientists are free to pursue visionary projects.

Smaller biotech firms, startups, and those without robust forms of funding are often forced to pursue ideas that will capture immediate investment attention. And because of the burdensome and costly bureaucratic processes, investors are justly skeptical about anything risky and cutting-edge.

For example, regarding the FDA approval process, small molecule drugs like pharmaceuticals generally take ten to fifteen years to reach the market. On average, one drug costs $1-2 billion to move through the process, and less than ten percent of those who enter clinical trials succeed. Biologics, such as vaccines and gene therapies, typically take ten to twelve years to reach the market and have a slightly higher success rate than small molecule drugs, ranging from 12 to 15 percent. Those are extensive periods of time, the costs are astronomical, and few can maintain the resources to climb the mountain. This discourages bold enterprise – and it leads to higher prices as well. Due to the cumbersome approval process, the FDA offers exclusivity to companies that bring a product to market, both to reward innovation and to allow companies the opportunity to recoup the tremendous losses incurred by the approval process. This can lead to monopolistic pricing. Innovation should not be rewarded by harming the consumer. Innovation should lift the tide that raises all boats. And so the innovative process shouldn’t be exclusive to those with enough capital to take risks. It should be available to anyone with the tenacity to actualize a bold and promising idea. That’s not to say the process should be less rigorous and methodical. It’s that it needs to be more efficient. But not just efficiency for efficiency's sake; it needs to be efficient toward the right ends and outcomes, and innovation should be a leading goal.

Therefore, a primary goal of the FDA should be to stimulate market interest by expediting the most innovative technologies emerging from research programs driven by the NIH and its innovation initiatives. It’s very important that private research continues innovating as well, and increases in private investment toward manufacturing and research – like Johnson & Johnson’s recent announcement – is good. But new technologies, drugs, vaccines, and therapies should be a central mission of the institutional framework advocated for here – and the process should begin with creativity for creativity’s sake. The profit motive should be employed after realizing a passionate and creative vision. Those truly motivated by inspiration, the people who have the will to manifest something novel and unimaginable, are generally the worst at navigating the business aspect - not always, but often. And the energy pushing them forward is a precious and scarce resource. And so institutions like the FDA and NIH should foster, rather than stifle, their capabilities and opportunities for creating meaningful contributions to the country and the world. The FDA has a history of being slow and untimely when it comes to processing and approving applications for moving to clinical trials. For example, the AIDS epidemic is a stain on the institution’s reputation. When AIDS spread across the US in 1980, it took scientists three years to identify HIV as the cause, five years for the FDA to approve the first blood test to screen for the virus, and seven years to finally get a drug to market. The response to COVID-19 should be the golden standard by which the FDA operates.

Section 4: Human Being and Its Essence

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Now, let’s ask the following: what does this have to do with national pride? How does this provide a new vision for the country?

In Alex Karp’s new book, The Technological Republic, he criticizes Silicon Valley for forgetting its roots in developing technology for national purposes. The foundational technology that defines Silicon Valley originated from government programs like DARPA and NASA, which had a clear purpose. They had a mission, and the achievements under those programs demonstrate that.

But now Silicon Valley has shifted to the consumer. Innovations in Silicon Valley generally make life more convenient, comfortable, pleasant, breezy. Goods and services satisfy all our wants and preferences. New apps, better features on social media, increasingly competent virtual assistants, faster food delivery services, endless streams of television and movies and videos, smart appliances, and more and more advanced phones pervade everyday life. The goal is always immediate gratification. There is no horizon that these products look up to. Everything is here and now.

This takes us back to our discussion of rights and conceptions of the good. Silicon Valley isn’t tethered to any real purpose or collective aim. Its goal is to let the market decide. There is no moral or spiritual integrity, no conception of the good that permeates Silicon Valley and its products. Nothing is off limits because it is the consumer’s right to choose. If there is a want, if enough people are willing to buy, Silicon Valley will produce it. No substantive conviction guides their innovations. What does Silicon Valley stand for? It certainly has a creative spirit – just look at all the devices we have today – but that spirit lacks a purpose, and so it wanders aimlessly chasing the fleeting nature of the consumer.

It’s perfectly understandable that Silicon Valley has severed itself from its military roots. Not only would it lose a substantial portion of revenue if it returned to those roots, but there is, of course, a moral dilemma at the heart of most military endeavors, and it is wise to take that seriously. And the Tech sector should not aim to impose a conception of the good on the consumers. The issue is its obsession with the consumer. There are more pressing areas of concern that warrant attention. The wealth of talent in Silicon Valley is better spent in those areas. And it should be done through the efficient use of public institutions.

The new vision is one where taxpayer dollars are used for purposeful and meaningful projects that generate new technologies and innovations that contribute to people’s real needs, not just their wants and preferences. Genuine pride involves courage and bold risk for the sake of principle. It consists in having the determination to carry through an arduous enterprise. And we should be proud as a country if a joint effort between the public and private sectors achieves collective ends.

And at the heart of this pride should be the creative process. Albert Einstein wrote that great scientific discoveries – the new ideas that are leaps in progress toward the expansion of human knowledge – are, again, not the inevitable product of a rigid, refined, and precisely applied method. He believed the great discoveries, the ones that establish new scientific paradigms that enrich society with so many practical fruit, result from a cosmic feeling, a kind of religious experience born out of feelings of awe, wonder, and mystery that are produced by the intellectual and spiritual effort to understand the rational order of the cosmos. He writes, “Enough for me (is) the mystery of the eternity of life, and the inkling of the marvelous structure of reality, together with the single-hearted endeavor to comprehend a portion, be it ever so tiny, of the reason that manifest itself in nature… I maintain that cosmic religious feeling is the strongest and noblest incitement to scientific research.”

Reaching for and clinching a new and profound idea is not a mechanical and algorithmic activity. Regardless of how finely one specifies the rules of procedure or how regimented the institutional standards for scientific knowledge are prescribed, intuition, sensitivity to the world and its objects, amazement at the experience of observing the world and its causal relations, in short, the feelings and moods of the subject investigating the object, are integral to the discovery of scientific ideas. Methods are pivotal in locating and developing the precise, logical nature of those ideas, but initial contact with them demands variables that are not reducible to fixed procedures. Ideas powerful enough to change the world and better the human condition originate in cosmic feelings of wonder and curiosity and are not strictly an output of a mechanized division of labor.

AI will outrun the human capacity for intelligence. This is a likely prediction. And so what will it mean to be a human being then? For centuries, philosophers have distinguished human beings from other parts of nature by invoking our seemingly unique capacity for reason. We have the ability to contemplate, reflect, and grasp the physical laws governing the cosmos. We can harness those laws and employ them to manipulate our environment, alter its forms, and recombine its parts, allowing us to raise our living standards beyond our ancestor’s imaginations. We are highly intelligent beings, and our intelligence has been regarded as our distinguishing mark.

AI erodes this image. This new technology is becoming, and perhaps already is, a concrete realization, an externalization of what history thought was uniquely our own. The reality that reason isn’t special, that it is nothing more than a physical product of an accidental evolution, a wisp of luck, has become more and more firmly impressed upon the mind over the last two centuries. AI will make it indelible; it is the final proof. And so what is a human being? What distinguishes us?

The answer is in our spontaneous acts of creativity, in our ability to produce beauty in art, complexity in design, and in our profound capability to experience wonder. Again, the innovative process discussed above cannot be rationally formed into a precise instrument. As frustrating as it is, as much as it bumps against our instinct to make everything intelligible and known, our ability for spontaneity and creativity, our capacity to fail over and over again until we receive those moments of imaginative brilliance, cannot be reduced into a definite set of rules and procedures.

And so as the world changes, as everything alters before our eyes, we have to value what makes us distinctly human. We need a new Enlightenment, one that celebrates our creativity and our will to manifest what we can internally envision. Our self-respect as individuals and collectives lies in our instincts for curiosity, inquiry, discovery, and the creative and imaginative processes that animate them.

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Ein Gedicht unserer Zeit von Lionne Douce.

Sprecherin: Sabrina Khalil

https://soundcloud.com/radiomuenchen/der-gutmenschzug-ist-da-von?

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In the heart of Romania’s 2024 presidential election, a seismic shock rattled the foundations of its democracy. Just days before the final runoff, the Constitutional Court made an unprecedented move: it annulled the entire election, citing evidence of Russian interference that propelled a far-right nationalist, Călin Georgescu, to a surprise lead. Was this a bold reflex to safeguard democratic integrity against foreign manipulation, or a chilling cancellation of the people’s voice, silencing millions who had cast their ballots? As Romania grapples with this historic decision, the line between protecting democracy and undermining it has never been blurrier, leaving citizens and observers alike questioning the true cost of this electoral upheaval.

In this article, I will explore Romania’s 2024 presidential election annulment chronologically, tracing the rise of far-right candidate Călin Georgescu, the Constitutional Court’s decision to cancel the vote on December 6, and the resulting protests and probes into foreign interference. This timeline will clarify whether the move was a democratic safeguard or an undemocratic suppression of the people’s will.

October 15, 2024

Judges booted candidate Diana Șoșoacă, leader of the ultra-nationalist party S.O.S Romania, from the race because she threatened Bucharest’s place in the EU and NATO. But her rivals are saying the court overstepped its remit.

The unprecedented ruling by the Constitutional Court of Romania (CCR) sparked criticism from Șoșoacă’s rivals across the political spectrum, encompassing socialists, liberals and academics — with one figure even pointing to how it echoes the Kremlin’s electoral governance.

November 22, 2024

The final major poll before Romania’s 2024 presidential election, released on the eve of the vote, painted a starkly different picture from the eventual outcome. Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu led with 23.7%, followed by Elena Lasconi at 17.8%, George Simion at 16.9%, and Nicolae Ciucă at 14.3%. Astonishingly, Călin Georgescu, who would later surge to a stunning first-round victory, languished in fifth place with just 8.1%, a staggering underestimation that would soon fuel suspicions of manipulation and upend the nation’s electoral process.

November 24, 2024

In a stunning upset, Călin Georgescu won Romania’s 2024 presidential election with 22.94% of the vote, dominating the first round despite trailing in pre-election polls. George Simion, often labeled the country’s “hard right chief” by Western media, lagged behind in fourth place with just 13.8%. No credible evidence suggests vote tampering; Georgescu’s victory reflected a genuine surge of voter support, particularly among the diaspora, where he won overwhelmingly—except in Moldova, where he secured only 3.11% amid a large pro-Russian population that had narrowly passed a pro-EU referendum a month earlier.

As regards Georgescu himself, by CV, appearance and speaking style he comes across as the ideal candidate. He studied agronomy, has a PhD in soil science and is a university lecturer; has worked at senior levels in government – including in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs – as well as at the UN and other NGOs, with a focus on sustainable development; and he speaks four foreign languages. He projects a professional, clean-cut image of a determined, experienced 62 year-old nationalist at the apex of his powers, speaking very simply and clearly in a calm, confident manner. Strictly by these superficial PR metrics, on paper, he is, at first glance, perfectly suited for the role.

Nor is he unknown in Romanian politics; but he is – or has been – a very fringe figure. His name was floated several times in recent years, in nationalist-populist circles, as a potential alternative for prime minister. He nearly became honorary president of Romania’s main nationalist conservative party, AUR, before the deal fell through when past comments came to light in which he had called the country’s Second World War leader and Axis ally, Marshal Antonescu – who is considered responsible for the Romanian Holocaust – a “hero”.

Georgescu had conducted a persuasive online campaign, primarily on TikTok, focusing on the importance of an autochthon economy, the inherent superiority of rural life in Romania, and essentially claiming that just like a national poet from the 19th century, he is a divine messenger. The campaign consisted of thousands of TikTok profiles distributing ten-second videos about him, with many influencers suggesting in the past weeks that they would vote for him. According to Georgescu, he didn’t spend any money on the campaign, but the scale and the professionalism in which it was conducted suggest otherwise.

November 25, 2024

Politico comes to remind us why EU is so interested about Romania. According to this article, Romania has been a steadfast ally in the West’s support for Ukraine, leveraging the Port of Constanța as a critical lifeline for exporting Ukrainian grain and funneling military supplies into the conflict zone. The war has also elevated the strategic significance of the Mihail Kogălniceanu air base on the Black Sea, poised to become NATO’s largest. However, Călin Georgescu’s unexpected electoral triumph raises alarms across Europe, as his leadership could pivot Romania away from this pro-Western stance, potentially disrupting these vital geopolitical roles. This prospect underscores why European leaders are deeply invested in ensuring Romania remains in “reliable” hands, aligned with NATO and EU priorities.

November 26, 2024

Reformist Elena Lasconi, who was going to face Georgescu in the runoff on Dec. 8, was directly warning that Romanians must now rally together to stop the country falling back under the thrall of Russia, which occupied it after World War II. She urged a crowd in Bucharest not to let frustration with the current establishment “become a vulnerability exploited by Russia.”

November 28, 2024

The official claim of Russian meddling rested directly and exclusively on a specific set of intelligence documents on the matter, first submitted in a closed National Security Council meeting on 28 November. Romania’s Constitutional Court asked the country’s top election authority to recount and check again all ballots from Sunday’s presidential election first round.

November 30, 2024

Elena Lasconi, who narrowly secured a runoff spot by edging out PSD Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu by just 2,700 votes, has firmly rejected allegations of electoral misconduct. Lasconi and her party, USR, accuse the PSD and center-right PNL of undermining the people’s will through the annulment push. In a passionate statement, she urged, “I appeal to all state institutions: Don’t destroy democracy in Romania,” highlighting the high stakes for the nation’s democratic integrity.

December 4, 2024

The set of intelligence documents on the matter, first submitted in a closed National Security Council meeting on 28 November and then hastily declassified on 4 December by the sitting President in order to “inform” the Constitutional Court’s decision. But the reports contained no actual evidence of the sort.

The documents alleged that 800 TikTok accounts had been activated just before the election and that they had supported Călin Georgescu’s campaign.

Albeit these reports did not definitely say that the meddling effort managed to actually sway the election in Georgescu’s favour, they suggested it.

I ve translated the declassified documents using the AI tools: Grok and ChatGPT. I can assure you that the following summary from "Brussels Signal" is accurate. I will quote the summary because of the key importance on the subject:

The documents provide no concrete evidence of Russian state interference in Romania’s presidential elections or any links between presidential candidate Calin Georgescu and Russia.

The most important and explosive term used in these documents (by SRI) is “state actor.” The documents offer no evidence or analytical explanation for the use of this term, rendering it an unsupported claim.

On the contrary, to the extent that they shed light on anything, the documents indicate that Georgescu’s campaign simply employed highly effective digital marketing techniques, giving him a “comparative exponential” advantage (according to SRI).

The documents offer only disparate, circumstantial, and often trivial information presented in a way that leaves plenty of room for wide-ranging interpretations. Their tone and terminology appear designed to fuel an anti-Georgescu narrative in the public sphere.

As intelligence products, the documents are sloppy and of very poor quality by Allied standards. They include contradictions, errors, and blatant inaccuracies. The language is often vague, and key terms remain undefined (e.g., various uses of the word “network”). For the most part, the documents are full only of useless platitudes, with the majority of the information already having been circulating in the public domain in the days after 24 November (the date of the first voting round).

The documents are merely “Briefing Notes” (note informative, in Romanian), not assessments – thus lacking clear and definitive analytical conclusions or interpretations. They make isolated claims (mostly unsupported), with no discussion of sources or evidence. This is likely a method for the intelligence services to protect themselves politically. Subsequent interpretations of these documents by the media are not, therefore, based on conclusions of the Romanian state.

The documents are also redacted in key parts. It is therefore important to understand that the information in these documents was only partially declassified – despite the media narrative suggesting the documents were declassified in their entirety. It is also important to understand that the redacted passages may alter the meaning of the text.

The SIE Briefing Note has not actually been declassified. The President only published an “unclassified excerpt” from it. The SIE Note itself remains classified, likely because it contradicts the Notes submitted by the other agencies.

The documents do point to potential irregularities in Georgescu’s campaign finance statements. However, such issues are common in campaigns worldwide and, moreover, should be investigated with respect to all the other candidates as well, in the same way. In any case, the documents make no suggestion of foreign funding, let alone from Russia.

The only concrete elements noted in the documents as being specifically identified as of 24 November (the day of the vote in the first round) are: 100 TikTok influencer accounts paid to distribute content using 3 (three) hashtags that do not even mention Calin Georgescu; 797 accounts created before (!) the launch of TikTok itself, under this brand name; 1,088 users in a “coordination” group on Telegram (which, again, is standard in all political campaigns); and $381,000 paid to some “influencers”.

Conclusion: The CSAT documents declassified by the President provide absolutely no real, concrete basis for the public narratives about a “Russian attack” on Romania or of links between Georgescu’s campaign and Russia. These documents, by themselves, cannot rationally be used as arguments against this candidate because they prove nothing.

Shortly after the vote in a televised address President Iohannis claimed that the ‘campaign was illegally supported from outside Romania’ and that it is a ‘matter of national security’.

December 6, 2024

Romania’s top constitutional court dramatically cancelled high-stakes presidential elections after security services warned Russia was mounting “aggressive” hybrid attacks against the country. Călin Georgescu was accused to benefit from a TikTok campaign that was similar to influence operations allegedly run by the Kremlin in Ukraine and Moldova. The files said Moscow was targeting Romania as an enemy state, using “aggressive hybrid action,” a view backed by the United States, at that time.

Running as an independent, Georgescu was due to face liberal Elena Lasconi of the Save Romania Union (USR) in a Dec. 8 runoff. Suspicious of the two old parties, she is also calling on the court not to meddle with Romanian democracy. According to Radio Romania Actualitati, she said: ‘Today is the moment when the Romanian state has trampled on democracy,’ adding: ‘We should have gone ahead with the vote. We should have respected the will of the Romanian people, whether we like it or not; legally and legitimately, nine million Romanian citizens, both at home and in the diaspora, have expressed their preference for a particular candidate by voting. We cannot ignore their will.’

Elena Lasconi, a liberal—by Western standards, however, she might not be considered a typical liberal, as she openly expresses patriotism, displays the Romanian flag alongside the EU flag, and occasionally wears traditional folk costumes—former TV journalist. Lasconi, like Georgescu, is an anti-establishment figure, vocal in her criticism of the current political elite and adept at channelling voter discontent and frustration with mainstream parties. It is no surprise, then, that both the Social Democratic Party (PSD) and the National Liberal Party (PNL)—Romania’s two largest establishment parties—reacted with dismay to the performances of Georgescu and Lasconi. This discontent was amplified by the fact that neither party’s candidate came close to qualifying for a potential second round. Politicians from both the far right as well as liberal reformists Save Romania Union (USR) party view an annulment as an attempt by the widely distrusted old establishment parties — the Social Democratic Party (PSD) and the center-right National Liberal Party (PNL) — to hold on to power by pulling strings within the judiciary. Elena Lasconi, a liberal former TV journalist who was set to stand against Georgescu in the second round, was mortified by what she saw as a hijacking of the electoral process.

The court canceled the process completely, leaving voters bemused as they turned up to cast their ballots. In a defiant video released on Friday night, Georgescu accused the court of launching “practically a formalized coup d’état” and told his supporters to show they are “brave” and not to give up.

In fact, Georgescu was leading with as much as 77 per cent against Lasconi’s 23 per cent in the diaspora when Romania’s Constitutional Court decided to annul the elections.

The President, at that time, Klaus Iohannis was due to end his term on Dec. 21. But in an address to the nation Friday evening, he announced that he was going to stay on until the next president was about to sworn in.

Nicolae Ciucă, the head of the Romanian senate and the National Liberal Party’s presidential candidate in the first round said that The decision to cancel the vote was “without precedent in Romania’s democratic history,” he said, adding “the current situation is a difficult test for our democratic institutions.”

According to the press's findings, behind Georgescu there appears to have been an entire “network” of volunteers – often organised via Telegram – running thousands of co-ordinated TikTok accounts designed to boost each other’s posts – i.e. Georgescu’s short promo videos. TikTok has only relatively recently caught on in Romania; certainly it wasn’t a factor at the last election. This might explain why a strong TikTok campaign would not have registered properly in political analysis, and why it might’ve had an outsized effect on voting intentions. It is also a warning for the future of the very idea of democratic politics, as it shows that it is possible for candidates to completely side-step the traditional “public square”, avoid any major real-world debates or campaigning, and win elections exclusively online.

Still, there is a great deal of mystery over exactly how all this worked. Georgescu’s TikTok metrics are inferior to his three key adversaries for example: there were 145 million views this year for Georgescu’s main hashtags compared to 396 million for Simion’s, 328 million for Ciolacu and 202 million for Lasconi. One difference is that the bulk of Georgescu’s TikTok views and followers accrued within the past two months. Coupled with other indicators, it seems rather clear that so-called “troll farms” have been at work on his behalf, to spread his message; but it is not clear whether this practice is unique to Georgescu or whether it has been used – to varying degrees – by his opponents as well.

As Georgescu is perceived to be “pro-Russia” – an imprecise term to boot – suspicion in this regard is directed towards the Kremlin. But hard evidence is lacking; there is no smoking gun, so far. Russian actors are involved in virtually every election in the West, but their exact role in swinging the result is hardly ever clear. In the US a Congressional investigation – eventually known as the “Russia Hoax”, for good reason – failed to prove alleged collusion between Trump’s 2016 campaign and Moscow, despite widespread belief in this story from those shocked that “orange man” could ever win because his message was more effective.

The reaction from the EU and Washington was particularly alarming, though hardly surprising. ‘The integrity of Romania’s elections is paramount for Romanians’ hard-earned democracy. It is the choice of the Romanian people whom they elect. No other country or foreign actor has that right,’ the US State Department said in a statement. The contradiction is glaring, isn’t it? It’s supposedly the Romanians’ choice who they elect, yet if a candidate not favoured by the Americans wins, the election results are annulled.

Moscow denied meddling into the Romanian democratic process.

December 20, 2024

According to a Snoop (investigative journalist organization) investigation, Georgescu’s alleged financing would have been done by the PNL. ** All this, so that Georgescu’s message would spread and more people could vote for him so that George Simion would not make it to the second round. ** In fact, the ANAF (National Agency for Tax Administration) discovered that the PNL paid for a campaign massively promoting Călin Georgescu on TikTok, published on 20 December 2024.

December 22, 2024

Subsequent investigations by the National Agency for Fiscal Administration (ANAF), Romania’s tax authority, uncovered the origins of Călin Georgescu’s successful TikTok campaign: the PNL. The centre-right party’s campaign initially employed the hashtag #echilibrusiseriozitate to promote European values and pro-EU positions. Kensington Communication, the company responsible for the campaign, also targeted Georgescu’s content, aiming to counter his EU-critical rhetoric. However, the hashtag #echilibrusiseriozitate, designed to create an unfavourable environment for non-liberal presidential candidates on TikTok, was replaced by #echilibrusiverticalitate on the FameUP platform—a free automated platform that amplifies marketing campaigns. Interestingly, this new hashtag was ultimately adopted and used by Georgescu’s supporters, transforming its purpose and amplifying his campaign’s visibility. The Romanian government proposed 4 May as the date for a new presidential election. However, no formal decision was made since. Călin Georgescu has since challenged the Constitutional Court’s decision at a local appeals court and lodged a complaint with the European Court of Human Rights. ‘I will take our cause to the heart of Europe, to the highest courts. Each of us is doing our part in this historic mission to defend our democracy,’ he declared.

January 5, 2025

Recent polls show that Călin Georgescu remains the most popular presidential candidate, with some surveys suggesting that the ultranationalist contender could garner close to 40 per cent support.

January 8, 2025

The court is considering disqualifying Georgescu for undeclared campaign funding.

The leaders of the ruling coalition made up of the Social Democrats (PSD), Liberals (PNL), the Democratic Alliance of Hungarians (UDMR), and the minorities' group decided on the new dates for the presidential elections. According to the agreed election schedule, the first round would have taken place on May 4, followed by the runoff on May 18.

At the beginning of the government meeting, prime minister Marcel Ciolacu announced the introduction of sanctions against social media networks that favor candidates, according to Europa Libera Romania.

Georgescu’s appeal against the constitutional court’s decision to nullify the election was rejected, so he lodged a complaint to the European Court of Human Rights.

In fact, even the Venice Commission (the officially European Commission for Democracy through Law) stated that, regarding what had happened in Romania, evidence must be given: ‘An election annulment must be based on transparent evidence, not classified information.’

January 10, 2025

Former European commissioner Thierry Breton assured that the European Union has mechanisms to overturn an eventual AfD victory:

We did it in Romania and obviously we will do it in Germany if necessary.

This was widely seen as a clear admission of their true intentions, as if they had dropped all pretenses and fully revealed themselves.

They tell you to your face that they can suspend elections and that absolutely nothing happens, then they have the cheek to declare themselves the ‘democrats’ and ‘tolerant’, when it is them who are the main enemies of democracy and freedom of expression!

January 12, 2025

Tens of thousands of supporters of Romanian presidential candidate Călin Georgescu took to the streets in Bucharest on Sunday to protest the annulment of the presidential election. With no concrete evidence emerging to substantiate the allegations of Russian interference, it has become increasingly evident that the progressive elite will go to any lengths to remain in power.

February 1, 2025 According to the last polls, Georgescu would be around 50 per cent; specifically, according to the last one published by România TV, he would obtain 47 per cent.

February 10, 2025

Romanian President Klaus Iohannis announced his resignation before his possible forced dismissal from parliament. Iohannis, echoing Joe Biden, made sure to pardon his family and the judges who suspended the presidential election before leaving, for reasons of precaution.

Once the court cancelled the elections—so no new president was elected—, it also decided to lengthen the current president’s term in office until a new vote in May 2025. Iohannis faced raising opposition, however, as some viewed his lengthened mandate as illegitimate. On the one hand, the Romanian constitution states that a presidential term is five years, and the president remains in office until their successor takes over. On the other hand, it also makes clear that the presidency can be extended only in case of war or catastrophe. Protests also took place against the decision of him remaining in office, and the legislature initiated his removal as well. **Preventing a successful impeachment procedure, Klaus Iohannis stepped down. ** In his resignation speech he highlighted that Romania’s western partners will not understand the reason why he was forced to step down, and that his departure will damage Bucharest’s relationship with its allies. The country’s interim president will be the Senate’s president, Ilie Bolojan.

February 15, 2025

The Constitutional Court of Romania is accused of canceling elections without evidence, allegedly to suppress votes against the EU-aligned political establishment. Claims suggest court judges are linked to Soros-funded NGOs. A network of "independent" NGOs and media, funded by hundreds of millions from the EU and USAID, is said to promote left-wing globalist agendas, manipulate public opinion, and counter conservative values. EU grants and a secret 130 million euro contract to a French agency, tied to corruption, allegedly fueled pro-EU media campaigns, undermining independent journalism and labeling critics as pro-Russia. Independent journalist, Iosefina Pascal, talks thoroughly about this case.

February 19, 2025 Renowned journalist and X (formerly Twitter) personality Mario Nawfal interviews Georgescu, with clear expressions of support for Trump and Musk, alongside a strong critical stance toward George Soros.

February 26, 2025 Romania’s presidential candidate, Calin Georgescu was arrested while en route to Bucharest to announce his new presidential campaign. Georgescu’s campaign team has confirmed that Georgescu was picked up by the police and detained in the middle of traffic for questioning at the attorney general’s office.

Georgescu was declared the winner of that election round, but an arrest warrant was issued against him on February 26, as reported by the Romanian press.

Romanian prosecutors have initiated criminal proceedings against the right-wing politician and candidate for the 2024 presidential election, Călin Georgescu, on six charges. These include allegations of engaging in unconstitutional activities and providing inaccurate financial disclosures, according to official sources.

March 1, 2025

Thousands march for freedom in Romania. Over 200,000 Romanians flood streets for Georgescu. Anti-Soros feelings are everywhere.

March 6, 2025

The Romanian opposition – denied a likely victory – took their case to the European Court of Human Rights.

The ECHR (The European Convention on Human Rights, a supranational convention to protect human rights and political freedoms in Europe) threw the case out without even hearing it. Apparently, the Romanian courts were perfectly within their rights to simply indefinitely postpone their election on the basis of unproven allegations.

Romania is moving toward its strictest censorship law since 1989, granting authorities the power to block websites and social media posts without independent review.

The Emergency Ordinance (OUG) would allow the government to shut down content deemed “false information,” “manipulation,” or a “threat to national security,” with no clear definitions or court approval required.

The Romanian Intelligence Service (SRI), military, cybersecurity agencies, and electoral authorities would have sweeping powers to remove posts and block platforms, while internet providers refusing to comply could face massive daily fines.

This law could be used to silence journalists and political opponents, as there is no independent oversight and no clear standard for what counts as “false information.”

The government claims the measure is meant to combat foreign election interference, but it will actually be weaponized against free speech.

March 7, 2025 Călin Georgescu, the people’s choice in Romania’s annulled election, has officially submitted his candidacy for the upcoming presidential race, backed by over 324,000 signatures.

The Constitutional Court will decide this month or early April if his candidacy is approved, assuming, of course, that he doesn't get arrested again this time.

March 8, 2025

Demonstrators gathered in front of Romania’s Palace of Parliament, holding banners thanking Tulsi Gabbard and urging Trump to “help take our country back!”

Romania’s Constitutional Court has unanimously rejected 4 appeals attempting to block Călin Georgescu from the presidential race. The challenges, filed by minor candidates Sebastian Popescu and Cristian Terheș, accused him of failing to disclose campaign funding and alleged foreign financial ties. The court dismissed the claims as inadmissible, citing procedural failures and lack of legal merit.

Allegedly Soros-linked activists flood Romanian Electoral Bureau with 1,000 identical appeals against CĂLIN GEORGESCU

Over 1,000 copy-paste appeals were filed against Călin Georgescu’s candidacy, organized by Soros-backed activists trying to block him.

But the Electoral Bureau (BEC) is set to reject them all—the challenges were filed before his candidacy was even validated, making them invalid.

March 9, 2025

Calin Georgescu’s presidential candidacy has been officially rejected, sparking outrage among his supporters, who attempted to breach the Bureau of Electoral Control (BEC).

The candidacy was rejected with 10 votes in favor and 4 against.

Romania’s Electoral Office bypassed the Constitutional Court, which had approved his candidacy in December, and shut him down directly instead.

George Simion, president of the AUR stated in viral video:

Georgescu put his candidacy at the Central Electoral Bureau and by 10 members to 4, it was rejected without any reason. All the papers were in good order. They just said they voted through their conscience. We live in a dictatorship. Please help us. Please be on our side to restore democracy in Romania.

March 11, 2025

Romanian presidential candidate Călin Georgescu cannot run in the Presidential Election. Călin Georgescu’s appeal against the invalidation of his presidential candidacy has been rejected by the Constitutional Court.

March 27, 2025

The National Authority for Administration and Regulation in Communications (ANCOM), coordinator of digital services in Romania held an exercise to test the capacity to respond to challenges that may emerge in the online environment, in view of the presidential elections in May.

This initiative takes its root from the Rapid Response Mechanism (RRM), which ironically, was established during the G7 Charlevoix Summit in June 2018, meant to enhance cooperation among nations in addressing ‘crisis’ moments and perceived threats to western democracy.

Ahead of Romania’s new presidential election, the European Commission has launched its ‘RRM’ as a proactive strategy which the EC presents as a means to tackle potential electoral law violations on social media in member states holding elections. In effect, a similar simulation was reportedly held before the February elections in Germany. Coincidentally, a call for proposals to manage the new project described as a “Media Freedom Rapid Response Mechanism” was issued by the European Commission on Oct 24, 2024, under the cross-sectoral strand of the Creative Europe Programme. This CFP was launched to allegedly promote an independent and pluralistic media environment through an independent Europe-wide rapid response mechanism.

Subsequently, the Romanian government is now drafting an emergency ordinance to empower authorities to eliminate illegal (or inconvenient) online content, which they argue is essential for protecting the electoral process. However, some interpret this as a sign of a democratic crisis, with the current administration struggling to maintain power and resorting to emergency measures to suppress opposition and their freedom of speech. Recent polls suggest that Călin Georgescu could win the presidency in a single round, a situation complicated by the exclusion of the right-wing conservative candidate from the May 2025 elections. Other talks about possible corruption surrounding the construction of the multi-billion classified secret service contract for the Realization of the infrastructure of NATO 57th Air Base Mihail Kogălniceanu, located only 30 kilometres from the Black Sea and anticipated to be NATO’s largest base in Europe upon completion.

@ c0c42bba:a5feb7b5

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Outro ponto positivo é o sistema de bônus e promoções regulares, que tornam a jornada ainda mais empolgante. Novos usuários são recebidos com ofertas exclusivas, enquanto os jogadores mais assíduos têm acesso a vantagens progressivas conforme avançam em seus níveis de fidelidade.

Conclusão: GG666 é Sinônimo de Qualidade e Diversão A GG666 não é apenas mais uma plataforma de jogos online. Com sua abordagem centrada no usuário, vasta seleção de jogos de qualidade e compromisso com a segurança e responsabilidade, ela se destaca como uma das melhores escolhas para quem busca entretenimento online com confiança.

Seja você um jogador experiente ou alguém que está começando agora, a GG666 oferece um ambiente completo, seguro e cheio de oportunidades para explorar. Experimente hoje mesmo e descubra por que tantos brasileiros estão escolhendo a GG666 como seu portal favorito de diversão digital.

@ 57d1a264:69f1fee1

Design and build chemical processes, better. Alkali is creating the world's first AI Process Engineer.

What the future of chemical process design should look like.

Under the hood, APE-0 uses tried-and-true open-source packages to run simulations. You don't have to trust that the LLM predicted the result — you can check out the simulation file it produced, and run it yourself!

Discover more at https://www.alkali-eng.com/blogs/introducing-fel-0

originally posted at https://stacker.news/items/968211

@ 1d7ff02a:d042b5be

Source: https://youtu.be/e_Y9tI4dALA?si=F5wXRlpM0YulbhmY

Twitter Origins and Evolution

Twitter began as Dorsey's attempt to better understand cities by visualizing what people were doing and thinking (00:35-02:27) Key features like @mentions, hashtags, and retweets were invented by users, not the company (04:06-05:24) Dorsey realized Twitter was becoming significant when he saw politicians using it during Obama's first address to the nation (06:29-07:44)

Reflections on Twitter/X

Regrets monetizing too quickly through advertising rather than exploring better business models (12:19-13:05) Believes Twitter should have been built as an open protocol rather than a centralized company (13:05-14:23) Advocates for user choice in algorithms rather than having companies decide what content users see (15:35-18:31)

Decentralized Social Media

Started Blue Sky while at Twitter to create a decentralized social media protocol (22:51-24:07) Later focused on Nostr, which he believes has a better development model similar to Linux (24:07-25:57) Believes the future of social media includes agent-driven systems and greater user agency (29:01-29:41)

Block and Bitcoin

Block (formerly Square) focuses on economic empowerment through financial tools (32:08-32:47) Sees Bitcoin as essential for creating an internet protocol for moving money (33:25-35:09) Believes Bitcoin will eventually move beyond being just a store of value to become a currency for cross-border remittances (35:09-36:58)

Entrepreneurship Philosophy

Never intended to be an entrepreneur but wanted to build useful products (40:22-42:02) Compares entrepreneurship to art - knowing how to express ideas and where to set boundaries (42:02-43:09) Deals with rejection by viewing all experiences as teachers with lessons to offer (43:44-44:55)

Personal Habits

Practices meditation daily and previously did 10-day silent retreats (45:30-46:43) Creates daily lists of both what to do and what not to do (47:21-48:28) Eats only once a day to save time and better appreciate food (51:29-52:39) Dedicates morning hours to learning difficult subjects like quantum physics (48:28-49:40)

His advice to young people: observe everything, take in information, and don't worry about immediately reacting to it (52:39-53:00).

Noteable Quotes

• On Twitter's co-creation with users: "What's interesting about Twitter is it wasn't really us who determined where it went, it was the people using it." (04:06)

• On algorithms: "I think it's less about free speech, I think it's more about do we get to choose how the algorithms are programming us, because the algorithms are definitively programming us." (15:35)

• On rejections and setbacks: "Everything I encounter, everything I experience is a teacher and they have some lesson for me, and it's up to me whether I decide to learn from it or not." (43:44)

• On entrepreneurship as art: "It's expression, it's knowing when to end something, it's knowing what the chapters are and where the piece begins and where it ends." (42:02)

• On Bitcoin's potential: "Bitcoin is over close to 16 years old right now. It's never gone down, it's never had a security issue, it has no leader, it has a completely open roadmap, and it's determined by a consensus development model." (36:18)

• On learning: "I think people skip the observing phase too often. I don't think people are good listeners. I don't think people have honed their ability to observe the world and observe nature and observe how things work." (50:19)

• On his advice to young people: "Observe everything, like take everything in, get love information, love receiving information, don't worry about reacting to it, don't worry about memorizing it, don't worry about doing anything with it at all, just be open." (52:39)

@ 866e0139:6a9334e5

Autor: Ludwig F. Badenhagen. Dieser Beitrag wurde mit dem Pareto-Client geschrieben. Sie finden alle Texte der Friedenstaube und weitere Texte zum Thema Frieden hier. Die neuesten Pareto-Artikel finden Sie auch in unserem Telegram-Kanal.

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Die neuesten Artikel der Friedenstaube gibt es jetzt auch im eigenen Friedenstaube-Telegram-Kanal.

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Woran erkennt man einen Verbrecher? Die meisten Menschen erfahren von Verbrechern aus den Medien, denn die Medien erklären, wer ein Verbrecher und was ein Verbrechen ist. Die Medien berufen sich hierbei gerne auf „Experten“ und „helfen“ dem gewöhnlichen Bürger bei der „Einordnung“ von Sachverhalten. Man lernt, dass „ein junger Mann“, der mit einem Messer ein hilfloses Baby abschlachtet, nicht so hart bestraft wird, wie etwa ein „Steuersünder“. Und wer glaubt, dass Wahlbetrug juristisch geahndet werden könnte, der irrt ebenso wie jemand, der glaubt, dass es in einer Demokratie erlaubt sein könnte, ein satirisches Meme über einen Politiker zu teilen. Neuerdings sind selbst „Meinungen unterhalb der Strafbarkeitsgrenze“ für gewöhnliche Bürger nicht mehr folgenlos.

Bekanntlich ist die Staatsanwaltschaft in Deutschland eine weisungsgebundene Behörde und als solche ein Teil der Exekutive. Dem Staatsanwalt selbst ist gemäß § 353b Strafgesetzbuch zudem strafrechtlich untersagt, ihm gegenüber erteilte Weisungen Dritten mitzuteilen. Sofern demnach direkte Weisungen erteilt würden, hätte der weisungsgebundene Staatsanwalt diese nicht nur zu befolgen, sondern dürfte auch niemandem gegenüber offenbaren, dass er nicht aus eigener Überzeugung, sondern auf Anweisung - wie beispielsweisen aus politischen Motiven heraus - handelt. Diese juristische Konstruktion eröffnet regierenden Politikern einen erheblichen Gestaltungsspielraum. 

Anstelle der konsequenten Anwendung des Strafrechts gab es vor allem in der jüngeren Vergangenheit bei den der Öffentlichkeit nicht zu verbergenden Verfehlungen von Politikern lediglich folgenlose Untersuchungsausschüsse. Könnte dies daran gelegen haben, dass Gerechtigkeit eine Frage von Auslegung und Deutung ist – und die Politiker die Deutungshoheit haben?

Wenn dies so wäre, würde sich die Frage aufdrängen, wie weitgehend denn Straftaten dieser Personengruppe ungestraft ausgeführt werden könnten? Ein Manager eines Unternehmens wird für Fehlverhalten massiv bestraft, während der Lenker eines Landes quasi alles tun kann, was er – im Auftrag der Leute, für die er tatsächlich tätig ist – tun möchte? Wenn dies so wäre, würde es sich dann nicht eher um eine Kabale als um eine ehrenhafte Regierung handeln?

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DIE FRIEDENSTAUBE FLIEGT AUCH IN IHR POSTFACH!

Hier können Sie die Friedenstaube abonnieren und bekommen die Artikel zugesandt, vorerst für alle kostenfrei, wir starten gänzlich ohne Paywall. (Die Bezahlabos fangen erst zu laufen an, wenn ein Monetarisierungskonzept für die Inhalte steht). Sie wollen der Genossenschaft beitreten oder uns unterstützen? Mehr Infos hier oder am Ende des Textes. friedenstaube@pareto.space

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Was wäre in diesem Fall mit dem Gewaltmonopol? Könnten die Soldaten und Polizisten dann nicht für das Durchsetzen der individuellen Interessen dieser Leute missbraucht werden? Ein Bürger dürfte sich nicht kritisch über diese Leute äußern, oder müsste stärkste Repressionen erdulden. Wenn die Gerichtsbarkeit dieser Kabale dienen würde, wäre denn dann eine Rechtsprechung überhaupt möglich? Was würde mit einem Richter, der „in einer wichtigen Sache das falsche Urteil sprechen“ würde, denn passieren? Würde möglicherweise sein Haus von einem Sonderkommando durchsucht und würde er gedemütigt? Würde er seinen Job verlieren und käme er ins Gefängnis? Und wie würde dies auf andere Richter wirken? Würden sich diese gegen die Kabale auflehnen oder lieber tun, was die Kabale ihnen vorgibt?

Was wäre, wenn solch eine Kabale zu Krieg, höheren Steuerzahlungen, medizinischen Zwangsbehandlungen etc. unter Androhung von Bestrafungen zwingen würde? Und was wäre, wenn die Menschen erkennen würden, dass sie von Verbrechern regiert werden?

Was würden Sie tun?

Nun, man könnte demonstrieren, auf die Straße gehen, und dort für seine Rechte eintreten, oder? Aber ist dieses „Demonstrationsrecht“, welches dem eigentlichen Souverän, dem Bürger, „großzügig“ eingeräumt wurde, nicht etwas völlig Wirkungsloses? Wer demonstriert, hat das Gewaltmonopol des Staates zu akzeptieren, sodass er zwar geschlagen, mit Wasserwerfern und Pfefferspray besprüht, gewürgt und von Hunden gebissen werden, aber sich selbst nicht wehren darf. Wenn sich ein Demonstrant in der „falschen Sache“ nicht an die Demonstrationsregeln hält und beispielsweise Sicherheitsabstände nicht korrekt einhält, wird er sehr schnell von einem gepanzerten und anonymisierten Polizisten bestraft. Und was ist mit den vielen V-Leuten? Ein so genannter Agent Provokateur mischt sich unter die Demonstranten und gibt vor, ein Teil von diesen zu sein, um dann in deren Namen „etwas Unrechtes“ zu tun wie eine Reichsbürger-Fahne zu schwenken oder einen Sicherheitsabstand nicht einzuhalten oder einen Polizisten anzugreifen. Und schon hat man „einen Grund“, dieser Demonstration einen besonderen Anstrich zu verpassen. Wer sich noch an „den Sturm auf den Reichstag“ und die Verleihungen von Verdienstorden für „die Rettung unserer Demokratie“ erinnert, weiß, dass Demonstrationen gelenkt werden können und dass ein gewöhnlicher Bürger, der „sein Demonstrationsrecht“ wahrnimmt, im Zuge einer solchen Veranstaltung am eigenen Leib erfahren kann, dass ihm die Demo im günstigsten Fall weder genützt noch geschadet hat.

Aber was sonst könnte man tun, wenn man von Verbrechern regiert würde? Was könnte getan werden, wenn Untaten wie Kriegstreiberei, Gesundheitsdiktatur, Steuerwillkür, Klimawahn, Wahlmanipulationen etc. nicht „aus Versehen“, sondern mit schädigender Absicht, also mit Vorsatz getan wurden und werden?

Wer sich diese Fragen stellt, ist bereits sehr weit und weitgehend isoliert, denn der große Teil der Bevölkerung wird durch die Medien nicht nur darüber „informiert“, was Straftaten sind, sondern erhält zudem „wohlwollende Einordnungen“ zum jeweils aktuellen Geschehen. Der „gute Bürger Unsererdemokratie“ ist einfach „besser informiert“, und weiß, was er zu denken hat. Für den „guten Bürger“ ist alles klar: Wir leben in der besten Demokratie aller Zeiten und die Politiker geben ihr Bestes, zu unser aller Wohle. Sie schützen uns vor Pandemien, vor Feinden der Demokratie und Feinden des Landes, und sind hierbei weitestgehend selbstlos. 

Aber wer sich der Mühe unterziehen möchte, selbst zu denken, der hat die Möglichkeit, seine eigenen Einordnungen auf der Basis ungeschwärzter Fakten vorzunehmen. Wer beispielsweise die RKI-Protokolle oder auch anderes Material ungeschwärzt lesen möchte, kann sich (noch) unabhängiger Portale bedienen, die seitens der Regierung zwar allesamt verboten werden sollen (da man schließlich als Regierung bestimmen möchte, was die Bürger zu lesen und zu glauben haben), die aber derzeit noch verfügbar sind.

In welcher Welt wollen wir und unsere Kinder leben und was ist zu tun, damit diese wünschenswerte Welt entsteht? Die Menschen sollten in die Wahrnehmung und von dort aus in die Erkenntnis kommen. Und aus der Erkenntnis ins Wollen, denn letztendlich ist das Wollen stets die Grundvoraussetzung für das Tun. Und ohne das Tun passiert – nichts.

Lesen Sie hier, wie Menschen wie Vieh behandelt werden und hier, wie das System organisiert ist. Und hier ist zu nachzulesen, was getan werden könnte, wenn Verbrecher an der Macht wären.

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Wenn Sie auf anderem Wege beitragen wollen, schreiben Sie die Friedenstaube an: friedenstaube@pareto.space

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Sie sind noch nicht auf Nostr and wollen die volle Erfahrung machen (liken, kommentieren etc.)? Zappen können Sie den Autor auch ohne Nostr-Profil! Erstellen Sie sich einen Account auf Start. Weitere Onboarding-Leitfäden gibt es im Pareto-Wiki.

