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Robert Anton Wilson on the federal reserve


Guest Br Cornelius

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I wish I could learn that magic trick....

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I wish I could learn that magic trick....

I'm good at making money disappear!!

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I think its very telling that a man of RAW's intellect was never an advocate for the Gold Standard. He pointed out the fundamental criminality of the Fed but saw that some sort of no-interest baring Fiat currency was a necessity.

Br Cornelius

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Well I'm proud of you Br Cornelius I didn't think you had it in you to post this video. Thumbs up!

eta: As a friend of mine is always pointing out, the problem with gold and/or silver-backed currency is, there isn't enough gold and silver in the world to back all the wealth. Maybe this is true, I haven't really researched that. Anyway, I like this guy, he makes sense.

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Been an enemy of the Fed/Central bank system doesn't automatically make you a fan of the Gold Standard.

Br Cornelius

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More from the great man;

RAW: Of course, my position is based on the denial that money does store wealth. I think it’s a semantic hallucination, the verbal equivalent of an optical illusion, to speak at all of money containing or storing wealth. Such thinking should have gone out with phlogiston theory. The symbol is not the referent; the map is not the territory. Money symbolizes wealth, as words symbolize things, and that’s all. The delusions that money contains wealth is the mechanism by which the credit monopoly has gained a stranglehold on the entire economy. As Colonel Greene pointed out in
Mutual Banking
, all the money could disappear tomorrow morning and the wealth of the planet would remain the same. However, if the wealth disappeared—if squinks from the Pink Dimension dragged it off to null-space or something—the money would be worth nothing. You don’t need to plow through the dialects of the debate between the Austrians and the free credit people like Tucker and Gesell to see this; any textbook of semantics will make it clear in a few hours of study. Wealth is nature’s abundance, freely given, plus the exponential advance of technology via human intelligence, and as Korzybski and Fuller demonstrate, this can only increase an an accelerating rate. Money is just the tickets or symbols to arrange for the distribution—either equitably, in a free money system, or inequitably, as under the tyranny of the present money-cartel. As you realize, a cashless society could exist merely by keeping bookkeeping entries or computer tapes. Money is a primitive form of such computer tapes, serving a feedback function. If we are not to replace the present banking oligopoly with a programmer’s oligopoly, in which the interest will be paid to computer technicians, we must realize that this is all a matter of abstract symbolism—that it exists by social agreement and nobody owns it, anymore than Webster owns the language. Why is it, incidentally, that the Austrians don’t follow their logic to its natural conclusion and demand that we pay interest to the dictionary publishers every time we speak or write?

You have to watch people playing Monopoly, and see them begin to “identify” the paper markers with real value, to understand how the mass hypnosis of Capitalism works. Fortunately, the Head Revolution is still proceeding and more and more people are waking up to the difference between our economic game-rules and the real existential situation of humanity.

http://dangerousminds.net/comments/robert_anton_wilson_on_money_its_a_semantic_hallucination

Br Cornelius

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Been an enemy of the Fed/Central bank system doesn't automatically make you a fan of the Gold Standard.

Br Cornelius

If the reasoning for the argument against the Fed is the magic fiat money that they can wave a magic wand and print or electronically add endless amounts of, then it might not stretch all the way to a gold standard (of ANY fashion or just one historical example you can refer to?) but it does make the distinction between money that can be printed on a magic press and money (gold) that cannot.

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If the reasoning for the argument against the Fed is the magic fiat money that they can wave a magic wand and print or electronically add endless amounts of, then it might not stretch all the way to a gold standard (of ANY fashion or just one historical example you can refer to?) but it does make the distinction between money that can be printed on a magic press and money (gold) that cannot.

Its still magic thinking to believe the symbol (gold) is equivalent to the thing (the real wealth). Symbols are powerful things - but they are not real, unlike real wealth (ie things that we need and perform work for us).

RAW is quite clear about the fundamental issues at work here and see's the primary failing in that those who understand the power of symbol have got one over on those who don't. That is the magic of the Fed. It all comes down to choices about what we want to believe, the Gold standard is simply another form of magic which has been tried before and found wanting for the needs of