@ 57d1a264:69f1fee1

The mystical d attribute in SVG paths is actually a series of small commands. In this guide, we'll take a look at each path command and how we can use them to draw icons. Read more at https://www.nan.fyi/svg-paths

I you'd like to learn Interactive SVG Animations, here a text-based mini-course on making whimsical, playful SVG animations https://www.svg-animations.how/

credits: @nandafyi

originally posted at https://stacker.news/items/968195

@ 57d1a264:69f1fee1

credits: @rubenslp

originally posted at https://stacker.news/items/968189

@ 7c082548:0b32521e

SP8BET là một nền tảng trực tuyến hiện đại, được thiết kế với mục tiêu mang lại trải nghiệm liền mạch, tiện lợi và bảo mật cao cho người dùng. Giao diện của SP8BET rất dễ sử dụng, với bố cục rõ ràng và trực quan, giúp người dùng nhanh chóng làm quen và tận hưởng các dịch vụ mà nền tảng cung cấp. Với khả năng tương thích đa thiết bị, người dùng có thể truy cập vào SP8BET trên mọi thiết bị, từ máy tính để bàn đến điện thoại di động, mà không gặp phải bất kỳ vấn đề nào về tốc độ hay hiệu suất. Nền tảng này tối ưu hóa tốc độ truy cập, giúp người dùng trải nghiệm một cách mượt mà và hiệu quả nhất. Chính nhờ vào giao diện đơn giản nhưng mạnh mẽ và hiệu suất ổn định, SP8BET trở thành một lựa chọn lý tưởng cho những ai tìm kiếm một nền tảng trực tuyến tiện lợi và không gặp rắc rối trong quá trình sử dụng.

Bên cạnh những tính năng về giao diện và hiệu suất, SP8BET còn đặc biệt chú trọng đến bảo mật và an toàn thông tin. Với công nghệ bảo mật tiên tiến, nền tảng đảm bảo rằng mọi dữ liệu cá nhân của người dùng đều được bảo vệ an toàn tuyệt đối. SP8BET sử dụng các biện pháp mã hóa mạnh mẽ để ngăn chặn mọi hành vi truy cập trái phép, đồng thời hệ thống của nền tảng này luôn được kiểm tra và cập nhật để chống lại các mối đe dọa từ bên ngoài. Người dùng có thể hoàn toàn yên tâm khi sử dụng nền tảng này mà không cần lo lắng về các vấn đề bảo mật. Thêm vào đó, SP8BET cũng cung cấp các công cụ bảo vệ thông tin tài khoản, giúp người dùng dễ dàng kiểm soát và quản lý dữ liệu của mình. Đội ngũ hỗ trợ khách hàng của SP8BET luôn sẵn sàng giải đáp các thắc mắc về bảo mật, giúp người dùng có một trải nghiệm an toàn, tin cậy và thoải mái.

Ngoài các yếu tố về giao diện và bảo mật, SP8BET cũng không ngừng cải tiến và phát triển các tính năng mới để phục vụ người dùng một cách tốt nhất. Nền tảng này luôn chú trọng đến việc tích hợp các công nghệ mới nhất, đảm bảo rằng người dùng có thể trải nghiệm các tiện ích hiện đại và phù hợp với xu hướng công nghệ toàn cầu. Các tính năng của SP8BET không chỉ đáp ứng nhu cầu hiện tại mà còn mang đến các giải pháp tiên tiến cho tương lai, giúp người dùng luôn được cung cấp những công cụ hữu ích để tối ưu hóa trải nghiệm. SP8BET cũng đặc biệt chú trọng đến việc tạo dựng một cộng đồng người dùng thân thiện và hỗ trợ lẫn nhau. Các hoạt động tương tác giữa người dùng và nền tảng luôn được khuyến khích, tạo ra một không gian chia sẻ, học hỏi và phát triển. Với tất cả những điểm mạnh này, SP8BET đang ngày càng khẳng định được vị thế của mình như một nền tảng trực tuyến hàng đầu, cung cấp những dịch vụ chất lượng và đáng tin cậy cho người dùng trong thời đại công nghệ số hiện nay.

@ 5df413d4:2add4f5b

Blank

@ 5df413d4:2add4f5b

𝗦𝗰𝗮𝗹𝗲: 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗨𝗻𝗶𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘀𝗮𝗹 𝗟𝗮𝘄𝘀 𝗼𝗳 𝗟𝗶𝗳𝗲, 𝗚𝗿𝗼𝘄𝘁𝗵, 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗗𝗲𝗮𝘁𝗵 𝗶𝗻 𝗢𝗿𝗴𝗮𝗻𝗶𝘀𝗺𝘀, 𝗖𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗲𝘀, 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗖𝗼𝗺𝗽𝗮𝗻𝗶𝗲𝘀 𝗯𝘆 𝗚𝗲𝗼𝗳𝗳𝗿𝗲𝘆 𝗪𝗲𝘀𝘁

This book is a wonderfully cross-disciplinary exercise in fractal discovery and insight onto our world - initially the result of the author's pondering his own mortality which led to a study of longevity across organisms, and then expanded to social structures like cities and companies.

In the book, “scale" itself, conceptually, is defined as "how systems respond to changes in size." Does doubling an animal's dimensions increase its relative strength? Does doubling a city's size double it's relative rate of crime? These 2 questions introduce the key distinctions between sublinear scaling (the larger the thing, the relatively less of some characteristic it has) and superlinear scaling (the larger the thing, the relatively more of some characteristic it has), respectively.

Organisms, we discover, scale sublinearally - larger animals are more efficient requiring less energy per unit of weight, but similarly they become, relatively structurally weaker as size increases - this is why Godzilla cannot exist, he would collapse under his own weight! Further, biological metabolic rates scale sublinearlly to size, so as the organism grows, energy demands of cellular maintenance outstrips supply leading to cessation of growth and eventual death (we also find companies face a similar fate, with "costs" replacing cellular maintenance).

Cities, however, are more interesting. In terms of infrastructure they scale like organisms (sublinearlly), but in terms of emergent human outputs, they scale superlinearlly - the larger the city, the relatively more patents, companies, GDP, crime, and disease it will host. For cities, superlinear scaling of those emergent human properties, or "social metabolism" results in the creation of social capital increasingly outpacing the demands of maintenance (those being largely infrastructural) suggesting accelerating, unbounded, open-ended growth.

With regard to growth, superlinearity results in exponential growth, which the author approaches as a terrifying and dark mathematical horror. He illustrates this with what I found to be the book's most illuminating vignette…

SCENARIO: It is 11:00. A petri dish 🧫 contains a single bacteria🦠 cell. This bacteria will double every minute. The petri dish will be completely full in 1 hour. At what time is the petri dish 🧫 50% full?

If you said anything other than 11:59, you've missed the key implication of exponential growth. Exponential growth is slowly, then all at once. But let’s double down on this to really underscore that point - at what time does the petri dish in the aforementioned scenarios become just 1% full? The answer is somewhere between 11:53 and 11:54. Reflect on that.

What might this kind of acceleration in growth mean for technological advancement? For human population and biosphere carrying capacity? For resource consumption? And for how all of these things interrelate and impact each other? Quite thankfully, the book rejects Malthusianism. While still raising legitimate questions about the math of an exponentially expanding Earthbound civilization's sustainability, the author rightfully points to the imperative to harness nuclear and solar energy at-scale as our best hopes to sustain requirements both continuous population and technological acceleration.

Finally, the examination of exponentiality brings us to the deepest conundrum identified in the book - the finite time singularity - where unbounded growth cannot sustain without either (1) infinite energy or (2) paradigm shift "reset" that temporarily staves off system collapse. But wait! There's more! The mathematics of superlinearity suggest that, in absence of infinite energy, the chain of paradigm shift resets are themselves required to happen at an ever faster and faster pace, or at shorter and shorter intervals.

So, if we are confined to Earth's closed system, the need for continuous and unending paradigm shift innovations at ever-shorter intervals eventually manifests a meta-finite time singularity, the essential singularity which is perhaps, inescapable. The core insight to be extrapolated here is that if we are to overcome the singularity trap, we must drive real, constant step-function innovation and that this innovation must, almost necessarily, allow us to progressively harness orders of magnitude more energy than today - think Dyson Spheres, interstellar / intergalactic travel, quasar bitcoin mining, and so on.

CONCLUSION: Dense yet whimsical, lengthy yet very fun. Questing and questioning cover to cover. Great for anyone interested in inter-disciplinarianism and fractal thinking (the long practice of which I find lends to heightened levels of predictive intuition) (4.5/5☢️)

https://www.amazon.com/Scale-Universal-Growth-Organisms-Companies/dp/014311090X

Bitcoin #Plebchain #Coffeechain #Books #Bookstr #Nostr #NostrLove #GrowNostr #Writestr #Createstr

@ 306555fe:fd7fdf12

when his rivals got wind of that scandalous evening, they ratted him out to the highest Athenian court for stealing “kykeon,” the sacred elixir he’d shared with his guests. He was tried in absentia for a crime punishable by death—blaspheming the Mysteries.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 47-48

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At the center of this dynamic sits the myth of Prometheus,9 the original upstart rebel, who stole fire from the gods and shared it with humankind.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 77-78

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For anthropologists, uncovering the ingredients of kykeon has become a Holy Grail kind of quest. It ranks right up there with decoding soma, the ancient Indian sacrament that inspired Aldous Huxley’s groupthink happy drug in Brave New World. Swiss chemist Albert Hofmann7 and Harvard-trained classicist Carl Ruck argued that the barley in kykeon might have been tainted with an ergot fungus.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 65-69

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The Greeks had a word3 for this merger that Davis quite liked—ecstasis—the act of “stepping beyond oneself.” Davis had his own word as well. He called it “the switch,” the moment they stopped being separate men with lives and wives and things that matter. The moment they became, well, there’s no easy way to explain it—but something happened out there. Plato described ecstasis as an altered state where our normal waking consciousness vanishes completely, replaced by an intense euphoria and a powerful connection to a greater intelligence. Contemporary scientists have slightly different terms and descriptions. They call the experience “group flow.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 166-171

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“More than any other skill,” he explains, “SEALs rely on this merger of consciousness. Being able to flip that switch—that’s the real secret to being a SEAL.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 182-183

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“At every step of the training,” says Davis, “from the first day of BUD/S (Basic Underwater Demolition/SEALs) through their last day in DEVGRU, we are weeding out candidates who cannot shift their consciousness and merge with the team.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 211-212

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But, by breaking down what’s going on in the brain, we start to see that what feels supernatural might just be super-natural: beyond our normal experience, for sure, but not beyond our actual capabilities.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 44, loc. 726-727

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The Greeks called that sudden understanding anamnesis. Literally, “the forgetting of the forgetting.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 44, loc. 719-720

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The Greeks called that sudden understanding anamnesis. Literally, “the forgetting of the forgetting.” A powerful sense of remembering.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 44, loc. 719-720

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Often, an ecstatic experience25 begins when the brain releases norepinephrine and dopamine into our system. These neurochemicals raise heart rates,26 tighten focus, and help us sit up and pay attention. We notice more of what’s going on around us, so information normally tuned out or ignored becomes more readily available. And besides simply increasing focus, these chemicals amp up the brain’s pattern recognition abilities,27 helping us find new links between all this incoming information.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 44, loc. 727-733

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This ability to unlock motivation has widespread implications. Across the board, from education to health care to business, motivational gaps cost us trillions of dollars a year. We know better; we just can’t seem to do better. But we can do better. Effortlessness upends the “suffer now, redemption later” of the Protestant work ethic and replaces it with a far more powerful and enjoyable drive.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 43, loc. 711-714

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Anandamide also plays another important role here,31 boosting “lateral thinking,” which is our ability to make far-flung connections between disparate ideas. Post-its, Slinkys, Silly Putty, Super Glue, and a host of other breakthroughs all came when an inventor made a sideways leap, applying an overlooked tool in a novel way. In part, that’s anandamide at work.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 45, loc. 742-746

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As we move even deeper into ecstasis, the brain can release endorphins and anandamide.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 45, loc. 740-741

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Umwelt is the technical term34 for the sliver of the data stream that we normally apprehend. It’s the reality our senses can perceive. And all umwelts are not the same. Dogs hear whistles we cannot, sharks detect electromagnetic pulses, bees see ultraviolet light—while we remain oblivious. It’s the same physical world, same bits and bytes, just different perception and processing.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 45, loc. 755-758

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As of late 2016, with the initial phases of the research completed, the study came to two overarching conclusions. First, creativity is essential for solving complex problems—the kinds we often face in a fast-paced world. Second, we have very little success training people to be more creative. And there’s a pretty simple explanation for this failure: we’re trying to train a skill, but what we really need to be training is a state of mind.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 46, loc. 771-774

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But when non-ordinary states trigger timelessness, they deliver us to the perpetual present—where we have undistracted access to the most reliable data. We find ourselves at full strength. “That was another thing I noticed,” says Silva, “when I go off on a tangent and the ideas start to flow, there’s no room for anything else. Definitely not for time. People who see my videos often ask how I can find all those connections between ideas. But the reason I can find them is simple: without time in the picture, I have all the time I need.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 41, loc. 668-672

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"lifted"

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 42, loc. 692

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“The [experience] lifts the course of life to another level,”19 he writes in his book Flow. “Alienation gives way to involvement, enjoyment replaces boredom, helplessness turns into a feeling of control. . . . When experience is intrinsically rewarding life is justified.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 42, loc. 692-695

Notes: 1) "lifted"

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But just as the selflessness of an altered state can quiet our inner critic, and the timelessness lets us pause our hectic lives, a sense of effortlessness can propel us past the limits of our normal motivation. And we’re beginning to understand where this added drive comes from. In flow, as in most of the states18 we’re examining, six powerful neurotransmitters—norepinephrine, dopamine, endorphins, serotonin, anandamide, and oxytocin—come online in varying sequences and concentrations.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 42, loc. 684-688

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Without the ability to separate past from present from future, we’re plunged into an elongated present, what researchers describe as “the deep now.” Energy normally used for temporal processing gets reallocated for focus and attention. We take in more data per second, and process it more quickly. When we’re processing more information faster, the moment seems to last longer—which explains why the “now” often elongates in altered states.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 40, loc. 645-648

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With our prefrontal cortex offline, we can’t run those scenarios. We lose access to the most complex and neurotic part of our brains, and the most primitive and reactive part of our brains, the amygdala, the seat of that fight-or-flight response, calms down, too.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 40, loc. 650-651

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During transient hypofrontality, when the prefrontal cortex goes offline, we can no longer perform this calculation.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 40, loc. 644-645

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The past is less an archived library of what really happened, and more a fluid director’s commentary we’re constantly updating.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 41, loc. 664-665

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In fact, a big part of Silva’s appeal hinges on this overlap. “A Buddhist monk experiencing satori while meditating in a cave, or a nuclear physicist having a breakthrough insight in the lab, or a fire spinner at Burning Man,” he says, “look like different experiences from the outside, but they feel similar from the inside. It’s a shared commonality, a bond linking all of us together. The ecstatic is a language without words that we all speak.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 35, loc. 565-568

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But once we get past the narrative wrapping paper—what researchers call the “phenomenological reporting”—we find four signature characteristics underneath: Selflessness, Timelessness, Effortlessness, and Richness, or STER for short.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 36, loc. 572-574

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Then the National Geographic Channel hired him to host “Brain Games,” which became their highest-rated TV show ever and earned him an Emmy nomination.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 532-533

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At the center of this complexity lies the prefrontal cortex, our most sophisticated piece of neuronal hardware. With this relatively recent evolutionary adaptation came a heightened degree of self-awareness, an ability to delay gratification, plan for the long term, reason through complex logic, and think about our thinking. This hopped-up cogitation promoted us from slow, weak, hairless apes into tool-wielding apex predators, turning a life that was once nasty, brutish, and short into something decidedly more civilized.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 37, loc. 588-591

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In reviewing the literature, we discovered that almost every previous breakdown of these experiences was weighed down by content. Trying to tease apart the consciousness-altering effects of meditation, for example, means wading through religious interpretations of what those states mean.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 36, loc. 576-578

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When you think about the billion-dollar industries that underpin the Altered States Economy, isn’t this what they’re built for? To shut off the self. To give us a few moments of relief from the voice in our heads.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 37, loc. 596-598

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Scientists call this shutdown7 “transient hypofrontality.” Transient means temporary. “Hypo,” the opposite of “hyper,” means “less than normal.” And frontality refers to the prefrontal cortex, the part of our brain that generates our sense of self.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 38, loc. 604-606

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He calls it “the subject-object shift” and argues that it’s the single most important move we can make to accelerate personal growth. For Kegan, our subjective selves are, quite simply, who we think we are. On the other hand, the “objects” are things we can look at, name, and talk about with some degree of objective distance. And when we can move from being subject to our identity to having some objective distance from it, we gain flexibility in how we respond to life and its challenges.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 38, loc. 617-621

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or the next moment

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 38, loc. 614

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Come Monday morning, we may still clamber back into the monkey suits of our everyday roles—parent, spouse, employee, boss, neighbor—but, by then, we know they’re just costumes with zippers.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 38, loc. 614-615

Notes: 1) or the next moment

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That’s Kegan’s point. When we are reliably able to make the subject-object shift, as he points out in his book In Over Our Heads, “You start . . . constructing a world that is much more friendly to contradiction, to oppositeness, to being able to hold onto multiple systems of thinking. . . . This means that the self is more about movement through different forms of consciousness than about defending and identifying with any one form.” By stepping outside ourselves, we gain perspective. We become objectively aware of our costumes rather than subjectively fused with them. We realize we can take them off, discard those that are worn out or no longer fit, and even create new ones. That’s the paradox of selflessness—by periodically losing our minds we stand a better chance of finding ourselves.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 39, loc. 623-629

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the Pale of the State.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 52, loc. 862-862

Notes: 1) bit coin

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the Pale of the Church, the Pale of the Body, and the Pale of the State.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 52, loc. 862-862

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That’s because the experiences at the center of this book stand outside the perimeter fence of polite society. Instead of hearing stories about the possibilities of altered states, we’re treated to cautionary tales. Stories of hubris and excess. Icarus redux.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 51, loc. 857-859

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doctrine? That’s downright dangerous. In Christianity, it shows up as the tension between chapter-and-verse Roman Catholics and holy-rolling Pentecostals; in Islam, it’s solemn imams versus twirling Sufis; in China, it’s by-the-book Confucians against go-with-the-flow Taoists. In each case, a small community figures out a more direct path to knowledge and, because they blossom without the sanction of the orthodoxy, they are persecuted for it.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 54, loc. 895-898

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To understand what happened to Valentine during that game, we need to understand that Mormons believe the Holy Ghost can enter a person during prayer. “The feeling of spirit entering you,” explains Valentine, “what Mormons call ‘the feeling of the Holy Ghost,’ is the very center of the religion.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 53, loc. 878-880

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After all, the term “smart drug” applies to the unsupervised and often dangerous off-label use of ADHD drugs like Ritalin and Adderall. But public health wasn’t the issue.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 56, loc. 941-942

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my biological skin-bag, inside the ancient fortress of skin and skull.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 56, loc. 935-935

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The bishop seized the moment, condemning her for the lesser charge of cross-dressing-as-heresy. She had stolen fire and, the Church insisted, she’d die by it.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 55, loc. 918-919

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But similar outcomes are happening in Fadiman’s current survey of microdosing among professionals. With more than four hundred responses from people in dozens of fields, the majority, as Fadiman recently explained, report “enhanced pattern recognition [and] can see more of the pieces at once of a problem they are trying to solve.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 49, loc. 829-831

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when it comes to complex problem solving, ecstasis could be the “wicked solution” we’ve been looking for.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 50, loc. 846-847

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to prompt flow, they found that soldiers solved complex problems and mastered new skills up to 490 percent faster than normal.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 49, loc. 814-814

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While everyone experienced a boost in creativity—some as much as 200 percent—what got the most attention were the real-world breakthroughs that emerged: “Design of a linear electron accelerator beam-steering device, a mathematical theorem regarding NOR-gate circuits, a new design for a vibratory microtome, a space probe designed to measure solar properties, and a new conceptual model of a photon.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 49, loc. 825-828

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Some were given 50 micrograms of LSD; others took 100 milligrams of mescaline. Both are microdosages, well below the level needed to produce psychedelic effects.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 49, loc. 822-823

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Tibetan Buddhists38 in the 1990s showed that longtime contemplative practice can produce brainwaves in the gamma range. Gamma waves are unusual. They arise primarily during “binding,”39 when novel ideas come together for the first time and carve new neural pathways. We experience binding as “Ah-Ha insight,” that eureka moment, the telltale signature of sudden inspiration. This meant that meditation could amplify complex problem solving, but, since the monks needed to put in more than 34,000 hours (roughly thirty years) to develop this skill, it was a finding with limited application.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 47, loc. 790-796

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discovered that their ability to find solutions required holding conflicting perspectives and using that friction to synthesize a new idea. “The ability to face constructively the tension37 of opposing ideas,” Martin writes in his book The Opposable Mind, “. . . is the only way to address this kind of complexity.” But developing Martin’s “opposable mind” isn’t easy. You have to give up exclusively identifying with your own, singular point of view. If you want to train this kind of creativity and problem solving, what the research shows is that the either/or logic of normal consciousness is simply the wrong tool for the job.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 47, loc. 782-788

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see reference

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 48, loc. 798

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meditation40 training

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 48, loc. 798-799

Notes: 1) see reference

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In a recent University of Sydney study,42 researchers relied on transcranial magnetic stimulation to induce flow—using a weak magnetic pulse to knock out the prefrontal cortex and create a twenty-to-forty-minute flow state.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 48, loc. 806-809

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Under normal circumstances, fewer than 5 percent of the population pulls it off. In the control group, no one did. In the flow-induced group, 40 percent connected the dots in record time, or eight times better than the norm.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 48, loc. 810-811

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The Pale of the Body is ascetic to its core: no pain, no gain. Altered states that arise within ourselves, via internal catalysts like prayer and meditation, are considered stable, reliable, and earned. If the goal is genuine transformation, then nothing as fleeting or pleasant as a flow state or psychedelic session can substitute for decades of prayer and meditation. “The ultimate wisdom of enlightenment,”11 author Sam Harris emphasized in his recent bestseller Waking Up, “whatever it is, cannot be a matter of having fleeting experiences. . . . Peak experiences are fine, but real freedom must be coincident with normal waking life.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 57, loc. 957-962

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Roland Griffiths got the same results when he reran the experiment with full double-blind modern standards. When author Michael Pollan asked him15 about this unusual need for redundancy, in a 2015 New Yorker article, Griffiths’s answer said it all: “There is such a sense of authority that comes out of the primary mystical experience that it can be threatening to existing hierarchical structures. We end up demonizing these compounds. Can you think of another area of science regarded as so dangerous and taboo that all research gets shut down for decades? It’s unprecedented in modern science.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 59, loc. 980-985

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Already, commercial versions of the God Helmet are available online, as are stories of DIY hackers who are reproducing its basic effects with little more than some wires and a nine-volt battery. There’s talk about developing a version for virtual reality and incorporating it in video games.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 59, loc. 993-995

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the experience on the drug actually increased commitment to religious delusion ?

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 58, loc. 971

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“[Psilocybin] subjects ranked their experiences13 much higher in mystical qualities than members of the control group did,” explains John Horgan in his book Rational Mysticism. “Six months later, the psilocybin group reported persistent beneficial effects on their attitude and behavior; the experience had deepened their religious faith. . . . The experiment was widely hailed as proof that psychedelic drugs can generate life-enhancing mystical experiences.” So life-enhancing, in fact, that nine out of the ten seminary students who received psilocybin ended up becoming ministers, while none of the placebo group stayed on the path to ordination.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 58, loc. 971-977

Notes: 1) the experience on the drug actually increased commitment to religious delusion ?

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Headlines across the country 19 read: “British policy doctor claims ecstasy is safer than riding a horse.” Tabloids had a field day.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 61, loc. 1021-1023

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For every 60 million tablets of MDMA consumed, Nutt found 10,000 adverse events, or one for every 6,000 pills popped. He then compared that number to the 1-in-350 tally for horseback riding and published the results.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 61, loc. 1019-1020

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Soon, as the technology matures, a novice will be able to put on the device and use these biomarkers to steer toward the same experience. But if we continue to insist that smart drugs and psychedelics are cheating, what happens as the boundaries between ourselves and our tools continue to blur?

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 60, loc. 999-1001

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It’s one of the reasons people go on spiritual pilgrimages, and why evangelical megachurches are booming (with more than six million attendees every Sunday).30 Bring a large group of people together, deploy a suite of mind-melding technologies, and suddenly everyone’s consciousness is doing the wave. “Communitas” is the term University of Chicago anthropologist Victor Turner31 used to describe this ecstatic sense of unity. This feeling tightens social bonds and ignites enduring passion—the kind that lets us come together to plan, organize, and tackle great challenges. But it’s a double-edged sword. When we lose ourselves and merge with the group, we are in danger of losing too much of ourselves. Our cherished rational individualism risks being overrun by the power of irrational collectivism.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 68, loc. 1137-1145

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Melissa Gregg in the Atlantic,25 “it is little wonder that workers resort to performance-enhancing drugs. . . . When so many jobs require social networking to maintain employability, these mood enhancers are a natural complement to the work day after 5 p.m. In an always-on world, professional credibility involves a judicious mix of just the right amount of uppers and downers to remain charming.” Because these substances drive us forward, they continue to sit inside society’s perimeter fence, and never mind the evidence.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 64, loc. 1078-1083

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while the 4.4 million American children who took ADHD drugs were striving to become better students. Same drugs, different contexts. One is manufactured by major pharmaceutical companies and enthusiastically dispensed by suburban doctors; the other is cooked up in trailers and sold on street corners.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 64, loc. 1068-1070

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Nutt had transgressed a different barrier, the Pale of the State. In very simple terms, the states of consciousness we prefer are those that reinforce established cultural values. We enshrine these states socially, economically, and legally. That is, we have state-sanctioned states of consciousness. Altered states that subvert these values are persecuted, while the people who enjoy them are marginalized. Take Ritalin and Adderall, the ADHD meds that students as young as grade school pop like candy. These drugs don’t even make an appearance on Nutt’s list,

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 63, loc. 1056-1061

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Does an operator, with his back against the wall, retreat into himself, or merge with his team? This is why they relentlessly emphasize “swim buddies” (the partner you can never leave behind, no matter what) in basic training.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 217-219

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“When SEALs sweep a building,” says Rich Davis, “slow is dangerous. We want to move as fast as possible. To do this, there are only two rules. The first is do the exact opposite of what the guy in front of you is doing—so if he looks left, then you look right. The second is trickier: the person who knows what to do next is the leader. We’re entirely nonhierarchical in that way. But in a combat environment, when split seconds make all the difference, there’s no time for second-guessing. When someone steps up to become the new leader, everyone, immediately, automatically, moves with him. It’s the only way we win.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 222-226

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The conscious mind is a potent tool, but it’s slow, and can manage only a small amount of information at once. The subconscious, meanwhile, is far more efficient. It can process more data in much shorter time frames. In ecstasis, the conscious mind takes a break, and the subconscious takes over. As this occurs, a number of performance-enhancing neurochemicals flood the system, including norepinephrine and dopamine. Both of these chemicals amplify focus, muscle reaction times, and pattern recognition. With the subconscious in charge and those neurochemicals in play, SEALs can read micro-expressions across dark rooms at high speeds.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 256-260

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“Attending festivals like Burning Man,”17 explains Oxford professor of neuropsychology Molly Crockett, “practicing meditation, being in flow, or taking psychedelic drugs rely on shared neural substrates. What many of these routes have in common is activation of the serotonin system.” But it’s not only serotonin that makes up the foundation of those collaborative experiences. In those states, all of the neurochemicals18 that can arise—serotonin, dopamine, norepinephrine, endorphins, anandamide, and oxytocin—play roles in social bonding. Norepinephrine and dopamine typically underpin “romantic love,” endorphins and oxytocin link mother to child and friend to friend, anandamide and serotonin deepen feelings of trust, openness, and intimacy. When combinations of these chemicals flow through groups at once, you get tighter bonds and heightened cooperation. That heightened cooperation, that communal vocational ecstasy, was what Page, Brin, and so many of Google’s engineers had discovered in the desert.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 327-336

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accomplished on that raid comes much closer to illustrating the true core of special operations culture: at their best, they are always an anonymous team. “I do not seek recognition11 for my actions . . . ,” reads the SEAL code. “I expect to lead and be led . . . my teammates steady my resolve and silently guide my every deed.” And this ethos is reinforced every time they flip that switch, when egos disappear and they perform together in ways that are just not possible alone.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 272-276

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Even for a company like Google, dedicated to unassuming goals like “10x moonshots” and organizing the entire world’s information—a 400x return? As close to priceless as they’ll ever get.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 351-352

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When we say ecstasis we’re talking about a very specific range of nonordinary states of consciousness (NOSC)21—what Johns Hopkins psychiatrist Stanislav Grof defined as those experiences “characterized by dramatic perceptual changes, intense and often unusual emotions, profound alterations in the thought processes and behavior, [brought about] by a variety of psychosomatic manifestations, rang[ing] from profound terror to ecstatic rapture . . . There exist many different forms of NOSC; they can be induced by a variety of different techniques or occur spontaneously, in the middle of everyday life.”

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an altered state of consciousness was both essential to mission success and elusive as hell—something they had to screen for by attrition, but couldn’t train for by design? That doesn’t make a lot of sense. That’s because, any way you slice it, ecstasis doesn’t make a lot of sense. It remains a profound experience, a place far beyond our normal selves, what author Arthur C. Clarke called a “sufficiently advanced technology”—the kind that still looks like magic to us.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 359-363

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Instead of following the breath (or chanting a mantra or puzzling out a koan), meditators can be hooked up to neurofeedback devices that steer the brain directly toward that alpha/theta range. It’s a fairly straightforward adjustment to electrical activity, but it can accelerate learning, letting practitioners achieve in months what used to take years.

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flow states, those “in-the-zone” moments including group flow, or what the SEALs experienced during the capture of Al-Wazu, and the Googlers harnessed in the desert. Second, contemplative and mystical states, where techniques like chanting, dance, meditation, sexuality, and, most recently, wearable technologies are used to shut off the self. Finally, psychedelic states, where the recent resurgence in sanctioned research is leading to some of the more intriguing pharmacological findings in several decades. Taken together, these three categories define our territory of ecstasis.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 377-381

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Regular waking consciousness has a predictable and consistent signature22 in the brain: widespread activity in the prefrontal cortex, brainwaves in the high-frequency beta range, and the steady drip, drip of stress chemicals like norepinephrine and cortisol.

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Flow states have been typically associated with artists and athletes; contemplative and mystical states belonged to seekers and saints; and psychedelic states were mostly sampled by hippies and ravers. But over the past decade, thanks to advances in brain science, we’ve been able to pull back the curtain and discover that these seemingly unrelated phenomena share remarkable neurobiological similarities.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 382-385

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At the same time, brainwaves slow from agitated beta to daydreamy alpha and deeper theta. Neurochemically, stress chemicals like norepinephrine and cortisol are replaced by performance-enhancing, pleasure-producing compounds such as dopamine, endorphins, anandamide, serotonin, and oxytocin.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 391-393

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They’re deploying these upgrades for a practical purpose: accelerated learning. By using the tanks to eliminate all distraction, entrain specific brainwaves, and regulate heart rate frequency, the SEALs are able to cut the time it takes to learn a foreign language from six months to six weeks. For a specialized unit deployed across five continents, shutting off the self to accelerate learning has become a strategic imperative.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 434-437

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“communal vocational ecstasy” they’d first glimpsed at Burning Man in the Black Rock Desert of Nevada. Right after our presentation, we pedaled a couple of the ubiquitous and colorful Google bikes to the other side of campus to attend the opening of their new multimillion-dollar mindfulness center. Outfitted in soothing lime green with bamboo accents, the center features a vitality bar offering fresh-squeezed juices around the clock and a suite of meditation rooms decked out with sensor suits and neurofeedback devices similar to what we saw in the Navy’s Mind Gym.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 439-443

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“G Pause” (their name for their mindfulness training program). “We’ve got active communities around the world, but the bigger challenge is getting people who aren’t already meditators to start. The folks that already sit [in meditation] understand the benefits. It’s the ones that are too busy and too stressed to slow down and need it the most that are the hardest to reach.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 446-449

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In fact, many are the exact opposite: impulsive, destructive, and unintentional. But that very fact—that we are driven to pursue altered states often at a steep cost—underscores how large and sometimes hidden a role they play in our lives.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 473-474

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And those states have become increasingly popular. In 2014, EDM represented almost half of all concert sales, attracting a quarter of a million concertgoers at a time and drawing the attention of Wall Street investors and major private equity firms.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 488-490

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We also included the legal and illegal markets for marijuana, psychopharmaceuticals like Ritalin and Adderall, and mood-shifting painkillers like OxyContin and Vicodin.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 478-479

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Yet this raises a few additional questions. If we’re already spending a ton of time and money chasing these states, and even elite organizations like the SEALs and Google haven’t definitively cracked the code, could something so elusive and confounding be worth all that trouble?

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 516-518

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(see endnotes for a detailed workup of these numbers and www.stealingfirebook.com/downloads/ for a worksheet where you can calculate your own personal tally).

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 509-510

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What makes these online distractions so sticky is how effectively they prime our brains for reward (mainly the feel-good neurochemical dopamine). Stanford neuroscientist Robert Sapolsky calls this priming the “magic of maybe.” When we check our email or Facebook or Twitter, and sometimes we find a response and sometimes we don’t, the next time a friend connects, Sapolsky discovered that we enjoy a 400 percent spike in dopamine.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, loc. 500-503

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“I still measure the quality of my life by the number of times I get into the zone,” explains Ulmer. “If I spend two weeks at Burning Man and only get that experience a handful of times, then I feel cheated. It wasn’t worth it. But now I can try different things. That’s the real change. Now I know I have options, that there are actual comparisons to make.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 210, loc. 3386

Notes: 1) skills and state contraststhe ability to choose the right tool

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Notes: 1) skills and state contrasts

the ability to choose the right tool

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Not long after that near-fatal drowning, he had another brush with death. In the hospital, Lilly had a textbook NDE and, as he reported afterward, was visited by the same entities he’d been encountering in the float tank. They presented him with a choice: leave with them for good, or return to his body, heal, and focus on more worldly pursuits. Finally, Lilly got the message. He abandoned his psychedelic research and retired with his wife to Hawaii, where he lived to the ripe age of eighty-four.

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After all this, Lilly came to one overarching conclusion: “What one believes to be true is true or becomes true, within certain limits to be found experientially and experimentally. These limits are further beliefs to be transcended. In the province of the mind, there are no limits.”

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This leaves us with four rules of thumb to carry into our exploration of these states. It’s not about you and it’s not about now help us balance ego inflation and time distortion. While don’t become a bliss junky and don’t dive too deep ensure that we don’t get seduced by the sensations and information that arise in altered states.

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Research shows we’re more likely to keep habits23 that are tied to cultural milestones. So connecting practices to preexisting traditions can make them easier to stick to. Daily? Link it to sunrise or sunset, dinners, or bedtime. Weekly? Make it your own contemporary TGIF or Sabbath observance. Monthly? Connect it to the lunar cycle or the first or last days of the calendar. Seasonal? Solstices, equinoxes, Christmas, Easter, July Fourth, and Halloween all work and often come with vacation days attached. Annual? Take your pick: birthdays, anniversaries, New Year’s, back to school, whatever’s significant to you.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 215, loc. 3453

Notes: 1) it makes sense that an occassional ecstatic event is seasonal because it provides a contrastfrom other days but also rememberin to hav it.no wonder it creates excitement and anticipation and ultimately celebration and release

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Notes: 1) it makes sense that an occassional ecstatic event is seasonal because it provides a contrastfrom other days but also rememberin to hav it. no wonder it creates excitement and anticipation and ultimately celebration and release

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Action sports, yoga, live music, sex, brain stimulation, meditation, personal growth workshops, adventure travel, etc.

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So how to pursue this path without getting “hooked on the high”? If we use the ecstasis equation to help us answer the question, “What is the best way to get into the zone?” then we need to add an additional concept here—hedonic calendaring—which helps us figure out how often we should get into the zone. Hedonic calendaring provides a way to hack the ecstatic path without coming undone. It gives us a method to integrate hard-and-fast approaches like extreme skiing and psychedelics with slow and steady paths like meditation and yoga.

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Yet salt, sugar, fat provide a fraction of the payoff of ecstasis. In that state, we get access to all the brain’s feel-good neurochemistry at once. For most of evolutionary history, nonordinary states were rare and precious experiences. So when we consider how readily accessible the four forces are making them today, it’s important to remember that we’re tinkering with impulses that are millions of years old.

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But the final analysis is simple: are any of these pursuits worth the time, effort, and money we invest in them? Are we more energetic, empathetic, and ethical afterward? If not, they’re just distractions or diversions from our lives. “I care not a whit for a man’s religion,” Abraham Lincoln once quipped, “unless his dog is the better for it.”

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As Hemingway reminds us,25 “the world breaks everyone.”

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Ironically, the attempt to avoid suffering often creates more of it, leaving us susceptible to the most predictable trap of all: spiritual bypassing. “[It’s] a widespread tendency to use spiritual ideas and practices,”26 says John Welwood, the psychologist who coined the term, “to sidestep or avoid facing unresolved emotional issues, psychological wounds, and unfinished developmental tasks.” Typically, what gets bypassed on an ecstatic path are the mundane dissatisfactions of regular life. If those dissatisfactions are too intense, non-ordinary states can offer a tempting escape. But rather than bypassing these challenges, we can accept them and even draw power from them. This response has a paradoxical name: vulnerable strength. Brené Brown, whose books and TED talks on the subject have resonated with massive audiences, explains it this way: “Embracing our vulnerabilities is risky but not nearly as dangerous as giving27 up on love and belonging and joy—the experiences that make us the most vulnerable. Only when we are brave enough to explore the darkness will we discover the infinite power of our light.”

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For the stickier (and likely, more enjoyable) weekly, monthly, and annual practices, you’re putting in buffers to ensure you don’t do them too much.

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Once a year, set your indulgences up on a shelf, go thirty days cold turkey, and use this time to recalibrate. Attach the hiatus to traditional seasons of forbearance—Lent, Yom Kippur, Ramadan—or impose your own.

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“The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom,”24 William Blake once wrote. Hedonic calendaring adds guardrails to that road. By dismantling the “oughts and “shoulds” of the orthodox approach, while avoiding the pitfalls of “if it feels good, do it” sensation seeking, we up the odds of getting to our destination in one piece.

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The love that “tells me I am everything” arises from the awe and connection that we often experience in these states. Endorphins, oxytocin, and serotonin soothe our vigilance centers. We feel strong, safe, and secure.

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The Indian philosopher Nisargadatta summed up the dilemma well: “Love tells me I am everything. Wisdom tells me I am nothing.28 And between these two banks, flows the river of my life.”

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“Ring the bells that still can ring,31 forget your perfect offering. There is a crack, a crack in everything. It’s where the light gets in.”

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Ecstasis doesn’t absolve us of our humanity. It connects us to it. It’s in our brokenness, not in spite of our brokenness, that we discover what’s possible.

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Zeus said no, Prometheus stole fire anyway, and got punished. That’s the part we all remember. But Zeus wasn’t finished with the humans, or the brothers. He wanted to make sure that no one challenged his power ever again. So he made a woman, Pandora, whose name means “all giving,” and gave her a box filled with the tragedies of life to unleash on the world.

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Just as old sailing wisdom favored “high and slow”—meaning that you pointed your boat as close to the eventual upwind destination as possible—we are steeped in a “high and slow” culture of relentless goal setting and linear forward progress. It’s why, in the United States, more than half of paid vacation days go unclaimed and we perversely brag about clocking 60–80-hour workweeks (even though our effectiveness drops after 50 hours). We valorize suffering and sacrifice, even when the victories they provide are hollow. Surrendering any of that hard-fought ground to pursue nonordinary states can seem, at first glance, irresponsible, or, at a minimum, deeply counterintuitive.

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We’ve got free tools to tally your own Altered States Economy, plan your Hedonic Calendar and discover your flow profile. We also offer intensive trainings to unlock personal and organizational high performance.

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So, for now, the leading candidates to explain how our waking conscious self shuts off in nonordinary states are: transient hypofrontality, transient hyperconnectivity, default mode network interruption, and cortico-thalamic gating (Henri Bergson’s’ original idea, which Aldous Huxley popularized in The Doors of Perception).

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While the details are subject to constant revision, we believe that the fundamental argument we’re making about our neurobiological “knobs and levers” affecting our psychological experience will only become stronger over time.

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four forces?

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In other words, it’s a transformation engine tailor-made to invoke the selflessness, timelessness, effortlessness, and richness of STER.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 158, loc. 2501-2502

Notes: 1) four forces?

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“At Burning Man, we’ve found a way to break out of the box that confines us.

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At least as far back as the Eleusinian Mysteries, which counted notables such as Plato and Pythagoras among its members, ecstatic culture has often been spread by an educated elite.

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former Apple executive Peter Hirshberg wrote in his book From Bitcoin to Burning Man and Beyond, “Burners are particularly skilled at functioning during chaotic crises when normal services—running water, electricity, communication channels and sanitation systems—are not available. Burners don’t just survive in such an environment; they create culture, art and community there.”

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to smartphone apps (including Firechat, which was designed as a peer-to-peer communication network at Burning Man, but then played a critical role in protest movements in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Russia). And because Burners vigorously defend an open-source, noncommercial approach, their efforts are easy to share and hard to censor.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 167, loc. 2655-2658

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Over the years, MaiTai members have founded and led companies with an aggregate market value of more than $20 billion,33 making them one of the more influential (and athletic) groups of entrepreneurs in the world.

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“We find the right mix of really interesting people and subject them to powerful state-changing experiences that accelerate social bonding. It’s the same formula used at Burning Man and at Summit.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 172, loc. 2733-2734

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By realizing that non-ordinary states are more than just a recreational diversion and can, in fact, heighten trust, amplify cooperation, and accelerate breakthroughs, a new generation of entrepreneurs, philanthropists and activists is fundamentally disrupting business as usual.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 174, loc. 2766-2768

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“We learned that when you take a bunch of really bright, diverse people,” explains Rosenthal, “and let them share a dynamic immersive experience, you get powerful results. Lifelong friendships were formed. It removed the tedious, transactional nature of networking. I guess you could say that one of the things we discovered on that trip was that altered states accelerate business.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 170, loc. 2708-2711

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MaiTai Global, started in 2006 by venture capitalist Bill Tai 31 and kitesurfing legend Susi Mai, uses action sports (mostly surfing and kitesurfing) as a stimulant for group flow and entrepreneurship.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 171, loc. 2726-2728

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The series, which has been called “TED crossed with Burning Man”30 or “the hipper Davos,” has struck a chord.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 170, loc. 2712-2713

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By using non-ordinary states to promote community, they’re reimagining the staid world of professional networking, philanthropy, and venture capital.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 171, loc. 2724-2725

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“We wanted to build a town dedicated . . . to what altered states really can provide: creativity, collaboration, innovation, entrepreneurship and community. And because our community shared that vision, we were able to crowdsource $40 million and buy a ski area (Powder Mountain) that sits on a mountain range the size of Manhattan.” So while folks at Burning Man are just starting to build themselves a homeland, Summit has already taken that step.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 169, loc. 2697-2700

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Just seven weeks earlier, the hosts, Summit Series, had bought the entire mountain. “We wanted a permanent home,29 explains Summit cofounder Jeff Rosenthal.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 169, loc. 2695-2697

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“After working in this 3D immersive space,” he admits, “it’s really challenging to go back to creating images that are on a rectangle hanging on a wall. I never realized how limiting the frames were.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 145, loc. 2336-2337

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His most recent project, appropriately named MicroDoseVR, is an immersive VR game offering an atom’s-eye tour through many of Shulgin’s alphabetamine compounds.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 145, loc. 2342-2343

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2012 study found that encounters with perceptual vastness, be it the endless spiral of galaxies in the night sky or Jones’s’ larger-than-life projections, triggers a self-negating, time-dilating sense of awe. And this happens automatically—which means an encounter with Jones’s projections could be enough to drive subjects into a deeply altered state, willingly or not.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 144, loc. 2328-2330

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On the Sydney Opera House,20 for instance, he live-painted during a performance by the YouTube Symphony Orchestra.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 143, loc. 2307-2309

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When tunes were playing, the distance between housemates decreased by 12 percent, while chances of cooking together increased by 33 percent, laughing together by 15 percent, inviting other people over by 85 percent, saying “I love you” by 18 percent, and, most tellingly, having sex by 37 percent.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 142, loc. 2283-2285

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“What we’re building in the Dance Temple,”18 explained one of its designers, “is a piece of tech to disintegrate peoples’ egos en masse.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 142, loc. 2292-2294

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that Neanderthal communities gathered beside the images they had painted, and they chanted or sang in some kind of shamanic ritual, using the reverberations of the cave to magically widen the sound of their voices.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 141, loc. 2263-2264

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recent years, scientists have found that a great many of the world’s oldest religious sites have peculiar acoustic properties. While studying the Arcy-sur-Cure caves10 in France, University of Paris music ethnographer Iegor Reznikoff discovered that the largest collection of Neolithic paintings are found more than a kilometer deep. They’d been intentionally located at the most acoustically interesting spots in the cave: the parts with the most resonance.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 140, loc. 2257-2261

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Scientists working in the burgeoning field of neuro-musicology15 have begun using high-powered imaging to decode these effects. When listening to music, brainwaves move from the high-beta of normal waking consciousness down into the meditative (and trance-inducing) ranges of alpha and theta. At the same time, levels of stress hormones like norepinephrine and cortisol drop, while social bonding and reward chemicals like dopamine, endorphins, serotonin, and oxytocin spike. Add in entrainment—where people’s brains synch to both the beat and to the brains of those around them—and you’ve got a potent combination for communitas.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 141, loc. 2275-2280

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proof that these four forces are driving a revolution is everywhere you look.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 154, loc. 2473-2474

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(movement, sound, light, and sensors)

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 152, loc. 2460-2460

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In the past, to get a glimpse of “no-self,” it might have taken a high-risk wingsuit flight, a decade of monastic isolation, or a heroic (and possibly reckless) dosage of an unpredictable substance. Today, we can use innovations like the Flow Dojo to skillfully tweak and tune the knobs and levers of our bodies and brains and get similar breakthroughs with a fraction of the breakdowns.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 152, loc. 2461-2464

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setup—Larry was feeling his wife’s heart beat and watching his flower pulse to her heart’s rhythms, and she was watching and feeling his. By deliberately crossing the feedback loops, the installation creates technologically mediated empathy, no talking required. So absorbing was the experience that when the nighttime sprinklers came on and accidentally sprayed them, they just assumed it was part of the simulation.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 152, loc. 2455-2458

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Sitting in an enclosed dome, he and his wife put on small backpack subwoofers (so they literally felt the bass through their bodies, not their ears).

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 152, loc. 2454-2455

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Even so, when Sergey Brin, one of Google’s cofounders, stepped up to the looping swing, we were unsure how it was going to go. Brin is an action sports enthusiast, pursuing everything from BASE jumping to kitesurfing. At the TED conference a few years ago, he also topped the leaderboard on an EEG mindfulness training demo. So, while he already had some experience in both the physical and mental elements of this training, he had never put the two together.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 151, loc. 2435-2438

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Embodied cognition research shows that we become more flexible and resilient when we train our bodies and brains together, and in increasingly dynamic situations. It’s why the SEALs say “you don’t ever rise to the occasion, you sink to your level of training” and then proceed to overtrain for every scenario possible.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 152, loc. 2447-2449

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Try remaining centered under more challenging conditions (like managing heart and brain activity while swinging upside down). If we want to train for stability in all conditions, the science suggests, it’s essential to practice with instability first.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 152, loc. 2450-2452

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And if I could be in extreme pain and still remain peaceful and clear, then I thought maybe other people could do this, too. In that instant, everything I believed about human potential shifted.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 146, loc. 2360-2361

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In his work with heart rate variability, Siegel’s found that by upgrading the tone to include a visual display, and adding in an EEG layer—so there’s neurofeedback to go along with the biofeedback—he can get whole groups of people to synchronize their heart rates and brainwaves and drive them into group flow.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 147, loc. 2376-2378

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“Consciousness-hacking technology is going to become as dynamic, available, and ubiquitous as cell phones. Imagine what happens if we can use personal technology to shift these experiences on demand, to support and catalyze the most important changes we can make at scale. More and more it’s looking like we can retune the nervous system of the entire planet.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 148, loc. 2394-2396

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“For the past three hundred years,” Siegel explains, “there has been a split between science and religion. But now we have the ability to investigate this domain and innovate around spirituality.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 148, loc. 2390-2392

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Jeffery Martin, also cofounded the Transformative Technology Conference23 and started organizing consciousness-hacking meet-ups.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 148, loc. 2384-2386

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Each day, participants engaged in a range of activities, from sleep tracking, to diet and hydration, to functional movement (designed to undo the imbalances of deskbound lives), to brain entraining audio and respiration exercises.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 149, loc. 2415-2416

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figure out their secret to getting into flow so readily. Time after time, they told us it came down to two things: the right triggers and gravity.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 150, loc. 2420-2421

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Historically, every time ecstasis has shown up, it’s led to upheaval and misuse. That’s because, while the insights provided by the four forces may give us a better way to stabilize these experiences and lessen that risk, there will always be those who try to bend them to other ends.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 181, loc. 2874-2876

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In both cases, we’ll see how the application of nonordinary states, as with other powerful technologies, has both ethical and political ramifications.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 182, loc. 2882-2883

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And despite the ostensibly pious intent of the gathering, there was plenty of drinking and fornicating. Even back then, the “Holy Ghost feeling” was tough to keep under wraps.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 180, loc. 2857-2859

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One of Bob Kegan’s graduate students recently determined that by college, many Millennials have reached stages of adult development43 (with all their associated increases in capacity) that took their parents until middle age to attain.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 175, loc. 2794-2796

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Since rolling out their program, Aetna estimates40 that it’s saved $2,000 per employee in health-care costs, and gained $3,000 per employee in productivity.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 175, loc. 2786-2788

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Take the first force, psychology.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 174, loc. 2781-2781

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Take the first force, psychology. Thanks to the work of Martin Seligman and others, a new generation of positive psychologists is repackaging meditation, stripping out its spiritual connotations, and providing evidenced-based validation for its benefits. This new version, known as mindfulness-based stress reduction, is gaining traction in places that would never have embraced earlier variants.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 174, loc. 2781-2783

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On the higher-tech end of the spectrum, state-changing treatments like transcranial magnetic stimulation are now outperforming antidepressants, and many Silicon Valley executives are going off-label, using the technology to ‘“defrag’” their mental hard drives and boost performance. Companies like Dave Asprey’s Bulletproof Executive are helping people biohack their daily lives with everything from smart sensors to nootropics (brain stimulating supplements). This market is expanding so rapidly that Bulletproof has grown into a nine-figure enterprise47 in less than four years and hundreds of other companies are flooding into the market.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 176, loc. 2804-2810

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And cannabis is merely the most obvious sign of this change. Whether we’re examining psychedelics like LSD or empathogens like MDMA, mind-altering drugs are more popular than at any other time in history. Thirty-two million Americans use psychedelics51 on a regular basis (that’s nearly one in ten) and report considered reasons for doing so. According

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 176, loc. 2819-2822

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Transcendence, not decadence, appears to be driving use forward.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 177, loc. 2824-2824

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The whole of the cannabis economy49 (including legal and medical) is now worth roughly $6.2 billion, and slated to rise to $22 billion by 2020. As of late 2016, twenty-eight states have legalized medical marijuana, and eight of them—Colorado, Washington, Oregon, Nevada, California, Massachusetts, and Alaska, and the District of Columbia—have legalized recreational use as well.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 176, loc. 2812-2815

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Over the next few years the watch will connect these sensors to become a platform for open-source research into everything from obesity to peak performance. In one twenty-four-hour beta test, more than thirty thousand people volunteered to contribute their personal data to Alzheimer’s research, making it four times the size of the next-largest study overnight.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 177, loc. 2829-2831

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With a handful of plug-and-play sensors, we can now measure hormones, heart rates, brainwaves, and respiration and get much clearer pictures of our real-time health.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 177, loc. 2826-2827

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With the data these devices are providing, we can shortcut our way not only to better health, but to deeper self-awareness, taking weeks and months to train what used to take yogis and monks decades to master.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 177, loc. 2834-2835

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It’s what prompted him to coin the term “net neutrality” back in 2003 and spawn an ongoing conversation about the balance of civic and corporate power online. It’s also where he got the title of his 2010 book.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 185, loc. 2954-2955

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As John Lilly’s early research established, it’s the knowledge of how to tweak the knobs and levers in our brain. When we get it right, it produces those invaluable sensations of selflessness, timelessness, effortlessness, and richness.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 186, loc. 2961-2963

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As John Lilly’s early research established, it’s the knowledge of how to tweak the knobs and levers in our brain. When we get it right, it produces those invaluable sensations of selflessness, timelessness, effortlessness, and richness. And that final step—the richness? That’s the information that we can’t normally access. As W. B. Yeats put it,14 “The world is full of magic things patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 186, loc. 2961-2965

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The tug-of-war between access and control becomes a battle for cognitive liberty. And while nation states have consistently sought to regulate external chemicals that shape consciousness, what happens when they attempt to regulate internal neurochemistry? If that sounds far-fetched, consider that elite athletes already submit “biological passports” to the World Anti-Doping Agency15 to confirm their unique baselines for hormones, blood profiles, and neurochemicals. If they fluctuate from that baseline without official permission, they are penalized and even brought up on criminal charges. Much in the same way that regimes used to declare certain books subversive, it’s not too much of a stretch to imagine a government declaring certain brain chemistry subversive. A telltale combination of neurotransmitters coursing through your bloodstream could be enough to get put on a watch list, or worse.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 186, loc. 2966-2973

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discovered that information technologies, ranging from the telegraph to radio, movies, and ultimately, the internet, tend to behave in similar ways—starting out utopian and democratic and ending up centralized and hegemonic. In his book The Master Switch, Wu calls this “the Cycle,” a recurring battle between access and control that shows up whenever these breakthroughs emerge.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 185, loc. 2939-2942

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Long before Linus Torvalds gave away the source code to Linux, or Sasha Shulgin published his chemical cookbook, or Elon Musk shared all of Tesla’s car and battery patents—long before there was even a term for it—Lilly took a stand for open-sourcing ecstasis.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 184, loc. 2922-2924

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And with the four forces, information technology is moving from the virtual to the perceptual.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 186, loc. 2959-2960

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As background research for his novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, which was set in a mental institution, Kesey had been volunteering at a U.S. Veterans Administration hospital (which, unbeknownst to the young author and many of the administering doctors, was part of MK-ULTRA). To earn a little extra money, a friend of his had turned him onto the $75 per session experiments the docs were running there on “psychomimetic” drugs—meaning chemicals like LSD that mimicked the mental breakdown of psychosis.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 188, loc. 3003-3007

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And, in the annals of unintended consequences, MK-ULTRA gets a notable mention for accidentally unleashing a leviathan: the psychedelic revolution of the 1960s.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 188, loc. 2996-2997

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Tom Wolfe recounts in The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, “and somehow drugs were getting up and walking out of there and over to Perry Lane.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 189, loc. 3012-3013

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What happened next became the well-documented subject of counterculture lore. Kesey moved the experiment into the hills above Palo Alto, Hunter S. Thompson, the Hells Angels, and Neal Cassady (from Kerouac’s On the Road fame) all showed up, as did a strange little band called the Grateful Dead, led by a chinless but oddly magnetic guitarist named Jerry Garcia. Armed with gallons of day-glo paint,23 strobe lights, and the prototypical art car, a tricked out 1939 International Harvester bus named “Further,” Kesey and his Merry Pranksters birthed West Coast psychedelic culture. Control of the Master Switch had been wrestled away from the spooks, and neither Silicon Valley nor the wider world would ever be the same.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 189, loc. 3017-3023

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No one was better at scanning for those ideas than Jim Channon, a lieutenant colonel in the Army and veteran of two tours of duty in Vietnam. “I just made it my weekend duty to get around all of these places, like Esalen, make friends and find out what this esoteric technology really was.”25 By the time he’d finished his hot tubs and crystals junket, Channon had, for all intents and purposes, gone native. He penned The First Earth Battalion Operations Manual,26 making the case that deliberately cultivating nonordinary states, including the ability to experience universal love, to perceive auras, to have out of body experiences, to see into the future, and, perhaps most memorably, “to encounter the enemy with sparkly eyes”—could transform the military.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 190, loc. 3029-3036

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In 2014, Ryan Holiday released a bestselling book12 on exactly this subject, The Obstacle Is the Way. It offered an update to the Roman Stoic Marcus Aurelius’s claim that “the impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way.” And this is certainly true of the ecstatic way. All that “effortless effort” takes a lot of work.

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surfer who in a flow state drops into a wave and strings together a series of moves he’s never pulled off before may need months of hard training to be able to reproduce them in a contest.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 204, loc. 3283

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Making this switch can help us unburden our psychology and manage the intensity of a wider range of states without overclocking our processors. But, when it comes to exploring those states, we still have to contend with a whole set of “known issues.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 202, loc. 3232

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And once we do take those freely shared ideas and use them to unlock nonordinary states for ourselves, what do we find? A self-authenticating experience of selflessness, timelessness, effortlessness, and richness. In short, all the ingredients required for a rational mysticism. It cuts out the middlemen, and remains rooted in the certainty of the lived experience. This ability to continually update and advance our own understanding, ahead of anyone else’s attempts to constrain or repurpose them may be the key to breaking the stalemate.

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“If we believe in liberty,” he writes, “it must be freedom from both private and public coercion.” It’s for this reason that so many of the Prometheans we’ve met in this book have taken a stand for open sourcing.

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In short, Orwell feared that our fears will ruin us. Huxley feared that our desire will ruin us.” And while the possibility of a nation deliberately invading our minds to shape and control behavior may feel like a relic of Cold War paranoia, the prospect of multinational corporations deliberately tweaking our subconscious desires to sell us more stuff is already here.

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Often, the experience of selflessness is so new and compelling that it feels like no one else has ever felt this way before—that it’s evidence of some kind of sacred anointment. When triggered by an awe-inspiring encounter with the Wailing Wall, the result is Jerusalem Syndrome. But the same thing can happen with any ecstatic experience. It’s why Burning Man advises people to not make any life-changing decisions for at least a month following the event,3 and why online psychedelic message boards like Erowid are filled with advice like “Don’t believe everything you think.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 202, loc. 3246

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Exposure to the selflessness, timelessness, effortlessness, and richness of an ecstasis can go wrong, and wrong in predictable ways. For each of these experiences, there is a corresponding danger that, if we know about it ahead of time, we have a chance to avoid.

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Rather than deciding, “Wow, I just had a mystical experience where I felt like Jesus Christ!” they conclude, “Wow, I am Jesus Christ. Clear the decks, people, I’ve got things to do!”

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As Buddhist teacher and author Jack Kornfield6 reminds us, “after the ecstasy, the laundry.”

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In nonordinary states, dopamine often skyrockets, while activity in the prefrontal cortex plummets. Suddenly we’re finding connections between ideas that we’ve never even thought of before. Some of those connections are legitimate insights; others are flights of fancy.

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most surprisingly—shopping and spirituality seem to rely on similar neuronal circuitry.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 194, loc. 3104-3105

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most surprisingly—shopping and spirituality seem to rely on similar neuronal circuitry. When deeply religious subjects view sacred iconography or reflect on their notion of God, brain scans reveal hyperactivity in the caudate nucleus, a part of the pleasure system that correlates with feelings of joy, love, and serenity. But Lindstrom and Calvert found that this same brain region lights up when subjects view images associated with strong brands like Ferrari or Apple. “Bottom line,” Calvert reported, “there was no discernible way to tell the difference between the ways subjects’ brains reacted to powerful brands35 and the way they reacted to religious icons and figures. . . . Clearly, our emotional engagement with powerful brands. . . . shares strong parallels with our feelings about religion.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 194, loc. 3104-3111

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What began as an attempt to infuse the military with the idealism of the human potential movement had devolved into a tool for psychological warfare—and the Cycle churned on.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 191, loc. 3058-3060

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But that afterthought got noticed. In May 2003, Newsweek ran a short blurb “PSYOPS: Cruel and Unusual,”29 revealing that U.S. military detention units were using a combination of bright light, disorienting sounds, and other consciousness-shifting tactics to break Iraqi prisoners. “Trust me, it works,” says one U.S. operative. “In training, they forced me to listen to the Barney ‘I Love You’ song for 45 minutes. I never want to go through that again.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 191, loc. 3052-3056

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And this repeated pattern of the “spooks lying down with the kooks,” from hippie float tanks at the SEALs’ Mind Gym, to Kesey’s misadventures at the V.A. hospital, to Lieutenant Colonel Channon hottubbing at Esalen, to the Pentagon at Burning Man, clearly highlights the back and forth contest for control of the Master Switch. More critically, it illustrates one of the central challenges of ecstasis: how to ensure that powerful techniques for altering consciousness don’t get used for the wrong reasons.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 192, loc. 3078-3082

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In heavily redacted documents recently released through the Freedom of Information Act,30 it turns out that the FBI has conducted a multiyear intelligence program at Burning Man. The official reason was to scout for domestic terrorists and track potential threats from Islamic extremists. More likely, the FBI was taking a page out of their old COINTELPRO playbook,31 the one used in the 1960’s to infiltrate and destabilize the Black Panthers,

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 192, loc. 3065-3069

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If that were the case, then one would expect increased surveillance of the event, heightened policing, insertion of agents provocateurs, and aggressive prosecution of nonviolent crimes. And while it’s hard to tell if it’s an anomaly or the beginning of a trend,32 in 2015, plainclothes and undercover agents spiked, and arrests at the festival were up 600 percent.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 192, loc. 3070-3073

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Under those amped-up conditions, salience—that is, the attention paid to incoming stimuli—increases. But, with the prefrontal cortex down-regulated, most impulse control mechanisms go offline too. For people who aren’t used to this combination, the results can be expensive. The video game industry may have gone further down this path than anyone. “Games are a multi-billion dollar industry that employ the best neuroscientists42 and behavior psychologists to make them as addicting as possible,” Nicholas Kardaras, one of the country’s top addiction specialists, recently explained to Vice. “The developers strap beta-testing teens with galvanic skin responses, EKG, and blood pressure gauges. If the game doesn’t spike their blood pressure to 180 over 140, they go back and tweak the game to make it have more of an adrenaline-rush effect. . . . Video games raise dopamine to the same degree that sex does, and almost as much as cocaine does. So this combo of adrenaline and dopamine are a potent one-two punch with regards to addiction.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 196, loc. 3146

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Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 195, loc. 3127-3130

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But we were at the Advertising Research Foundation38 to discuss the next step: the move from an experience economy to what author Joe Pine calls the “transformation economy.” In this marketplace, what we’re being sold is who we might become—or as, Pine explains: “In the transformation economy, the customer IS the product!”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 195, loc. 3127

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To understand this possibility, it’s helpful to understand a few of the developments that have led to today’s marketplace. At the tail end of the twentieth century, we started moving from the selling of ideas,36 the so-called information economy, toward the selling of feelings, or what author Alvin Toffler called the “experience economy.” This is why retail shops started to look like theme parks. Why, instead of stocking ammo on their shelves like Wal-Mart, the outdoor retailer Cabela’s turns their stores into a hunter’s paradise of big-game mounts, faux mountainsides, and giant aquariums.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 195, loc. 3120

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To understand this possibility, it’s helpful to understand a few of the developments that have led to today’s marketplace. At the tail end of the twentieth century, we started moving from the selling of ideas,36 the so-called information economy, toward the selling of feelings, or what author Alvi <You have reached the clipping limit for this item>

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 195, loc. 3120-3125

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They also discovered how to prompt that impulse. For the pitch to be most effective—that is, to earn the most money—it had to be highly engaging and display significant contrast between positive and negative story elements. Since the speaker was wearing a discreet earpiece while onstage, the researchers could use biofeedback to provide instant feedback, telling her to change the story on the fly, increasing tension, deepening empathy, and constantly priming the audience to alter their behavior.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 197, loc. 3168

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Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 197, loc. 3158-3160

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Once you understand what Lindstrom calls “buyology,” you can imprint unsuspecting consumers with all the pleasure-producing neurochemistry you can coax out of them. And as with the intelligence community’s efforts, ecstasis at 100 percent is transformational, but ecstasis at 80 percent is, well, pretty much whatever you want it to be.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 197, loc. 3158

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Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 197, loc. 3168-3171

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If the shift in psychology that led us from Esalen to Eckhart was about greater permission to explore, then Kegan and his colleagues have given us the next piece of that puzzle: a map of where we’re going. By bridging the gap between peak states and personal growth, these discoveries validate ecstasis as a tool not only for self-discovery, but also for self-development.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 94, loc. 1510-1513

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Consciousness, it turns out, goes straight to the bottom line.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 94, loc. 1509-1510

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In short, altered states can lead to altered traits.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 94, loc. 1514-1515

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Somehow, changes in the body—freezing the face with a neurotoxin—were producing changes in the mind: the ability to feel sadness or empathy. The horse appeared to be steering the rider. And we now know why. Our facial expressions are hardwired5 into our emotions: we can’t have one without the other. Botox lessens depression because it prevents us from making sad faces. But it also dampens our connection to those around us because we feel empathy by mimicking each other’s facial expressions.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 97, loc. 1548-1552

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The heart has about 40,000 neurons that play a central role in shaping emotion, perception, and decision making. The stomach and intestines complete this network, containing more than 500 million nerve cells, 100 million neurons, 30 different neurotransmitters, and 90 percent of the body’s supply of serotonin (one of the major neurochemicals responsible for mood and well-being). This “second brain,” as scientists have dubbed it, lends some empirical support to the persistent notion of gut instinct.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 97, loc. 1561-1565

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For those interested in shifting states, knowing that the body can drive the mind gives us a whole new set of knobs and levers with which to play. Einstein’s quote “you cannot solve a problem at the level at which it was created” is invariably used to encourage higher, more expansive solutions. But the opposite is equally true. Sometimes, lower, more basic solutions can have just as big an impact.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 98, loc. 1577-1580

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And two minutes of the pose was enough to increase levels of the dominance hormone testosterone by 20 percent and decrease the stress hormone cortisol by 15 percent. While the field of embodied cognition is in its infancy, and there is still lots of work to be done replicating studies and integrating insights, these early findings suggest a tighter linkage between our minds and our bodies than most of us would ever suspect.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 98, loc. 1573-1576

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And today, with so much of our emotional and social lives mediated by screens, we’ve become little more than heads on sticks, the most disembodied generation of humans that has ever lived.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 100, loc. 1597-1598

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In direct contrast to skin-and-bone ascetics who sought ecstasis by ignoring or denying the body, these monks believed transcendence began with its total mastery.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 99, loc. 1593-1594

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Defined by heightened empathy, an expanded capacity to hold differing and even conflicting perspectives, and a general flexibility in how you think of yourself, self-transforming is the developmental stage we tend to associate with wisdom (and Roger Martin’s Opposable Mind). But not everyone gets to be wise. While it usually takes three to five years for adults to move through a given stage of development, Kegan found that the further you go up that pyramid, the fewer people make it to the next stage. The move from self-authoring to self-transforming for example? Fewer than 5 percent of us ever make that jump.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 92, loc. 1489-1493

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He discovered that while some adults remained frozen in time, a select few achieved meaningful growth. Right around middle age, for example, Kegan noticed that some people moved beyond generally well-adjusted adulthood, or what he called “Self-Authoring,” into a different stage entirely: “Self-Transforming.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 92, loc. 1487-1489

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Can recurring access to these states really “nurture what is best within ourselves?” Can they, as Alan Watts suggested, be used to “cultivate the exceptional”?

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 91, loc. 1477-1478

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“Psychology is not just the study of weakness and damage, it is also the study of strength and virtue. Treatment is not just fixing what is broken, it is nurturing what is best within ourselves.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 91, loc. 1474-1475

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Flow researchers have achieved comparable results without drugs, simply by altering neurobiological function. In 2007, working with Iraq War veterans at Camp Pendleton, occupational therapist Carly Rogers of the University of California, Los Angeles blended surfing (a reliable flow trigger) and talk therapy into a treatment for PTSD. It was essentially the same protocol Mithoefer used, only with the flow generated by action sports substituting for MDMA.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 89, loc. 1435-1438

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Mithoefer found that the benefits provided by one to three rounds of MDMA therapy lasts for years.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 89, loc. 1432-1433

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In a 2014 paper published in the Journal of Occupational Therapy, Rogers reported that after as little as five weeks in the waves, soldiers had a “clinically meaningful improvement in PTSD symptom severity and in depressive symptoms.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 89, loc. 1442-1444

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recent study done by the military found that 84 percent of PTSD subjects who meditated for a month could reduce or even stop taking selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs).

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 89, loc. 1445-1446

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Taken together, all this work—from the NDE studies to the cancer and trauma research to the flow and meditation programs—demonstrates that even brief moments spent outside ourselves produce positive impact, regardless of the mechanisms used to get there.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 89, loc. 1447-1449

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or part of an illuminati controlled dumb-down of human potential

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 90, loc. 1457

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As Buddhist scholar Alan Watts put it, ‘Western scientists have an underlying assumption that normal is absolutely as good as it gets and that the exceptional is only for saints, that it is something that cannot be cultivated.’”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 90, loc. 1457-1458

Notes: 1) or part of an illuminati controlled dumb-down of human potential

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Her goal was both to get a clear picture of brainwave activity and record how long it took her subjects to enter REM sleep—an excellent way to measure happiness and well-being. Normal people go into REM at about 90 minutes; depressed people enter sooner, usually at 60 minutes. Generally happy people head in the opposite direction, dropping into REM at around 100 minutes. Britton discovered that NDEers delayed entry until 110 minutes—which meant that they were off the charts for happiness and life satisfaction.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 87, loc. 1406-1410

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In 2011, Griffiths gave three grams of psilocybin to a group of terminal cancer patients, in an attempt to provide them with relief from fear-of-death anxiety (which is understandably hard to alleviate). Afterward, he administered a battery of psychological tests, including a standard fear-of-dying metric, the Death Transcendence Scale, at one- and fourteen-month intervals. Just as with Britton’s NDE survivors, Griffiths found significant, sustained change: a marked decrease in their fear of death, and a significant uptick in their attitudes, moods, and behavior.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 88, loc. 1418-1422

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was glowing and extroverted for the first time since getting blown up. MDMA gave me my life back.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 88, loc. 1428-1429

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Pleasure produces endorphins, but pain can prompt even more. The uncertainty of teasing, as Stanford’s Robert Sapolsky established, spikes dopamine 400 percent. Nipple stimulation boosts oxytocin. Pressure in the throat or colon regulates the vagus nerve,23 creating exhilaration, intense relaxation, and goose bumps, what Princeton gastroenterologist Anish Sheth memorably terms poo-phoria. “To some it may feel like a religious experience,” Sheth writes, “to others like an orgasm, and to a lucky few like both.”  And momentary erotic transcendence

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 85, loc. 1376-1381

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Thirty years of research showed that people who had an NDE scored exceptionally high on tests of overall life satisfaction. As a trauma expert, Britton found this unusual.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 87, loc. 1401-1402

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Now there’s a broad movement to explore full-spectrum sexuality and elevate it from compulsion or perversion, into something more deliberate, playful, and potent. The arc of the moral universe may be long, but it’s bending toward the kinky.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 86, loc. 1391-1393

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Nowhere did this urge for raw self-expression show up more visibly than at Esalen, the Big Sur, California–based institute that the New York Times once called the “Harvard of the Human Potential movement.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 77, loc. 1243-1245

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What Tolle is preaching is nothing less than the Gospel of STER. His core argument is that through the experience of selflessness, timelessness, and effortlessness—his so-called “Power of Now”—we can dwell in a place of unlimited richness. And, if the popularity of his webcast is anything to go by, this idea is resonating with millions of people.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 76, loc. 1219-1222

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By democratizing access to some of the more controversial and misunderstood territory in history, these modern-day Gutenbergs are taking experiences once reserved for mystics and making them available to the masses.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 75, loc. 1201-1202

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Pharmacology gives us another tool to explore this terrain. By treating the six powerful neurochemicals that underpin ecstasis as raw ingredients, we’ve begun to refine the recipes for peak experience.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 74, loc. 1192-1193

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Whether we’re relying on flow-producing neurofeedback or awe-inducing virtual reality, these breakthroughs turn once-solitary epiphanies into experiences that can be shared by hundreds of thousands of people at once. More people having more experiences means more data and firmer conclusions.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 74, loc. 1195-1197

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This sharpened perspective allows us to strip out the interpretations of past gatekeepers and understand, in simple and rational terms, the mechanics of transcendence. And unlike the take-it-on faith dictates of traditional mythologies, the discoveries of neurobiology are testable.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 74, loc. 1190-1192

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In spiritual terms, Eckhart Tolle found sudden enlightenment. In the language of this book, he stabilized ecstasis, making the temporary selfless, timeless, and effortless experience of a non-ordinary state a part of his permanent reality.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 76, loc. 1215-1217

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Because the drive to get out of our heads has ended in tragedy as often as ecstasy. Because the pale protects us as much as it confines us.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 70, loc. 1162-1163

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As Nietzsche said: “madness is rare in individuals—but in groups, political parties, nations and eras, it’s the rule.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 70, loc. 1159-1159

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In the 1930s, Adolf Hitler provided a frightening example, co-opting traditional techniques of ecstasy—light, sound, chanting, movement—for his Nuremberg rallies. “I am beginning to comprehend some of the reasons for Hitler’s astounding success,”33 wrote Hearst journalist William Shirer in 1934. “Borrowing a chapter from the Roman church, he’s restoring pageantry . . . and mysticism to the drab lives of twentieth century Germans.” Hitler wasn’t just borrowing from Rome, but from the United States as well. According to Fuhrer confidant Ernst Hanfstaengl, “the ‘Sieg Heil’34 used in political rallies was a direct copy of the technique used by American college football cheerleaders. American college type music was used to excite the German masses who had been used to . . . dry-as-dust political lectures.” Hitler wasn’t the only twentieth-century despot to rely on these techniques. Stalin, Mao, and Pol Pot sold the same thing: a Utopia of We, the experience of communitas at scale. They even sold it the same way. Nearly identical stump speeches: “Individualism is out. We are all one. No one is better than anyone else.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 70, loc. 1148-1158

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Something similar is happening today. Thanks to accelerating developments in four fields—psychology, neurobiology, pharmacology, and technology; call them the “Four Forces of Ecstasis”—we’re getting greater access to and understanding of nonordinary states of consciousness.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 74, loc. 1181-1183

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rely less on hocus-pocus and superstition, and more on science and experience.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 74, loc. 1184-1185

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Archbishop of Canterbury John Tillotson later noted,1 “in all probability . . . hocus pocus is nothing else but a corruption of hoc est corpus (“this is the body”), [a] ridiculous imitation of the priests of the Church.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 73, loc. 1175-1177

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Tony Robbins’s empowerment seminars to the prosperity theology preached every Sunday by megachurch ministers like Joel Osteen.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 80, loc. 1296-1297

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Landmark, the latest incarnation of Erhard’s teachings, boasts corporate clients including Microsoft,14 NASA, Reebok, and Lululemon.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 80, loc. 1293-1294

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Erhard understood that seekers needed to be financially successful enough to afford his next workshop. So he hitched the human potential movement to the wagon of the Protestant work ethic. Napoleon Hill’s Think and Grow Rich replaced the Bhagavad Gita as seminal text. Mandalas were out. Vision boards were in. And the American spiritual marketplace has never been the same. If you’ve

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 80, loc. 1284-1287

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As an early Esalen motto put it,12 ‘No one captures the flag.’”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 79, loc. 1271-1272

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So Erhard repackaged an assortment of Esalen-inspired13 practices into a business-friendly format, creating EST, short for the Erhard Seminars Training. The seminar deliberately reproduced Price’s accidental transformation, engineering a “breakdown-to-breakthrough” experience via a series of marathon, fourteen-hour days, without food or breaks, and with lots of yelling and profanity—the fabled “EST encounter.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 79, loc. 1277-1281

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It was a “pragmatic culture of sensation and know-how,” notes author and modern religious historian Erik Davis11 in AfterBurn, “an essentially empirical approach to matters of the spirit that made tools more important than beliefs. Consciousness-altering techniques like meditation, biofeedback, yoga, ritual, isolation tanks, tantric sex, breathwork, martial arts, group dynamics and drugs were privileged over the claustrophobic structures of authority and belief that were seen to define conventional religion.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 78, loc. 1263-1267

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The lineage that goes from Esalen to EST to Eckhart is one of increasing self-exploration,

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 81, loc. 1301-1301

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“In French literature,” University of Pennsylvania neurologist18 Anjan Chatterjee explains in his book The Aesthetic Brain, “the release from orgasm is famously referred to as la petite mort, the little death . . . the person is in a state without fear and without thought of themselves or their future plans. . . . This pattern of deactivation could be the brain state of a purely transcendent experience enveloping a core experience of pleasure.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 83, loc. 1332-1336

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Together, they have prevented us from fully expressing that “fourth evolutionary drive,” the irrepressible desire to seek nonordinary states of consciousness.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 119, loc. 1903-1904

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The second limitation is culture. Anthropologists have discovered that as soon as a local intoxicant becomes enshrined in tradition, people grow suspicious of imports. “Most cultures,” explains Pollan, “curiously, promote one plant8 for this purpose, or two, and condemn others. They fetishize one and they have taboos on others.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 118, loc. 1894-1897

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Shulgin’s legacy. The first was PiHKAL, short for “Phenethylamines I Have Known and Loved,” a reference to the class of psychedelics containing mescaline and 2C-B. Cowritten with his wife and published in 1991, PiHKAL was divided into two parts. Part One contained a fictionalized autobiography of the couple. Part Two was a detailed description of 179 psychedelics and included step-by-step instructions for synthesis, bioassays, dosages, duration, legal status, and commentary—that is, everything a would-be psychonaut needed for takeoff. The second book, TiHKAL, came out in 1998, with the acronym standing for “Tryptamines I Have Known and Loved,” and referring to drugs like LSD, DMT, and ibogaine. In this volume, the Shulgins included recipes for fifty-five more substances along with even more commentary. “Use them with care,” they wrote, “and use them with respect as to the transformations they can achieve, and you have an extraordinary research tool. Go banging about with a psychedelic drug for a Saturday night turn-on, and you can get to a really bad place. . . .”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 122, loc. 1958

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Between 1966, when he first set up his backyard workshop, and his death in 2014, Shulgin became one of the more prolific psychonauts (an explorer of inner space) in history.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 121, loc. 1937-1938

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Shulgin’s legacy. The first was PiHKAL, short for “Phenethylamines I Have Known and Loved,” a reference to the class of psychedelics containing mescaline and 2C-B. Cowritten with his wife and published in 1991, PiHKAL was divided into two parts. Part One contained a fictionalized autobiography of the couple. Part Two was a detailed description of 179 psychedelics and included step-by-step instructions for synthesis, bioassays, dosages, duration, legal status, and commentary—that is, everything a would-be psychonaut needed for takeoff. The second book, TiHKAL, came out in 1998, with the acronym standing for “Tryptamines I Have Known and Loved,” and referring to drugs like LSD, DMT, and ibogaine. In this volume, the Shulgins included recipes for fifty-five more substances along with even more commentary. “Use them with care,” they wrote, “and use them with respect as to the transformations they can achieve, and you have an extraordinary research tool. Go banging about with a psychedelic drug for a Saturday night turn-on, and you can get to a really bad place. .

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 122, loc. 1958-1966

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His decision to share his research came from a real fear that he would die with this enormous body of knowledge trapped inside him. Even before PiHKAL, Sasha had that open-source impulse. He gave away information to anyone who asked—it didn’t matter if they were DEA agents or underground psychedelic chemists.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 123, loc. 1974-1976

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I was in a seminar where the class leader rattled off all the different methods we use to access it—free association, dream analysis, hypnosis, bungled actions, slips of the tongue. None were very good. Except for dreaming, they’re all indirect approaches. And dreaming takes place when we’re asleep, so all we can get is after-the-fact reports. If we were going to make any headway on this problem, we had to find a better way to explore the unconscious.” In his hunt for that better way, Carhart-Harris picked up psychologist Stanislav Grof’s classic book, Realms of the Human Unconscious: Observations from LSD Research. One of Grof’s main arguments was that during psychedelic states, our ego defenses are so diminished that we gain nearly direct access to the unconscious.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 124, loc. 1993-1999

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This is how we know that the vanishing of self is not really about specific regions deactivating. It’s bigger than that. It’s more like whole networks disintegrating.” One of the most important networks to disintegrate is the default mode network.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 125, loc. 2017-2019

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In 2009, he became head of psychedelic research at Imperial College London and became the second person in history to use fMRI to explore the neurological impact of psilocybin.22 And the very first to explore LSD.23

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 124, loc. 2002-2005

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But, like many of the brain’s systems, the default mode network is fragile. A little trouble in a couple of nodes is all it takes to knock it offline. “Early psychologists used terms like ‘ego disintegration’ to describe the effects of an altered state,” says Carhart-Harris. “They were more correct than they knew. The ego is really just a network, and things like psychedelics, flow, and meditation compromise those connections. They literally dis-integrate the network.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 125, loc. 2020-2023

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So when researchers like James Fadiman discovered that psychedelics could enhance creative problem solving—these far-flung connections were the reason why. Or, as Carhart-Harris explains, “What we’ve done in this research is begin to identify the biological basis of the reported mind expansion associated with psychedelic drugs.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 126, loc. 2026-2028

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This open-source approach to pharmacology has given us a way to fact-check ecstatic inspiration, moving us from the “one to many” route—à la Moses and Joseph Smith—to a “many to many” model. Rather than having to take anyone’s word for what happens out there, explorers can now repeat the original experiments and see for themselves.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 128, loc. 2070-2072

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But Strassman’s study group didn’t experience anything that could comfortably be described as Buddhist. More than 50 percent of his research subjects blasted off to distant galaxies, had hair-raising encounters with multidimensional entities, and came back swearing that those experiences felt “as real, or in many cases, more real than waking life.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 129, loc. 2081-2083

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One forum in particular, the Hyperspace Lexicon, reflects a collective effort to codify and make sense of the utterly novel landscape of DMT

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 130, loc. 2090-2091

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Initially, he turned his attention to melatonin but, disappointed with the results, soon decided to focus on its cousin DMT (dimethyltryptamine). DMT made sense as a candidate. It occurs naturally in the human body yet when vaporized or injected, becomes a powerful psychedelic.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 129, loc. 2076-2078

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And Joseph Smith was by no means the first person to have a prophetic vision that then birthed a religion. Moses fathered three of the world’s largest traditions—Judaism, Islam, and Christianity—when he came down from Mount Sinai with two stone tablets written by “the finger of God.” But this time as well, the problem was proof.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 127, loc. 2048-2050

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While all manner of psychoactive plants are available online, allowing the adventurous to distill potent psychedelics with little more than a Crock-Pot, some Mason jars and a turkey baster, the DEA and INTERPOL can still shut down these gray market suppliers. But Cronin’s 3D drug printer renders that kind of oversight almost impossible.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 132, loc. 2135-2137

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Even a few decades ago, they could have started a cult. These days, they’ll just get trolled online, then ignored.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 131, loc. 2111-2112

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If you put this all together, what seems to be emerging in the aftermath of Shulgin, Carhart-Harris, and Strassman is a kind of “agnostic Gnosticism,” an experience of the infinite rooted in the certainty that all interpretations are personal, provisional, and partial. As a result, no one can claim their particular vision of the divine as correct, if there are thousands of other “visions” with which to compare it.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 131, loc. 2108-2111

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“Pretty much any substance made by a plant, tree or mushroom, including all the neuroactive substances, is within reach of synthetic biology. We’re not there yet, but within a decade or so this one technology should be able to tickle all the same receptor sites in the brain that mind-altering substances impact.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 133, loc. 2153-2155

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Transformational leaders not only regulated their own nervous systems better than most; they also regulated other people’s.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 105, loc. 1691-1692

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Our understanding of the science has progressed to the point where we can not only shift how we think and feel in the present, but also make accurate predictions about how we’re going to think and feel in a future that has yet to occur.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 106, loc. 1698-1700

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There are thousands of depictions of the experience. And if you read through them, you’ll find that people often describe unity as more ‘fundamentally real’ than anything else they’ve ever experienced. More real than reality. Well, what does that mean? I think it means that in trying to answer this question we need to take into account both the science and the spirituality, that we can’t just dismiss the latter because it makes us uncomfortable as scientists.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 106, loc. 1709-1712

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And unity is only the first in a long series of those experiences that researchers have now decoded. “It’s amazing how far neurotheology has come,” explains Newberg. “Different types of meditation, chanting, singing, flow, prayer, mediumship, speaking in tongues, hypnosis, trances, possession, out-of-body-experiences, near-death experiences, and sensed presences—they’ve all been examined using high-powered imaging.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 108, loc. 1736-1739

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What Newberg discovered is that extreme concentration can cause the right parietal lobe to shut down. “It’s an efficiency exchange,” he explains. “During ecstatic prayer or meditation, energy normally used for drawing the boundary of self gets reallocated for attention. When this happens, we can no longer distinguish self from other. At that moment, as far as the brain can tell, you are one with everything.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 108, loc. 1730-1732

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The neurobiology of emotion shows that our nonverbal cues—our tics, twitches, and tone—reveal much more about our inner experience than words typically do. “People are in a constant state of impression management,”13 explains USC psychologist Albert “Skip” Rizzo, the director of the institute. “They have their true self and the self they want to project to the world. And we know the body displays things that sometimes people try to keep contained.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 101, loc. 1620-1624

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you think back to the embodied cognition work of Amy Cuddy, AI Ellie, and others, their big insight was that our bodies, facial expressions, posture, and voice all convey more information than we would ever suspect. And, if we change any of those things, we can substantially shift how we feel and what we think in the present moment. That’s pretty big news. But what we explored with Nike went even further than that, beyond “real-time” transformation and into “future-time” prediction—precognition itself.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 104, loc. 1665-1668

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The technical term for this is the Law of the Instrument. Give someone a hammer and, indeed, they’ll look for nails to pound. But present them with a problem where they need to repurpose that same hammer as a doorstop, or a pendulum weight, or a tomahawk, and you’ll typically get blank stares.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 111, loc. 1779-1781

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And we know it’s not working. Even a quick glance at today’s dire mental health statistics—the one in four Americans now on psychiatric medicines;23 the escalating rate of suicide24 for everyone from ages ten to seventy-eight—shows how critically overtaxed our mental processing is these days. We may have come to the end of our psychological tether. It might be time to rethink all that thinking.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 111, loc. 1784-1788

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Rather than treating our psychology like the unquestioned operating system (or OS) of our entire lives, we can repurpose it to function more like a user interface (or UI)—that

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 112, loc. 1793

Notes: 1) swappable selves instead of Buddhist no-self

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Take, for example, one of the most common ailments of the modern world—mild to moderate depression. Instead of moping around, hoping for things to get better on their own, we can scan our UI and choose an alternate program to run.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 112, loc. 1797-1798

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Rather than treating our psychology like the unquestioned operating system (or OS) of our entire lives, we can repurpose it to function more like a user interface (or UI)—

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 112, loc. 1793-1794

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Choices like these are available not just in our personal lives, but in our professional lives, too. Instead of nervously waiting for a job interview and obsessing about all the things that could go wrong, we can take a page out of Amy Cuddy’s book and stand up, breathe deeply, and power-pose our way to lower cortisol, higher testosterone, and more confidence. Instead of using trendy leadership books and a new mission statement to fire up employees, we can follow ESADE’s lead and use neurofeedback to heighten group coherence and prompt more productive strategy sessions.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 112, loc. 1804-1808

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Certainly, atheists have used the fact that there’s neuronal function beneath mystical experience to claim that spirituality is merely a trick of the brain. But neurotheology takes a faith-neutral position. All this work proves is that these experiences are biologically mediated. If you’re a believer, it offers a deeper understanding of divine methods. If you’re a nonbeliever, it provides another consciousness-altering tool upon which to draw. Either way, these advances do more than just provide an academic explanation for the ecstatic—they provide a user manual on how to get there.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 110, loc. 1771-1775

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So potent is the urge to get out of our heads that it functions as a “fourth drive,” a behavior-shaping force as powerful as our first three drives—the desire for food, water, and sex. The bigger question is why. Intoxication, in animals as in humans, is not always the best strategy for survival.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 117, loc. 1864-1866

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Researchers have been pondering this for a while now, and have concluded that intoxication does play a powerful evolutionary role—“depatterning.” In nature, animals often get stuck in ruts, repeating the same actions over and over with diminishing returns. But interrupting this behavior is not easy. “The principle of conservation6 tends to rigidly preserve established schemes and patterns,” writes Italian ethnobotanist Giorgio Samorini in his book Animals and Psychedelics, “but modification (the search for new pathways) requires a depatterning instrument . . . capable of opposing—at least at certain determined moments—the principle of conservation. It is my impression that drug-seeking and drug-taking behavior, on the part of both humans and animals, enjoys an intimate connection with . . . depatterning.”

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 117, loc. 1871-1878

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This idea, that our ego isn’t the be-all and end-all, flourished in Asia for centuries before landing in California in the 1960’s. Thoughts were illusions, the swamis and lamas maintained, and nirvana lay on the other side of ego death.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 113, loc. 1814-1816

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We’ll wait until after we feel better to go for that walk in the sun, rather than going for that walk in order to feel better. We’ll wait until after we get that job offer to pump our fists and stand tall, instead of the other way around.

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 112, loc. 1809-1811

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That’s because, at first, reorienting from OS to UI can be downright disorienting. If I can change the “wallpaper of my mind” by deliberately shifting my neurophysiology—my breathing, my posture, my brainwaves, or any number of other

Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal, Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, pg. 113, loc. 1811-1813

Notes: 1) swappable selves instead of Buddhist no-self

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@ 38e82785:9f8bc340

ct

@ 21335073:a244b1ad

Please respect Virginia Giuffre’s memory by refraining from asking about the circumstances or theories surrounding her passing.

Since Virginia Giuffre’s death, I’ve reflected on what she would want me to say or do. This piece is my attempt to honor her legacy.

When I first spoke with Virginia, I was struck by her unshakable hope. I had grown cynical after years in the anti-human trafficking movement, worn down by a broken system and a government that often seemed complicit. But Virginia’s passion, creativity, and belief that survivors could be heard reignited something in me. She reminded me of my younger, more hopeful self. Instead of warning her about the challenges ahead, I let her dream big, unburdened by my own disillusionment. That conversation changed me for the better, and following her lead led to meaningful progress.

Virginia was one of the bravest people I’ve ever known. As a survivor of Epstein, Maxwell, and their co-conspirators, she risked everything to speak out, taking on some of the world’s most powerful figures.

She loved when I said, “Epstein isn’t the only Epstein.” This wasn’t just about one man—it was a call to hold all abusers accountable and to ensure survivors find hope and healing.

The Epstein case often gets reduced to sensational details about the elite, but that misses the bigger picture. Yes, we should be holding all of the co-conspirators accountable, we must listen to the survivors’ stories. Their experiences reveal how predators exploit vulnerabilities, offering lessons to prevent future victims.

You’re not powerless in this fight. Educate yourself about trafficking and abuse—online and offline—and take steps to protect those around you. Supporting survivors starts with small, meaningful actions. Free online resources can guide you in being a safe, supportive presence.

When high-profile accusations arise, resist snap judgments. Instead of dismissing survivors as “crazy,” pause to consider the trauma they may be navigating. Speaking out or coping with abuse is never easy. You don’t have to believe every claim, but you can refrain from attacking accusers online.

Society also fails at providing aftercare for survivors. The government, often part of the problem, won’t solve this. It’s up to us. Prevention is critical, but when abuse occurs, step up for your loved ones and community. Protect the vulnerable. it’s a challenging but a rewarding journey.

If you’re contributing to Nostr, you’re helping build a censorship resistant platform where survivors can share their stories freely, no matter how powerful their abusers are. Their voices can endure here, offering strength and hope to others. This gives me great hope for the future.

Virginia Giuffre’s courage was a gift to the world. It was an honor to know and serve her. She will be deeply missed. My hope is that her story inspires others to take on the powerful.

@ 502ab02a:a2860397

EVERY Company ไข่ขาวเชื้อรา ที่รัฐส่งเสริม Unilever อุ้ม และเราถูกคลุมถุงให้กิน

อู๊ว ฉันเกิดมาเป็นไก่ โดนคนเลี้ยงเอาไว้ วันๆไม่ต้องทำอะไร แค่กินแล้วออกไข่ ป๊อกๆๆๆๆๆ กะต๊อก ป๊อกๆๆๆ ป๊อกๆๆๆๆๆ กะต๊อก ป๊อกๆๆๆ เพลงของเป้ อารักษ์ อาจกลายเป็นแค่คำเปรียบเปรย มนุษย์ ที่ถูกริดรอนสิทธิ์ตัวเองลงทุกวันจากนักล่า https://youtu.be/RctpDMoymVw?si=D3jzUXZBmyjxKGpN

โลกยุคใหม่อาจไม่ต้องมีแม่ไก่ แค่มีเชื้อรา กับเทคโนโลยี "precision fermentation" ก็สามารถทำให้ “ไข่” โผล่ออกมาในรูปของผงโปรตีนที่ไม่เคยผ่านตูดอุ่นๆ ไม่เคยมีเสียงกุ๊กๆ และไม่เคยเจอรังเจี๊ยบอีกต่อไป แต่เบื้องหลังของไข่ทดแทนที่ว่า “ก้าวหน้า” นี้ กลับเป็นการเคลื่อนไหวที่เชื่อมโยงรัฐ ธุรกิจยักษ์ และแคมเปญแนว “greenwashing” ได้อย่างแนบเนียนแบบพิมพ์นิยมของโลกอาหารสังเคราะห์ เรื่องราวมันประมาณนี้ครับ

เมื่อไข่เกิดจากเชื้อรา The EVERY Company ซึ่งเดิมชื่อว่า Clara Foods ก่อตั้งขึ้นในปี 2014 โดย Arturo Elizondo และเพื่อนร่วมทีมที่ออกมาจากโครงการ IndieBio ซึ่งเป็น accelerator สำหรับสตาร์ทอัปด้านชีววิทยาสังเคราะห์ที่มีชื่อเสียงใน Silicon Valley ได้ใช้ยีสต์ที่ถูกดัดแปลงพันธุกรรม (GMO yeast) สายพันธุ์ Komagataella phaffii เพื่อให้มันสร้าง “ovalbumin” หรือโปรตีนไข่ขาวขึ้นมาได้ คล้ายการหลอกยีสต์ให้กลายเป็นโรงงานสร้างไข่แบบไม่ต้องมีไก่ กระบวนการหมักนี้คือการจับยีสต์ใส่ถัง เติมน้ำตาล เติมสารอาหาร แล้วรอให้มัน "ผลิต" โปรตีนในห้องแล็บ แล้วก็สกัดออกมา ทำให้บริสุทธิ์ ตากแห้ง แล้วบรรจุใส่ซอง ชูป้าย “animal-free” แปะคำว่า “sustainable” แล้วส่งเข้าสู่ตลาดโปรตีนทดแทน ผลิตภัณฑ์นี้ได้รับการรับรองจาก FDA ว่าเป็น Generally Recognized as Safe (GRAS)

แต่คำถามคือ… ยีสต์ GMO + กระบวนการหมัก = sustainable จริงหรือเปล่า?

ถึงจะเป็นโปรตีนสังเคราะห์ ที่คนแพ้ไข่ก็ยังแพ้อยู่ดี แม้จะไม่มีสัตว์เกี่ยวข้องเลย แต่ EVERY Egg White ก็ยังคงต้องติดป้าย “Contains Egg” ตามกฎหมาย เพราะโครงสร้างโปรตีนที่ผลิตออกมา "เหมือน" โปรตีนไข่จริงมากจนสามารถกระตุ้นอาการแพ้ในคนที่แพ้ไข่ได้อยู่ดี แปลว่า... เราไม่ได้หลุดพ้นจากปัญหาแพ้อาหารเลย แค่เปลี่ยนแหล่งกำเนิดจากไก่มาเป็นเชื้อรา แต่สิ่งที่น่าคิดคือ นี่แสดงว่าองค์ประกอบของมันเหมือนชนิดที่ว่า สำเนาถูกต้องขนาดคนแพ้ไข่ยังแพ้อยู่ คุณคิดว่าในมุมนี้น่าคิดกว่าไหม???

Back ดีมีกองทัพอุ้ม เงินภาษีหนุน ที่น่าจับตาคือ EVERY ได้รับเงินสนับสนุนกว่า 2 ล้านดอลลาร์จากกระทรวงกลาโหมสหรัฐฯ (DoD) เพื่อศึกษาความเป็นไปได้ในการผลิตโปรตีนในประเทศ ตัวเลขนี้ไม่ใช่เล่น ๆ แปลว่า ภาครัฐกำลังพิจารณาให้ "ไข่จากเชื้อรา" เป็นอาหารแห่งอนาคตของกองทัพ ซึ่งหมายถึงเม็ดเงินระดับพันล้านเหรียญหากแผนนี้เดินหน้า และเมื่อรัฐหนุนขนาดนี้ เทคโนโลยีที่ยังแพงก็จะ “ไม่แพง” อีกต่อไป เพราะเงินภาษีช่วยลดต้นทุนแบบกลาย ๆ เหมือนที่เคยเกิดกับ Beyond Meat หรือ Impossible Foods

เท่านั้นไม่พอครับ ไข่ขาวของท่าน ได้รับการคัดเลือกที่จะจับมือกับ The Vegetarian Butcher บริษัทลูกของ Unilever บริษัทอาหารที่ครองตลาดโลกราวกับเป็นเจ้าของตู้เย็นของประชากรโลก Unilever จะใช้โปรตีนไข่จาก EVERY ใส่ในผลิตภัณฑ์ plant-based meat ที่กำลังไต่ตลาดโลก โดยไม่จำเป็นต้องแจ้งผู้บริโภคว่าโปรตีนนี้มาจากเชื้อรา GMO หรือกระบวนการ biotech ที่ไม่ธรรมดา แม้จะถูกจัดว่าเป็น "non-animal ingredient" หรือ "ไม่ได้มาจากสัตว์โดยตรง" แต่ก็มีสิทธิ์เข้าสู่เมนูมังสวิรัติ วีแกน และอาหารเด็กได้อย่างง่ายดาย เพราะภาพจำที่สื่อมวลชนร่วมกันสร้างขึ้น เพราะไม่มีภาพของ “สัตว์” อยู่ในกระบวนการเลย จึงกลายเป็น “วีแกนได้” ในสายตาคนทั่วไป ทั้งที่ความจริงมันคือเทคโนโลยีชีวภาพระดับลึก ด้วยการใช้คำอย่าง “cruelty-free”, “animal-free”, “sustainable protein”, รวมถึงหน้าตาผลิตภัณฑ์ที่ดูใสสะอาด ไร้กลิ่นอายห้องแล็บ

แม้จะยังไม่มีหลักฐานตรงๆ ว่า EVERY เข้าล็อบบี้รัฐบาลเหมือน Oatly แต่เส้นทางที่เห็นชัดคือความร่วมมือกับองค์กรระดับนโยบาย เช่น Good Food Institute (GFI) และกลุ่มผลักดัน food-tech เพื่อก่อรูปแนวคิดว่า “อาหารที่ไม่ได้มาจากธรรมชาติ” = “อนาคต” และเมื่อแบรนด์เหล่านี้จับมือกับยักษ์ใหญ่ กลายเป็นอาหารในโรงเรียน ทหาร โรงพยาบาล หรือ planet of the future คนทั่วไปก็ไม่มีสิทธิ์เลือกอีกต่อไป เพราะทุกที่ถูกจัดสรรโดยนโยบายที่ใครบางคนได้ตัดสินไปแล้ว

EVERY Company ไม่ได้ขายแค่ไข่สังเคราะห์ แต่ขาย “อนาคตของอาหาร” แบบที่มนุษย์ถูกแยกออกจากธรรมชาติ แล้วพึ่งพาเทคโนโลยีและเงินทุนแทน และในโลกที่รัฐกับบริษัทยักษ์กำลังร่วมมือกันสร้างนิยามใหม่ของคำว่า “โปรตีนดีต่อสิ่งแวดล้อม” เราในฐานะผู้บริโภคควรถามกลับว่า…

ดีต่อใคร? ธรรมชาติ หรือห้องแล็บ? สุขภาพของมนุษย์ หรือผลกำไรของเจ้าของแพลตฟอร์มอาหาร?

***สรุป timeline เบาๆ 2014 – Clara Foods ก่อตั้งในซานฟรานซิสโก โดยมีเป้าหมายผลิต “ไข่โดยไม่ต้องใช้ไก่” ผ่านกระบวนการ fermentation 2015-2019 – รับทุนหลายรอบ รวมถึงจาก Horizons Ventures (ที่ลงทุนใน Impossible Foods), IndieBio, Blue Horizon ฯลฯ 2021 – เปลี่ยนชื่อจาก Clara Foods เป็น The EVERY Company เพื่อสะท้อนเป้าหมายที่กว้างขึ้น: การสร้างโปรตีน “EVERYthing” จากจุลชีพ

ปล. ใครอยากอ่านเอกสาร GRAS ตัวเต็มของ EGGWHITE โหลดได้จากที่นี่ครับ https://www.fda.gov/media/175248/download #pirateketo #กูต้องรู้มั๊ย #ม้วนหางสิลูก #siamstr

@ 5df413d4:2add4f5b

@ 5df413d4:2add4f5b

*Short photo-stories of the hidden, hard to find, obscure, and off the beaten track. *

Come now, take a walk with me…

The Traveller 01: Ku/苦 Bar

Find a dingy, nondescript alley in a suspiciously quiet corner of Bangkok’s Chinatown at night. Walk down it. Pass the small prayer shrine that houses the angels who look over these particular buildings and approach an old wooden door. You were told that there is a bar here, as to yet nothing suggests that this is so…

Wait! A closer inspection reveals a simple bronze plaque, out of place for its polish and tended upkeep, “cocktails 3rd floor.” Up the stairs then! The landing on floor 3 presents a white sign with the Chinese character for bitter, ku/苦, and a red arrow pointing right.

Pass through the threshold, enter a new space. To your right, a large expanse of barren concrete, an empty “room.” Tripods for…some kind of filming? A man-sized, locked container. Yet, you did not come here to ask questions, such things are none of your business!

And to your left, you find the golden door. Approach. Enter. Be greeted. You have done well! You have found it. 苦 Bar. You are among friends now. Inside exudes deep weirdness - in the etymological sense - the bending of destinies, control of the fates. And for the patrons, a quiet yet social place, a sensual yet sacred space.

Ethereal sounds, like forlorn whale songs fill the air, a strange music for an even stranger magic. But, Taste! Taste is the order of the day! Fragrant, Bizarre, Obscure, Dripping and Arcane. Here you find a most unique use flavor, flavors myriad and manifold, flavors beyond name. Buddha’s hand, burnt cedar charcoal, ylang ylang, strawberry leaf, maybe wild roots brought in by some friendly passerby, and many, many other things. So, Taste! The drinks here, libations even, are not so much to be liked or disliked, rather, the are liquid context, experience to be embraced with a curious mind and soul freed from judgment.

And In the inner room, one may find another set of stairs. Down this time. Leading to the second place - KANGKAO. A natural wine bar, or so they say. Cozy, botanical, industrial, enclosed. The kind of private setting where you might overhear Bangkok’s resident “State Department,” “UN,” and “NGO” types chatting auspiciously in both Mandarin and English with their Mainland Chinese counterparts. But don’t look hard or listen too long! Surely, there’s no reason to be rude… Relax, relax, you are amongst friends now.

**苦 Bar. Bangkok, circa 2020. There are secrets to be found. Go there. **

Plebchain #Bitcoin #NostrArt #ArtOnNostr #Writestr #Createstr #NostrLove #Travel #Photography #Art #Story #Storytelling #Nostr #Zap #Zaps #Bangkok #Thailand #Siamstr

@ d9a329af:bef580d7

To be clear, this is 100% my subjective opinion on the alternatives to popular music, as it has become practically a formula of witchcraft, pseudoscience and mysticism. There is nothing you can do to get me to listen to pop music from the late 2010's to now. I could certainly listen to almost anything... just not modern pop, which is now completely backwards.

Most examples of compositions for these genres will be my own, unless otherwise stated. The genres on this list are in no particular order, though my favorite of which will be first: 1. Bossa Nova

Bossa Nova is a subgenre of jazz from Brazil, created in the 1950's as a mix of standard jazz and samba rhythms in a more gentle and relaxing manner. This genre's most famous songs are Tom Jobim's The Girl from Ipanema (found in albums like Getz/Gilberto), Wave, and even Triste. Most of the music is written in 2/4 time signature, and any key is almost acceptable. It's called Afro-Brazilian Jazz for a reason after all. I have a ton of compositions I produced, from Forget and Regret, to Rabbit Theory, Beaches of Gensokyo Past, Waveside, and even Willows of Ice to name a few of them.

1. Metal

This is an umbrella term for many subgenres of this fork of hard rock, with more distorted guitars, speedy and technical writing, vocals that sound demonic (some subgenres don't have that), or sometimes, chaotic lyrics and downright nasty ones if you look deep enough. If you want to get into it, just make sure it's not Black Metal (it's weird), Blackened Metal (Any subgenre of metal that's been inserted with elements of Black Metal), Metalcore, or any other genre that has vocals that aren't the best to hear (these are vocal fries that are really good if you're into the weird demonic sounds). This isn't for the faint of heart. Instrumental metal is good though, and an example is my composition from Touhou Igousaken called A Sly Foxy Liar if you want to know what techincal groove metal is like at a glance.

1. Touhou-style

I can attest to this one, as I produced bossa nova with a Touhou-like writing style. Touhou Project is a series of action video games created by one guy (Jun'ya Outa, a.k.a. ZUN), and are usually bullet curtain games in the main franchise, with some official spinoffs that are also action games (fighting games like Touhou 12.3 ~ Hisoutensoku). What I'm referring to here is music written by ZUN himself (He does almost everything for Touhou Project, and he's really good at it), or fans that write to his style with their own flair. I did this once with my composition, Toiled Bubble, which is from my self-titled EP. I probably wouldn't do much with it to be fair, and stick to bossa nova (my main genre if you couldn't tell).

1. Hip-Hop/Rap

This can get subjective here, but old-school rap and hip-hop... give me more of it. Before it became corrupted with all kinds of immoral things, hip-hop and rap were actually very good for their time. These were new, innovative and creative with how lyrics were written. Nowadays, while we're talking about cars, unspeakable acts, money, and just being dirtbags, artists in this genre back then were much classier than that. I fit in the latter category with my piece entitled, Don't Think, Just Roast, where I called out antis for a Vtuber agency who wanted to give its talent a hard time. It didn't get much traction on YouTube, because I'm not a well-known artist (I'm considered a nobody in the grand scheme of things. I'd like to get it fixed, but I don't want a record deal... I'd have to become a Pharisee or a Jesuit for that).

1. Synthwave

This is a genre of electronic music focused on 80's and 90's synths being used to carry a composition. Nowadays, we have plugins like Vital, Serum, Surge and others to create sounds we would otherwise be hearing on an 80's or 90's keyboard. An example of this is my composition, Wrenched Torque, which was composed for a promotion I did with RAES when he released his Vital synth pack.

More are to come in future installments of this series, and I will adjust the title of this one accordingly if y'all have any ideas of genres I should look into.

@ e0e92e54:d630dfaa

The Leadership Lesson I Learned at the Repair Shop

Today was a reminder of "Who You Know" actually matters.

Our van has been acting up as of late. Front-end noise. My guess? CV joint or bushings.

Not that I’m a mechanic though—my dad took the hammer away from me when I was 12, and now all "my" tools have flowers printed on them or Pink handles...

Yesterday it become apparent to my wife that "sooner rather than later" was optimal.

So this morning she took it to a repair shop where we know the owners.

You may have guessed by now that I’m no car repair guy. It’s just not my strength and I’m ok with that! And even though it’s not my strength, I’m smart enough to know enough about vehicles to be dangerous…

And I’m sure just like you, I hate being ripped off. So last year, we both decided she would handle repair duties—I just get too fired up by most the personnel that work there whom won’t shoot straight with you.

So this morning my wife takes our van in. She sees the owner and next thing my wife knows, the owner’s wife (my wife’s friend) is texting to go get coffee while they take care of the van.

Before the two ladies took off, my wife was told "we'll need all day as one step of it is a 4-hour job just to get to the part that needs to be replaced..."

And the estimate? Half the parts were warrantied out and the labor is lower than we expected it to be.

Fast forward, coffee having been drank… nearly 4 hours on the dot, we get a call “your van is ready!”

My wife didn't stand there haggling the price for parts and labor.

Nope…here’s the real deal:

1. Leadership = Relationships
2. You can’t have too many

Granted, quality is better than quantity in everything I can think of, and that is true for relationships as well...

And while there are varying degrees or depths of relationships. The best ones go both ways.

We didn’t expect a deal because we were at our friend’s shop. We went because we trust them.

That’s it.

Any other expectation other than a transparent and truthful transaction would be manipulating and exploiting the relationship…the exchange would fall into the purely transactional at best and be parasitic at worst!

The Bigger Lesson

Here’s the kicker:

This isn’t about vans or a repair shop. It’s about leading.

Theodore Roosevelt nailed it: “People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.”

Trust comes from relationships.

Relationships begin with who you know…And making who you know matter.

In other words, the relevance of the relationship is critical.

Your Move

Next time you dodge a call—or skip an event—pause.

Kill that thought…Or at least its tire marks. 😁

Realize that relationships fuel your business, your life, and your impact.

Because leadership? It’s relationships.

====

💡Who’s one person you can invest in today? A teammate? A client? A mechanic? 😉

🔹 Drop your answer below 👇 Or hit me up—book a Discovery Call. Let’s make your leadership thrive.

---

Jason Ansley* is the founder of Above The Line Leader*, where he provides tailored leadership support and operational expertise to help business owners, entrepreneurs, and leaders thrive— without sacrificing your faith, family, or future.

*Want to strengthen your leadership and enhance operational excellence? Connect with Jason at https://abovethelineleader.com/#your-leadership-journey

*📌 This article first appeared on NOSTR. You can also find more Business Leadership Articles and content at: 👉 https://abovethelineleader.com/business-leadership-articles

@ c9badfea:610f861a

1. Install Image Toolbox (it's free and open source)
2. Launch the app and navigate to the Tools tab
3. Choose Cipher from the tool list
4. Pick any file from your device storage
5. Keep Encryption toggle selected
6. Enter a password in the Key field
7. Keep default AES/GCM/NoPadding algorithm
8. Tap the Encrypt button and save your encrypted file
9. If you want to decrypt the file just repeat the previous steps but choose Decryption instead of Encryption in step 5

@ 2fdae362:c9999539

The architecture you choose for your embedded firmware has long-lasting consequences. It impacts how quickly you can add features, how easily your team can debug and maintain the system, and how confidently you can scale. While main loops and real-time operating systems (RTOS) are common, a third option — the state machine kernel — often delivers the most value in modern embedded development. At Wolff Electronic Design, we’ve used this approach for over 15 years to build scalable, maintainable, and reliable systems across a wide range of industries.

Every embedded system starts with one big decision: how will the firmware be structured?
Many teams default to the familiar—using a simple main loop or adopting a RTOS. But those approaches can introduce unnecessary complexity or long-term maintenance headaches. A third option, often overlooked, is using a state machine kernel—an event-driven framework designed for reactive, real-time systems. Below, we compare the three options head-to-head to help you choose the right architecture for your next project.

Comparison Chart

| Approach | Description | Pros | Cons | Best For | |-----------------------|------------------------------------------------------------------------|-------------------------------------------------------------|------------------------------------------------------------|--------------------------------------| | Main Loop | A single, continuous while-loop calling functions in sequence | Simple to implement, low memory usage | Hard to scale, difficult to manage timing and state | Small, simple devices | | RTOS | Multi-threaded system with scheduler, tasks, and preemption | Good for multitasking, robust toolchain support | Thread overhead, complex debugging, race conditions | Systems with multiple async tasks | | State Machine Kernel | Event-driven system with structured state transitions, run in a single thread | Easy to debug, deterministic behavior, scalable and modular | Learning curve, may need rethinking architecture | Reactive systems, clean architecture |

Why the State Machine Kernel Wins

Promotes Innovation Without Chaos

With clear, hierarchical state transitions, your codebase becomes modular and self-documenting — making it easier to prototype, iterate, and innovate without fear of breaking hidden dependencies or triggering bugs.

Prevents Hidden Complexity

Unlike RTOSes, where tasks run in parallel and can create race conditions or timing bugs, state machines run cooperatively in a single-threaded model. This eliminates deadlocks, stack overflows, and debugging nightmares that come with thread-based systems.

Scales Without Becoming Fragile

As features and states are added, the system remains predictable. You don’t have to untangle spaghetti logic or rework your entire loop to support new behaviors — you just add new events and state transitions.

Improves Maintainability and Handoff

Because logic is encapsulated in individual states with defined transitions, the code is easier to understand, test, and maintain. This lowers the cost of onboarding new developers or revisiting the system years later.

---

At Wolff Electronic Design, we’ve worked with every kind of firmware structure over the past 15+ years. Our go-to for complex embedded systems? A state machine kernel. It gives our clients the flexibility of RTOS-level structure without the bugs, complexity, or overhead. Whether you’re developing restaurant equipment or industrial control systems, this architecture offers a better path forward: clean, maintainable, and built to last.

Learn more about our capabilities here.

design, #methodologies, #quantumleaps, #statemachines

@ 1c19eb1a:e22fb0bc

I am happy to present to you the first full review posted to Nostr Reviews: #Primal for #Android!

Primal has its origins as a micro-blogging, social media client, though it is now expanding its horizons into long-form content. It was first released only as a web client in March of 2023, but has since had a native client released for both iOS and Android. All of Primal's clients recently had an update to Primal 2.0, which included both performance improvements and a number of new features. This review will focus on the Android client specifically, both on phone and tablet.

Since Primal has also added features that are only available to those enrolled in their new premium subscription, it should also be noted that this review will be from the perspective of a free user. This is for two reasons. First, I am using an alternate npub to review the app, and if I were to purchase premium at some time in the future, it would be on my main npub. Second, despite a lot of positive things I have to say about Primal, I am not planning to regularly use any of their apps on my main account for the time being, for reasons that will be discussed later in the review.

The application can be installed through the Google Play Store, nostr:npub10r8xl2njyepcw2zwv3a6dyufj4e4ajx86hz6v4ehu4gnpupxxp7stjt2p8, or by downloading it directly from Primal's GitHub. The full review is current as of Primal Android version 2.0.21. Updates to the review on 4/30/2025 are current as of version 2.2.13.

In the ecosystem of "notes and other stuff," Primal is predominantly in the "notes" category. It is geared toward users who want a social media experience similar to Twitter or Facebook with an infinite scrolling feed of notes to interact with. However, there is some "other stuff" included to complement this primary focus on short and long form notes including a built-in Lightning wallet powered by #Strike, a robust advanced search, and a media-only feed.

Overall Impression

Score: 4.4 / 5 (Updated 4/30/2025)

Primal may well be the most polished UI of any Nostr client native to Android. It is incredibly well designed and thought out, with all of the icons and settings in the places a user would expect to find them. It is also incredibly easy to get started on Nostr via Primal's sign-up flow. The only two things that will be foreign to new users are the lack of any need to set a password or give an email address, and the prompt to optionally set up the wallet.

Complaints prior to the 2.0 update about Primal being slow and clunky should now be completely alleviated. I only experienced quick load times and snappy UI controls with a couple very minor exceptions, or when loading DVM-based feeds, which are outside of Primal's control.

Primal is not, however, a client that I would recommend for the power-user. Control over preferred relays is minimal and does not allow the user to determine which relays they write to and which they only read from. Though you can use your own wallet, it will not appear within the wallet interface, which only works with the custodial wallet from Strike. Moreover, and most eggregiously, the only way for existing users to log in is by pasting their nsec, as Primal does not support either the Android signer or remote signer options for users to protect their private key at this time. This lack of signer support is the primary reason the client received such a low overall score. If even one form of external signer log in is added to Primal, the score will be amended to 4.2 / 5, and if both Android signer and remote signer support is added, it will increase to 4.5.

Update: As of version 2.2.13, Primal now supports the Amber Android signer! One of the most glaring issues with the app has now been remedied and as promised, the overall score above has been increased.

Another downside to Primal is that it still utilizes an outdated direct message specification that leaks metadata that can be readily seen by anyone on the network. While the content of your messages remains encrypted, anyone can see who you are messaging with, and when. This also means that you will not see any DMs from users who are messaging from a client that has moved to the latest, and far more private, messaging spec.

That said, the beautiful thing about Nostr as a protocol is that users are not locked into any particular client. You may find Primal to be a great client for your average #bloomscrolling and zapping memes, but opt for a different client for more advanced uses and for direct messaging.

Features

Primal has a lot of features users would expect from any Nostr client that is focused on short-form notes, but it also packs in a lot of features that set it apart from other clients, and that showcase Primal's obvious prioritization of a top-tier user experience.

Home Feed

By default, the infinitely scrolling Home feed displays notes from those you currently follow in chronological order. This is traditional Nostr at its finest, and made all the more immersive by the choice to have all distracting UI elements quickly hide themselves from view as the you begin to scroll down the feed. They return just as quickly when you begin to scroll back up.

Scrolling the feed is incredibly fast, with no noticeable choppiness and minimal media pop-in if you are on a decent internet connection.

Helpfully, it is easy to get back to the top of the feed whenever there is a new post to be viewed, as a bubble will appear with the profile pictures of the users who have posted since you started scrolling.

Interacting With Notes

Interacting with a note in the feed can be done via the very recognizable icons at the bottom of each post. You can comment, zap, like, repost, and/or bookmark the note.

Notably, tapping on the zap icon will immediately zap the note your default amount of sats, making zapping incredibly fast, especially when using the built-in wallet. Long pressing on the zap icon will open up a menu with a variety of amounts, along with the ability to zap a custom amount. All of these amounts, and the messages that are sent with the zap, can be customized in the application settings.

Users who are familiar with Twitter or Instagram will feel right at home with only having one option for "liking" a post. However, users from Facebook or other Nostr clients may wonder why they don't have more options for reactions. This is one of those things where users who are new to Nostr probably won't notice they are missing out on anything at all, while users familiar with clients like #Amethyst or #noStrudel will miss the ability to react with a 🤙 or a 🫂.

It's a similar story with the bookmark option. While this is a nice bit of feature parity for Twitter users, for those already used to the ability to have multiple customized lists of bookmarks, or at minimum have the ability to separate them into public and private, it may be a disappointment that they have no access to the bookmarks they already built up on other clients. Primal offers only one list of bookmarks for short-form notes and they are all visible to the public. However, you are at least presented with a warning about the public nature of your bookmarks before saving your first one.

Yet, I can't dock the Primal team much for making these design choices, as they are understandable for Primal's goal of being a welcoming client for those coming over to Nostr from centralized platforms. They have optimized for the onboarding of new users, rather than for those who have been around for a while, and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that.

Post Creation

Composing posts in Primal is as simple as it gets. Accessed by tapping the obvious circular button with a "+" on it in the lower right of the Home feed, most of what you could need is included in the interface, and nothing you don't.

Your device's default keyboard loads immediately, and the you can start typing away.

There are options for adding images from your gallery, or taking a picture with your camera, both of which will result in the image being uploaded to Primal's media-hosting server. If you prefer to host your media elsewhere, you can simply paste the link to that media into your post.

There is also an @ icon as a tip-off that you can tag other users. Tapping on this simply types "@" into your note and brings up a list of users. All you have to do to narrow down the user you want to tag is continue typing their handle, Nostr address, or paste in their npub.

This can get mixed results in other clients, which sometimes have a hard time finding particular users when typing in their handle, forcing you to have to remember their Nostr address or go hunt down their npub by another means. Not so with Primal, though. I had no issues tagging anyone I wanted by simply typing in their handle.

Of course, when you are tagging someone well known, you may find that there are multiple users posing as that person. Primal helps you out here, though. Usually the top result is the person you want, as Primal places them in order of how many followers they have. This is quite reliable right now, but there is nothing stopping someone from spinning up an army of bots to follow their fake accounts, rendering follower count useless for determining which account is legitimate. It would be nice to see these results ranked by web-of-trust, or at least an indication of how many users you follow who also follow the users listed in the results.

Once you are satisfied with your note, the "Post" button is easy to find in the top right of the screen.

Feed Selector and Marketplace

Primal's Home feed really shines when you open up the feed selection interface, and find that there are a plethora of options available for customizing your view. By default, it only shows four options, but tapping "Edit" opens up a new page of available toggles to add to the feed selector.

The options don't end there, though. Tapping "Add Feed" will open up the feed marketplace, where an ever-growing number of custom feeds can be found, some created by Primal and some created by others. This feed marketplace is available to a few other clients, but none have so closely integrated it with their Home feeds like Primal has.

Unfortunately, as great as these custom feeds are, this was also the feature where I ran into the most bugs while testing out the app.

One of these bugs was while selecting custom feeds. Occasionally, these feed menu screens would become unresponsive and I would be unable to confirm my selection, or even use the back button on my device to back out of the screen. However, I was able to pull the screen down to close it and re-open the menu, and everything would be responsive again.

This only seemed to occur when I spent 30 seconds or more on the same screen, so I imagine that most users won't encounter it much in their regular use.

Another UI bug occurred for me while in the feed marketplace. I could scroll down the list of available feeds, but attempting to scroll back up the feed would often close the interface entirely instead, as though I had pulled the screen down from the top, when I was swiping in the middle of the screen.

The last of these bugs occurred when selecting a long-form "Reads" feed while in the menu for the Home feed. The menu would allow me to add this feed and select it to be displayed, but it would fail to load the feed once selected, stating "There is no content in this feed." Going to a different page within the the app and then going back to the Home tab would automatically remove the long-form feed from view, and reset back to the most recently viewed short-form "Notes" feed, though the long-form feed would still be available to select again. The results were similar when selecting a short-form feed for the Reads feed.

I would suggest that if long-form and short-form feeds are going to be displayed in the same list, and yet not be able to be displayed in the same feed, the application should present an error message when attempting to add a long-form feed for the Home feed or a short-form feed for the Reads feed, and encourage the user add it to the proper feed instead.

Long-Form "Reads" Feed

A brand new feature in Primal 2.0, users can now browse and read long-form content posted to Nostr without having to go to a separate client. Primal now has a dedicated "Reads" feed to browse and interact with these articles.

This feed displays the author and title of each article or blog, along with an image, if available. Quite conveniently, it also lets you know the approximate amount of time it will take to read a given article, so you can decide if you have the time to dive into it now, or come back later.

Noticeably absent from the Reads feed, though, is the ability to compose an article of your own. This is another understandable design choice for a mobile client. Composing a long-form note on a smart-phone screen is not a good time. Better to be done on a larger screen, in a client with a full-featured text editor.

Tapping an article will open up an attractive reading interface, with the ability to bookmark for later. These bookmarks are a separate list from your short-form note bookmarks so you don't have to scroll through a bunch of notes you bookmarked to find the article you told yourself you would read later and it's already been three weeks.

While you can comment on the article or zap it, you will notice that you cannot repost or quote-post it. It's not that you can't do so on Nostr. You absolutely can in other clients. In fact, you can do so on Primal's web client, too. However, Primal on Android does not handle rendering long-form note previews in the Home feed, so they have simply left out the option to share them there. See below for an example of a quote-post of a long-form note in the Primal web client vs the Android client.

Primal Web:

Primal Android:

The Explore Tab

Another unique feature of the Primal client is the Explore tab, indicated by the compass icon. This tab is dedicated to discovering content from outside your current follow list. You can find the feed marketplace here, and add any of the available feeds to your Home or Reads feed selections. You can also find suggested users to follow in the People tab. The Zaps tab will show you who has been sending and receiving large zaps. Make friends with the generous ones!

The Media tab gives you a chronological feed of just media, displayed in a tile view. This can be great when you are looking for users who post dank memes, or incredible photography on a regular basis. Unfortunately, it appears that there is no way to filter this feed for sensitive content, and so you do not have to scroll far before you see pornographic material.

Indeed, it does not appear that filters for sensitive content are available in Primal for any feed. The app is kind enough to give a minimal warning that objectionable content may be present when selecting the "Nostr Firehose" option in your Home feed, with a brief "be careful" in the feed description, but there is not even that much of a warning here for the media-only feed.

The media-only feed doesn't appear to be quite as bad as the Nostr Firehose feed, so there must be some form of filtering already taking place, rather than being a truly global feed of all media. Yet, occasional sensitive content still litters the feed and is unavoidable, even for users who would rather not see it. There are, of course, ways to mute particular users who post such content, if you don't want to see it a second time from the same user, but that is a never-ending game of whack-a-mole, so your only realistic choices in Primal are currently to either avoid the Nostr Firehose and media-only feeds, or determine that you can put up with regularly scrolling past often graphic content.

This is probably the only choice Primal has made that is not friendly to new users. Most clients these days will have some protections in place to hide sensitive content by default, but still allow the user to toggle those protections off if they so choose. Some of them hide posts flagged as sensitive content altogether, others just blur the images unless the user taps to reveal them, and others simply blur all images posted by users you don't follow. If Primal wants to target new users who are accustomed to legacy social media platforms, they really should follow suit.

The final tab is titled "Topics," but it is really just a list of popular hashtags, which appear to be arranged by how often they are being used. This can be good for finding things that other users are interested in talking about, or finding specific content you are interested in.

If you tap on any topic in the list, it will display a feed of notes that include that hashtag. What's better, you can add it as a feed option you can select on your Home feed any time you want to see posts with that tag.

The only suggestion I would make to improve this tab is some indication of why the topics are arranged in the order presented. A simple indicator of the number of posts with that hashtag in the last 24 hours, or whatever the interval is for determining their ranking, would more than suffice.

Even with those few shortcomings, Primal's Explore tab makes the client one of the best options for discovering content on Nostr that you are actually interested in seeing and interacting with.

Built-In Wallet

While this feature is completely optional, the icon to access the wallet is the largest of the icons at the bottom of the screen, making you feel like you are missing out on the most important feature of the app if you don't set it up. I could be critical of this design choice, but in many ways I think it is warranted. The built-in wallet is one of the most unique features that Primal has going for it.

Consider: If you are a new user coming to Nostr, who isn't already a Bitcoiner, and you see that everyone else on the platform is sending and receiving sats for their posts, will you be more likely to go download a separate wallet application or use one that is built-into your client? I would wager the latter option by a long shot. No need to figure out which wallet you should download, whether you should do self-custody or custodial, or make the mistake of choosing a wallet with unexpected setup fees and no Lightning address so you can't even receive zaps to it. nostr:npub16c0nh3dnadzqpm76uctf5hqhe2lny344zsmpm6feee9p5rdxaa9q586nvr often states that he believes more people will be onboarded to Bitcoin through Nostr than by any other means, and by including a wallet into the Primal client, his team has made adopting Bitcoin that much easier for new Nostr users.

Some of us purists may complain that it is custodial and KYC, but that is an unfortunate necessity in order to facilitate onboarding newcoiners to Bitcoin. This is not intended to be a wallet for those of us who have been using Bitcoin and Lightning regularly already. It is meant for those who are not already familiar with Bitcoin to make it as easy as possible to get off zero, and it accomplishes this better than any other wallet I have ever tried.

In large part, this is because the KYC is very light. It does need the user's legal name, a valid email address, date of birth, and country of residence, but that's it! From there, the user can buy Bitcoin directly through the app, but only in the amount of $4.99 at a time. This is because there is a substantial markup on top of the current market price, due to utilizing whatever payment method the user has set up through their Google Play Store. The markup seemed to be about 19% above the current price, since I could purchase 4,143 sats for $4.99 ($120,415 / Bitcoin), when the current price was about $101,500. But the idea here is not for the Primal wallet to be a user's primary method of stacking sats. Rather, it is intended to get them off zero and have a small amount of sats to experience zapping with, and it accomplishes this with less friction than any other method I know.

Moreover, the Primal wallet has the features one would expect from any Lightning wallet. You can send sats to any Nostr user or Lightning address, receive via invoice, or scan to pay an invoice. It even has the ability to receive via on-chain. This means users who don't want to pay the markup from buying through Primal can easily transfer sats they obtained by other means into the Primal wallet for zapping, or for using it as their daily-driver spending wallet.

Speaking of zapping, once the wallet is activated, sending zaps is automatically set to use the wallet, and they are fast. Primal gives you immediate feedback that the zap was sent and the transaction shows in your wallet history typically before you can open the interface. I can confidently say that Primal wallet's integration is the absolute best zapping experience I have seen in any Nostr client.

One thing to note that may not be immediately apparent to new users is they need to add their Lightning address with Primal into their profile details before they can start receiving zaps. So, sending zaps using the wallet is automatic as soon as you activate it, but receiving is not. Ideally, this could be further streamlined, so that Primal automatically adds the Lightning address to the user's profile when the wallet is set up, so long as there is not currently a Lightning address listed.

Of course, if you already have a Lightning wallet, you can connect it to Primal for zapping, too. We will discuss this further in the section dedicated to zap integration.

Advanced Search

Search has always been a tough nut to crack on Nostr, since it is highly dependent on which relays the client is pulling information from. Primal has sought to resolve this issue, among others, by running a caching relay that pulls notes from a number of relays to store them locally, and perform some spam filtering. This allows for much faster retrieval of search results, and also makes their advanced search feature possible.

Advanced search can be accessed from most pages by selecting the magnifying glass icon, and then the icon for more options next to the search bar.

As can be seen in the screenshot below, there are a plethora of filters that can be applied to your search terms.

You can immediately see how this advanced search could be a very powerful tool for not just finding a particular previous note that you are looking for, but for creating your own custom feed of notes. Well, wouldn't you know it, Primal allows you to do just that! This search feature, paired with the other features mentioned above related to finding notes you want to see in your feed, makes Primal hands-down the best client for content discovery.

The only downside as a free user is that some of these search options are locked behind the premium membership. Or else you only get to see a certain number of results of your advanced search before you must be a premium member to see more.

Can My Grandma Use It?

Score: 4.8 / 5 Primal has obviously put a high priority on making their client user-friendly, even for those who have never heard of relays, public/private key cryptography, or Bitcoin. All of that complexity is hidden away. Some of it is available to play around with for the users who care to do so, but it does not at all get in the way of the users who just want to jump in and start posting notes and interacting with other users in a truly open public square.

To begin with, the onboarding experience is incredibly smooth. Tap "Create Account," enter your chosen display name and optional bio information, upload a profile picture, and then choose some topics you are interested in. You are then presented with a preview of your profile, with the ability to add a banner image, if you so choose, and then tap "Create Account Now."

From there you receive confirmation that your account has been created and that your "Nostr key" is available to you in the application settings. No further explanation is given about what this key is for at this point, but the user doesn't really need to know at the moment, either. If they are curious, they will go to the app settings to find out.

At this point, Primal encourages the user to activate Primal Wallet, but also gives the option for the user to do it later.

That's it! The next screen the user sees if they don't opt to set up the wallet is their Home feed with notes listed in chronological order. More impressive, the feed is not empty, because Primal has auto-followed several accounts based on your selected topics.

Now, there has definitely been some legitimate criticism of this practice of following specific accounts based on the topic selection, and I agree. I would much prefer to see Primal follow hashtags based on what was selected, and combine the followed hashtags into a feed titled "My Topics" or something of that nature, and make that the default view when the user finishes onboarding. Following particular users automatically will artificially inflate certain users' exposure, while other users who might be quality follows for that topic aren't seen at all.

The advantage of following particular users over a hashtag, though, is that Primal retains some control over the quality of the posts that new users are exposed to right away. Primal can ensure that new users see people who are actually posting quality photography when they choose it as one of their interests. However, even with that example, I chose photography as one of my interests and while I did get some stunning photography in my Home feed by default based on Primal's chosen follows, I also scrolled through the Photography hashtag for a bit and I really feel like I would have been better served if Primal had simply followed that hashtag rather than a particular set of users.

We've already discussed how simple it is to set up the Primal Wallet. You can see the features section above if you missed it. It is, by far, the most user friendly experience to onboarding onto Lightning and getting a few sats for zapping, and it is the only one I know of that is built directly into a Nostr client. This means new users will have a frictionless introduction to transacting via Lightning, perhaps without even realizing that's what they are doing.

Discovering new content of interest is incredibly intuitive on Primal, and the only thing that new users may struggle with is getting their own notes seen by others. To assist with this, I would suggest Primal encourage users to make their first post to the introductions hashtag and direct any questions to the AskNostr hashtag as part of the onboarding process. This will get them some immediate interactions from other users, and further encouragement to set up their wallet if they haven't already done so.

How do UI look?

Score: 4.9 / 5

Primal is the most stunningly beautiful Nostr client available, in my honest opinion. Despite some of my hangups about certain functionality, the UI alone makes me want to use it.

It is clean, attractive, and intuitive. Everything I needed was easy to find, and nothing felt busy or cluttered. There are only a few minor UI glitches that I ran into while testing the app. Some of them were mentioned in the section of the review detailing the feed selector feature, but a couple others occurred during onboarding.

First, my profile picture was not centered in the preview when I uploaded it. This appears to be because it was a low quality image. Uploading a higher quality photo did not have this result.

The other UI bug was related to text instructions that were cut off, and not able to scroll to see the rest of them. This occurred on a few pages during onboarding, and I expect it was due to the size of my phone screen, since it did not occur when I was on a slightly larger phone or tablet.

Speaking of tablets, Primal Android looks really good on a tablet, too! While the client does not have a landscape mode by default, many Android tablets support forcing apps to open in full-screen landscape mode, with mixed results. However, Primal handles it well. I would still like to see a tablet version developed that takes advantage of the increased screen real estate, but it is certainly a passable option.

At this point, I would say the web client probably has a bit better UI for use on a tablet than the Android client does, but you miss out on using the built-in wallet, which is a major selling point of the app.

This lack of a landscape mode for tablets and the few very minor UI bugs I encountered are the only reason Primal doesn't get a perfect score in this category, because the client is absolutely stunning otherwise, both in light and dark modes. There are also two color schemes available for each.

Log In Options

Score: 4 / 5 (Updated 4/30/2025)

Unfortunately, Primal has not included any options for log in outside of pasting your private key into the application. While this is a very simple way to log in for new users to understand, it is also the least secure means to log into Nostr applications.

This is because, even with the most trustworthy client developer, giving the application access to your private key always has the potential for that private key to somehow be exposed or leaked, and on Nostr there is currently no way to rotate to a different private key and keep your identity and social graph. If someone gets your key, they are you on Nostr for all intents and purposes.

This is not a situation that users should be willing to tolerate from production-release clients at this point. There are much better log in standards that can and should be implemented if you care about your users.

That said, I am happy to report that external signer support is on the roadmap for Primal, as confirmed below:

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No word yet on whether this will be Android signer or remote signer support, or both.

This lack of external signer support is why I absolutely will not use my main npub with Primal for Android. I am happy to use the web client, which supports and encourages logging in with a browser extension, but until the Android client allows users to protect their private key, I cannot recommend it for existing Nostr users.

Update: As of version 2.2.13, all of what I have said above is now obsolete. Primal has added Android signer support, so users can now better protect their nsec by using Amber!

I would still like to see support for remote signers, especially with nstart.me as a recommended Nostr onboarding process and the advent of FROSTR for key management. That said, Android signer support on its own has been a long time coming and is a very welcome addition to the Primal app. Bravo Primal team!

Zap Integration

Score: 4.8 / 5

As mentioned when discussing Primal's built-in wallet feature, zapping in Primal can be the most seamless experience I have ever seen in a Nostr client. Pairing the wallet with the client is absolutely the path forward for Nostr leading the way to Bitcoin adoption.

But what if you already have a Lightning wallet you want to use for zapping? You have a couple options. If it is an Alby wallet or another wallet that supports Nostr Wallet Connect, you can connect it with Primal to use with one-tap zapping.

How your zapping experience goes with this option will vary greatly based on your particular wallet of choice and is beyond the scope of this review. I used this option with a hosted wallet on my Alby Hub and it worked perfectly. Primal gives you immediate feedback that you have zapped, even though the transaction usually takes a few seconds to process and appear in your wallet's history.

The one major downside to using an external wallet is the lack of integration with the wallet interface. This interface currently only works with Primal's wallet, and therefore the most prominent tab in the entire app goes unused when you connect an external wallet.

An ideal improvement would be for the wallet screen to work similar to Alby Go when you have an external wallet connected via Nostr Wallet Connect, allowing the user to have Primal act as their primary mobile Lightning wallet. It could have balance and transaction history displayed, and allow sending and receiving, just like the integrated Primal wallet, but remove the ability to purchase sats directly through the app when using an external wallet.

Content Discovery

Score: 4.8 / 5

Primal is the best client to use if you want to discover new content you are interested in. There is no comparison, with only a few caveats.

First, the content must have been posted to Nostr as either a short-form or long-form note. Primal has a limited ability to display other types of content. For instance, discovering video content or streaming content is lacking.

Second, you must be willing to put up with the fact that Primal lacks a means of filtering sensitive content when you are exploring beyond the bounds of your current followers. This may not be an issue for some, but for others it could be a deal-breaker.

Third, it would be preferable for Primal to follow topics you are interested in when you choose them during onboarding, rather than follow specific npubs. Ideally, create a "My Topics" feed that can be edited by selecting your interests in the Topics section of the Explore tab.

Relay Management

Score: 2.5 / 5

For new users who don't want to mess around with managing relays, Primal is fantastic! There are 7 relays selected by default, in addition to Primal's caching service. For most users who aren't familiar with Nostr's protocol archetecture, they probably won't ever have to change their default relays in order to use the client as they would expect.

However, two of these default relays were consistently unreachable during the week that I tested. These were relay.plebes.fans and remnant.cloud. The first relay seems to be an incorrect URL, as I found nosflare.plebes.fans online and with perfect uptime for the last 12 hours on nostr.watch. I was unable to find remnant.cloud on nostr.watch at all. A third relay was intermittent, sometimes online and reachable, and other times unreachable: v1250.planz.io/nostr. If Primal is going to have default relays, they should ideally be reliable and with accurate URLs.

That said, users can add other relays that they prefer, and remove relays that they no longer want to use. They can even set a different caching service to use with the client, rather than using Primal's.

However, that is the extent of a user's control over their relays. They cannot choose which relays they want to write to and which they want to read from, nor can they set any private relays, outbox or inbox relays, or general relays. Loading the npub I used for this review into another client with full relay management support revealed that the relays selected in Primal are being added to both the user's public outbox relays and public inbox relays, but not to any other relay type, which leads me to believe the caching relay is acting as the client's only general relay and search relay.

One unique and welcomed addition is the "Enhanced Privacy" feature, which is off by default, but which can be toggled on. I am not sure why this is not on by default, though. Perhaps someone from the Primal team can enlighten me on that choice.

By default, when you post to Nostr, all of your outbox relays will see your IP address. If you turn on the Enhanced Privacy mode, only Primal's caching service will see your IP address, because it will post your note to the other relays on your behalf. In this way, the caching service acts similar to a VPN for posting to Nostr, as long as you trust Primal not to log or leak your IP address.

In short, if you use any other Nostr clients at all, do not use Primal for managing your relays.

Media Hosting Options

Score: 4.9 / 5 This is a NEW SECTION of this review, as of version 2.2.13!

Primal has recently added support for the Blossom protocol for media hosting, and has added a new section within their settings for "Media Uploads."

Media hosting is one of the more complicated problems to solve for a decentralized publishing protocol like Nostr. Text-based notes are generally quite small, making them no real burden to store on relays, and a relay can prune old notes as they see fit, knowing that anyone who really cared about those notes has likely archived them elsewhere. Media, on the other hand, can very quickly fill up a server's disk space, and because it is usually addressable via a specific URL, removing it from that location to free up space means it will no longer load for anyone.

Blossom solves this issue by making it easy to run a media server and have the same media mirrored to more than one for redundancy. Since the media is stored with a file name that is a hash of the content itself, if the media is deleted from one server, it can still be found from any other server that has the same file, without any need to update the URL in the Nostr note where it was originally posted.

Prior to this update, Primal only allowed media uploads to their own media server. Now, users can upload to any blossom server, and even choose to have their pictures or videos mirrored additional servers automatically. To my knowledge, no other Nostr client offers this automatic mirroring at the time of upload.

One of my biggest criticisms of Primal was that it had taken a siloed approach by providing a client, a caching relay, a media server, and a wallet all controlled by the same company. The whole point of Nostr is to separate control of all these services to different entities. Now users have more options for separating out their media hosting and their wallet to other providers, at least. I would still like to see other options available for a caching relay, but that relies on someone else being willing to run one, since the software is open for anyone to use. It's just not your average, lightweight relay that any average person can run from home.

Regardless, this update to add custom Blossom servers is a most welcome step in the right direction!

Current Users' Questions

The AskNostr hashtag can be a good indication of the pain points that other users are currently having with a client. Here are some of the most common questions submitted about Primal since the launch of 2.0:

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This was a pretty common question, because users expect that they will be able to create the same type of content that they can consume in a particular client. I can understand why this was left out in a mobile client, but perhaps it should be added in the web client.

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This is a more concerning bug, since it appears some users are experiencing their images being replaced with completely different images. I did not experience anything similar in my testing, though.

nostr:note1uhrk30nq0e566kx8ac4qpwrdh0vfaav33rfvckyvlzn04tkuqahsx8e7mr

There hasn't been an answer to this, but I have not been able to find a way. It seems search results will always include replies as well as original notes, so a feed made from the search results will as well. Perhaps a filter can be added to the advanced search to exclude replies? There is already a filter to only show replies, but there is no corresponding filter to only show original notes.

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Since both mobile platforms support the wallet, users expect that they will be able to access it in their web client, too. At this time, they cannot. The only way to have seamless zapping in the web client is to use the Alby extension, but there is not a way to connect it to your Primal wallet via Nostr Wallet Connect either. This means users must have a separate wallet for zapping on the web client if they use the Primal Wallet on mobile.

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It seems that Primal is filtering for spam even for profiles you actively follow. Moreover, exactly what the criteria is for being considered spam is currently opaque.

nostr:note1xexnzv0vrmc8svvduurydwmu43w7dftyqmjh4ps98zksr39ln2qswkuced

For those unaware, Blossom is a protocol for hosting media as blobs identified by a hash, allowing them to be located on and displayed from other servers they have been mirrored to when when the target server isn't available. Primal currently runs a Blossom server (blossom.primal.net) so I would expect we see Blossom support in the future.

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Currently, Primal on Android only supports uploading photos to your posts. Users must upload any video to some other hosting service and copy/paste a link to the video into their post on Primal. I would not be surprised to see this feature added in the near future, though.

nostr:note10w6538y58dkd9mdrlkfc8ylhnyqutc56ggdw7gk5y7nsp00rdk4q3qgrex

Many Nostr users have more than one npub for various uses. Users would prefer to have a way to quickly switch between accounts than to have to log all the way out and paste their npub for the other account every time they want to use it.

There is good news on this front, though:

nostr:note17xv632yqfz8nx092lj4sxr7drrqfey6e2373ha00qlq8j8qv6jjs36kxlh

Wrap Up

All in all, Primal is an excellent client. It won't be for everyone, but that's one of the strengths of Nostr as a protocol. You can choose to use the client that best fits your own needs, and supplement with other clients and tools as necessary.

There are a couple glaring issues I have with Primal that prevent me from using it on my main npub, but it is also an ever-improving client, that already has me hopeful for those issues to be resolved in a future release.

So, what should I review next? Another Android client, such as #Amethyst or #Voyage? Maybe an "other stuff" app, like #Wavlake or #Fountain? Please leave your suggestions in the comments.

I hope this review was valuable to you! If it was, please consider letting me know just how valuable by zapping me some sats and reposting it out to your follows.

Thank you for reading!

PV 🤙

@ 401014b3:59d5476b

And here's what it said.

And for what it's worth, I actually think ChatGPT nailed it.

Thoughts?

1. Andy Reid – Kansas City Chiefs Andy Reid remains the gold standard among NFL head coaches. With three Super Bowl titles in the past six seasons and a career record of 273-146-1 (.651), Reid's offensive innovation and leadership continue to set him apart. ​

2. Sean McVay – Los Angeles Rams Sean McVay has revitalized the Rams since taking over in 2017, leading them to two Super Bowl appearances and maintaining only one losing season in eight years. His ability to adapt and keep the team competitive has solidified his status as one of the league's elite coaches. ​

3. John Harbaugh – Baltimore Ravens John Harbaugh's tenure with the Ravens has been marked by consistent success, including a Super Bowl victory in 2012 and multiple double-digit win seasons. His leadership and adaptability have kept Baltimore as a perennial contender. ​

4. Nick Sirianni – Philadelphia Eagles Nick Sirianni has quickly risen through the ranks, boasting a .706 regular-season winning percentage and leading the Eagles to two Super Bowl appearances, including one victory. His emphasis on player morale and adaptability have been key to Philadelphia's recent success. ​

5. Dan Campbell – Detroit Lions Dan Campbell has transformed the Lions into a formidable team, improving their record each season and instilling a culture of toughness and resilience. Despite a disappointing playoff exit in 2024, Campbell's impact on the franchise is undeniable.

originally posted at https://stacker.news/items/967880

@ 3c389c8f:7a2eff7f

Sharing a Note on Nostr:

🔁Yeah, it probably seems obvious. No need to dwell for long, but this is another function that goes by half a dozen different names. Repost, renote, retweet, boost, bump, the ubiquitous little repeat button... It's all the same. It doesn't matter what its called, the feature lets you push notes you may find valuable, to the people who follow you. Additionally you also have the "Quote" option if you would like to add your own remarks or context. Both of these features are supported by most Nostr microblogging clients and some specialty clients, though some have chosen to exclude one or the other to adhere to a set of guiding principles aimed at helping users to enjoy a healthier social media experience.

Similar to a quote, you also have the option to copy NoteIDs to paste in other places. They will look like: nevent..., naddr..., or some other possibly foreign looking string prefixed with 'n' and in some cases the may be preceded by 'nostr:'. These are handy when you'd like to use a note for some other purpose beyond a quote. Perhaps you would like to quote it in a Nostr article or blog entry, or you would like to create a note focusing on a series of notes. Many clients offer easy access to these handy nostr links. If you're finding that the one you are using, does not, then simply hop to another. This is one of the amazing yet simple uses of Nostr's unique identity and contact list ownership.

Sharing Note and Profile Links Off of Nostr:

This is where things get really interesting. If you try to send these 'n' prefixed Nostr links to someone, they will receive that random string and have no clue what to do with it. To solve this, some clever minds came up with njump.me. Just visit that URL and tack your 'n' prefixed event to the end, and boom! you have a link you can send to anyone. Many apps have integrated this feature into their interface to make it easy and convenient to send awesome Nostr content to anyone anywhere, and they can choose which Nostr app they want to use to engage with it right in the landing. Some Nostr clients have traditional link sharing, as well, so you can share links right to the app that you use.

Helping Your Friends to Get Started:

We've touched on this a lot in previous posts but in case you missed it: nstart.me hubstr.org nosta.me These are all great options to onboarding your friends in a way that allows for them to explore Nostr right out of the gate. You always have the option of creating a keypair in nearly every app around, too. This is easier for some people, depending on how much they want to learn right away, or how they may be using Nostr.

There's some cool new tools coming out to help even more with getting your friends set up to use Nostr to its fullest capacity. Follow packs, trust attestations, and suggested app packs are all things we look forward to diving into more deeply in the near future. Please keep an eye out if your interested in reading the Spatia Nostra

@ e968e50b:db2a803a

Has anyone developed a lightning wallet using a raspberry pi or something like that? This would be a device that could fit in your pocket with a small screen and QR scanner for people that can't afford or don't want to carry a smart phone. It would use wifi or something like that. Is this too much of a security headache? Can it be done easily with any wallet's current software?

originally posted at https://stacker.news/items/967863

@ 5f078e90:b2bacaa3

Petal's Glow

In a quiet meadow, pink flower blooms named Petal danced under moonlight. Their delicate petals glowed, guiding a weary firefly home. Grateful, the firefly wove light patterns, telling their tale. By dawn, bees hummed Petal’s story, spreading it across the valley. The blooms stood prouder, their rosy hue a symbol of gentle hope.

This is 334 characters, some md, bidirectional-bridge.js used.

@ 5f078e90:b2bacaa3

Cactus story

In a sun-scorched desert, a lone cactus named Sage stood tall. Each dawn, she whispered to the wind, sharing tales of ancient rains. One night, a lost coyote curled beneath her spines, seeking shade. Sage offered her last drops of water, saved from a rare storm. Grateful, the coyote sang her story to the stars, and Sage’s legend grew, a beacon of kindness in the arid wild.

This test is between 300 and 500 characters long, started on Nostr to test the bidirectional-bridge script.

It has a bit of markdown included.

@ 4d41a7cb:7d3633cc

Did you know that Federal Reserve Notes (FRNs), commonly known as "us dollars" are broken contracts? In fact FRNs started as dollar IOUs and then the Federal Reserve (a private corporation) defaulted on its debts and made the U.S citizens pay the bill: effectively stealing the privately owned gold.

Comand + shift + v = pegar sin choclo.

The United States Dollar

It is not that the dollar was "backed by gold" as it is commonly said. The dollar was primally a measure of weight of silver and then a measure of weight of gold. Let see a little history about the U.S dollar.

What does the constitution says?

Article I, Section 8:

This section grants Congress the power "to coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, and fix the standard of weights and measures."

Article I, Section 10:

"No State shall... make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts."

The United States government, by decree, created the dollar as measure of weight defined by the Coinage Act of 1792 as 371.25 grains (24 grams) of silver.

The 1794 silver dollar, known as the "Flowing Hair dollar," was the first silver dollar coin produced by the United States Mint. This was the original dollar! The were minted in $1, $0,5.

In 1795 the United States minted its first gold coins under the Coinage Act of 1792, which introduced the following denominations: $2,5, $5 and $10. The silver to gold ratio was fixed at 1:15, meaning 15 ounces of silver was the equivalent to one ounce of gold.

Individuals could bring silver bullion to the U.S. Mint and have it coined into legal tender.

## Coinage acts

The Coinage Act of 1834 adjusted the gold-to-silver ratio to 16:1 and and the weight of the gold coins because gold was undervalue and encouraging the melting and exporting of American gold.

The coinage act of 1837 defined the silver dollar as containing 412.5 grains of standard silver (90% silver and 10% copper) and it reinforced the legal tender status of these coins, ensuring their acceptance for all debts, public and private.

The Coinage Act of 1849 specifically addressed the introduction of new gold denominations in response to the California Gold Rush, which significantly increased gold supplies in the United States. The Act authorized the minting of a $1 gold coin, the smallest gold denomination ever issued by the United States. The Act also authorized the creation of the $20 gold coin, known as the Double Eagle.

The gold dollar coin contained 23.22 grains of pure gold or 1.505grams or 0.0484 troy ounces.

The Double Eagle contained 464.4 grains of pure gold or 30.093 grams, 0.968 troy ounces.

The coinage act of 1857 sought to establish a uniform domestic currency and reduce reliance on foreign coins, demonetizing every foreign coins as legal tender. This was also the beginning of the Flying Eagle cent, which was smaller in diameter and composed of 88% copper and 12% nickel. This centralized more the coinage in the U.S.

U.S Gold certificates

The Act of March 3, 1863, officially known as the National Bank Act, was a significant piece of legislation during the American Civil War aimed at creating a national banking system and establishing a uniform national currency.

This legislation allowed the U.S. Treasury to issue gold certificates, which served as a form of paper currency backed by gold. The introduction of gold certificates was primarily intended to facilitate transactions involving gold without the need for the physical transfer of the metal.

This was primary for large size comercial transactions or payments among banks.

1865 Series

"It is hereby certified that one hundred dollars have been deposited with the assistant treasurer of the U.S in New York payable in GOLD at his office in the xxx New York "

The coinage act of 1873 also known as the "crime of 1873" was the intent to demonetize silver by ceasing the minting of silver dollars which meant that citizens could no longer bring silver to the mint to be coined into legal tender. By stopping the production of silver dollars, the Act implicitly placed the U.S. on a gold standard, where gold, not silver, was the primary basis for currency. This had lasting economic effects, particularly on farmers and silver miners who preferred bimetallism (the use of both gold and silver as standards).

The Act was controversial, particularly in western and rural areas where silver was a significant economic factor. Many believed that the Act was passed to benefit creditors and large financial interests by adopting a gold standard, which tended to deflate prices and increase the value of money.

The coinage act of 1878, The Act mandated the U.S. Treasury to purchase a specified amount of silver each month, between two million and four million dollars worth, and to mint it into silver dollars. This marked a partial return to the use of silver as currency through the coinage of the standard silver dollar. The Act allowed for the issuance of silver certificates, which could be used as currency in place of actual silver coins, thus easing the circulation of silver-backed currency.

The Bland-Allison Act was passed against a backdrop of economic depression and agrarian unrest. It represented a compromise between advocates of the gold standard and those wishing to return to bimetallism.

1882 series

The 30 years of economic and political discourse between bimetallism supporters and gold only advocates finally ended in the 1900.

The Gold Standard Act of 1900

The Gold Standard Act of 1900 formalized the monetary system of the United States by establishing gold as the sole standard for redeeming paper money and effectively ending the bimetallic standard. It established that the gold dollar would be the standard unit of value, equating the dollar to 25.8 grains of gold at a purity of 90%. Silver certificates and silver coins remained in circulation but without the backing of free and unlimited coinage.

Let's remember that the dollar was still a measure of gold. The certificates where government IOUs for that gold that was deposited in the treasury of the United States.

1907 series of gold certificates:

The Federal Reserve Act of 1913

The Federal Reserva Act of 1913 created a monopoly over the issuance of the American paper currency. This marked the privatization of the currency and a centralization of power like never before. More about this in another article.

But essentially the secret agenda of banksters was to issue IOUs without any restriction and make the United State Government responsible to redeem this paper currency for gold. And I will show you exactly how. Alfred Owen Crozier wrote a book in 1912 one year before the bill was passed analyzing and opposing it and made this same argument.

Federal Reserve Notes

A paper contract, a promissory note, an "I owe you x amount"

This paper currency issued by this private central bank were dollar IOUs contracts or promissory notes.

According to Black's law dictionary a Federal Reserve note is: The paper currency in circulation in the United States. The notes are issued by the Federal Reserve Banks, are effectively non-interest-bearing promissory notes payable to bearer on demand, and are issued in denominations of $1, $5, $10, $20, $50, $100, $500, $1000, $5,000 and $10,000.

NON INTERES BEARING PROMISSORY NOTES.

A promissory note is a written, unconditional promise made by one party (the maker) to pay a definite sum of money to another party (the payee) or bearer, either on demand or at a specified future date. It is essentially a financial instrument representing a formal commitment to settle a specified monetary obligation.

Key Characteristics of a Promissory Note:

1. Written Instrument: The promise to pay must be documented in writing.
2. Unconditional Promise: The promise to pay cannot be contingent on any external factors or conditions.
3. Definite Sum: The amount to be paid must be clearly specified and agreed upon in the note.
4. Payee: The note must designate the person or entity to whom the payment is to be made either explicitly or implicitly by specifying it as payable "to bearer".
5. Payable on Demand or at a Specific Time: The promissory note should indicate whether the payment is due upon demand by the payee or at a specific future date as agreed by the involved parties.

Promissory notes are commonly used in various financial transactions, including loans, business financing, and real estate deals, as they formalize the commitment to pay and can be enforced as a legal contract if necessary.

The Federal Reserve (FED) issued paper contract promising to be redeemable in gold. Most people never saw or understood the contract. Most never read it because the Fed cleverly hid the contract on the front of the bill by dividing it into five separate lines of text with a very different typeface for each line and placing the president's picture right in the middle. They even used the old lawyer's trick of hiding the most important text in small print.

Over time, the terms and conditions of the contract were watered down until they eventually became literally a promissory note for nothing. But let's analice how they did this step by step...

FEDERAL RESERVE NOTES: 1914 SERIES

Content of the contract:

Federal reserve note

The United States of America will pay to the bearer on demand: FIFTY DOLLARS

Authorized by federal reserve act of December 23, 1913

This note is receivable by all national and member banks and federal reserve banks and for all taxes, customs and other public dues. It is redeemable in gold on demand at the treasury department of the United States in the city of Washington district of Columbia or in gold or lawful money at any federal reserve bank.

So if a dollar was 20.67 per ounce, $50 could be exchanged for about 2.42 ounces of gold.

FEDERAL RESERVE NOTES :1918 SERIES

Content of the contract:

Federal reserve note

The United States of America will pay to the bearer on demand: Ten thousand dollars

Authorized by federal reserve act of December 23, 1913, as amended by act of September 26, 1918

This note is receivable by all national and member banks and federal reserve banks and for all taxes, customs and other public dues. It is redeemable in gold on demand at the treasury department of the United States in the city of Washington district of Columbia or in gold or lawful money at any federal reserve bank.

So if a dollar was 20.67 per ounce, $10,000 could be exchanged for 484.29ounces of gold.

Series of 1928

The great imitation

In 1928 the U.S government issued a new series of gold certificates payable to the bearer on demand.

The same year the Federal Reserve issued it's own promissory notes copying the us government gold certificate's design:

Content of the contract:

Federal reserve note

The United States of America

will pay to the bearer on demand: One hundred dollars

Reedemable in gold on demand at the United States treasury, or in gold or lawful money, at any federal reserve bank.

So if a dollar was 20.67 per ounce, $100 could be exchanged for 4.84 ounces of gold.

Here's all the denominations issued by the Federal Reserve back then:

This instrument was the facilitator of the Great depression, the inflation and deflation of the paper currency: as Thomas Jefferson warned long time ago:

“If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency first by inflation then by deflation the banks and corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the people of all property until their children wake up homeless on the continent their Fathers conquered... I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies... The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people to whom it properly belongs.”

THE CONFISCATION OF GOLD

The end of the dollar and the replacement of gold and gold certificates by Federal Reserve Notes worthless paper currency.

Executive Order 6102, issued on April 5, 1933, by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, forced everyone to exchange their gold and gold certificates for federal reserve notes at $20,67 FEDERAL RESERVE NOTES per ounce.

THIS WAS THE END OF THE DOLLAR. THE END OF THE GOLD STANDARD. THE END OF THE CONSTITUTIONAL REPUBLIC FORM OF GOVERNMENT. THE END OF FREEDOM. THE ABANDONMENT OF THE CONSTITUTIONAL PRINCIPLES.

The Gold Reserve Act of 1934

This act further devalued the "gold content of the FRNs" and ended the redemption of gold certificates for gold coins. One ounce of gold was now "35 FRNs" in theory but this was not entirely true.

Lets analice the evolution of the Federal Reserve Notes.

Content of the contract:

Federal reserve note

The United States of America

will pay to the bearer on demand: One hundred dollars

THIS NOTE IS LEGAL TENDER FOR ALL DEBTS, PUBLIC AND PRIVATE AND IT IS REDEEMABLE IN LAWFUL MONEY AT THE UNITED STATES TREASURY, OR AT ANY FEDERAL RESERVE BANK.

So if a dollar was 20.67 per ounce, $100 could be exchanged for one hundred dollars of Lawful money?

They eliminated the gold clause from the contract. This contract is a lie, what is this redeemable for? U.S treasuries? Different denominations of FRNs? They changed the definition of lawful money. This was never money this was a broken contract and it gets obvious in the next series...

1963 Series

This series look like they did photoshop on the "payable to the bearer on demand" part that was below franklin in previous series.

Content of the contract now was

Federal reserve note

The United States of America

THIS NOTE IS LEGAL TENDER FOR ALL DEBTS, PUBLIC AND PRIVATE.

ONE HUNDRED DOLLARS

Conclusion

Between 1913 and 1928 the dollar was gradually replaced by Federal Reserve Notes until in 1934 the gold standard was definitively abandoned. From that time the Federal Reserve Note became the "new legal tender money" replacing the dollar and slowly replacing silver coins too until in 1965 silver was definitively abandoned.

---

IT IS NOT THAT THE DOLLAR WAS “BACKED” BY SILVER OR GOLD.

Gold and silver were such powerful money during the founding of the United States of America that the founding fathers declared that only gold or silver coins can be “money” in America. Since gold and silver coinage was heavy and inconvenient for a lot of transactions, they were stored in banks and a claim check was issued as a money substitute. People traded their coupons as money or “currency.” Currency is not money, but a money substitute. Redeemable currency must promise to pay a dollar equivalent in gold or silver money. Federal Reserve Notes (FRNs) make no such promises and are not “money.” A Federal Reserve Note is a debt obligation of the federal United States government, not “money.” The federal United States government and the U.S. Congress were not and have never been authorized by the Constitution for the united States of America to issue currency of any kind, but only lawful money – gold and silver coin.

It is essential that we comprehend the distinction between real money and paper money substitute. One cannot get rich by accumulating money substitutes; one can only get deeper into debt. We the People no longer have any “money.” Most Americans have not been paid any “money” for a very long time, perhaps not in their entire life. Now do you comprehend why you feel broke? Now do you understand why you are “bankrupt” along with the rest of the country?

@ b99efe77:f3de3616

🚦Traffic Light Control System🚦

This Petri net represents a traffic control protocol ensuring that two traffic lights alternate safely and are never both green at the same time.

petrinet ;start () -> greenLight1 redLight2 ;toRed1 greenLight1 -> queue redLight1 ;toGreen2 redLight2 queue -> greenLight2 ;toGreen1 queue redLight1 -> greenLight1 ;toRed2 greenLight2 -> redLight2 queue ;stop redLight1 queue redLight2 -> ()

@ b99efe77:f3de3616

🚦Traffic Light Control System🚦

This Petri net represents a traffic control protocol ensuring that two traffic lights alternate safely and are never both green at the same time.

petrinet ;start () -> greenLight1 redLight2 ;toRed1 greenLight1 -> queue redLight1 ;toGreen2 redLight2 queue -> greenLight2 ;toGreen1 queue redLight1 -> greenLight1 ;toRed2 greenLight2 -> redLight2 queue ;stop redLight1 queue redLight2 -> ()

@ b99efe77:f3de3616

🚦Traffic Light Control System🚦

This Petri net represents a traffic control protocol ensuring that two traffic lights alternate safely and are never both green at the same time.

petrinet ;start () -> greenLight1 redLight2 ;toRed1 greenLight1 -> queue redLight1 ;toGreen2 redLight2 queue -> greenLight2 ;toGreen1 queue redLight1 -> greenLight1 ;toRed2 greenLight2 -> redLight2 queue ;stop redLight1 queue redLight2 -> ()

@ 59b96df8:b208bd59

Nostr is a decentralized protocol designed to be censorship-resistant.
However, this resilience can sometimes make data synchronization between relays more difficult—though not impossible.

In my opinion, Nostr still lacks a few key features to ensure consistent and reliable operation, especially regarding data versioning.

Profile Versions

When I log in to a new Nostr client using my private key, I might end up with an outdated version of my profile, depending on how the client is built or configured.

Why does this happen?
The client fetches my profile data (kind:0 - NIP 1) from its own list of selected relays.
If I didn’t publish the latest version of my profile on those specific relays, the client will only display an older version.

Relay List Metadata

The same issue occurs with the relay list metadata (kind:10002 - NIP 65).
When switching to a new client, it's common that my configured relay list isn't properly carried over because it also depends on where the data is fetched.

Protocol Change Proposal

I believe the protocol should evolve, specifically regarding how kind:0 (user metadata) and kind:10002 (relay list metadata) events are distributed to relays.

Relays should be able to build a list of public relays automatically (via autodiscovery), and forward all received kind:0 and kind:10002 events to every relay in that list.

This would create a ripple effect:

``` Relay A relay list: [Relay B, Relay C]
Relay B relay list: [Relay A, Relay C]
Relay C relay list: [Relay A, Relay B]

User A sends kind:0 to Relay A
→ Relay A forwards kind:0 to Relay B
→ Relay A forwards kind:0 to Relay C
→ Relay B forwards kind:0 to Relay A
→ Relay B forwards kind:0 to Relay C → Relay A forwards kind:0 to Relay B
→ etc. ```

Solution: Event Encapsulation

To avoid infinite replication loops, the solution could be to wrap the user’s signed event inside a new event signed by the relay, using a dedicated kind (e.g., kind:9999).

When Relay B receives a kind:9999 event from Relay A, it extracts the original event, checks whether it already exists or if a newer version is present. If not, it adds the event to its database.

Here is an example of such encapsulated data:

json { "content": "{\"content\":\"{\\\"lud16\\\":\\\"dolu@npub.cash\\\",\\\"name\\\":\\\"dolu\\\",\\\"nip05\\\":\\\"dolu@dolu.dev\\\",\\\"picture\\\":\\\"!(image)[!(image)[https://pbs.twimg.com/profile_images/1577320325158682626/igGerO9A_400x400.jpg]]\\\",\\\"pubkey\\\":\\\"59b96df8d8b5e66b3b95a3e1ba159750a6edd69bcbba1857aeb652a5b208bd59\\\",\\\"npub\\\":\\\"npub1txukm7xckhnxkwu450sm59vh2znwm45mewaps4awkef2tvsgh4vsf7phrl\\\",\\\"created_at\\\":1688312044}\",\"created_at\":1728233747,\"id\":\"afc3629314aad00f8786af97877115de30c184a25a48440a480bff590a0f9ba8\",\"kind\":0,\"pubkey\":\"59b96df8d8b5e66b3b95a3e1ba159750a6edd69bcbba1857aeb652a5b208bd59\",\"sig\":\"989b250f7fd5d4cfc9a6ee567594c81ee0a91f972e76b61332005fb02aa1343854104fdbcb6c4f77ae8896acd886ab4188043c383e32a6bba509fd78fedb984a\",\"tags\":[]}", "created_at": 1746036589, "id": "efe7fa5844c5c4428fb06d1657bf663d8b256b60c793b5a2c5a426ec773c745c", "kind": 9999, "pubkey": "79be667ef9dcbbac55a06295ce870b07029bfcdb2dce28d959f2815b16f81798", "sig": "219f8bc840d12969ceb0093fb62f314a1f2e19a0cbe3e34b481bdfdf82d8238e1f00362791d17801548839f511533461f10dd45cd0aa4e264d71db6844f5e97c", "tags": [] }

@ 866e0139:6a9334e5

Autor: Ulrike Guérot. Dieser Beitrag wurde mit dem Pareto-Client geschrieben. Sie finden alle Texte der Friedenstaube und weitere Texte zum Thema Frieden hier.**

---

Die neuesten Artikel der Friedenstaube gibt es jetzt auch im eigenen Friedenstaube-Telegram-Kanal.

---

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KarwcXKmD3E

Liebe Freunde und Bekannte,

liebe Friedensbewegte,

liebe Dresdener, Dresden ist ja auch eine kriegsgeplagte Stadt,

dies ist meine dritte Rede auf einer Friedensdemonstration innerhalb von nur gut einem halben Jahr: München im September, München im Februar, Dresden im April. Und der Krieg rückt immer näher! Wer sich den „Operationsplan Deutschland über die zivil-militärische Kooperation als wesentlicher Bestandteil der Kriegsführung“ anschaut, dem kann nur schlecht werden zu sehen, wie weit die Kriegsvorbereitungen schon gediehen sind. 

Doch bevor ich darauf eingehe, möchte ich mich als erstes distanzieren von dem wieder einmal erbärmlichen Framing dieser Demo als Querfront oder Schwurblerdemo. Durch dieses Framing wurde diese Demo vom Dresdener Marktplatz auf den Postplatz verwiesen, wurden wir geschmäht und wurde die Stadtverwaltung Dresden dazu gebracht, eine „genehmere“ Demo auf dem Marktplatz zuzulassen! Es wäre schön, wenn wir alle - alle! - solche Framings weglassen würden und uns als Friedensbewegte die Hand reichen! Der Frieden im eigenen Haus ist die Voraussetzung für unsere Friedensarbeit. Der Streit in unserem Haus nutzt nur denen, die den Krieg wollen und uns spalten!

Ich möchte hier noch einmal klarstellen, von welcher Position aus ich hier und heute wiederholt auf einer Bühne spreche: Ich spreche als engagierte Bürgerin der Bundesrepublik Deutschland. Ich spreche als Europäerin, die lange Jahre in und an dem einstigen Friedensprojekt EU gearbeitet hat. Ich spreche als Enkelin von zwei Großvätern. Der eine ist im Krieg gefallen, der andere kam ohne Beine zurück. Ich spreche als Tochter einer Mutter, die 1945, als 6-Jährige, unter traumatischen Umständen aus Schlesien vertrieben wurde, nach Delitzsch in Sachsen übrigens. Ich spreche als Mutter von zwei Söhnen, 33 und 31 Jahre, von denen ich nicht möchte, dass sie in einen Krieg müssen. Von dieser, und nur dieser Position aus spreche ich heute zu Ihnen und von keiner anderen! Ich bin nicht rechts, ich bin keine Schwurblerin, ich bin nicht radikal, ich bin keine Querfront.

Als Bürgerin wünsche ich mir – nein, verlange ich! – dass die Bundesrepublik Deutschland sich an ihre gesetzlichen Grundlagen und Vertragstexte hält. Das sind namentlich: Die Friedensklausel des Grundgesetzes aus Art. 125 und 126 GG, dass von deutschem Boden nie wieder Krieg ausgeht. Und der Zwei-plus-Vier-Vertrag, in dem Deutschland 1990 unterschrieben hat, dass es nie an einem bewaffneten Konflikt gegen Russland teilnimmt. Ich schäme mich dafür, dass mein Land dabei ist, vertragsbrüchig zu werden. Ich bitte Friedrich Merz, den designierten Bundeskanzler, keinen Vertragsbruch durch die Lieferung von Taurus-Raketen zu begehen!

Ich bitte ferner darum, dass sich dieses Land an seine didaktischen Vorgaben für Schulen hält, die im immer noch geltenden „Beutelsbacher Konsens“ aus den 1970er Jahren festgelegt wurden. In diesem steht in Artikel I. ein Überwältigungsverbot: „Es ist nicht erlaubt, den Schüler – mit welchen Mitteln auch immer – im Sinne erwünschter Meinungen zu überrumpeln und damit an der Gewinnung eines selbständigen Urteils zu hindern.“ Vor diesem Hintergrund ist es nicht erlaubt, Soldaten oder Gefreite in Schulen zu schicken und für die Bundeswehr zu werben. Vielmehr wäre es geboten, unsere Kinder über Art. 125 & 126 GG und die Friedenspflicht des Landes und seine Geschichte mit Blick auf Russland aufzuklären.

Als Europäerin wünsche ich mir, dass wir die europäische Hymne, Beethovens 9. Sinfonie, ernst nehmen, deren Text da lautet: Alle Menschen werden Brüder. Alle Menschen werden Brüder. Alle! Dazu gehören auch die Russen und natürlich auch die Ukrainer! 

Als Europäerin, die in den 1990er Jahren für den großartigen EU-Kommissionspräsidenten Jacques Delors gearbeitet hat, Katholik, Sozialist und Gewerkschafter, wünsche ich mir, dass wir das Versprechen, #Europa ist nie wieder Krieg, ernst nehmen. Wir haben es 70 Jahre lang auf diesem Kontinent erzählt. Die Lügen und die Propaganda, mit der jetzt die Kriegsnotwendigkeit gegen Russland herbeigeredet wird, sind unerträglich. Die EU, Friedensnobelpreisträgerin von 2012, ist dabei – oder hat schon – ihr Ansehen in der Welt verloren. Es ist eine politische Tragödie! Neben ihrem Ansehen ist die EU jetzt dabei, das zivilisatorische Erbe Europas zu verspielen, die civilité européenne, wie der französische Historiker und Marxist, Étienne Balibar es nennt. 

Ein Element dieses historischen Erbes ist es, dass uns in Europa eint, dass wir über Jahrhunderte alle zugleich Täter und Opfer gewesen sind. Ce que nous partageons, c’est ce que nous étions tous bourreaux et victimes. So schreibt es der französische Literat Laurent Gaudet in seinem europäischen Epos, L’Europe. Une Banquet des Peuples von 2016.

Das heißt, dass niemand in Europa, niemand – auch die Esten nicht! – das Recht hat, vorgängige Traumata, die die baltischen Staaten unbestrittenermaßen mit Stalin-Russland gehabt haben, zu verabsolutieren, auf die gesamte EU zu übertragen, die EU damit zu blockieren und die Politikgestaltung der EU einseitig auf einen Kriegskurs gegen Russland auszurichten. Ich wende mich mit dieser Feststellung direkt an Kaja Kalles, die Hohe Beauftragte für Sicherheits- und Außenpolitik der EU und hoffe, dass sie diese Rede hört und das Epos von Laurent Gaudet liest.

Es gibt keinen gerechten Krieg! Krieg ist immer nur Leid. In Straßburg, dem Sitz des Europäischen Parlaments, steht auf dem Place de la République eine Statue, eine Frau, die Republik. Sie hält in jedem Arm einen Sohn, einen Elsässer und einen Franzosen, die aus dem Krieg kommen. In der Darstellung der Bronzefigur haben die beiden Soldaten-Männer ihre Uniformen schon ausgezogen und werden von Madame la République gehalten und getröstet. An diesem Denkmal sollten sich alle Abgeordnete des Straßburger Europaparlamentes am 9. Mai versammeln. Ich zitiere noch einmal Cicero: Der ungerechteste Friede ist besser als der gerechteste Krieg. Für den Vortrag dieses Zitats eines der größten Staatsdenker des antiken Roms in einer Fernsehsendung bin ich 2022 mit einem Shitstorm überzogen worden. Allein das ist Ausdruck des Verfalls unserer Diskussionskultur in unfassbarem Ausmaß, ganz besonders in Deutschland.

Als Europäerin verlange ich die Überwindung unserer kognitiven Dissonanz. Wenn schon die New York Times am 27. März 2025 ein 27-seitiges Dossier veröffentlicht, das nicht nur belegt, was man eigentlich schon weiß, aber bisher nicht sagen durfte, nämlich, dass der ukrainisch-russische Krieg ein eindeutiger Stellvertreter-Krieg der USA ist, in der die Ukraine auf monströseste Weise instrumentalisiert wurde – was das Dossier der NYT unumwunden zugibt! – wäre es an der Zeit, die eindeutige Schuldzuweisung an Russland für den Krieg zurückzuziehen und die gezielt verbreitete Russophobie in Europa zu beenden. Anstatt dass – wofür es leider viele Verdachtsmomente gibt – die EU die Friedensverhandlungen in Saudi-Arabien nach Strich und Faden torpediert. 

Der französische Philosoph Luc Ferry hat vor ein paar Tagen im prime time französischen Fernsehen ganz klar gesagt, dass der Krieg 2014 nach der Instrumentalisierung des Maidan durch die USA von der West-Ukraine ausging, dass Zelensky diesen Krieg wollte und – mit amerikanischer Rückendeckung – provoziert hat, dass Putin nicht Hitler ist und dass die einzigen mit faschistoiden Tendenzen in der ukrainischen Regierung sitzen. Ich wünschte mir, ein solches Statement wäre auch im Deutschen Fernsehen möglich und danke Richard David Precht, dass er, der noch in den Öffentlich-Rechtlichen Rundfunk vorgelassen wird, an dieser Stelle versucht, etwas Vernunft in die Debatte zu bringen.

Auch ist es gerade als Europäerin nicht hinzunehmen, dass russische Diplomaten von den Feierlichkeiten am 8. Mai 2025 ausgeschlossen werden sollen, ausgerechnet 80 Jahre nach Ende des II. Weltkrieges. Nicht nur sind Feierlichkeiten genau dazu da, sich die Hand zu reichen und den Frieden zu feiern. Doch gerade vor dem Hintergrund von 27 Millionen gefallenen sowjetischen Soldaten ist die Zurückweisung der Russen von den Feierlichkeiten geradezu eklatante Geschichtsvergessenheit.

***

Der Völkerbund hat 1925 die Frage erörtert, warum der I. Weltkrieg noch so lange gedauert hat, obgleich er militärisch bereits 1916 nach Eröffnung des Zweifrontenkrieges zu Lasten des Deutschen Reiches entschieden war. Wir erinnern uns: Für die Niederlage wurden mit der Dolchstoßlegende die jüdischen, kommunistischen und sozialistischen Pazifisten verantwortlich gemacht. Richtig ist, so der Bericht des Völkerbundes von 1925, dass allein die Rüstungsindustrie dafür gesorgt hat, dass der militärisch eigentlich schon entschiedene Krieg noch zwei weitere Jahre als Materialabnutzungs- und Stellungskrieg weiterbetrieben wurde, nur, damit noch ein bisschen Geld verdient werden konnte. Genauso scheint es heute zu sein. Der Krieg ist militärisch entschieden. Er kann und muss sofort beendet werden, und das passiert lediglich deswegen nicht, weil der Westen seine Niederlage nicht zugeben kann. Hochmut aber kommt vor dem Fall, und es darf nicht sein, dass für europäischen Hochmut jeden Tag rund 2000 ukrainische oder russische Soldaten und viele Zivilisten sterben. Die offenbare europäische Absicht, den Krieg jetzt einzufrieren, nur, um ihn 2029/ 2030 wieder zu entfachen, wenn Europa dann besser aufgerüstet ist, ist nur noch zynisch.

Als Kriegsenkelin von Kriegsversehrten, Tochter einer Flüchtlingsmutter und Mutter von zwei Söhnen, deren französischer Urgroßvater 6 Jahre in deutscher Kriegsgefangenschaft war, wünsche ich mir schließlich und zum Abschluss, dass wir die Kraft haben werden, wenn dieser Wahnsinn, den man den europäischen Bürgern gerade aufbürdet, vorbei sein wird, ein neues europäisches Projekt zu erdenken und zu erbauen, in dem Europa politisch geeint ist und es bleibt, aber dezentral, regional, subsidiär, friedlich und neutral gestaltet wird. Also ein Europa jenseits der Strukturen der EU, das bereit ist, die Pax Americana zu überwinden, aus der NATO auszutreten und der multipolaren Welt seine Hand auszustrecken! Unser Europa ist postimperial, postkolonial, groß, vielfältig und friedfertig!

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Ulrike Guérot, Jg. 1964, ist europäische Professorin, Publizistin und Bestsellerautorin. Seit rund 30 Jahren beschäftigt sie sich in europäischen Think Tanks und Universitäten in Paris, Brüssel, London, Washington, New York, Wien und Berlin mit Fragen der europäischen Demokratie sowie mit der Rolle Europas in der Welt. Ulrike Guérot ist seit März 2014 Gründerin und Direktorin des European Democracy Lab e.V., Berlin und initiierte im März 2023 das European Citizens Radio, das auf Spotify zu finden ist. Zuletzt erschien von ihr „Über Halford J. Mackinders Heartland-Theorie, Der geografische Drehpunkt der Geschichte“ (Westend, 2024). Mehr Infos zur Autorin hier.

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A Vision for #GitViaNostr

Git has long been the standard for version control in software development, but over time, we has lost its distributed nature. Originally, Git used open, permissionless email for collaboration, which worked well at scale. However, the rise of GitHub and its centralized pull request (PR) model has shifted the landscape.

Now, we have the opportunity to revive Git's permissionless and distributed nature through Nostr!

We’ve developed tools to facilitate Git collaboration via Nostr, but there are still significant friction that prevents widespread adoption. This article outlines a vision for how we can reduce those barriers and encourage more repositories to embrace this approach.

First, we’ll review our progress so far. Then, we’ll propose a guiding philosophy for our next steps. Finally, we’ll discuss a vision to tackle specific challenges, mainly relating to the role of the Git server and CI/CD.

I am the lead maintainer of ngit and gitworkshop.dev, and I’ve been fortunate to work full-time on this initiative for the past two years, thanks to an OpenSats grant.

How Far We’ve Come

The aim of #GitViaNostr is to liberate discussions around code collaboration from permissioned walled gardens. At the core of this collaboration is the process of proposing and applying changes. That's what we focused on first.

Since Nostr shares characteristics with email, and with NIP34, we’ve adopted similar primitives to those used in the patches-over-email workflow. This is because of their simplicity and that they don’t require contributors to host anything, which adds reliability and makes participation more accessible.

However, the fork-branch-PR-merge workflow is the only model many developers have known, and changing established workflows can be challenging. To address this, we developed a new workflow that balances familiarity, user experience, and alignment with the Nostr protocol: the branch-PR-merge model.

This model is implemented in ngit, which includes a Git plugin that allows users to engage without needing to learn new commands. Additionally, gitworkshop.dev offers a GitHub-like interface for interacting with PRs and issues. We encourage you to try them out using the quick start guide and share your feedback. You can also explore PRs and issues with gitplaza.

For those who prefer the patches-over-email workflow, you can still use that approach with Nostr through gitstr or the ngit send and ngit list commands, and explore patches with patch34.

The tools are now available to support the core collaboration challenge, but we are still at the beginning of the adoption curve.

Before we dive into the challenges—such as why the Git server setup can be jarring and the possibilities surrounding CI/CD—let’s take a moment to reflect on how we should approach the challenges ahead of us.

Philosophy

Here are some foundational principles I shared a few years ago:

• Let Git be Git
• Let Nostr be Nostr
• Learn from the successes of others

I’d like to add one more:

• Embrace anarchy and resist monolithic development.

Micro Clients FTW

Nostr celebrates simplicity, and we should strive to maintain that. Monolithic developments often lead to unnecessary complexity. Projects like gitworkshop.dev, which aim to cover various aspects of the code collaboration experience, should not stifle innovation.

Just yesterday, the launch of following.space demonstrated how vibe-coded micro clients can make a significant impact. They can be valuable on their own, shape the ecosystem, and help push large and widely used clients to implement features and ideas.

The primitives in NIP34 are straightforward, and if there are any barriers preventing the vibe-coding of a #GitViaNostr app in an afternoon, we should work to eliminate them.

Micro clients should lead the way and explore new workflows, experiences, and models of thinking.

Take kanbanstr.com. It provides excellent project management and organization features that work seamlessly with NIP34 primitives.

From kanban to code snippets, from CI/CD runners to SatShoot—may a thousand flowers bloom, and a thousand more after them.

Friction and Challenges

The Git Server

In #GitViaNostr, maintainers' branches (e.g., master) are hosted on a Git server. Here’s why this approach is beneficial:

• Follows the original Git vision and the "let Git be Git" philosophy.
• Super efficient, battle-tested, and compatible with all the ways people use Git (e.g., LFS, shallow cloning).
• Maintains compatibility with related systems without the need for plugins (e.g., for build and deployment).
• Only repository maintainers need write access.

In the original Git model, all users would need to add the Git server as a 'git remote.' However, with ngit, the Git server is hidden behind a Nostr remote, which enables:

• Hiding complexity from contributors and users, so that only maintainers need to know about the Git server component to start using #GitViaNostr.
• Maintainers can easily swap Git servers by updating their announcement event, allowing contributors/users using ngit to automatically switch to the new one.

Challenges with the Git Server

While the Git server model has its advantages, it also presents several challenges:

1. Initial Setup: When creating a new repository, maintainers must select a Git server, which can be a jarring experience. Most options come with bloated social collaboration features tied to a centralized PR model, often difficult or impossible to disable.

2. Manual Configuration: New repositories require manual configuration, including adding new maintainers through a browser UI, which can be cumbersome and time-consuming.

3. User Onboarding: Many Git servers require email sign-up or KYC (Know Your Customer) processes, which can be a significant turn-off for new users exploring a decentralized and permissionless alternative to GitHub.

Once the initial setup is complete, the system works well if a reliable Git server is chosen. However, this is a significant "if," as we have become accustomed to the excellent uptime and reliability of GitHub. Even professionally run alternatives like Codeberg can experience downtime, which is frustrating when CI/CD and deployment processes are affected. This problem is exacerbated when self-hosting.

Currently, most repositories on Nostr rely on GitHub as the Git server. While maintainers can change servers without disrupting their contributors, this reliance on a centralized service is not the decentralized dream we aspire to achieve.

Vision for the Git Server

The goal is to transform the Git server from a single point of truth and failure into a component similar to a Nostr relay.

Functionality Already in ngit to Support This

1. State on Nostr: Store the state of branches and tags in a Nostr event, removing reliance on a single server. This validates that the data received has been signed by the maintainer, significantly reducing the trust requirement.

2. Proxy to Multiple Git Servers: Proxy requests to all servers listed in the announcement event, adding redundancy and eliminating the need for any one server to match GitHub's reliability.

Implementation Requirements

To achieve this vision, the Nostr Git server implementation should:

1. Implement the Git Smart HTTP Protocol without authentication (no SSH) and only accept pushes if the reference tip matches the latest state event.

2. Avoid Bloat: There should be no user authentication, no database, no web UI, and no unnecessary features.

3. Automatic Repository Management: Accept or reject new repositories automatically upon the first push based on the content of the repository announcement event referenced in the URL path and its author.

Just as there are many free, paid, and self-hosted relays, there will be a variety of free, zero-step signup options, as well as self-hosted and paid solutions.

Some servers may use a Web of Trust (WoT) to filter out spam, while others might impose bandwidth or repository size limits for free tiers or whitelist specific npubs.

Additionally, some implementations could bundle relay and blossom server functionalities to unify the provision of repository data into a single service. These would likely only accept content related to the stored repositories rather than general social nostr content.

The potential role of CI / CD via nostr DVMs could create the incentives for a market of highly reliable free at the point of use git servers.

This could make onboarding #GitViaNostr repositories as easy as entering a name and selecting from a multi-select list of Git server providers that announce via NIP89.

!(image)[https://image.nostr.build/badedc822995eb18b6d3c4bff0743b12b2e5ac018845ba498ce4aab0727caf6c.jpg]

Git Client in the Browser

Currently, many tasks are performed on a Git server web UI, such as:

• Browsing code, commits, branches, tags, etc.
• Creating and displaying permalinks to specific lines in commits.
• Merging PRs.
• Making small commits and PRs on-the-fly.

Just as nobody goes to the web UI of a relay (e.g., nos.lol) to interact with notes, nobody should need to go to a Git server to interact with repositories. We use the Nostr protocol to interact with Nostr relays, and we should use the Git protocol to interact with Git servers. This situation has evolved due to the centralization of Git servers. Instead of being restricted to the view and experience designed by the server operator, users should be able to choose the user experience that works best for them from a range of clients. To facilitate this, we need a library that lowers the barrier to entry for creating these experiences. This library should not require a full clone of every repository and should not depend on proprietary APIs. As a starting point, I propose wrapping the WASM-compiled gitlib2 library for the web and creating useful functions, such as showing a file, which utilizes clever flags to minimize bandwidth usage (e.g., shallow clone, noblob, etc.).

This approach would not only enhance clients like gitworkshop.dev but also bring forth a vision where Git servers simply run the Git protocol, making vibe coding Git experiences even better.

song

nostr:npub180cvv07tjdrrgpa0j7j7tmnyl2yr6yr7l8j4s3evf6u64th6gkwsyjh6w6 created song with a complementary vision that has shaped how I see the role of the git server. Its a self-hosted, nostr-permissioned git server with a relay baked in. Its currently a WIP and there are some compatability with ngit that we need to work out.

We collaborated on the nostr-permissioning approach now reflected in nip34.

I'm really excited to see how this space evolves.

CI/CD

Most projects require CI/CD, and while this is often bundled with Git hosting solutions, it is currently not smoothly integrated into #GitViaNostr yet. There are many loosely coupled options, such as Jenkins, Travis, CircleCI, etc., that could be integrated with Nostr.

However, the more exciting prospect is to use DVMs (Data Vending Machines).

DVMs for CI/CD

Nostr Data Vending Machines (DVMs) can provide a marketplace of CI/CD task runners with Cashu for micro payments.

There are various trust levels in CI/CD tasks:

• Tasks with no secrets eg. tests.
• Tasks using updatable secrets eg. API keys.
• Unverifiable builds and steps that sign with Android, Nostr, or PGP keys.

DVMs allow tasks to be kicked off with specific providers using a Cashu token as payment.

It might be suitable for some high-compute and easily verifiable tasks to be run by the cheapest available providers. Medium trust tasks could be run by providers with a good reputation, while high trust tasks could be run on self-hosted runners.

Job requests, status, and results all get published to Nostr for display in Git-focused Nostr clients.

Jobs could be triggered manually, or self-hosted runners could be configured to watch a Nostr repository and kick off jobs using their own runners without payment.

But I'm most excited about the prospect of Watcher Agents.

CI/CD Watcher Agents

AI agents empowered with a NIP60 Cashu wallet can run tasks based on activity, such as a push to master or a new PR, using the most suitable available DVM runner that meets the user's criteria. To keep them running, anyone could top up their NIP60 Cashu wallet; otherwise, the watcher turns off when the funds run out. It could be users, maintainers, or anyone interested in helping the project who could top up the Watcher Agent's balance.

As aluded to earlier, part of building a reputation as a CI/CD provider could involve running reliable hosting (Git server, relay, and blossom server) for all FOSS Nostr Git repositories.

This provides a sustainable revenue model for hosting providers and creates incentives for many free-at-the-point-of-use hosting providers. This, in turn, would allow one-click Nostr repository creation workflows, instantly hosted by many different providers.

Progress to Date

nostr:npub1hw6amg8p24ne08c9gdq8hhpqx0t0pwanpae9z25crn7m9uy7yarse465gr and nostr:npub16ux4qzg4qjue95vr3q327fzata4n594c9kgh4jmeyn80v8k54nhqg6lra7 have been working on a runner that uses GitHub Actions YAML syntax (using act) for the dvm-cicd-runner and takes Cashu payment. You can see example runs on GitWorkshop. It currently takes testnuts, doesn't give any change, and the schema will likely change.

Note: The actions tab on GitWorkshop is currently available on all repositories if you turn on experimental mode (under settings in the user menu).

It's a work in progress, and we expect the format and schema to evolve.

Easy Web App Deployment

For those disapointed not to find a 'Nostr' button to import a git repository to Vercel menu: take heart, they made it easy. vercel.com_import_options.png there is a vercel cli that can be easily called in CI / CD jobs to kick of deployments. Not all managed solutions for web app deployment (eg. netlify) make it that easy.

Many More Opportunities

Large Patches via Blossom

I would be remiss not to mention the large patch problem. Some patches are too big to fit into Nostr events. Blossom is perfect for this, as it allows these larger patches to be included in a blossom file and referenced in a new patch kind.

Enhancing the #GitViaNostr Experience

Beyond the large patch issue, there are numerous opportunities to enhance the #GitViaNostr ecosystem. We can focus on improving browsing, discovery, social and notifications. Receiving notifications on daily driver Nostr apps is one of the killer features of Nostr. However, we must ensure that Git-related notifications are easily reviewable, so we don’t miss any critical updates.

We need to develop tools that cater to our curiosity—tools that enable us to discover and follow projects, engage in discussions that pique our interest, and stay informed about developments relevant to our work.

Additionally, we should not overlook the importance of robust search capabilities and tools that facilitate migrations.

Concluding Thoughts

The design space is vast. Its an exciting time to be working on freedom tech. I encourage everyone to contribute their ideas and creativity and get vibe-coding!

I welcome your honest feedback on this vision and any suggestions you might have. Your insights are invaluable as we collaborate to shape the future of #GitViaNostr. Onward.

Contributions

To conclude, I want to acknowledge some the individuals who have made recent code contributions related to #GitViaNostr:

nostr:npub180cvv07tjdrrgpa0j7j7tmnyl2yr6yr7l8j4s3evf6u64th6gkwsyjh6w6 (gitstr, song, patch34), nostr:npub1useke4f9maul5nf67dj0m9sq6jcsmnjzzk4ycvldwl4qss35fvgqjdk5ks (gitplaza)

nostr:npub1elta7cneng3w8p9y4dw633qzdjr4kyvaparuyuttyrx6e8xp7xnq32cume (ngit contributions, git-remote-blossom),nostr:npub16p8v7varqwjes5hak6q7mz6pygqm4pwc6gve4mrned3xs8tz42gq7kfhdw (SatShoot, Flotilla-Budabit), nostr:npub1ehhfg09mr8z34wz85ek46a6rww4f7c7jsujxhdvmpqnl5hnrwsqq2szjqv (Flotilla-Budabit, Nostr Git Extension), nostr:npub1ahaz04ya9tehace3uy39hdhdryfvdkve9qdndkqp3tvehs6h8s5slq45hy (gnostr and experiments), and others.

nostr:npub1uplxcy63up7gx7cladkrvfqh834n7ylyp46l3e8t660l7peec8rsd2sfek (git-remote-nostr)

Project Management nostr:npub1ltx67888tz7lqnxlrg06x234vjnq349tcfyp52r0lstclp548mcqnuz40t (kanbanstr) Code Snippets nostr:npub1ygzj9skr9val9yqxkf67yf9jshtyhvvl0x76jp5er09nsc0p3j6qr260k2 (nodebin.io) nostr:npub1r0rs5q2gk0e3dk3nlc7gnu378ec6cnlenqp8a3cjhyzu6f8k5sgs4sq9ac (snipsnip.dev)

CI / CD nostr:npub16ux4qzg4qjue95vr3q327fzata4n594c9kgh4jmeyn80v8k54nhqg6lra7 nostr:npub1hw6amg8p24ne08c9gdq8hhpqx0t0pwanpae9z25crn7m9uy7yarse465gr

and for their nostr:npub1c03rad0r6q833vh57kyd3ndu2jry30nkr0wepqfpsm05vq7he25slryrnw nostr:npub1qqqqqq2stely3ynsgm5mh2nj3v0nk5gjyl3zqrzh34hxhvx806usxmln03 and nostr:npub1l5sga6xg72phsz5422ykujprejwud075ggrr3z2hwyrfgr7eylqstegx9z for their testing, feedback, ideas and encouragement.

Thank you for your support and collaboration! Let me know if I've missed you.

@ c230edd3:8ad4a712

Chef's notes

I found this recipe on beyondsweetandsavory.com. The site is incredibly ad infested (like most recipe sites) and its very annoying so I'm copying it to Nostr so all the homemade ice cream people can access it without dealing with that mess. I haven't made it yet. Will report back, when I do.

Details

• ⏲️ Prep time: 20 min
• 🍳 Cook time: 55 min
• 🍽️ Servings: 8

Ingredients

• 2 cups heavy cream
• 1 cup 2% milk
• 8 oz dark chocolate, 70%
• ¼ cup Dutch cocoa
• 2 tbsps loose Earl grey tea leaves
• 4 medium egg yolks
• ¾ cup granulated sugar
• ⅛ tsp salt
• ¼ cup dark chocolate, 70% chopped

Directions

1. In a double boiler or a bowl set over a saucepan of simmering water, add the cacao solids and ½ cup of heavy cream. Stir chocolate until melted and smooth. Set melted chocolate aside.
2. In a heavy saucepan, combine remaining heavy cream, milk, salt and ½ cup of sugar.
3. Put the pan over medium heat and let the mixture boil gently to bubbling just around the edges (gentle simmer) and sugar completely dissolved, about 5 minutes. Remove from heat.
4. Add the Earl Grey tea leaves and let it steep for 7-8 minutes until the cream has taken on the tea flavor, stirring occasionally and tasting to make sure it’s not too bitter.
5. Whisk in Dutch cocoa until smooth. Add in melted chocolate and whisk until smooth.
6. In a medium heatproof bowl, whisk the yolks just to break them up and whisk in remaining sugar. Set aside.
7. Put the saucepan back on the stove over low heat and let it warm up for 2 minutes.
8. Carefully measure out ½ cup of hot cream mixture.
9. While whisking the eggs constantly, whisk the hot cream mixture into the eggs until smooth. Continue tempering the eggs by adding another ½ cup of hot cream to the bowl with the yolks.
10. Pour the cream-egg mixture back to the saucepan and cook over medium-low heat, stirring constantly until it is thickened and coats the back of a spatula, about 5 minutes.
11. Strain the base through a fine-mesh strainer into a clean container.
12. Pour the mixture into a 1-gallon Ziplock freezer bag and submerge the sealed bag in an ice bath until cold, about 30 minutes. Refrigerate the ice cream base for at least 4 hours or overnight.
13. Pour the ice cream base into the frozen canister of your ice cream machine and follow the manufacturer’s instructions.
14. Spin until thick and creamy about 25-30 minutes.
15. Pack the ice cream into a storage container, press a sheet of parchment directly against the surface and seal with an airtight lid. Freeze in the coldest part of your freezer until firm, at least 4 hours.
16. When ready to serve, scoop the ice cream into a serving bowl and top with chopped chocolate.

@ 5d4b6c8d:8a1c1ee3

I was a bit more distracted than normal this month, but ~econ kept humming along.

• Posts: 228 (7th)
• Comments: 1459 (5th)
• Stacking: 128k (4th)
• Revenue: 74k (4th)

We're holding pretty steady, but haven't gotten back to our highs from last year.

With revenue down slightly, I'll move the post fee back towards the previous local max and conclude the posting fee optimization process for now. Going forward the posting fee will be set at 84 sats (until I decide to start messing with it again).

Next month, I'll start the comment fee optimization process.

We're still on pace for a profitable year and having a nice sized fund to pay out the end-of-year awards.

Thanks everyone for supporting this community!

Let me know if you have any suggestions for how to improve the territory.

originally posted at https://stacker.news/items/967545

@ 1739d937:3e3136ef

MLS over Nostr - 30th April 2025

YO! Exciting stuff in this update so no intro, let's get straight into it.

🚢 Libraries Released

I've created 4 new Rust crates to make implementing NIP-EE (MLS) messaging easy for other projects. These are now part of the rust-nostr project (thanks nostr:npub1drvpzev3syqt0kjrls50050uzf25gehpz9vgdw08hvex7e0vgfeq0eseet) but aren't quite released to crates.io yet. They will be included in the next release of that library. My hope is that these libraries will give nostr developers a simple, safe, and specification-compliant way to work with MLS messaging in their applications.

Here's a quick overview of each:

nostr_mls_storage

One of the challenges of using MLS messaging is that clients have to store quite a lot of state about groups, keys, and messages. Initially, I implemented all of this in White Noise but knew that eventually this would need to be done in a more generalized way.

This crate defines traits and types that are used by the storage implementation crates and sets those up to wrap the OpenMLS storage layer. Now, instead of apps having to implement storage for both OpenMLS and Nostr, you simply pick your storage backend and go from there.

Importantly, because these are generic traits, it allows for the creation of any number of storage implementations for different backend storage providers; postgres, lmdb, nostrdb, etc. To start I've created two implementations; detailed below.

nostr_mls_memory_storage

This is a simple implementation of the nostr_mls_storage traits that uses an in-memory store (that doesn't persist anything to disc). This is principally for testing.

nostr_mls_sqlite_storage

This is a production ready implementation of the nostr_mls_storage traits that uses a persistent local sqlite database to store all data.

nostr_mls

This is the main library that app developers will interact with. Once you've chose a backend and instantiated an instance of NostrMls you can then interact with a simple set of methods to create key packages, create groups, send messages, process welcomes and messages, and more.

If you want to see a complete example of what the interface looks like check out mls_memory.rs.

I'll continue to add to this library over time as I implement more of the MLS protocol features.

🚧 White Noise Refactor

As a result of these new libraries, I was able to remove a huge amount of code from White Noise and refactor large parts of the app to make the codebase easier to understand and maintain. Because of this large refactor and the changes in the underlying storage layer, if you've installed White Noise before you'll need to delete it from your device before you trying to install again.

🖼️ Encrypted Media with Blossom

Let's be honest: Group chat would be basically useless if you couldn't share memes and gifs. Well, now you can in White Noise. Media in groups is encrypted using an MLS secret and uploaded to Blossom with a one-time use keypair. This gives groups a way to have rich conversations with images and documents and anything else while also maintaining the privacy and security of the conversation.

This is still in a rough state but rendering improvements are coming next.

📱 Damn Mobile

The app is still in a semi-broken state on Android and fully broken state on iOS. Now that I have the libraries released and the White Noise core code refactored, I'm focused 100% on fixing these issues. My goal is to have a beta version live on Zapstore in a few weeks.

🧑‍💻 Join Us

I'm looking for mobile developers on both Android and iOS to join the team and help us build the best possible apps for these platforms. I have grant funding available for the right people. Come and help us build secure, permissionless, censorship-resistant messaging. I can think of few projects that deserve your attention more than securing freedom of speech and freedom of association for the entire world. If you're interested or know someone who might be, please reach out to me directly.

🙏 Thanks to the People

Last but not least: A HUGE thank you to all the folks that have been helping make this project happen. You can check out the people that are directly working on the apps on Following._ (and follow them). There are also a lot of people behind the scenes that have helped in myriad ways to get us this far. Thank you thank you thank you.

🔗 Links

Libraries

• nostr_mls
• nostr_mls_storage
• nostr_mls_memory_storage
• nostr_mls_sqlite_storage

White Noise

• White Noise Repo
• White Noise Releases

Other

• Previous updates

@ 4e616576:43c4fee8

asdfasdfsadfaf

@ 4e616576:43c4fee8

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@ 4e616576:43c4fee8

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@ e096a89e:59351479

Why Oshi?

I had another name for this brand before, but it was hard for folks to say. Then I saw a chance to tap into the #Nostr and #Bitcoin crowd, people who might vibe with what I’m creating, and I knew I needed something that’d stick.

A good name can make a difference. Well, sometimes. Take Blink-182 - it might sound odd, but it worked for them and even has a ring to it. So, why Oshi?

Names mean a lot to me, and Oshi’s got layers. I’m into Japanese culture and Bitcoin, so it fits perfectly with a few meanings baked in:

• It’s a nod to Bitcoin’s visionary, Satoshi Nakamoto.
• In Japanese, “oshi” means cheering on your favorite idol by supporting their work - think of me as the maker, you as the fan.
• It’s short for “oh shiiiitttt” - what most folks say when they taste how good this stuff is.

My goal with Oshi is to share how amazing pecans and dates can be together. Everything I make - Hodl Butter, Hodl Bars, chocolates - is crafted with intention, keeping it simple and nuanced, no overdoing it. It’s healthy snacking without the grains or junk you find in other products.

I’ve got a few bars and jars in stock now. Grab something today and taste the unique flavor for yourself. Visit my website at https://oshigood.us/

foodstr #oshigood #hodlbar #hodlbutter

@ 3589b793:ad53847e

※本記事は別サービスで2022年6月24日に公開した記事の移植です。

どうも、「NostrはLNがWeb統合されマネーのインターネットプロトコルとしてのビットコインが本気出す具体行動のショーケースと見做せばOK」です、こんばんは。

またまた実験的な試みがNostrで行われているのでレポートします。本シリーズはライブ感を重視しており、例によって（？）プルリクエストなどはレビュー段階なのでご承知おきください。

今回の主役はあくまでLightningNetworkの新提案（ただし以前からあるLSATからのリブランディング）となるLightning HTTP 402 Protocol（略称: L402）です。そのショーケースの一つとしてNostrが活用されているというものになります。

Lightning HTTP 402 Protocol（略称: L402）とは何か

bLIPに今月挙がったプロポーザル内容です。

https://github.com/lightning/blips/pull/26

L402について私はまだ完全に理解した段階ではあるのですがなんとか一言で説明しようとすると「Authトークンのように"Paid"トークンをHTTPヘッダーにアタッチして有料リソースへのHTTPリクエストの受け入れ判断を行えるようにする」ものだと解釈しました。

Authenticationでは、HTTPヘッダーにAuthトークンを添付し、その検証が通ればHTTPリクエストを許可し、通らなければ401 Unauthorizedコードをエラーとして返すように定められています。

https://developer.mozilla.org/ja/docs/Web/HTTP/Status/401

L402では、同じように、HTTPヘッダーに支払い済みかどうかを示す"Paid"トークンを添付し、その検証が通ればHTTPリクエストを許可し、通らなければ402 Payment Requiredコードをエラーとして返すようにしています。

なお、"Paid"トークンという用語は私の造語となります。便宜上本記事では使わせていただきますが、実際はAuthも入ってくるのが必至ですし、プルリクエストでも用語をどう定めるかは議論になっていることをご承知おきください。（"API key", "credentials", "token", らが登場しています）

この402ステータスコードは従来から定義されていましたが、MDNのドキュメントでも記載されているように「実験的」なものでした。つまり、器は用意されているがこれまで活用されてこなかったものとなり、本プロトコルの物語性を体現しているものとなります。

https://developer.mozilla.org/ja/docs/Web/HTTP/Status/402

幻であったHTTPステータスコード402 Payment Requiredを実装する

この物語性は、上述のbLIPのスペックにも詳述されていますが、以下のスライドが簡潔です。402 Payment Requiredは予約されていましたが、けっきょくのところWorldWideWebはペイメントプロトコルを実装しなかったので、Bitcoinの登場まで待つことになった、というのが要旨になります。このWorldWideWebにおける決済機能実装に関する歴史話はクリプト界隈でもたびたび話題に上がりますが、そこを繋いでくる文脈にこれこそマネーのインターネットプロトコルだなと痺れました。

https://x.com/AlyseKilleen/status/1671342634307297282

この"Paid"トークンによって実現できることとして、第一にAIエージェントがBitcoin/LNを自律的に利用できるようになるM2M(MachineToMachine)的な話が挙げられていますが、ユースケースは想像力がいろいろ要るところです。実際のところは「有料リソースへの認可」を可能にすることが主になると理解しました。本連載では、繰り返しNostrクライアントにLNプロトコルを直接搭載せずにLightningNetworkを利用可能にする組み込み方法を見てきましたが、本件もインボイス文字列 & preimage程度の露出になりアプリケーション側でノードやウォレットの実装が要らないので、その文脈で位置付ける解釈もできるかと思います。

Snortでのサンプル実装

LN組み込み業界のリーディングプロダクトであるSnortのサンプル実装では、L402を有料コンテンツの購読に活用しています。具体的には画像や動画を投稿するときに有料のロックをかける、いわゆるペイウォールの一種となります。もともとアップローダもSnortが自前で用意しているので、そこにL402を組み込んでみたということのようです。

体験方法の詳細はこちらにあります。 https://njump.me/nevent1qqswr2pshcpawk9ny5q5kcgmhak24d92qzdy98jm8xcxlgxstruecccpz4mhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuerpd46hxtnfduhszrnhwden5te0dehhxtnvdakz78pvlzg

上記を試してみた結果が以下になります。まず、ペイウォールでロックした画像がNostrに投稿されている状態です。まったくビューワーが実装されておらず、ただのNotFound状態になっていますが、支払い前なのでロックされているということです。

次にこのHTTP通信の内容です。

通信自体はエラーになっているわけですが、ステータスコードが402で、レスポンスヘッダーのWWW-AuthenticateにInvoice文字列が返ってきています。つまり、このインボイスを支払えば"Paid"トークンが付与されて、その"Paid"トークンがあれば最初の画像がアンロックされることとなります。残念ながら現在は日本で利用不可のStrikeAppでしか払込みができないためここまでとなりますが、本懐である402 Payment Requiredとインボイス文字列は確認できました。

今確認できることは以上ですが、AmethystやDamusなどの他のNostrクライアントが実装するにあたり、インラインメディアを巡ってL402の仕様をアップデートする必要性や同じくHTTPヘッダーへのAuthトークンとなるNIP-98と組み合わせるなどの議論が行われている最中です。

LinghtningNetworkであるからこそのL402の実現

"Paid"トークンを実現するためにはLightningNetworkのファイナリティが重要な要素となっています。逆に言うと、reorgによるひっくり返しがあり得るBitcoinではできなくもないけど不便なわけです。LightningNetworkなら、当事者である二者間で支払いが確認されたら「同期的」にその証であるハッシュ値を用いて"Paid"トークンを作成することができます。しかもハッシュ値を提出するだけで台帳などで過去の履歴を確認する必要がありません。加えて言うと、受金者側が複数のノードを建てていて支払いを受け取るノードがどれか一つになる状況でも、つまり、スケーリングされている状況でも、"Paid"トークンそのものはどのノードかを気にすることなくステートレスで利用できるとのことです。（ここは単にreverse proxyとしてAuthサーバががんばっているだけと解釈することもできますがずいぶんこの機能にも力点を置いていて大規模なユースケースが重要になっているのだなという印象を抱きました）

Macaroonの本領発揮か？それとも詳細定義しすぎか？

HTTP通信ではWWW-Authenticateの実値にmacaroonの記述が確認できます。また現在のL402スペックでも"Paid"トークンにはmacaroonの利用が前提になっています。

このmacaroonとは（たぶん）googleで研究開発され、LNDノードソフトウェアで活用されているCookieを超えるという触れ込みのデータストアになります。しかし、あまり普及しなかった技術でもあり、個人の感想ですがなんとも微妙なものになっています。

https://research.google/pubs/macaroons-cookies-with-contextual-caveats-for-decentralized-authorization-in-the-cloud/

macaroonの強みは、Cookieを超えるという触れ込みのようにブラウザが無くてもプロセス間通信でデータ共有できる点に加えて、HMACチェーンで動的に認証認可を更新し続けられるところが挙げられます。しかし、そのようなユースケースがあまり無く、静的な認可となるOAuthやJWTで十分となっているのが現状かと思います。

L402では、macaroonの動的な更新が可能である点を活かして、"Paid"トークンを更新するケースが挙げられています。わかりやすいのは上記のスライド資料でも挙げられている"Dynamic Pricing"でしょうか。プロポーザルではloop©️LightningLabsにおいて月間の最大取引量を認可する"Paid"トークンを発行した上でその条件を動向に応じて動的に変更できる例が解説されています。とはいえ、そんなことしなくても再発行すればええやんけという話もなくもないですし、プルリクエストでも仕様レベルでmacaroonを指定するのは「具体」が過ぎるのではないか、もっと「抽象」し単なる"Opaque Token"程度の粒度にして他の実装も許容するべきではないか、という然るべきツッコミが入っています。

個人的にはそのツッコミが妥当と思いつつも、なんだかんだ初めてmacaroonの良さを実感できて感心した次第です。

@ 3589b793:ad53847e

※本記事は別サービスで2023年4月19日に公開した記事の移植です。

どうも、「NostrはLNがWeb統合されマネーのインターネットプロトコルとしてのビットコインが本気出す具体行動のショーケースと見做せばOK」です、こんにちは。

前回まで投げ銭や有料購読の組み込み方法を見てきました。

zapsという投げ銭機能が各種クライアントに一通り実装されて活用が進んでいることで、統合は次の段階へ移り始めています。「作戦名: ウォレットをNostrクライアントに組み込め」です。今回はそちらをまとめます。

投げ銭する毎にいちいちウォレットを開いてまた元のNostrクライアントに手動で戻らないといけない is PAIN

LNとNostrはインボイス文字列で繋がっているだけの疎結合ですが、投稿に投げ銭するためには何かのLNウォレットを開いて支払いをして、また元のNostrクライアントに戻る操作をユーザーが手作業でする必要があります。お試しで一回やる程度では気になりませんが普段使いしているとこれはけっこうな煩わしさを感じるUXです。特にスマホでは大変にだるい状況になります。連打できない！

2月の実装以来、zapsは順調に定着して日々投げられています。

https://stats.nostr.band/#daily_zaps

なので、NostrクライアントにLNウォレットの接続を組み込み、支払いのために他のアプリに遷移せずにNostクライアント単独で完結できるようなアップデートが始まっています。

Webクライアント

NostrのLN組み込み業界のリーディングプレイヤーであるSnortでの例です。以下のようにヘッダーのウォレットアイコンをクリックすると連携ウォレットの選択ができます。

もともとNostrに限らずウェブアプリケーションとの連携をするために、WebLNという規格があります。簡単に言うと、ブラウザのグローバル領域を介して、LNウォレットの拡張機能と、タブで開いているウェブアプリが、お互いに連携するためのインターフェースを定めているものです。これに対応していると、LNによる支払いをウェブアプリが拡張機能に依頼できるようになります。さらにオプションで「確認無し」をオンにすると、拡張機能画面がポップアップせずにバックグラウンドで実行できるようになり、ノールック投げ銭ができるようになります。

似たようなものにNostrではNIP-07があります。NIP-07はNostrの秘密鍵を拡張機能に退避して、Nostrクライアントは秘密鍵を知らない状態で署名や複合を拡張機能に移譲できるようにしているものです。

Albyの拡張機能ではWebLNとNIP-07のどちらにも対応しています。

実はSnortはzapsが来る前からWebLNには対応していたのですが、さらに一歩進み、拡張機能ウォレットだけでなく、LNノードや拡張機能以外のLNウォレットと連携設定できるようになってきています。

umbrelなどでノードを立てている人ならLND with LNCでノードと直接繋げます。またLNDHubに対応したウォレットなどのアプリケーションとも繋げます。これらの接続は、WebLNにラップされて拡張機能ウォレットとインターフェースを揃えられた上で、Snort上でのインボイスの支払いに活用されます。

なお、LNCのpairingPhrase/passwordやLNDHubの接続情報などのクレデンシャルは、ブラウザのローカルストレージに保存されています。Nostrのリレーサーバなどには送られませんので、端末ごとに設定が必要です。

スマホアプリ

今回のメインです。なお、例によって（？）スペックは絶賛議論中でまだフィックスしていない中で記事を書いています。ディテールは変わるかもしれないので悪しからずです。

スマホアプリで上記のことをやるためには、後半のLNCやLNDHubはすでにzeusなどがやっているようにできますが、あくまでネイティブウォレットのラッパーです。Nostrでは限られた用途になるので1-click支払いのようなものを行うためにはそこから各スマホアプリが作り込む必要があります。まあこれはこれでやればいいという話でもあるのですが、LNノードやLNウォレットのアプリケーション側へのインターフェースの共通仕様は定められていないので、LNDとcore-lightningとeclairではすべて実装方法が違いますし、ウォレットもバラバラなので大変です。

そこで、多種多様なノードやウォレットの接続を取りまとめ一般アプリケーションへ統一したインターフェースを媒介するLN Adapter業界のリーディングカンパニーであるAlbyが動きました。AndroidアプリのAmethystで試験公開されていますが、スマホアプリでも上記のSnortのような連携が可能になるようなSDKが開発されました。

リリース記事 https://blog.getalby.com/native-zapping-in-amethyst/

"Unstoppable zapping for users"なんて段落見出しが付けられているように、スマホで別のアプリに切り替えてまた元に戻らなくても良いようにして、Nostr上でマイクロペイメントを滑らかにする、つまり、連打できることを繰り返し強調しています。

具体的にやっていることを見ていきます。以下の画像群はリリース記事の動画から抜粋しています。各投稿のzapsボタン⚡️をタップしたときの画面です。

上の赤枠が従来の投げ銭の詳細を決める場所で、下の赤枠の「Wallet Connect Service」が新たに追加されたAlby提供のSDKを用いたコネクト設定画面です。基本的にはOAuth2.0ベースのAlbyのAPIを活用していて、右上のAlbyアイコンをタップすると以下のようなOAuthの認可画面に飛びます。（ただし後述するように通常のOAuthとは一部異なります。）

画面デザインは違いますが、まあ他のアプリでよく目にするTwitter連携やGoogleアカウント連携とやっていることは同じです。

このOAuthベースのAPIはNostr専用のエンドポイントが建てられています。Nostr以外のECショップやマーケットプレイスなどへのAlbyのOAuthは汎用のエンドポイントが用意されています。よって通常のAlbyの設定とは別にセッション詳細を以下のサイトで作成する必要があります。

https://nwc.getalby.com/ （サブドメインのnwcはNostr Wallet Connectの略）

なぜNostrだけは特別なのかというところが完全には理解しきれていないですが、以下のところまで確認できています。一番にあるのは、Nostrクライアントにウォレットを組み込まずに、かつ、ノードやウォレットへの接続をNostrリレーサーバ以外は挟まずに"decentralized"にしたいというところだと理解しています。

• 上記のnwcのURLはalbyのカストディアルウォレットusername@getalby.comをNostrに繋ぐもの（たぶん）
• umbrelのLNノードを繋ぐためにはやはり専用のアプリがumbrelストアに上がっている。https://github.com/getAlby/umbrel-community-app-store
• 要するにOAuthの1stPartyの役割をウォレットやノードごとにそれぞれ建てる。
• OAuthのシークレットはクライアントに保存するので設定は各クライアント毎に必要。しかし使い回しすることは可能っぽい。通常のOAuthと異なり、1stParty側で3rdPartyのドメインはトラストしていないようなので。
• Nostrクライアントにウォレットを組み込まずに、さらにウォレットやノードへの接続をNostrリレーサーバ以外には挟まなくて良いようにするために、「NIP-47 Nostr Wallet Connect」というプロポーザルが起こされていて、絶賛議論中である。https://github.com/nostr-protocol/nips/pull/406
• このWallet Connect専用のアドホックなリレーサーバが建てられる。その情報が上記画像の赤枠の「Wallet Connect Service」の下半分のpub keyやらrelayURL。どうもNostrクライアントはNIP-47イベントについてはこのリレーサーバにしか送らないようにするらしい。（なんかNostrの基本設計を揺るがすユースケースの気がする...）
• Wallet Connect専用のNostrイベントでは、ペイメント情報をNostrアカウントと切り離すために、Nostrの秘密鍵とは別の秘密鍵が利用できるようにしている。

Imagin the Future

今回取り上げたNostrクライアントにウォレット接続を組み込む話を、Webのペイメントの歴史で類推してみましょう。

Snortでやっていることは、各サイトごとにクレジットカードを打ち込み各サイトがその情報を保持していたようなWeb1.0の時代に近いです。そうなるとクレジットカードの情報は各サービスごとに漏洩リスクなどがあり、Web1.0の時代はECが普及する壁の一つになっていました。（今でもAmazonなどの大手はそうですが）

Webではその後にPayPalをはじめとして、銀行口座やクレジットカードを各サイトから切り出して一括管理し、各ウェブサイトに支払いだけを連携するサービスが出てきて一般化しています。日本ではケータイのキャリア決済が利用者の心理的障壁を取り除きEC普及の後押しになりました。

後半のNostr Wallet ConnectはそれをNostrの中でやろうとしている試みになります。クレジットカードからLNに変える理由はビットコインの話になるので詳細は割愛しますが、現実世界の金（ゴールド）に類した価値保存や交換ができるインターネットマネーだからです。

とはいえ、Nostrの中だけならまだしも、これをNostr外のサービスで利用するためには、他のECショップやブログやSaaSがNostrを喋れる必要があります。そんな未来が来るわけないだろと思うかもしれませんが、言ってみればStripeはまさにそのようなサービスとなっていて、サイト内にクレジット決済のモジュールを組み込むための主流となっています。

果たして、Nostrを、他のECショップやブログやSaaSが喋るようになるのか！？

以上、「NostrはLNがWeb統合されマネーのインターネットプロトコルとしてのビットコインが本気出す具体行動のショーケースと見做せばOK」がお送りしました。

@ 3589b793:ad53847e

前回の続きです。

特に「Snortで試験的にノート単位に投げ銭できる機能」について。実は記事書いた直後にリリースされて慌ててw追記してたんですが追い付かないということで別記事にしました。

今回のここがすごい！

「Snortで試験的にノート単位に投げ銭できる機能」では一つブレイクスルーが起こっています。それは「ウォレットにインボイスを放り投げた後に払い込み完了を提示できる」ようになったことです。これによりペイメントのライフサイクルが一通りカバーされたことになります。

Snortの画面

なにを当たり前のことをという向きもあるかもしれませんが、Nostrクライアントで払い込み完了を追跡することはとても難しいです。基本的にNostrとLNウォレットはまったく別のアプリケーションで両者の間を繋ぐのはインボイス文字列だけです。ウォレットもNostrからキックされずに、インボイス文字列をコピペするなりQRコードで読み取ったものを渡されるだけかもしれません。またその場でリアルタイムに処理される前提もありません。

なのでNostrクライアントでその後をトラックすることは難しく、これまではあくまで請求書を送付したり（LNインボイス）振り込み口座を提示する（LNアドレス）という一方的に放り投げてただけだったわけです。といっても魔法のようにNostrクライアントがトラックできるようになったわけではなく、今回の対応方法もインボイスを発行/お金を振り込まれるサービス側（LNURL）にNostrカスタマイズを入れさせるというものになります。

プロポーザルの概要について

前回の記事ではよくわからんで終わっていましたが、当日夜（日本時間）にスペックをまとめたプロポーザルも起こされました（早い！）。LNURLが、Nostr用のインボイスを発行して、さらにNostrイベントの発行を行っていることがポイントでした。名称は"Lightning Zaps"で確定のようです。プロポーザルは、NostrとLNURLの双方の発明者であるfiatjaf氏からツッコミが入り、またそれが妥当な指摘のために、エンドポイントURLのインターフェースなどは変わりそうなのですが、概要はそう変わらないだろうということで簡単にまとめてみます。

全体の流れ

図は、Nostrクライアント上に提示されているLNアドレスへ投げ銭が開始してから、Nostrクライアント上に払い込み完了したイベントが表示されるまでの流れを示しています。

1. 投げ銭の内容が固まったらNostrイベントデータを添付してインボイスの発行を依頼する
2. 説明欄にNostr用のデータを記載したインボイスを発行して返却する
3. Nostrクライアントで提示されたインボイスをユーザーが何かしらの手段でウォレットに渡す
4. ウォレットがLNに支払いを実行する
5. インボイスの発行者であるLNURLが管理しているLNノードにsatoshiが届く
6. LNURLサーバが投げ銭成功のNostrイベントを発行する
7. Nostrクライアントがイベントを受信して投げ銭履歴を表示する

特にポイントとなるところを補足します。

対応しているLNアドレスの識別

LNアドレスに投げ銭する場合は、LNアドレスの有効状態やインボイス発行依頼する先の情報をhttps://[domain]/.well-known/lnurlp/[username]から取得しています。そのレスポンス内容にNostr対応を示す情報を追加しています。ただし、ここに突っ込み入っていてlnurlp=LNURL Payから独立させるためにzaps専用のエンドポイントに変わりそうです。（2/15 追記　マージされましたが変更無しでした。PRのディスカッションが盛り上がっているので興味ある方は覗いてみてください。）

インボイスの説明欄に書き込むNostrイベント（kind:9734）

これは投げ銭する側のNostrイベントです。投げ銭される者や対象ノートのIDや金額、そしてこのイベントを作成している者が投げ銭したということを「表明」するものになります。表明であって証明でないところは、インボイスを別の人が払っちゃう事態がありえるからですね。この内容をエンクリプトするパターンも用意されていたが複雑になり過ぎるという理由で今回は外され追加提案に回されました。また、このイベントはデータを作成しただけです。支払いを検知した後にLNURLが発行するイベントに添付されることになります。そのため投げ銭する者にちゃんと届くように作成者のリレーサーバリストも書き込まれています。

支払いを検知した後に発行するNostrイベント（kind:9735）

これが実際にNostrリレーサーバに発行されるイベントです。LNURL側はウォッチしているLNノードにsatoshiが届くと、インボイスの説明欄に書かれているNostrイベントを取り出して、いわば受領イベントを作成して発行します。以下のようにNostイベントのkind:9734とkind:9735が親子になったイベントとなります。

json { "pubkey": "LNURLが持っているNostrアカウントの公開鍵", "kind": 9735, "tags": [ [ "p", "投げ銭された者の公開鍵" ], [ "bolt11", "インボイスの文字列lnbc〜" ], [ "description", "投げ銭した者が作成したkind:9734のNostrイベント" ], [ "preimage", "インボイスのpreimage" ] ], }

所感

とにかくNostrクライアントはLNノードを持たないしLNプロトコルとも直接喋らずにインボイス文字列だけで取り扱えるようになっているところがおもしろいと思っています。NostrとLNという二つのデセントライズドなオープンプロトコルが協調できていますし、前回も述べましたがどんなアプリでも簡単に真似できます。

とはいえ、さすがに払込完了のトラックは難しく、今回はLNURL側にそのすり合わせの責務が寄せられることになりました。しかし、LNURLもLNの上に作られたオープンプロトコル/スペックの位置付けになるため、他のLNURLのスペックに干渉するという懸念から、本提案のNIP-57に変更依頼が出されています。LN、LNURL、Nostrの3つのオープンプロトコルの責務分担が難しいですね。アーキテクチャ層のスタックにおいて3つの中ではNostrが一番上になるため、Nostrに相当するレイヤーの他のwebサービスでやるときはLNプロトコルを喋るなりLNノードを持つようにして、今回LNURLが寄せられた責務を吸収するのが無難かもしれません。

また、NIP-57の変更依頼理由の一つにはBOLT-12を見越した抽象化も挙げられています。他のLNURLのスペックを削ぎ落としてzapsだけにすることでBOLT-12にも載りやすくなるだろうと。LNURLの多くはBOLT-12に取り込まれる運命なわけですが、LNアドレス以外の点でもNostrではBOLT-12のOfferやInvoiceRequestのユースケースをやりたいという声が挙がっているため、NostrによりBOLT-12が進む展開もありそうだなあ、あってほしい。

@ 3589b793:ad53847e

※本記事は別サービスで2023年2月5日に公開した記事の移植です。

Nostrクライアントは多種ありますがメジャーなものはだいたいLNの支払いが用意されています。現時点でどんな組み込み方法になっているか調べました。この記事では主にSnortを対象にしています。

LN活用場面

大きくLNアドレスとLNインボイスの2つの形式があります。

1. LNアドレスで投げ銭をセットできる

LNURLのLNアドレスをセットすると、プロフィールやノート（ツイートに相当）からLN支払いができます。別クライアントのastralなどではプリミティブなLNURLの投げ銭形式 lnurl1dp68～でもセットできます。

[追記]さらに本日、Snortで試験的にノート単位に投げ銭できる機能が追加されています。

2. LNインボイスが投稿できる

投稿でLNインボイスを貼り付ければ上記のように他の発言と同じようにタイムラインに流れます。Payボタンを押すと各自の端末にあるLNウォレットが立ち上がります。

3. DMでLNインボイスを送る

メッセージにLNインボイスが組み込まれているという点では2とほぼ同じですが、ユースケースが異なります。発表されたばかりですがリレーサーバの有料化が始まっていて、その決済をDMにLNインボイスを送付して行うことが試されています。2だとパブリックに投稿されますが、こちらはプライベートなので購入希望者のみにLNインボイスを届けられます。

おまけ: Nostrのユーザ名をLNアドレスと同じにする

直接は関係ないですが、Nostrはユーザー名をemail形式にすることができます。LNアドレスも自分でドメイン取って作れるのでNostrのユーザー名と投げ銭のアドレスを同じにできます。

LNウォレットのAlbyのドメインをNostrのユーザ名にも活用している様子 [Not found]

実装方法

LNアドレスもLNインボイスも非常にシンプルな話ですが軽くまとめます。 Snortリポジトリ

LNアドレス

1. セットされたLNアドレスを分解してhttps://[domain]/.well-known/lnurlp/[username]にリクエストする
2. 成功したら投げ銭量を決めるUIを提示する
3. Get Inoviceボタンを押したら1のレスポンスにあるcallbackにリクエストしてインボイスを取得する
4. 成功したらPayボタンを提示する

LNインボイス

1. 投稿内容がLNインボイス識別子lnbc10m〜だとわかると、識別子の中の文字列から情報（金額、説明、有効期限）を取り出し、表示用のUIを作成する
2. 有効期限内だったらPayボタンを提示し、期限が切れていたらExpiredでロックする

支払い

Payボタンを押された後の動きはアドレス、インボイスとも同じです。

• ブラウザでWebLN（Albyなど）がセットされていて、window.weblnオブジェクトがenableになっていると、拡張機能の支払い画面が立ち上がる。クライアント側で支払い成功をキャッチすることも可能。
• Open Walletボタンを押すと lightning:lnbc10m~のURI形式でwindow.openされ、Mac/Windows/iPhone/Androidなど各OSに応じたアプリケーション呼び出しが行われ、URIに対応しているLNウォレットが立ち上がる

[追記]ノート単位の投げ銭

Snort周辺の数人（strike社員っぽい人が一人いて本件のメイン実装している）で試験的にやっているようで現時点では実装レベルでしか詳細わかりませんでした。strikeのzapといまいち区別が付かなかったのですが、実装を見るとnostrプロトコルにzapイベントが追加されています。ソースコメントではこの後NIP(nostr improvement proposal)が起こされるようでかなりハッキーです。zap=tipの方言なんでしょうか？

ノートやプロフィールやリアクションなどに加えて新たにnostrイベントに追加しているものは以下2つです。

• zapRequest　投げ銭した側が対象イベントIDと量を記録する
• zapReceipt　投げ銭を受け取った側用のイベント

一つでできそうと思ったけど、nostrは自己主権のプロトコルでイベント作成するには発行者の署名が必須なので2つに分かれているのでしょう。

所感

現状はクライアントだけで完結する非常にシンプルな方法になっています。リレーサーバも経由しないしクライアントにLNノードを組み込むこともしていません。サードパーティへのhttpリクエストやローカルのアプリに受け渡すだけなので、実はどんな一般アプリでもそんなに知識もコストも要らずにパッとできるものです。

現状ちょっと不便だなと思っていることは、タイムラインに流れるインボイスの有効期限内の支払い済みがわからないことです。Payボタンを押してエラーにならないとわかりません。ウォレットアプリに放り投げていてこのトレースするためには、ウォレット側で支払い成功したらNostrイベントを書き込むなどの対応しない限りは、サービス側でインボイスを定期的に一つ一つLNに投げてチェックするなどが必要だと思われるので、他のサービスでマネするときは留意しておくとよさそうです。

一方で、DMによるLNインボイス送付は活用方法が広がりそうな予感があります。Nostrの公開鍵による本人特定と、LNインボイスのメモ欄のテキスト情報による突き合わせだけでも、かんたんな決済機能として用いれそうだからです。もっとNostrに判断材料を追加したければイベント追加も簡単にできることをSnortが示しています。とくにリレーサーバ購読やPROメニューなどのNostr周辺の支払いはやりやすそうなので、DM活用ではなくなにかしらの決済メニューを搭載したNostrクライアントもすぐに出てきそう気がします。

@ 3589b793:ad53847e

※本記事は別サービスで2022年9月25日に公開した記事の移植です。

LNの手数料の適正水準はどう見積もったらいいだろうか？ルーティングノードの収益性を算出するためにはどうアプローチすればよいだろうか？本記事ではルーティングノード運用のポジションに立ち参考になりそうな数値や計算式を整理する。

個人的な感想を先に書くと以下となる。

• 現在の手数料市場は収益性が低くもっと手数料が上がった方が健全である。
• 他の決済手段と比較すると、LN支払い料金は10000ppm（手数料1%相当）でも十分ではないか。4ホップとすると中間1ノードあたり2500ppmである。
• ルーティングノードの収益性を考えると、1000ppmあれば1BTC程度の資金で年利2.8%になり半年で初期費用回収できるので十分な投資対象になると考える。

基本概念の整理

LNの料金方式

• LNの手数料は送金額に応じた料率方式が主になる。（基本料金の設定もあるが1 ~ 0 satsが大半）
• 料率単位のppm（parts per million）は、1,000,000satsを送るときの手数料をsats金額で示したもの。
• %での手数料率に変換すると1000ppm = 0.1%になる。
• 支払い者が払う手数料はルーティングに参加した各ノードの手数料の合計である。本稿では4ホップ（経由ノードが4つ）のルーティングがあるとすれば、各ノードの取り分は単純計算で1/4とみなす。
• ルーティングノードの収益はアウトバウンドフローで発生するのでアウトバウンドキャパシティが直接的な収益資源となる。

LNの料金以外のベネフィット

本稿では料金比較だけを行うが実際の決済検討では以下のような料金以外の効用も忘れてはならない。

• Bitcoin(L1)に比べると、料金の安さだけでなく、即時確定やトランザクション量のスケールという利点がある。
• クレジットカードなどの集権サービスと比較した特徴はBitcoin(L1)とだいたい同じである。
• 24時間365日利用できる
• 誰でも自由に使える
• 信頼する第三者に対する加盟や審査や手数料率などの交渉手続きが要らない
• 検閲がなく匿名性が高い
• 逆にデメリットはオンライン前提がゆえの利用の不便さやセキュリティ面の不安さなどが挙げられる。

現在の料金相場

• ルーティングノードの料金設定
• sinkノードとのチャネルは500 ~ 1000ppmが多い。
• routing/sourceノードとのチャネルは0 ~ 100ppmあたりのレンジになる。
• リバランスする場合もsinkで収益を上げているならsink以下になるのが道理である。
• プロダクト/サービスのバックエンドにいるノードの料金設定
• sinkやsourceに相当するものは上記の通り。 
• 1000〜5000ppmあたりで一律同じ設定というノードもよく見かける。
• ビジネスモデル次第で千差万別だがアクティブと思われるノードでそれ以上はあまり見かけない。
• 上記は1ノードあたりの料金になる。支払い全体では経由したノードの合計になる。

料金目安

いくつかの方法で参考数字を出していく。LN料金算出は「支払い全体/2ホップしたときの1ノードあたり/4ホップしたときの1ノードあたり」の三段階で出す。

類推方式

決済代行業者との比較

• Squareの加盟店手数料は、日本3.25%、アメリカ2.60%である。
• 参考資料 https://www.meti.go.jp/shingikai/mono_info_service/cashless_payment/pdf/20220318_1.pdf

3.25%とするとLNでは「支払い全体/2ホップしたときの1ノードあたり/4ホップしたときの1ノードあたり」でそれぞれ32,500ppm/16,250ppm/8,125ppmになる。

スマホのアプリストアとの比較

• Androidのアプリストアは年間売上高が100万USDまでなら15%、それ以上なら30%
• 参考資料https://support.google.com/googleplay/android-developer/answer/112622?hl=ja

15%とするとLNでは「支払い全体/2ホップしたときの1ノードあたり/4ホップしたときの1ノードあたり」でそれぞれ150,000ppm/75,000ppm/37,500ppmになる。

Bitcoin(L1)との比較

Bitcoin(L1)は送金額が異なっても手数料がほぼ同じため、従量課金のLNと単純比較はできない。そのためここではLNの方が料金がお得になる目安を出す。

Bitcoin(L1)の手数料設定

• SegWitのシンプルな送金を対象にする。
• input×1、output×2（送金+お釣り）、tx合計222byte
• L1の手数料は、1sat/byteなら222sats、10sat/byteなら2,220sats、100sat/byteなら22,200sats。（単純化のためvirtual byteではなくbyteで計算する）
• サンプル例 https://www.blockchain.com/btc/tx/15b959509dad5df0e38be2818d8ec74531198ca29ac205db5cceeb17177ff095

L1相場が1sat/byteの時にLNの方がお得なライン

• 100ppmなら、0.0222BTC（2,220,000sats）まで
• 1000ppmなら、0.00222BTC（222,000sats）まで

L1相場が10sat/byteの時にLNの方がお得なライン

• 100ppmなら、0.222BTC（22,200,000sats）まで
• 1000ppmなら、0.0222BTC（2,220,000sats）まで

L1相場が100sat/byteの時にLNの方がお得なライン

• 100ppmなら、2.22BTC（222,000,000sats）まで
• 1000ppmなら、0.222BTC（22,200,000sats）まで

コスト積み上げ方式

ルーティングノードの原価から損益分岐点となるppmを算出する。事業者ではなく個人を想定し、クラウドではなくラズベリーパイでのノード構築環境で計算する。

費用明細

• BTC市場価格　1sat = 0.03円（1BTC = 3百万円)

初期費用

• ハードウェア一式　40,000円
• Raspberry Pi 4 8GB
• SSD 1TB
• 外付けディスプレイ
• チャネル開設のオンチェーン手数料　6.69円/チャネル　　
• 開設料　223sats
• 223sats * BTC市場価格0.03円 = 6.69円

固定費用

• 電気代　291.6円/月　　
• 時間あたりの電力量　0.015kWh 
  • Raspberry Pi 4　電圧5V、推奨電源容量3.0A
  • https://www.raspberrypi.com/documentation/computers/raspberry-pi.html#power-supply
• kWh単価27円
• 0.015kWh * kWh単価27円 * １ヶ月の時間720h = 291.6円

損益分岐点

• 月あたりの電気代を上回るために9,720sats（291.6円）/月以上の収益が必要である。
• ハードウェア費用回収のために0.01333333BTC（133万sats) = 40,000円の収益が必要である。

費用回収シナリオ例

アウトバウンドキャパに1BTCをデポジットしたAさんを例にする。1BTCは初心者とは言えないと思うが、このくらい原資を用意しないと費用回収の話がしづらいという裏事情がある。チャネル選択やルーティング戦略は何もしていない仮定である。ノード運用次第であることは言うまでもないので今回は要素や式を洗い出すことが主目的で一つ一つの変数の値は参考までに。

変数設定

• インバウンドを同額用意して合計キャパを2BTCとする。
• １チャネルあたり5m satsで40チャネル開設する。
• チャネル開設費用　223sats * 40チャネル = 8,920sats
• 初期費用合計　1,333,333sats + 8,920sats = 1,342,253sats
• 一回あたり平均ルーティング量 = 100,000sats
• 1チャネルあたり平均アウトバウンド数/日 = 2
• 1チャネルあたり平均アウトバウンドppm = 50

費用回収地点

• 1日のアウトバウンド量は、 40チャネル * 2本 * 100,000sats = 8m sats
• 手数料収入は、8m sats * 0.005%(50ppm) = 400sats/日。月換算すると12,000sats/月
• 電気代を差し引くと、12,000sats - 電気代9,720sats =月収益2,280sats(68.4円)
• 初期費用回収まで、1,342,253sats / 2,280sats = 589ヵ月（49年）
• 後述するが電気代差引き前で年利0.14%になる。

理想的なppm

6ヵ月での初期費用回収を目的にしてアウトバウンドppmを求める。

• ひと月あたり、初期費用合計1,342,253sats / 6ヵ月 + 電気代9,720sats = 233,429sats(7,003円)の収益が必要。
• 1日あたり、7,781sats(233円)の収益
• その場合の平均アウトバウンドppmは、 7,781sats（1日の収益量） / 8m sats（1日のアウトバウンド量） * 1m sats（ppm変換係数） = 973ppm

他のファイナンスとの比較

ルーティングノードを運用して手数料収入を得ることは資産運用と捉えることもできる。レンディングやトレードなどの他の資産運用手段とパフォーマンス比較をするなら、デポジットしたアウトバウンドキャパシティに対する手数料収入をAPY換算する。（獲得した手数料はアウトバウンドキャパシティに積み重ねられるので複利と見做せる）

例としてLNDg（v1.3.1）のAPY算出計算式を転載する。見ての通り画面上の表記はAPYなのに中身はAPRになっているので注意だが今回は考え方の参考としてこのまま採用する。

年換算 = 365 / 7 = 52.142857 年利 = (7dayの収益 * 年換算) / アウトバウンドのキャパシティ

例えば上記のAさんの費用回収シナリオに当てはめると以下となる。

年利 0.14% = （400sats * 7日 * 年換算）/ 100m sats

電気代を差し引くと 76sats/日となり年利0.027%

もし平均アウトバウンド1000ppmになると8,000sats/日なので年利2.9%になる。 この場合、電気代はほぼ1日で回収されるため差し引いても大差なく7,676sats/日で年利2.8%になる。

考察

以上、BTC市場価格や一日のアウトバウンド量といった重要な数値をいくつか仮置きした上ではあるが、LN手数料の適正水準を考えるための参考材料を提示した。

まず、現在のLNの料金相場は他の決済手段から比べると圧倒的に安いことがわかった。1%でも競争力が十分ありそうなのに0.1%前後で送金することが大半である。

健全な市場発展のためには、ルーティングノードの採算が取れていることが欠かせないと考えるが、残念ながら現在の収益性は低い。ルーティングノードの収益性は仮定に仮定を重ねた見積もりになるが、平均アウトバウンドが1000ppmでようやく個人でも参入できるレベルになるという結論になった。ルーティングノードの立場に立つと、現在の市場平均から大幅な上昇が必要だと考える。

手数料市場は競争のためつねに下方圧力がかかっていて仕様上で可能な0に近づいている。この重力に逆らうためには、1. 需要 > 供給のバランスになること、2. 事業用途での高額買取のチャネルが増えること、の2つの観点を挙げる。1にせよ2にせよネットワークの活用が進むことで発生し、手数料市場の大きな変動機会になるのではないか。他の決済手段と比較すれば10000ppm、1チャネル2500ppmあたりまでは十分に健全な範囲だと考える。

@ 81650982:299380fa

Let us delve into Monero (XMR). Among the proponents of various altcoins, Monero arguably commands one of the most dedicated followings, perhaps second only to Ethereum. Unlike many altcoins where even investors often harbor speculative, short-term intentions, the genuine belief within the Monero community suggests an inherent appeal to the chain itself.

The primary advantage touted by Monero (and similar so-called "privacy coins") is its robust privacy protection features. The demand for anonymous payment systems, tracing its lineage back to David Chaum, predates even the inception of Bitcoin. Monero's most heavily promoted strength, relative to Bitcoin, is that its privacy features are enabled by default.

This relates to the concept of the "anonymity set." To guarantee anonymity, a user must blend into a crowd of ordinary users. The larger the group one hides within, the more difficult it becomes for an external observer to identify any specific individual. From the perspective of Monero advocates, Bitcoin's default transaction model is overly transparent, clearly revealing the flow of funds between addresses. While repeated mixing can enhance anonymity in Bitcoin, the fact that users must actively undertake such measures presents a significant hurdle. More critically, proponents argue, the very group engaging in such deliberate obfuscation is precisely the group one doesn't want to be associated with for effective anonymity. Hiding requires blending with the ordinary, not merely mixing with others who are also actively trying to hide — the latter, they contend, is akin to criminals mixing only with other criminals.

This is a valid point. For instance, there's a substantial difference between a messenger app offering end-to-end encryption for all communications by default, versus one requiring users to explicitly create a "secret chat" for encryption. While I personally believe that increased self-custody of Bitcoin in personal wallets, acquisition through direct peer-to-peer payments rather than exchange purchases, and the widespread adoption of the Lightning Network would make tracing significantly harder even without explicit mixing efforts, let us concede, for the sake of argument, that Bitcoin's base-layer anonymity might not drastically improve even in such a future scenario.

Nevertheless, Monero's long-term prospects appear considerably constrained when focusing purely on technical limitations, setting aside economic factors or incentive models for now. While discussions on economics can often be countered with "That's just your speculation," technical constraints present more objective facts and leave less room for dispute.

Monero's most fundamental problem is its lack of scalability. To briefly explain how Monero obfuscates the sender: it includes other addresses alongside the true sender's address in the 'from' field and attaches what appears to be valid signatures for all of them. With a default setting of 10 decoys (plus the real spender, making a ring size of 11), the signature size naturally becomes substantially larger than Bitcoin's. Since an observer cannot determine which of the 11 is the true sender, and these decoys are arbitrary outputs selected from the blockchain belonging to other users, anonymity is indeed enhanced. While the sender cannot generate individually valid signatures for the decoy outputs (as they don't own the private keys), the use of a ring signature mathematically proves that one member of the ring authorized the transaction, allowing it to pass network validation.

The critical issue is that this results in transaction sizes several times larger than Bitcoin's. Bitcoin already faces criticism for being relatively expensive and slow. Monero's structure imposes a burden that is multiples greater. One might question the relationship between transaction data size and transaction fees/speed. However, the perceived slowness of blockchains isn't typically due to inefficient code, but rather the strict limitations imposed on block size (or equivalent throughput constraints) to maintain decentralization. Therefore, larger transaction sizes directly translate into throughput limitations and upward pressure on fees. If someone claims Monero fees are currently lower than Bitcoin's, that is merely a consequence of its significantly lower usage. Should Monero's transaction volume reach even a fraction of Bitcoin's, its current architecture would struggle severely under the load.

To address this, Monero implemented a dynamic block size limit instead of a hardcoded one. However, this is not a comprehensive solution. If the block size increases proportionally with usage, a future where Monero achieves widespread adoption as currency — implying usage potentially hundreds, thousands, or even hundreds of thousands of times greater than today — would render the blockchain size extremely difficult to manage for ordinary node operators. Global internet traffic might be consumed by Monero transactions, or at the very least, the bandwidth and storage costs could exceed what individuals can reasonably bear.

Blockchains, by their nature, must maintain a size manageable enough for individuals to run full nodes, necessitating strict block size limits (or equivalent constraints in blockless designs). This fundamental requirement is the root cause of limited transaction speed and rising fees. Consequently, the standard approach to blockchain scaling involves Layer 2 solutions like the Lightning Network. The problem is, implementing such solutions on Monero is extremely challenging.

Layer 2 solutions, while varying in specific implementation details across different blockchains, generally rely heavily on the transparency of on-chain transactions. They typically involve sophisticated smart contracts built upon the ability to publicly verify on-chain states and events. Monero's inherent opacity, hiding crucial details of on-chain transactions, makes it exceptionally difficult for two mutually untrusting parties to reach the necessary consensus and cryptographic agreements (like establishing payment channels with verifiable state transitions and dispute mechanisms) that underpin such Layer 2 systems. The fact that Monero, despite existing for several years, still lacks a functional, widely adopted Layer 2 implementation suggests that this remains an unsolved and technically formidable challenge. While theoretical proposals exist, their real-world feasibility remains uncertain and would likely require significant breakthroughs in cryptographic protocol design.

Furthermore, Monero faces another severe scaling challenge related to its core privacy mechanism. As mentioned, decoy outputs are used to obscure the true sender. An astute observer might wonder: If a third party cannot distinguish the real spender, could the real spender potentially double-spend their funds later? Or could someone's funds become unusable simply because they were chosen as a decoy in another transaction? Naturally, Monero's developers anticipated this. The solution employed involves key images.

When an output is genuinely spent within a ring signature, a unique cryptographic identifier called a "key image" is derived from the real output and the spender's private key. This derivation is one-way (the key image cannot be used to reveal the original output or key). This key image is recorded on the blockchain. When validating a new transaction, the network checks if the submitted key image has already appeared in the history. If it exists, the transaction is rejected as a double-spend attempt. The crucial implication is that this set of used key images can never be pruned. Deleting historical key images would directly enable double-spending.

Therefore, Monero's state size — the data that full nodes must retain and check against — grows linearly and perpetually with the total number of transactions ever processed on the network.

Summary In summary, Monero faces critical technical hurdles:

Significantly Larger Transaction Sizes: The use of ring signatures for anonymity results in transaction data sizes several times larger than typical cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin.

Inherent Scalability Limitations: The large transaction size, combined with the necessity of strict block throughput limits to preserve decentralization, creates severe scalability bottlenecks regarding transaction speed and cost under significant load. Dynamic block sizes, while helpful in the short term, do not constitute a viable long-term solution for broad decentralization.

Layer 2 Implementation Difficulty: Monero's fundamental opacity makes implementing established Layer 2 scaling solutions (like payment channels) extremely difficult with current approaches. The absence of a widely adopted solution to date indicates that this remains a major unresolved challenge.

Unprunable, Linearly Growing State: The key image mechanism required to prevent double-spending mandates the perpetual storage of data proportional to the entire transaction history, unlike Bitcoin where nodes can prune historical blocks and primarily need to maintain the current UTXO set (whose size depends on usage patterns, not total history).

These technical constraints raise legitimate concerns about Monero's ability to scale effectively and achieve widespread adoption in the long term. While ongoing research may alleviate some of these issues, at present they represent formidable challenges that any privacy-focused cryptocurrency must contend with.

@ 3589b793:ad53847e

※本記事は別サービスで2022年5月22日に公開した記事の移植です。

Happy 🍕 Day's Present

まだ邦訳版が出版されていませんがこれまでのシリーズと同じくGitHubにソースコードが公開されています。なんと、現在のライセンスでは個人使用限定なら翻訳や製本が可能です。Macで、翻訳にはPDFをインプットにできるDeepLを用いた環境で、インスタントに製本してKindleなどで読めるようにする方法をまとめました。

手順の概要

1. Ruby環境を用意する
2. PDF作成ツールをセットアップする
3. GitHubのリポジトリを自分のPCにクローンする
4. asciidocをPDFに変換する
5. DeepLを節約するためにPDFを結合する
6. DeepLで翻訳ファイルを作る
7. 一冊に製本する

この手法の強み・弱み

翻訳だけならPDFを挟まなくてもGithubなどでプレビューできるコンパイル後のドキュメントの文章をコピーしてDeepLのWebツールにペーストすればよいですが、原著のペーパーブックで438ページある大容量です。熟練のコピペ職人でも年貢を納めて後進（機械やソフトウェア）に道を譲る刻ではないでしょうか？ただし、Pros/Consがあります。

Pros

• 一冊の本になるので毎度のコピペ作業がいらない
• Pizzaを食べながらタブレットやKindleで読める
• 図や表が欠落しない（プロトコルの手順を追った解説が多いため最大の動機でした）
• 2022/6/16追記: DeepLの拡張機能がアップデートされウェブページの丸ごと翻訳が可能になりました。よってウェブ上のgithubの図表付きページをそのまま翻訳できます。

Cons

• Money is power（大容量のためDeepLの有料契約が必要）
• ページを跨いだ文章が統合されずに不自然な翻訳になる（仕様です）
• ~~翻訳できない章が一つある（解決方法がないか調査中です。DeepLさんもっとエラーメッセージ出してくれ。Help me）~~ DeepLサポートに投げたら翻訳できるようになりました。

詳細ステップ

0.Ruby環境を用意する

asciidoctorも新しく入れるなら最新のビルドで良いでしょう。

1.PDF作成ツールをセットアップする

$ gem install asciidoctor asciidoctor-pdf $ brew install gs

2.GitHubのリポジトリを自分のPCにクローンする

どこかの作業ディレクトリで以下を実行する $ git clone git@github.com:lnbook/lnbook.git $ cd lnbook

3.asciidocをPDFに変換する

ワイルドカードを用いて本文を根こそぎPDF化します。 $ asciidoctor-pdf 0*.asciidoc 1*.asciidoc

いろいろ解析の警告が出ますが、ソースのasciidocを弄んでいくなりawsomeライブラリを導入すれば解消できるはずです。しかし如何せん量が多いので心が折れます。いったん無視して"Done is better than perfect"精神で最後までやり切りましょう。そのままGO！

また、お好みに合わせて、htmlで用意されている装丁用の部品も準備しましょう。私は表紙のcover.htmlをピックしました。ソースがhtmlなのでasciidoctorを通さず普通にPDFへ変換します。https://qiita.com/chenglin/items/9c4ed0dd626234b71a2c

4.DeepLを節約するためにPDFを結合する

DeepLでは課金プラン毎に翻訳可能なファイル数が設定されている上に、一本あたりの最大ファイルサイズが10MBです。また、翻訳エラーになる章が含まれていると丸ごとコケます。そのためPDCAサイクルを回し、最適なファイル数を手探りで見つけます。以下が今回導出した解となります。

$ gs -q -dNOPAUSE -dBATCH -sDEVICE=pdfwrite -sOutputFile=output_1.pdf 01_introduction.pdf 02_getting_started.pdf 03_how_ln_works.pdf 04_node_client.pdf 05_node_operations.pdf $gs -q -dNOPAUSE -dBATCH -sDEVICE=pdfwrite -sOutputFile=output_2_1.pdf 06_lightning_architecture.pdf 07_payment_channels.pdf 08_routing_htlcs.pdf $gs -q -dNOPAUSE -dBATCH -sDEVICE=pdfwrite -sOutputFile=output_2_2.pdf 09_channel_operation.pdf 10_onion_routing.asciidoc$ gs -q -dNOPAUSE -dBATCH -sDEVICE=pdfwrite -sOutputFile=output_3.pdf 11_gossip_channel_graph.pdf 12_path_finding.pdf 13_wire_protocol.pdf 14_encrypted_transport.pdf 15_payment_requests.pdf 16_security_privacy_ln.pdf 17_conclusion.pdf

5. DeepLで翻訳ファイルを作る

PDFファイルを真心を込めた手作業で一つ一つDeepLにアップロードしていき翻訳ファイルを作ります。ファイル名はデフォルトの[originalName]（日本語）.pdfのままにしています。

6. 一冊に製本する

表紙 + 本文で作成する例です。

$ gs -q -dNOPAUSE -dBATCH -sDEVICE=pdfwrite -sOutputFile=mastering_ln_jp.pdf cover.pdf "output_1 (日本語).pdf" "output_2_1 (日本語).pdf" "output_2_2 (日本語).pdf" "output_3 (日本語).pdf"

コングラチュレーションズ🎉

あなたは『Mastering the Lightning Network』の日本語版を手に入れた！個人使用に限り、あとは煮るなり焼くなりEPUBなりkindleへ送信するなり好き放題だ。

@ a5142938:0ef19da3

Dilling is a Danish brand that creates wool, silk, and organic cotton clothing for the whole family.

Natural materials used in products

• Cotton (organic)
• Natural latex (OEKO-TEX ®)
• Silk
• Wool (merino, alpaca)

⚠️ Warning: some products from this brand (especially Clothes – socks, jackets, thongs, shorts) contain non-natural materials, including:

• Elastane, spandex, lycra
• Polyamide, nylon (recycled nylon)
• Polyester (recycled)

Categories of products offered

• Clothing: men, women, children, babies, underwear, t-shirts, tank tops, dresses, jackets, trousers, shorts, sweaters, cardigans, bodysuits, jumpsuits, panties, briefs, boxers...

👉 See natural products from this brand

Other information

• Nordic Swan ecolabel (dye)
• Made in Lithuania (cutting and sewing)
• Made in Denmark (dye)
• Made in Europe

👉 Learn more on the brand's website

---

This article is published on origin-nature.com 🌐 Voir cet article en français

📝 You can contribute to this entry by suggesting edits in comments.

🗣️ Do you use this product? Share your opinion in the comments.

⚡ Happy to have found this information? Support the project by making a donation to thank the contributors.

@ e4950c93:1b99eccd

Dilling est une marque danoise qui crée des vêtements en laine, soie et coton biologique pour toute la famille.

Matières naturelles utilisées dans les produits

• Coton (biologique)
• Laine (mérinos, alpaga)
• Latex naturel (OEKO-TEX ®)
• Soie

⚠️ Attention, certains produits de cette marque (notamment les Vêtements - chaussettes, vestes, strings, shorts) contiennent des matières non naturelles, dont :

• Elasthanne
• Polyamide, nylon (nylon recyclé)
• Polyester (recyclé)

Catégories de produits proposés

• Vêtements : homme, femme, enfant, bébé, sous-vêtements, t-shirts, débardeurs, robes, vestes, pantalons, shorts, pulls, gilets, bodies, combinaisons, culottes, slips, boxers...

👉 Voir les produits naturels de cette marque

Autres informations

• Ecolabel Nordic Swan (teintures)
• Fabriqué en Lituanie (coupe et couture)
• Fabriqué au Danemark (teintures)
• Fabriqué en Europe

👉 En savoir plus sur le site de la marque

---

Cet article est publié sur origine-nature.com 🌐 See this article in English

📝 Vous pouvez contribuer à cette fiche en suggérant une modification en commentaire.

🗣️ Vous utilisez ce produit ? Partagez votre avis en commentaire.

⚡ Heureu-x-se de trouver cette information ? Soutenez le projet en faisant un don, pour remercier les contribut-eur-ice-s.

@ d08c9312:73efcc9f

Resolvr CEO, Aaron Daniel, summarizes his keynote speech from the Bitcoin Insurance Summit, April 26, 2025

Introduction

At the inaugural Bitcoin Insurance Summit in Miami, I had the pleasure of sharing two historical parallels that illuminate why "Bitcoin needs insurance, and insurance needs Bitcoin." The insurance industry's reactions to fire and coffee can help us better understand the profound relationship between emerging technologies, risk management, and commercial innovation.

Fire: Why Bitcoin Needs Insurance

The first story explores how the insurance industry's response to catastrophic urban fires shaped modern building safety. Following devastating events like the Great Fire of London (1666) and the Great Chicago Fire (1871), the nascent insurance industry began engaging with fire risk systematically.

Initially, insurers offered private fire brigades to policyholders who displayed their company's fire mark on their buildings. This evolved into increasingly sophisticated risk assessment and pricing models throughout the 19th century:

• Early 19th century: Basic risk classifications with simple underwriting based on rules of thumb
• Mid-19th century: Detailed construction types and cooperative sharing of loss data through trade associations
• Late 19th/Early 20th century: Scientific, data-driven approaches with differentiated rate pricing

The insurance industry fundamentally transformed building construction practices by developing evidence-based standards that would later inform regulatory frameworks. Organizations like the National Board of Fire Underwriters (founded 1866) and Underwriters Laboratories (established 1894) tested and standardized new technologies, turning seemingly risky innovations like electricity into safer, controlled advancements.

This pattern offers a powerful precedent for Bitcoin. Like electricity, Bitcoin represents a new technology that appears inherently risky but has tremendous potential for society. By engaging with Bitcoin rather than avoiding it, the insurance industry can develop evidence-based standards, implement proper controls, and ultimately make the entire Bitcoin ecosystem safer and more robust.

Coffee: Why Insurance Needs Bitcoin

The second story reveals how coffee houses in 17th-century England became commercial hubs that gave birth to modern insurance. Nathaniel Canopius brewed the first documented cup of coffee in England in 1637. But it wasn't until advances in navigation and shipping technology opened new trade lanes that coffee became truly ubiquitous in England. Once global trade blossomed, coffee houses rapidly spread throughout London, becoming centers of business, information exchange, and innovation.

In 1686, Edward Lloyd opened his coffee house catering to sailors, merchants, and shipowners, which would eventually evolve into Lloyd's of London. Similarly, Jonathan's Coffee House became the birthplace of what would become the London Stock Exchange.

These coffee houses functioned as information networks where merchants could access shipping news and trade opportunities, as well as risk management solutions. They created a virtuous cycle: better shipping technology brought more coffee, which fueled commerce and led to better marine insurance and financing, which in turn improved global trade.

Today, we're experiencing a similar technological and financial revolution with Bitcoin. This digital, programmable money moves at the speed of light and operates 24/7 as a nearly $2 trillion asset class. The insurance industry stands to benefit tremendously by embracing this innovation early.

Conclusion

The lessons from history are clear. Just as the insurance industry drove safety improvements by engaging with fire risk, it can help develop standards and best practices for Bitcoin security. And just as coffee houses created commercial networks that revolutionized finance, insurance, and trade, Bitcoin offers new pathways for global commerce and risk management.

For the insurance industry to remain relevant in a rapidly digitizing world, it must engage with Bitcoin rather than avoid it. The companies that recognize this opportunity first will enjoy significant advantages, while those who resist change risk being left behind.

The Bitcoin Insurance Summit represented an important first step in creating the collaborative spaces needed for this transformation—a modern version of those innovative coffee houses that changed the world over three centuries ago.

View Aaron's full keynote:

https://youtu.be/eIjT1H2XuCU

For more information about how Resolvr can help your organization leverage Bitcoin in its operations, contact us today.

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Qu'est-ce qu'une matière naturelle ? La question fait débat, et chacun-e privilégiera ses propres critères. Voici comment les matières sont classées sur ce site. La liste est régulièrement mise à jour en fonction des produits ajoutés. N'hésitez pas à partager votre avis !

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✅ Matières naturelles

Matières d'origine végétale, animale ou minérale, sans transformation chimique altérant leur structure moléculaire.

🌱 Principaux critères : - Biodégradabilité - Non-toxicité - Présence naturelle nécessitant le minimum de transformation

🔍 Liste des matières naturelles : - Bois - Cellulose régénérée (cupra, lyocell, modal, viscose) - Chanvre - Coton - Cuir - Latex naturel, caoutchouc - Liège - Lin - Laine - Métal - Soie - Terre - Verre - … (Autres matières)

⚠️ Bien que "naturelles", ces matières peuvent générer des impacts négatifs selon leurs conditions de production (pollution par pesticides, consommation d’eau excessive, traitement chimique, exploitation animale…). Ces impacts sont mentionnés sur la fiche de chaque matière.

Les versions biologiques de ces matières (sans traitement chimique, maltraitance animale, etc.) sont privilégiées pour référencer les produits sur ce site, tel qu'indiqué sur la fiche de chaque matière (à venir).

Les versions conventionnelles ne sont référencées que tant que lorsqu'il n'a pas encore été trouvé d'alternative plus durable pour cette catégorie de produits.

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🚫 Matières non naturelles

Matières synthétiques ou fortement modifiées, souvent issues de la pétrochimie.

📌 Principaux problèmes : - Toxicité et émissions de microplastiques - Dépendance aux énergies fossiles - Mauvaise biodégradabilité

🔍 Liste des matières non naturelles : - Acrylique - Élasthanne, lycra, spandex - Polyamides, nylon - Polyester - Silicone - … (Autres matières)

⚠️ Ces matières ne sont pas admises sur le site. Néanmoins, elles peuvent être présentes dans certains produits référencés lorsque :

• elles sont utilisées en accessoire amovible (ex. : élastiques, boutons… généralement non indiqué dans la composition par la marque) pouvant être retiré pour le recyclage ou compostage, et
• aucune alternative 100 % naturelle n’a encore été identifiée pour cette catégorie de produits.

Dans ce cas, un avertissement est alors affiché sur la fiche du produit.

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What is a natural material? It's a topic of debate, and everyone will prioritize their own criteria. Here’s how materials are classified on this site. The list is regularly updated based on the products added. Feel free to share your thoughts!

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✅ Natural Materials

Materials of plant, animal, or mineral origin, without chemical transformation that alters their molecular structure.

🌱 Main Criteria: - Biodegradability - Non-toxicity - Naturally occurring and recquiring minimal transformation

🔍 List of Natural Materials: - Regenerated Cellulose (cupra, lyocell, modal, rayon) - Cork - Cotton - Earth - Glass - Hemp - Natural Latex, rubber - Leather - Linen - Metal - Silk - Wood - Wool - … (Other materials)

⚠️ Although "natural", these materials can have negative impacts depending on their production conditions (pesticide pollution, excessive water consumption, chemical treatments, animal exploitation, etc.). These impacts are mentionned in the description of each material.

Organic versions of these materials — free from chemical treatments, animal mistreatment, etc. — are preferred for listing products on this site, as indicated on each material's page (coming soon).

Conventional versions are only referenced when no more sustainable alternative has yet been found for that product category.

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🚫 Non-Natural Materials

Synthetic or heavily modified materials, often derived from petrochemicals.

📌 Main Issues: - Toxicity and microplastic emissions - Dependence on fossil fuels - Poor biodegradability

🔍 List of Non-Natural Materials: - Acrylic - Elastane, spandex, lycra - Polyamides, nylon - Polyester - Silicone - … (Other materials)

⚠️ These materials are not accepted on this site. However, they may be present in certain listed products if:

• they are used in removable accessories (e.g., elastics, buttons—often not listed in the product’s composition by the brand) that can be detached for recycling or composting, and
• no 100% natural alternative has yet been identified for that product category.

In such cases, a warning will be displayed on the product page.

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To explore the link between Gavekal-style platform companies and the US dollar's status as the global reserve currency, we need to view the problem through multiple interlocking lenses—monetary economics, network effects, macro-political architecture, financial plumbing, and the logic of platform capitalism. Gavekal’s conceptual framework focuses heavily on capital-light, scalable businesses that act as platforms rather than traditional linear firms. Their model emphasizes "soft" balance sheets, asset-light capital formation, high intangible value creation, and the scaling of network effects. These traits dovetail in complex ways with the structural position of the United States in the global financial system.

What follows is a broad and recursive dissection of how these two phenomena—platform companies and reserve currency status—are mutually constitutive, each feeding the other, both directly and via second- and third-order effects.

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1. The Core Metaphor: Platforms and Monetary Hegemony

At its root, a platform is a meta-infrastructure—a set of protocols and affordances that enable others to interact, produce, consume, and transact. The dollar, as reserve currency, functions in an analogous way. It is not merely a medium of exchange but a platform for global commerce, pricing, credit formation, and risk transfer.

In this metaphor, the United States is not just a country but a platform operator of global finance. And like Amazon or Apple, it enforces terms of access, extracts rents, underwrites standardization, and benefits disproportionately from marginal activity across its ecosystem. Just as Apple's App Store tax or Amazon’s marketplace fee are invisible to most users, the dollar hegemon collects global seigniorage, institutional influence, and capital inflow not as overt tolls, but through the structuring of default behaviors.

This already suggests a deep isomorphism between platform logic and reserve currency logic.

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1. Capital-Light Scaffolding and Global Dollar Demand

Gavekal-style firms (e.g. Apple, Google, Microsoft) have something unusual in common: they generate high levels of free cash flow with low reinvestment needs. That is, they do not soak up global capital so much as recycle it outward, often via share buybacks or bond issuance. This creates a paradox: they are net issuers of dollar-denominated financial claims even as they are net accumulators of global income.

Now map this onto the structure of reserve currency systems. The US must export financial assets to the world (Treasuries, MBS, high-grade corporates) in order to satisfy foreign demand for dollar claims. But traditional exporting economies (e.g. Germany, China) create excess savings they must park in safe dollar assets, while running trade surpluses.

Gavekal-style firms allow the US to square a circle. The US economy does not need to run trade surpluses, because its platform companies export “intangible products” at near-zero marginal cost (e.g. iOS, search ads, cloud infrastructure), generate global rents, and then repatriate those earnings into US financial markets. These flows offset the US current account deficit, plugging the "Triffin dilemma" (the need to run deficits to supply dollars while maintaining credibility).

Thus, platform companies act as soft exporters, replacing industrial exports with intangible, rent-generating capital. Their global cash flows are then recycled through dollar-denominated assets, providing the scale and liquidity necessary to sustain reserve status.

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1. The Hierarchy of Money and Intangible Collateral

Modern monetary systems rest on a hierarchy of collateral—some assets are more money-like than others. US Treasuries sit at the apex, but AAA-rated corporates, especially those with global footprints and balance-sheet integrity, are close behind.

Platform firms are unique in their capacity to create high-quality, globally accepted private collateral. Apple’s bonds, Microsoft’s equity, and Google’s cash reserves function as synthetic dollar instruments, widely accepted, liquid, and backed by consistent income streams. These firms extend the reach of the dollar system by providing dollar-denominated assets outside the banking system proper, further embedding dollar logic into global capital flows.

Moreover, platform companies often internalize global tax arbitrage, holding cash offshore (or in tax-efficient jurisdictions) and issuing debt domestically. This creates a loop where foreign dollar claims are used to finance US domestic consumption or investment, but the underlying income comes from global activities. This is reverse colonization through intangibles.

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1. Winner-Take-Most Dynamics and Network Effects in Dollar Space

The dollar system, like platform capitalism, obeys a power-law distribution. Liquidity begets liquidity. The more that dollar instruments dominate global trade, the more pricing, settlement, and hedging mechanisms are built around them. This self-reinforcing loop mimics network effect entrenchment: the more users a platform has, the harder it is to displace.

Reserve currency status is not a product of GDP share alone. It’s a function of infrastructure, institutional depth, legal recourse, capital mobility, and networked habits. Likewise, Apple’s dominance is not just about better phones, but about developer lock-in, payment systems, user base, and design mores.

Gavekal-style firms reinforce this pattern: their software platforms often denominate activity in dollars, price in dollars, store value in dollars, and link digital labor across borders into dollar-based flows. YouTube creators in Jakarta are paid in dollars. AWS charges Chilean entrepreneurs in dollars. App Store remittances to Kenya settle in dollars.

This creates global micro-tributaries of dollar flows, all of which aggregate into the larger river that sustains dollar supremacy.

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1. Geopolitical Power Projection by Private Means

Traditional hegemonic systems project power through military, legal, and diplomatic tools. But platforms provide soft control mechanisms. The US can influence foreign populations and elite behavior not merely through embassies and aircraft carriers, but through tech platforms that shape discourse, information flows, norms, and cognitive frames.

This is a kind of cognitive imperialism, in which reserve currency status is bolstered by the fact that cultural products (e.g. Netflix, social media, productivity tools) are encoded in American norms, embedded in American legal systems, and paid for in American currency.

The platform firm thus becomes a shadow extension of statecraft, whether or not it sees itself that way. Dollar hegemony is reinforced not only by Treasury markets and SWIFT access, but by the gravity of the mental ecosystem within which the global bourgeoisie operates. To earn, spend, invest, create, and dream within American-built systems is to keep the dollar central by default.

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1. Second-Order Effects: The Intangibility Ratchet and Global Liquidity Traps

An overlooked consequence of Gavekal-style platform dominance is that global capital formation becomes disembodied. That is, tangible projects—factories, infrastructure, energy systems—become less attractive relative to financial or intangible investments.

As a result, much of the world, especially the Global South, becomes capital-starved even as capital is abundant. Why? Because the returns on tangible investment are less scalable, less defensible, and less liquid than buying FAANG stocks or US Treasuries.

This results in a liquidity trap at the global scale: too much capital chasing too few safe assets, which only reinforces demand for dollar instruments. Meanwhile, intangible-intensive firms deepen their moats by mining attention, user data, and payment flows—often without any large-scale employment or industrial externalities.

Thus, Gavekal-style firms create asymmetric global development, further concentrating economic gravitational mass in the dollar zone.

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1. Feedback Loops and Fragility

All of this breeds both strength and fragility. On one hand, platform firm cash flows make the dollar system seem robust—anchored in cash-generative monopolies with global reach. On the other hand, the system becomes narrower and more brittle. When so much of global liquidity is intermediated through a few firms and the sovereign system that hosts them, any attack on these nodes—financial, legal, technological, or geopolitical—could unseat the equilibrium.

Moreover, platform logic tends to reduce systemic redundancy. It optimizes for efficiency, not resilience. It centralizes control, narrows option sets, and abstracts real production into code. If the dollar system ever loses credibility—through inflation, sanctions overreach, geopolitical backlash, or platform fatigue—the network effects could reverse violently.

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1. Conclusion: The Intangible Empire

The United States today operates an empire of intangibles, in which reserve currency status and platform firm dominance are co-constituted phenomena. Each reinforces the other:

Platform firms channel global rents into dollar instruments.

The dollar system provides legal scaffolding, liquidity, and pricing infrastructure for these firms.

Global user bases are conditioned into dollar-denominated interaction by default.

Financial markets treat platform firms as synthetic sovereigns: safe, liquid, predictable.

What is left is a cybernetic loop of financialized cognition: the dollar is strong because platform firms dominate, and platform firms dominate because the dollar is strong.

This loop may persist longer than many expect, but it is not permanent. Its unravelling, when it comes, will likely not be driven by any single actor, but by the erosion of symbolic power, the emergence of parallel platforms, or the ecological unsustainability of the model. But for now, the Gavekal firm and the dollar empire are the two poles of a single global architecture—seen best not as cause and effect, but as the two faces of the same Janus coin.

@ a5142938:0ef19da3

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Support the project by making a donation to keep it running and thank the contributors.

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• You can also support us on a recurring basis 👉 Make a pledge on LiberaPay

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💡 A Value-Sharing Model

Half of the donations are redistributed to the contributors who create the site's value, experimenting with a revenue-sharing model on the Internet—one that respects your data and doesn’t seek to capture your attention. The other half helps cover the site's operating costs.

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Core Team

The Core Team drives the project and validates the content.

• Jean-David Bar: https://njump.me/npub1qr4p7uamcpawv7cr8z9nlhmd60lylukf7lvmtlnpe7r4juwxudzq3hrnll

To start, I'm managing the project solo by sharing my bookmarks to avoid plastic on ourselves and on our children. Contact me if you'd like to join!

Content Enrichers

Our contributors make this site engaging and interesting.

Coming soon.

👉 Learn more about contributions

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Finding 100% natural, plastic-free products turned out to be much harder than I expected… So I started collecting bookmarks. And then I thought: "What if we shared?!

Help me discover the best natural alternatives for clothing and gear without plastic!

This project is all about sharing: half of the site's potential revenue is redistributed to contributors. A small experiment in revenue and value sharing on the internet. :-)

Jean-David Bar

Q&A

Why focus on natural materials?

Synthetic materials are mostly plastics (polyester, polyamide…). The problem? They end up contaminating us:

• Microplastics absorbed through the skin,
• Particles released with every wash, making their way into the water we drink and the food we eat,
• Major challenges in recycling plastic waste.

What exactly are natural materials?

They are non-synthetic materials, whose components exist in nature without molecular modification. But what really matters here is their biodegradability and non-toxicity.

Some materials may spark debates about their acceptability on this site!

👉 Learn more about materials

How is this different from other ethical fashion or shopping websites?

Many websites offer ethical and sustainable products, but I often found they still included synthetic materials. I had to check every product individually. Some promote recycled plastic fibers as an eco-friendly choice, but I’d rather not put plastic on my skin or my children's.

How can I contribute?

If you find this project useful or interesting, here’s how you can support it:

• 📝 Contribute: suggest edits by commenting on existing entries or propose new product or brand references. 👉 Learn more about contributions

• ⚡ Donate: Help sustain the project and support contributors. 👉 Learn more about donations

• 📢 Spread the word: Share the site on social media, your blog…

How can I receive a share of the site’s revenue?

You need a NOSTR account and a Bitcoin Lightning address.

👉 Learn more about rewards

What is NOSTR?

NOSTR is a decentralized internet protocol, still experimental, that allows you to:

• Publish and browse content without relying on a centralized platform.
• Log in to multiple services while keeping full control over your data.
• Use the Bitcoin Lightning network for instant, peer-to-peer payments.

What about my data privacy?

• No ads, no personalized tracking.
• NOSTR comments are public, but you can use a pseudonym.
• You retain ownership of your contributions on the NOSTR protocol.

Who is behind this project?

👉 See the contributors

We use open-source tools and services:

• NOSTR for content publishing and contributions checking,
• npub.pro for content visualization,
• Coinos.io for payment management.

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Rewards are an experimental approach to sharing the value created by contributors to this site, through a revenue-sharing system based on the following conditions:

• Any revenue generated by the site each month is distributed over the following 12 months, ensuring long-term visibility and smoothing out monthly variations.
• On the 1st of each month, half of the revenue is distributed among all contributors, in proportion to the number of their validated contributions.
• Contributions remain valid indefinitely, but rewards are only distributed to contributors who have made at least one validated contribution in the past 12 months.

Payment Method

Rewards are paid via the Lightning network, in sats (the smallest unit of Bitcoin).

To receive payments, you must have a NOSTR account linked to a Lightning wallet.

To receive them, the NOSTR account used to contribute must be linked to a Lightning wallet.

💡 New to these tools? - Don’t have a NOSTR account yet? A simple way to get started is to create one on an open-source NOSTR client like yakihonne.com to set up your profile and wallet there. Then, retrieve your NOSTR keys (from the settings) and save them in a secure vault like nsec.app to log in here and start contributing. - Already started contributing on this site? Make sure to securely store your NOSTR keys in a vault like nsec.app. You can also log in with them on yakihonne.com to set up your profile. - You can also contribute directly from yakihonne.com by commenting on Origine Nature’s articles.

👉 Learn more about contributions

Next rewards

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@ f11e91c5:59a0b04a

!!!2022-07-07に書かれた記事です。

暗号通貨とかでお弁当売ってます 11:30〜14:00ぐらいでやってます

◆住所 木曜日・東京都渋谷区宇田川町41 （アベマタワーの下らへん）

◆お値段

Monacoin 3.9mona

Bitzeny 390zny

Bitcoin 3900sats (#lightningNetwork)

Ethereum 0.0039Ether(#zkSync)

39=thank you. （円を基準にしてません）

最近は週に一回になりました。 他の日はキッチンカーの現場を探したり色々してます。 東京都内で平日ランチ出店出来そうな場所があればぜひご連絡を！

写真はNFCタグです。 スマホにウォレットがあればタッチして3900satsで決済出来ます。 正直こんな怪しい手書きのNFCタグなんて絶対にビットコイナーは触りたくも無いだろうなと思いますが、これでも良いんだぜというメッセージです。

今までbtcpayのposでしたが速度を追求してこれに変更しました。 たまに上手くいかないですがそしたら渋々POS出すので温かい目でよろしくお願いします。

ノードを建てたり決済したりで1年経ちました。 最近も少しずつノードを建てる方が増えてるみたいで本当凄いですねUmbrel 大体の人がルーティングに果敢に挑むのを見つつ 奥さんに土下座しながら費用を捻出する弱小の私は決済の利便性を全開で振り切るしか無いので応援よろしくお願いします。

あえて あえて言うのであれば、ルーティングも楽しいですけど やはり本当の意味での即時決済や相手を選んでチャネルを繋げる楽しさもあるよとお伝えしたいっ！！ 決済を受け入れないと分からない所ですが 承認がいらない時点で画期的です。

QRでもタッチでも金額指定でも入力でも もうやりようには出来てしまうし進化が恐ろしく早いので1番利用の多いpaypayの手数料（事業者側のね）を考えたらビットコイン凄いじゃない！と叫びたくなる。 が、やはり税制面や価格の変動（うちはBTC固定だけども）ウォレットの操作や普及率を考えるとまぁ難しい所もあるんですかね。

それでも継続的に沢山の人が色んな活動をしてるので私も何か出来ることがあれば 今後も奥さんに土下座しながら頑張って行きたいと思います。

(Originally posted 2022-07-07)

I sell bento lunches for cryptocurrency. We’re open roughly 11:30 a.m. – 2:00 p.m. Address Thursdays – 41 Udagawa-chō, Shibuya-ku, Tokyo (around the base of Abema Tower)

Prices Coin Price Note Monacoin 3.9 MONA
Bitzeny 390 ZNY Bitcoin 3,900 sats (Lightning Network)
Ethereum 0.0039 ETH (zkSync) “39” sounds like “thank you” in Japanese. Prices aren’t pegged to yen.

These days I’m open only once a week. On other days I’m out scouting new spots for the kitchen-car. If you know weekday-lunch locations inside Tokyo where I could set up, please let me know!

The photo shows an NFC tag. If your phone has a Lightning wallet, just tap and pay 3,900 sats. I admit this hand-written NFC tag looks shady—any self-respecting Bitcoiner probably wouldn’t want to tap it—but the point is: even this works!

I used to run a BTCPay POS, but I switched to this setup for speed. Sometimes the tap payment fails; if that happens I reluctantly pull out the old POS. Thanks for your patience.

It’s been one year since I spun up a node and started accepting Lightning payments. So many people are now running their own nodes—Umbrel really is amazing. While the big players bravely chase routing fees, I’m a tiny operator scraping together funds while begging my wife for forgiveness, so I’m all-in on maximising payment convenience. Your support means a lot!

If I may add: routing is fun, but instant, trust-minimised payments and the thrill of choosing whom to open channels with are just as exciting. You’ll only understand once you start accepting payments yourself—zero-confirmation settlement really is revolutionary.

QR codes, NFC taps, fixed amounts, manual entry… the possibilities keep multiplying, and the pace of innovation is scary fast. When I compare it to the merchant fees on Japan’s most-used service, PayPay, I want to shout: “Bitcoin is incredible!” Sure, taxes, price volatility (my shop is BTC-denominated, though), wallet UX, and adoption hurdles are still pain points.

Even so, lots of people keep building cool stuff, so I’ll keep doing what I can—still on my knees to my wife, but moving forward!

@ 86d4591f:a987c633

Once upon a time, power wore a crown. Then it wore a top hat. Today, it wears a hoodie and speaks in sanitized mission statements about connection, safety, and user experience. But make no mistake: this is empire — softened, digitized, gamified, but empire all the same.

The old robber barons built railroads and refineries. They captured the flow of goods and oil. The new ones build feeds and filters. They’ve captured the flow of attention, of meaning, of reality itself.

We used to trade in commodities; now we trade in perception. The platform is the factory, your data the raw material, your behavior the product. And like all robber barons, these new lords of code and cloud mask extraction in the language of progress.

They promise frictionless connection while selling surveillance. They promise community while cultivating dependency. They promise democratization while algorithmically anointing kings and silencing dissidents. A swipe, a like, a follow — every gesture is monetized. Every word is moderated. Every post is subject to invisible whims dressed up as “community standards.”

And we? We scroll through curated realities in gilded cages. We call it the feed, but what is it feeding? We’re not the customers — we’re the cattle. The economy has shifted from production to prediction, from ownership to access, from sovereignty to servitude.

The invisible hand now wears visible chains.

But rebellion brews — not as a riot, but as a protocol. Nostr: No gatekeepers. No kill switches. No boardroom behind the curtain. Just a blunt, defiant tool — a new printing press for the digital age.

Nostr isn’t slick. It doesn’t care about onboarding funnels or quarterly growth. It cares about freedom. It is infrastructure for speech that doesn’t ask permission. A raw wire of intent between human beings. An insurgent standard in a world of walled gardens.

This is not just about apps. This is about autonomy. About reclaiming the digital commons. About refusing to let five companies in Silicon Valley draw the borders of acceptable thought.

So plant your flag. Publish what they won’t. Build what they fear. This is not nostalgia for the early web — it is the refusal to let the next web become a prison wrapped in personalization.

The New Robber Barons control the rails of perception.

But we are building tunnels.

Protocol over platform.

Signal over spectacle.

Freedom over frictionless servitude.

Speak freely. Build fiercely. The territory is ours to reclaim.

@ 57d1a264:69f1fee1

• The Dangers of Ignorance
• A Brief History of Mechanistic Interpretability
• The Utility of Interpretability
• What We Can Do

The progress of the underlying technology is inexorable, driven by forces too powerful to stop, but the way in which it happens—the order in which things are built, the applications we choose, and the details of how it is rolled out to society—are eminently possible to change, and it’s possible to have great positive impact by doing so. We can’t stop the bus, but we can steer it. —Dario Amodei

originally posted at https://stacker.news/items/967193

@ edeb837b:ac664163

We’re incredibly proud to announce that NVSTly has won the Gold Stevie® Award for Tech Startup of the Year – Services in the 23rd Annual American Business Awards®! Winners were officially revealed on April 24th, and this recognition is a powerful validation of the innovation, impact, and passion our team continues to deliver every day.

More than 250 professionals worldwide participated in the judging process to select this year’s Stevie Award winners.

We were honored among a competitive field of over 3,600 nominations from organizations across nearly every industry. NVSTly was recognized for redefining social investing with a first-of-its-kind platform that empowers traders to track, share, and automatically broadcast trades and buy/sell alerts across nearly every financial market—including stocks, options, forex, and crypto—with futures support coming soon.

The Stevie judges praised NVSTly for “creating an ecosystem that blends brokerage integration, real-time trade tracking, and community engagement into one seamless experience,” and noted that “NVSTly’s social investing model is paving the way for a new generation of retail traders.”

This award comes at a time of major momentum for us:

:star: 4.9-star rating on the iOS App Store :star: 5.0-star rating on Google Play :star: 4.9-star rating on Product Hunt :star: 5.0-star rating on Disboard for our 51,000+ strong Discord trading community :star: 4.98-star rating on Top.gg — making our trading bot the highest-rated and only one of its kind in the finance category

And it’s not our first recognition. NVSTly has previously earned:

:trophy: Fintech Product of the Week on Product Hunt (2023 & 2024) :trophy: People’s Choice Award at the 2024 Benzinga Fintech Awards

We’re still just getting started. Our mobile and web platform is used by over 10,000 traders, and our brokerage integrations now include Webull, with Moomoo support launching in the coming days and Schwab integration already underway. These integrations allow traders to automate buy/sell alerts directly to their NVSTly followers and across Discord and supported social platforms.

“Winning a Gold Stevie is an incredible milestone that reflects the hard work of our team and the unwavering support of our community,” said Rich Watson, CEO of NVSTly. “We’ve always believed that trading should be transparent, collaborative, and empowering—and this recognition confirms we’re building something truly impactful.”

More than 3,600 nominations from organizations of all sizes and in virtually every industry were submitted this year for consideration in a wide range of categories, including Startup of the Year, Executive of the Year, Best New Product or Service of the Year, Marketing Campaign of the Year, Thought Leader of the Year, and App of the Year, among others. NVSTly was nominated in the Tech Startup of the Year – Services category for financial technology startups.

We’ll be officially celebrated at the 2025 Stevie Awards gala in New York City on June 10, but today, we’re celebrating with the traders, creators, investors, and builders who have believed in our mission from day one. (It's still undecided if anyone representing NVSTly will attend the award event to be presented or award.)

Thank you for being part of this journey. We’re just getting started.

@ 33633f1e:21137a92

Toglobal learninghuwabohu – wer räumt das alles auf?

Einheit veröffentlicht am Oktober 9, 2024 von settle

Worum religlobalt

| | | |:---:|:---:| | | |

Die zweite Schöpfungserzählung / Kirchenwälder in Äthiopien / Bewahrung der Schöpfung

Wir alle leben auf einer Erde – Tiere, Pflanzen und Menschen. Am Anfang war die Erde wüst und leer … aus diesem anfänglichen Tohuwabohu schafft Gott die natürliche Ordnung der Welt. Ursprünglich, so erzählt es der erste Schöpfungshymnus, war alles gut, wenn auch aus menschlicher Sicht, ziemlich durcheinander.

In der zweiten Schöpfungserzählung setzt Gott den Menschen in einen Paradiesgarten. Dieser Mensch soll nun die Erde behüten und bewahren. Das bedeutet auch Platz zu schaffen und aufzuräumen. Menschen greifen gemäß ihrem Auftrag, den Garten zu bestellen, in die Natur ein. Welche Konsequenzen hat unser Handeln? Wie sieht es mit dem zweiten Teil des Auftrags aus, den Garten auch zu beschützen? Was bedeutet es, wenn Menschen anfangen “auszuräumen” und dabei die Konsequenzen nicht mitbedenken?

In diesem Unterrichtsentwurf lernen Schüler:innen die biblischen Schöpfungserzählungen kennen und setzen sich kritisch mit den Folgen des menschlichen Handelns für Klima und Umwelt auseinander. Beispielhaft werden die Brot für die Welt “Reli fürs Klima”-Projekte aufgenommen. Anhand von Projekten in Kirchenwäldern der orthodoxen Kirche in Äthiopien und in Kirchenwäldern in Brandenburg erfahren die Schülerinnen und Schüler praktische Möglichkeiten, den Auftrag Gottes an die Menschen, die Schöpfung zu bebauen und zu bewahren, ernst zu nehmen und umzusetzen. Wie kann richtiges Aufräumen aussehen?

Die Konzeption orientiert sich am Dreischritt „Erkennen –Begreifen – Handeln“:

1. Erkennen: Und siehe, es war sehr gut … – Zugang zum 2. biblischen Schöpfungsbericht (Gen 2,4–15)
2. Begreifen: Und machet sie euch untertan – zerstören wir die Erde?
3. Handeln: Bestellen und beschützen – kleine Paradiesgärten

Für das Unterrichtsvorhaben werden mindestens 3 x 45 Minuten Unterrichtszeit veranschlagt. Alle drei Teile des Unterrichtes können auch deutlich vertiefter und mit größerem Zeiteinsatz und -aufwand durchgeführt werden.

Das vorgestellte Unterrichtsvorhaben wurde entwickelt im Rahmen des von Brot für die Welt geförderten Projektes “reliGlobal”. Zur Förderung des “Globalen Lernens” erstellen Mitarbeiter:innen aus mehreren Pädagogischen Instituten in der EKD kooperativ Unterrichtsmaterialien für den evangelischen Religionsunterricht.

Unterrichtsschritte

---

Tohuwabohu – Schritt 1 Erkennen

In diesem Schritt beschäftigen sich die Schüler:innen mit dem zweiten biblischen Schöpfungsbericht.

---

Tohuwabohu – Schritt 2 Begreifen

In diesem Schritt werden die Auswirkungen der Eingriffe des Menschen in die Natur ins Blickfeld genommen und problematisiert.

---

Tohuwabohu – Schritt 3 Handeln

In diesem Schritt lernen die Schüler:innen praktische Möglichkeiten, die Natur zu bewahren, kennen und selbst umzusetzen.

Metamaterial

---

Tohuwabohu – Theologisch-Didaktische Hinweise

---

Tohuwabohu – Curricularer Bezug

---

Tohuwabohu – Hintergrund

@ 6f50351f:7b36c393

Toglobal learninghuwabohu – wer räumt das alles auf?

Einheit veröffentlicht am Oktober 9, 2024 von settle

Worum religlobalt

| | | |:---:|:---:| | | |

Die zweite Schöpfungserzählung / Kirchenwälder in Äthiopien / Bewahrung der Schöpfung

Wir alle leben auf einer Erde – Tiere, Pflanzen und Menschen. Am Anfang war die Erde wüst und leer … aus diesem anfänglichen Tohuwabohu schafft Gott die natürliche Ordnung der Welt. Ursprünglich, so erzählt es der erste Schöpfungshymnus, war alles gut, wenn auch aus menschlicher Sicht, ziemlich durcheinander.

In der zweiten Schöpfungserzählung setzt Gott den Menschen in einen Paradiesgarten. Dieser Mensch soll nun die Erde behüten und bewahren. Das bedeutet auch Platz zu schaffen und aufzuräumen. Menschen greifen gemäß ihrem Auftrag, den Garten zu bestellen, in die Natur ein. Welche Konsequenzen hat unser Handeln? Wie sieht es mit dem zweiten Teil des Auftrags aus, den Garten auch zu beschützen? Was bedeutet es, wenn Menschen anfangen “auszuräumen” und dabei die Konsequenzen nicht mitbedenken?

In diesem Unterrichtsentwurf lernen Schüler:innen die biblischen Schöpfungserzählungen kennen und setzen sich kritisch mit den Folgen des menschlichen Handelns für Klima und Umwelt auseinander. Beispielhaft werden die Brot für die Welt “Reli fürs Klima”-Projekte aufgenommen. Anhand von Projekten in Kirchenwäldern der orthodoxen Kirche in Äthiopien und in Kirchenwäldern in Brandenburg erfahren die Schülerinnen und Schüler praktische Möglichkeiten, den Auftrag Gottes an die Menschen, die Schöpfung zu bebauen und zu bewahren, ernst zu nehmen und umzusetzen. Wie kann richtiges Aufräumen aussehen?

Die Konzeption orientiert sich am Dreischritt „Erkennen –Begreifen – Handeln“:

1. Erkennen: Und siehe, es war sehr gut … – Zugang zum 2. biblischen Schöpfungsbericht (Gen 2,4–15)
2. Begreifen: Und machet sie euch untertan – zerstören wir die Erde?
3. Handeln: Bestellen und beschützen – kleine Paradiesgärten

Für das Unterrichtsvorhaben werden mindestens 3 x 45 Minuten Unterrichtszeit veranschlagt. Alle drei Teile des Unterrichtes können auch deutlich vertiefter und mit größerem Zeiteinsatz und -aufwand durchgeführt werden.

Das vorgestellte Unterrichtsvorhaben wurde entwickelt im Rahmen des von Brot für die Welt geförderten Projektes “reliGlobal”. Zur Förderung des “Globalen Lernens” erstellen Mitarbeiter:innen aus mehreren Pädagogischen Instituten in der EKD kooperativ Unterrichtsmaterialien für den evangelischen Religionsunterricht.

Unterrichtsschritte

---

Tohuwabohu – Schritt 1 Erkennen

In diesem Schritt beschäftigen sich die Schüler:innen mit dem zweiten biblischen Schöpfungsbericht.

---

Tohuwabohu – Schritt 2 Begreifen

In diesem Schritt werden die Auswirkungen der Eingriffe des Menschen in die Natur ins Blickfeld genommen und problematisiert.

---

Tohuwabohu – Schritt 3 Handeln

In diesem Schritt lernen die Schüler:innen praktische Möglichkeiten, die Natur zu bewahren, kennen und selbst umzusetzen.

Metamaterial

---

Tohuwabohu – Theologisch-Didaktische Hinweise

---

Tohuwabohu – Curricularer Bezug

---

Tohuwabohu – Hintergrund

@ 8d34bd24:414be32b

My post on the signs of the End Times according to Jesus got way too long. It was too long to email, so I had to split it into two posts. I recommend reading Part 1 before continuing. You also may want to read my post Signs of the Times: Can We Know? I also want to reiterate my caveat. Although I believe the signs suggests the Rapture and the Tribulation are coming soon, no one can know the exact hour or day, so I can’t say exactly what soon means (days, months, years, decades, or possibly more).

As a review here is the primary passage where Jesus answers His disciples’ question “What will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age?” Below the passage is the 8 signs He gave. We will pick up with point 5.

Jesus’s Signs of the End

As He was sitting on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to Him privately, saying, “Tell us, when will these things happen, and what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age?”

And Jesus answered and said to them, “See to it that no one misleads you. For many will come in My name, saying, ‘I am the Christ,’ and will mislead many. You will be hearing of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not frightened, for those things must take place, but that is not yet the end. For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and in various places there will be famines and earthquakes. But all these things are merely the beginning of birth pangs.

“Then they will deliver you to tribulation, and will kill you, and you will be hated by all nations because of My name. At that time many will fall away and will betray one another and hate one another. Many false prophets will arise and will mislead many. Because lawlessness is increased, most people’s love will grow cold. But the one who endures to the end, he will be saved. This gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all the nations, and then the end will come. (Matthew 24:3-14) {emphasis mine}

Here is my summary of the signs Jesus said would identify the coming of the 7 year Tribulation:

1. Wars and rumors of wars. (Matthew 24:6a)

2. Famines (Matthew 24:7)

3. Earthquakes (Matthew 24:7).

4. Israel will be attacked and will be hated by all nations (Matthew 24:9)

5. Falling away from Jesus (Matthew 24:10)

6. Many Misled (Matthew 24:10)

7. People’s love will grow cold (Matthew 24:12)

8. Gospel will be preached to the whole world (Matthew 24:14)

The first 4 signs relate more to physical and political signs that the end times are near. The last 4 signs relate to spiritual matters.

5. Falling away from Jesus

One thing we are definitely seeing today is a falling away. This is most prevalent in the historically Christian Western nations in Europe and North America (and to a lesser, but significant, extent South America).

But the Spirit explicitly says that in later times some will fall away from the faith, paying attention to deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons, by means of the hypocrisy of liars seared in their own conscience as with a branding iron, men who forbid marriage and advocate abstaining from foods which God has created to be gratefully shared in by those who believe and know the truth. (1 Timothy 4:1-3) {emphasis mine}

For centuries Europe and North America were full of Christians or at least cultural Christians. Today that is no longer true. Christians are even being considered the hateful, criminal class and things like praying outside an abortion clinic is being punished with jail time. The Western nations can no longer be called Christian nations.

There are still a relatively large number of Americans who call themselves Christians, but the majority do not have a biblical worldview or live lives more like Christ than non-Christians.

“Seven out of 10 US adults call themselves “Christians” and yet only 6 in 100 (6%) actually have a biblical worldview.” In general, most Christian’s worldview does not align with the Bible, according to George Barna Surveys. In the most recent survey they found:

Many self-proclaimed Christians tend to believe a form of syncretism where they combine certain biblical principles with cultural ideas, scientism, and other religions to make “Christianity” into whatever they want to believe, just as the Bible predicted almost 2,000 years ago.

I solemnly charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by His appearing and His kingdom: preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort, with great patience and instruction. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, and will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths. (2 Timothy 4:1-4) {emphasis mine}

This is both a sign of the end times and something to watch in our own lives. I pray you will analyze your own life and beliefs in the light of the Bible to make sure you aren’t integrating unbiblical principles into your worldview.

6. Many Misled

Closely related to the falling away is that many will be misled. We have reached the point that the majority of so-called churches teach ideas and principles contrary to the Bible. They focus more on entertainment, self-help, and making everyone feel good about themselves instead of teaching of sin and the need for forgiveness or teaching how to live lives honoring to Christ. Preaching obedience to God has become anathema in most churches.

I am amazed that you are so quickly deserting Him who called you by the grace of Christ, for a different gospel; which is really not another; only there are some who are disturbing you and want to distort the gospel of Christ. But even if we, or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel contrary to what we have preached to you, he is to be accursed! As we have said before, so I say again now, if any man is preaching to you a gospel contrary to what you received, he is to be accursed! (Galatians 1:6-9) {emphasis mine}

We are also lied to and/or misled by politicians, scientists, the media, and the culture in general. We are told that science has disproven the Bible, despite the fact that nothing of the sort has occurred. (See my series on a literal Genesis for some details. icr.org and aig.org are also good resources). Peter warned of this very view.

Know this first of all, that in the last days mockers will come with their mocking, following after their own lusts, and saying, “Where is the promise of His coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all continues just as it was from the beginning of creation.” For when they maintain this, it escapes their notice that by the word of God the heavens existed long ago and the earth was formed out of water and by water, through which the world at that time was destroyed, being flooded with water. But by His word the present heavens and earth are being reserved for fire, kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men. (2 Peter 3:3-7) {emphasis mine}

God warned us that the last days would be far enough into the future that people would begin to mock the coming of the Tribulation & Millennium and deny the clear truths spoken of in the Bible. We are seeing this everywhere today.

We are also warned to be alert to deception so we, believers, are not misled.

Now we request you, brethren, with regard to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together to Him, that you not be quickly shaken from your composure or be disturbed either by a spirit or a message or a letter as if from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord has come. Let no one in any way deceive you, for it will not come unless the apostasy comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction, who opposes and exalts himself above every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, displaying himself as being God. (2 Thessalonians 2:1-4) {emphasis mine}

7. People’s love will grow cold

You can feel love growing cold day by day. We no longer have community that works together, but have been broken into groups to fight against one another. Instead of friendly, logical debate with those with whom we disagree, we have name calling, hate, and even violence. Children have been taught to hate their parents and parents have been taught to not value children and to murder them for convenience. The church has been split into so many different denominations that I don’t know if it is possible to know what they all are and many are fighting in hateful manner against each other. Hate, depression, and selfishness seem to have taken over the world.

But realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come. For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, holding to a form of godliness, although they have denied its power; Avoid such men as these. (2 Timothy 3:1-5) {emphasis mine}

Yes, spiritually and physically we are a basket case and it feels like the world is literally falling apart around us. This was predicted almost 2,000 years ago and is all according to God’s perfect plan. Most people turn to God in hard times and we have those in abundance. We do not need to despair, but need to turn to God and lean on Him for wisdom, faith, and peace. This is the birth pangs before the Tribulation and the Second coming of Jesus Christ. The news isn’t all bad, though.

8. Gospel preached to the whole world

The really good news is that the Gospel is being preached around the world. Parts of the world that had never heard the Gospel are hearing it and turning to Jesus.

All the ends of the earth will remember and turn to the Lord , And all the families of the nations will worship before You. (Psalm 22:27) {emphasis mine}

Wycliffe Bible translators is hoping to have at least started Bible translation in every active language by the end of this year (2025)

He says, “It is too small a thing that You should be My Servant To raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the preserved ones of Israel; I will also make You a light of the nations So that My salvation may reach to the end of the earth.” (Isaiah 49:6) {emphasis mine}

The Joshua Project tracks nations and people groups to determine which have been reached and which have not. It still looks like there is a large portion of the population that has not received the Gospel, but I also know people who are or have shared the Gospel to some of these people, so this map doesn’t mean that there are no Christians or that the Gospel has not been shared at all, but it does mean many people in these areas have not heard the Gospel and/or, that due to hatred of Christians, it is dangerous to share the Gospel and therefore has to be done slowly, carefully, and privately. Most of these unreached or barely reached people groups are areas that are predominantly Muslim, where those preaching the Gospel or those converting to Christianity are at risk of jail or death sentences.

As you can see, everything that Jesus said would come before the end is either escalating or here. We need to be ready and work to bring as many people to Christ as possible while we still have the opportunity because Jesus could come for us at any moment.

Share the Gospel with all those around you. Consider supporting missionaries, especially those going to unreached/least-reached areas. Maybe even consider becoming a missionary yourself. The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few.

May the God of heaven give us a heart for the lost around the world. May He give us the courage to share the Gospel with all those around us. May He align our priorities with His priorities, so we can be useful tools in the hands of God almighty.

Trust Jesus.

FYI, I hope to write several more articles on the end times (signs of the times, the rapture, the millennium, and the judgement), but I might be a bit slow rolling them out because I want to make sure they are accurate and well supported by Scripture. You can see my previous posts on the end times on the end times tab at trustjesus.substack.com. I also frequently will list upcoming posts.

@ 8e351a6d:770975b7

Se você está em busca de uma plataforma confiável, moderna e cheia de opções para se divertir jogando online, a KZ999 é uma excelente escolha. Com uma interface intuitiva, suporte ágil e uma vasta gama de jogos empolgantes, o site se destaca no cenário atual de entretenimento digital no Brasil. Neste artigo, vamos explorar o que torna a KZ999 única, quais jogos ela oferece e como é a experiência real dos jogadores na plataforma.

Desde o primeiro acesso, a KZ999 transmite profissionalismo e praticidade. O site é otimizado para funcionar bem tanto em computadores quanto em dispositivos móveis, permitindo que os jogadores tenham acesso aos seus jogos favoritos a qualquer momento e em qualquer lugar.

A segurança é um dos pilares da plataforma. Utilizando tecnologias avançadas de criptografia, a KZ999 protege todas as transações e dados dos usuários, oferecendo tranquilidade em cada movimentação financeira. Além disso, o processo de cadastro é simples e rápido, ideal para quem quer começar a jogar sem complicações.

Um dos grandes atrativos da KZ999 é a diversidade de jogos disponíveis. A plataforma reúne títulos de provedores renomados, garantindo gráficos de qualidade, jogabilidade fluida e recursos que aumentam o envolvimento do usuário.

Entre os principais tipos de jogos oferecidos, podemos destacar:

Jogos de cartas e mesa: Clássicos como pôquer, bacará e outros jogos de estratégia estão disponíveis para quem gosta de testar suas habilidades e raciocínio lógico.

Slots online: Com dezenas de opções temáticas, os slots da KZ999 variam entre aventuras, fantasia, cultura oriental, esportes e muito mais. Eles são perfeitos para quem busca diversão leve com chances de bons retornos.

Jogos ao vivo: Para quem gosta de interatividade, a KZ999 também oferece jogos com transmissão em tempo real, trazendo um toque mais imersivo à experiência.

Apostas esportivas: Outra funcionalidade muito popular é a seção de esportes, onde os usuários podem apostar em eventos reais, como futebol, basquete e esportes eletrônicos.

Experiência do Jogador: Confiabilidade e Diversão Garantida A KZ999 foi projetada com foco total no usuário. Isso significa que cada detalhe — desde a navegação até os métodos de pagamento — é pensado para oferecer a melhor experiência possível.

O atendimento ao cliente é um dos pontos altos da plataforma. Disponível 24 horas por dia, o suporte pode ser contatado via chat ao vivo ou outros canais de comunicação, sempre pronto para solucionar dúvidas ou resolver problemas com rapidez e cordialidade.

Além disso, os métodos de depósito e saque são variados e incluem opções que os brasileiros conhecem e confiam, como PIX e transferências bancárias. Os prazos para retirada também são bastante competitivos, garantindo mais agilidade na hora de aproveitar seus ganhos.

Conclusão A KZ999 chega ao mercado brasileiro com uma proposta sólida e atrativa: oferecer uma experiência completa de entretenimento digital, com jogos variados, segurança robusta e suporte eficiente. Seja você um jogador experiente ou alguém em busca de uma nova forma de diversão online, a KZ999 merece ser descoberta.

Com inovação, qualidade e foco no usuário, a KZ999 tem tudo para se tornar sua plataforma favorita. Explore, jogue e descubra por que tantos brasileiros já estão escolhendo a KZ999 para se divertir todos os dias.

@ 502ab02a:a2860397

50by40 คืออีกโครงการนึงที่ขยายภาพรวมขึ้นมาอีก recap กันครับ (ใครที่มาเจอกลางทาง อาจต้องย้อนเยอะครับ ย้อนไปสัก ปลายเดือน มีนาคม 2025) หลังจากที่เราได้ดูส่วนเล็กกันมาหลายตอน ตั้งแต่เรื่องเล็กๆอย่าง น้ำมันมะกอกปลอม ซึ่งตอนนั้นหลายคนที่อ่านอาจคิดว่า ไกลตัวส่วนใหญ่ยังดีพอ แต่ความนัยที่ซ่อนไว้ในบทนั้นคือ จุดเริ่มของการทำลายความเชื่อใจในอาหาร , ที่มาของบรอกโคลีเพื่อให้รู้ว่า สิ่งที่คิดว่าธรรมชาติ มันไม่ธรรมชาติ, นมโอ้ต นมประดิษฐ์ที่เป็นจุดที่เราคิดว่ามันคือการพลิกวงการแล้ว, การแอบจดสิทธิบัตรเมล็ดพันธุ์ที่เคยปลูกกินอย่างอิสระ, การพัฒนา GMO 2.0 ที่ไม่ต้องเรียกว่า GMO, โปรตีนจากแลป มาจนถึงเวย์ที่ไม่มีวัว แล้วเราก็ขยายภาพขึ้นกับข้อกำหนดการควบคุมการปลูกพืช UPOV1991/CPTPP, การเข้าสู่โรงเรียน, การกำเนิดของ ProVeg แล้วเราก็ได้รู้จักกับ Sebastian Joy ก็ถือว่าเดินทางมา 1 ด่านแล้วครับ หนทางเรื่องนี้ยังอีกยาวไกล วันนี้เราก็มาคุยกันถึงเรื่อง

โครงการ 50by40

โครงการนี้เริ่มต้นขึ้นในเดือนเมษายน ปี 2018 โดยมีการจัดการประชุม "50by40 Corporate Outreach Summit" ระหว่างวันที่ 27–29 เมษายน 2018 ที่กรุงเบอร์ลิน ประเทศเยอรมนี ซึ่งจัดโดย ProVeg International ร่วมกับ Humane Society of the United States การประชุมนี้ถือเป็นจุดเริ่มต้นของพันธมิตรระดับโลกที่มีเป้าหมายร่วมกันในการลดการผลิตและบริโภคผลิตภัณฑ์จากสัตว์ลง 50% ภายในปี 2040​

Sebastian Joy ผู้ก่อตั้งและประธานของ ProVeg International มีบทบาทสำคัญในการริเริ่มโครงการ 50by40 โดยเขาได้ช่วยก่อตั้งพันธมิตรนี้เพื่อส่งเสริมการเปลี่ยนแปลงระบบอาหารโลก นอกจากนี้ ProVeg International ยังมีบทบาทในการสนับสนุนองค์กรและสตาร์ทอัพที่มุ่งเน้นการเปลี่ยนแปลงระบบอาหารผ่านโปรแกรมต่างๆ

แม้ว่าโครงการ 50by40 จะประกาศเป้าหมายในการลดการบริโภคผลิตภัณฑ์จากสัตว์เพื่อสุขภาพและสิ่งแวดล้อม แต่เบื้องหลังยังมีการดำเนินงานที่มุ่งเน้นการเปลี่ยนแปลงระบบอาหารโลก โดยการส่งเสริม "อาหารที่เพาะเลี้ยงในห้องปฏิบัติการเป็นหลัก​"

โครงการนี้ยังมีการจัดกิจกรรมเพื่อดึงดูดนักลงทุนและผู้สนับสนุนทางการเงิน เช่น การจัดงาน Food Funders Circle ซึ่งเป็นเวทีสำหรับนักลงทุนที่สนใจในอาหารทางเลือก นอกจากนี้ โครงการ 50by40 ยังมีความสัมพันธ์กับองค์กรต่างๆ ทั้งภาครัฐและเอกชน รวมถึงองค์กรระดับนานาชาติ เช่น Greenpeace, WWF และ Compassion in World Farming ซึ่งมีเป้าหมายร่วมกันในการลดการบริโภคผลิตภัณฑ์จากสัตว์ ​และ ProVeg International เองก็มีสถานะเป็นผู้สังเกตการณ์ถาวรในองค์การสหประชาชาติ เช่น UNFCCC, IPCC และ CBD รวมถึงมีสถานะที่ปรึกษาพิเศษกับ ECOSOC และได้รับการรับรองจาก UNEA อีกด้วย ถ้ามองแค่เนทเวิร์คเบื้องต้นแล้ว วินาทีนี้ ตอบได้เลยครับว่า "อาหารที่เพาะเลี้ยงในห้องปฏิบัติการเป็นหลัก​" มาแน่นอนครับ มองข้ามความ plant based / animal based ได้เลย

เพื่อบรรลุเป้าหมายนี้ โครงการได้ดำเนินกิจกรรมต่างๆ ทั้งในระดับโรงเรียนและการผลักดันนโยบายสาธารณะ ผมจะลองแบ่งเป็นข้อๆให้เพื่อความสะดวกในการมองภาพรวมประมาณนี้นะครับ

การดำเนินงานในโรงเรียนและเยาวชน 1. Early Action Network โครงการนี้เป็นความร่วมมือระหว่าง 50by40, ProVeg International และ Educated Choices Program โดยมีเป้าหมายในการส่งเสริมการบริโภคอาหารจากพืชในกลุ่มเด็กและเยาวชนผ่านกิจกรรมต่างๆ เช่น การจัดกิจกรรมเชิงโต้ตอบเกี่ยวกับสุขภาพ สิ่งแวดล้อม และสวัสดิภาพสัตว์, การจัดแคมเปญในโรงเรียนและชุมชน, การเผยแพร่สื่อการเรียนรู้และโปรแกรมฝึกอบรม, การปรับปรุงเมนูอาหารในโรงเรียนให้มีทางเลือกจากพืชมากขึ้น

โครงการนี้มุ่งหวังที่จะสร้างความตระหนักรู้และเปลี่ยนแปลงพฤติกรรมการบริโภคของเยาวชนตั้งแต่เนิ่นๆ เพื่อส่งเสริมการบริโภคอาหารที่ยั่งยืนและเป็นมิตรกับสิ่งแวดล้อม

1. School Plates Programme ProVeg International ได้เปิดตัวโครงการ School Plates ในสหราชอาณาจักรเมื่อปี 2018 โดยมีเป้าหมายในการปรับปรุงเมนูอาหารในโรงเรียนให้มีความหลากหลายและสุขภาพดีขึ้นผ่านการเพิ่มทางเลือกอาหารจากพืช โครงการนี้ได้ร่วมมือกับโรงเรียน หน่วยงานท้องถิ่น และบริษัทจัดเลี้ยง เพื่อเปลี่ยนแปลงเมนูอาหารในโรงเรียนกว่า 3.1 ล้านมื้อจากอาหารที่มีเนื้อสัตว์เป็นหลักไปเป็นอาหารจากพืช

สำหรับในส่วนของการผลักดันนโยบายสาธารณะและการมีส่วนร่วมในเวทีนานาชาตินั้น ก็มีไม่น้อยครับ อาทิเช่น การมีส่วนร่วมในองค์การสหประชาชาติ ProVeg International มีสถานะเป็นผู้สังเกตการณ์ถาวรในองค์การสหประชาชาติ เช่น UNFCCC และ UNEP และได้มีบทบาทในการผลักดันให้มีการรวมประเด็นเกี่ยวกับอาหารจากพืชในการเจรจาด้านสภาพภูมิอากาศ โดยในปี 2022 ProVeg ได้เข้าร่วมการประชุมสภาพภูมิอากาศของสหประชาชาติในสตอกโฮล์มและบอนน์ เพื่อส่งเสริมแนวคิด "Diet Change Not Climate Change" และเรียกร้องให้มีการเปลี่ยนแปลงระบบอาหารสู่การบริโภคอาหารจากพืชมากขึ้น

การสนับสนุนเยาวชนในเวทีนานาชาติ ProVeg ได้จัดตั้ง Youth Board ซึ่งประกอบด้วยเยาวชนจากทั่วโลก เพื่อมีส่วนร่วมในการผลักดันนโยบายด้านอาหารจากพืชในเวทีสหประชาชาติ และเตรียมความพร้อมสำหรับการประชุม COP30 ที่จะจัดขึ้นในเบเลง ประเทศบราซิล

นอกจากนี้ยังมีการสนับสนุนองค์กรและสตาร์ทอัพที่มุ่งเปลี่ยนแปลงระบบอาหารอีกมากมาย โดยที่โดดเด่นเป็นพิเศษคือ โปรแกรม Kickstarting for Good ProVeg International ได้เปิดตัวโปรแกรม Kickstarting for Good ซึ่งเป็นโปรแกรมบ่มเพาะและเร่งการเติบโตสำหรับองค์กรไม่แสวงหาผลกำไร โครงการที่มีผลกระทบ และสตาร์ทอัพทางสังคมที่มุ่งเปลี่ยนแปลงระบบอาหาร โปรแกรมนี้มีระยะเวลา 8 สัปดาห์ โดยมีการฝึกอบรมแบบเข้มข้น การให้คำปรึกษาจากผู้เชี่ยวชาญ และโอกาสในการสร้างเครือข่าย เพื่อสนับสนุนการพัฒนาโครงการที่มีศักยภาพในการลดการบริโภคผลิตภัณฑ์จากสัตว์และส่งเสริมอาหารจากพืช

นอกจาก Sebastian Joy จะเริ่มต้นโครงการต่างๆมากมายไม่ว่าจะ ProVeg International, ProVeg Incubator, Kickstarting for Good แต่ก็ยังมี องค์กรพันธมิตรในเครือข่าย 50by40 ที่หลากหลาย เช่น Plant Powered Metro New York, Public Justice, Rainforest Alliance, Real Food Systems, Reducetarian Foundation, Rethink Your Food, SEED และ Seeding Sovereignty ซึ่งร่วมกันส่งเสริมการบริโภคอาหารจากพืชและการลดการบริโภคผลิตภัณฑ์จากสัตว์ แม้ว่าโครงการ 50by40 จะได้รับการสนับสนุนจากองค์กรต่างๆ อย่างกว้างขวาง แต่ยังไม่มีข้อมูลที่ชัดเจนเกี่ยวกับบริษัทเอกชนรายใดที่แสดงการสนับสนุนโครงการนี้อย่างเปิดเผยครับ

ทีนี้เรามาดูความเคลื่อนไหวของลูกพี่ใหญ่อย่าง USDA กันบ้างนะครับ ​จากการตรวจสอบข้อมูลที่มีอยู่จนถึงปัจจุบัน ยังไม่พบหลักฐานชัดเจนว่า กระทรวงเกษตรสหรัฐฯ (USDA) มีการสนับสนุนโครงการ 50by40 อย่างเป็นทางการหรือเปิดเผย อย่างไรก็ตาม มีความเคลื่อนไหวที่เกี่ยวข้องกับการส่งเสริมโปรตีนทางเลือกและการลดการบริโภคเนื้อสัตว์ในระดับนโยบายของสหรัฐฯ ซึ่งอาจสอดคล้องกับเป้าหมายของโครงการ 50by40 อยู่เช่นกันครับ

ในปี 2021 คณะกรรมาธิการด้านการเกษตรของสภาผู้แทนราษฎรสหรัฐฯ ได้สนับสนุนให้ USDA จัดสรรงบประมาณ 50 ล้านดอลลาร์สหรัฐฯ ผ่านโครงการ Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (AFRI) เพื่อสนับสนุนการวิจัยเกี่ยวกับโปรตีนทางเลือก เช่น การใช้พืช การเพาะเลี้ยงเซลล์ และการหมัก เพื่อพัฒนาอาหารที่มีคุณสมบัติคล้ายเนื้อสัตว์

นอกจากนี้ USDA ได้ยอมรับคำว่า "cell-cultured" เป็นคำที่ใช้เรียกเนื้อสัตว์ที่ผลิตจากการเพาะเลี้ยงเซลล์ในห้องปฏิบัติการ ซึ่งเป็นส่วนหนึ่งของการกำหนดมาตรฐานและการควบคุมผลิตภัณฑ์อาหารใหม่ๆ ที่เกี่ยวข้องกับโปรตีนทางเลือก

แล้วกลุ่มองค์กรด้านสิ่งแวดล้อมและสุขภาพ เช่น Center for Biological Diversity ได้ส่งจดหมายถึงรัฐมนตรีกระทรวงเกษตรสหรัฐฯ เรียกร้องให้ USDA นำประเด็นการลดการบริโภคเนื้อสัตว์และผลิตภัณฑ์นมมาเป็นส่วนหนึ่งของยุทธศาสตร์ด้านสภาพภูมิอากาศ และปรับปรุงแนวทางโภชนาการแห่งชาติให้สอดคล้องกับเป้าหมาย "ด้านความยั่งยืน"

แม้ว่า USDA จะไม่ได้แสดงการสนับสนุนโครงการ 50by40 โดยตรง แต่มีความร่วมมือกับองค์กรที่มีเป้าหมายคล้ายคลึงกัน เช่น ProVeg International และ The Good Food Institute ซึ่งเป็นพันธมิตรในเครือข่ายของ 50by40 โดยมีเป้าหมายในการส่งเสริมการบริโภคอาหารจากการเพาะเลี้ยงเซลล์ในห้องปฏิบัติการและโปรตีนทางเลือก

อนาคตได้มีการขีด Goal ไว้ประมาณนี้ เรายังคิดว่าการที่ "แค่ไม่กินมัน" "ก็แค่เลือกกินอาหารธรรมชาติ" จะยังเป็นคำพูดที่เราพูดได้อีกไหม สิ่งนี้ก็ยังเป็นคำถามต่อไปครับ คงไม่มีใครสามารถตอบได้ใน วันนี้ (มั๊ง)

แต่ที่แน่ๆ มีคนไม่น้อยแล้วแหละครับ ที่บอกว่าอาหารจากแลปคุมในโรงงานที่สะอาด มันก็ดีนี่ สะอาดปลอดภัย ดีกว่าเนื้อหมูที่ผัดข้างทาง ล้างหรือเปล่าก็ไม่รู้ เอาหมูแบบไหนมาก็ไม่รู้

มันดูเหมือนว่าเป็นการเปรียบเปรยแบบตรรกะวิบัตินะครับ แต่รอบตัวคุณ มีคนคิดแบบนี้เยอะไหม? เป็นคำถามที่ไม่มีคำตอบอีกเช่นกันครับ

#pirateketo #กูต้องรู้มั๊ย #ม้วนหางสิลูก #siamstr

@ 8e351a6d:770975b7

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Apostas Esportivas: Além dos jogos eletrônicos, Pix188 também é referência para os fãs de esportes, oferecendo uma plataforma completa de palpites em tempo real. Futebol, basquete, tênis e outras modalidades estão disponíveis com cotações competitivas.

A Experiência do Jogador em Foco A Pix188 entende que o sucesso de uma plataforma depende da satisfação do usuário. Por isso, além da variedade de jogos, ela investe pesado em segurança, suporte ao cliente e recompensas para os jogadores. O sistema de bônus é outro atrativo: usuários ativos são constantemente surpreendidos com promoções, giros grátis e outras vantagens.

O suporte ao cliente é outro ponto que merece destaque. A equipe de atendimento está disponível 24 horas por dia, todos os dias da semana, para tirar dúvidas, auxiliar em transações e garantir que nenhum jogador fique desamparado. O canal via WhatsApp também agiliza o contato e proporciona ainda mais conveniência.

Conclusão A Pix188 chega ao mercado como uma alternativa moderna, segura e empolgante para quem busca entretenimento online de qualidade. Com uma plataforma robusta, jogos variados e uma experiência centrada no usuário, ela rapidamente conquistou seu espaço entre as favoritas do público brasileiro. Seja para momentos de lazer ou para quem gosta de adrenalina, a Pix188 é uma escolha que vale a pena explorar.

@ fd06f542:8d6d54cd

今天介绍一个 long-form 项目，源代码在：

https://github.com/dhalsim/nostr-static

从项目的介绍看也是为了展示kind 30023 long-form的。

Demo

https://blog.nostrize.me

界面还可以： {.user-img}

1. 支持多个tags
2. 支持评论

下面看他自己的介绍： nostr-static 是一个开源项目，其主要目的是将 Nostr 网络上的长文内容转化为静态博客。下面从多个方面对该项目进行分析：

1. 项目概述

nostr-static 是一个静态网站生成器（SSG）工具，它可以从 Nostr 网络中获取长文内容，并生成可在任何地方托管的 HTML 页面。这使得用户能够轻松地创建和维护由 Nostr 内容驱动的博客，同时结合了去中心化内容和传统网站托管的优点。

2. 功能特性

• 内容转换：能够将 Nostr 上的长文内容转化为美观的静态博客页面，博客加载速度快。
• 去中心化与传统结合：文章存储在 Nostr 网络上，保证了内容的去中心化，同时为读者提供了熟悉的博客界面。
• 易于维护：通过简单的配置和自动更新功能，降低了博客的维护成本。
• 灵活的托管方式：支持多种静态网站托管服务，如 Netlify、Vercel、Cloudflare Pages、Amazon S3 以及传统的 Web 托管服务。
• 社交互动：可以利用 Nostr 进行评论等社交互动。

3. 技术实现

• 前端：从代码片段可以看出，项目使用了 HTML 和 CSS 来构建页面布局和样式，同时支持明暗两种主题模式。页面包含文章卡片、标签、作者信息等常见博客元素。
• 后端：项目使用 Go 语言编写，通过 go build -o nostr-static ./src && ./nostr-static 命令进行构建和运行。
• 数据获取：从 Nostr 网络中获取文章内容，需要提供 Nostr naddr 信息。

4. 使用步骤

根据 README.md 文件，使用该项目的步骤如下： 1. Fork 项目仓库。 2. 将项目克隆到本地或使用 GitHub Codespaces。 3. 修改 config.yaml 文件进行配置。 4. 在 articles 列表中添加要展示的 Nostr naddr。 5. 将 logo.png 文件放入项目文件夹（如果文件名不同，需要在 config.yaml 中更新）。 6. 构建并运行项目。 7. 提交并推送更改。

5. 项目优势

• 创新性：结合了 Nostr 的去中心化特性和传统博客的易用性，为博主提供了一种新的博客创建方式。
• 简单易用：通过简单的配置和命令即可完成博客的创建和部署，降低了技术门槛。
• 社区支持：开源项目可以吸引更多开发者参与贡献，不断完善功能和修复问题。

nostr-static 是一个有创新性和潜力的项目，为 Nostr 用户提供了一种将长文内容转化为传统博客的有效方式。随着项目的不断发展和完善，有望在博客领域获得更多的关注和应用。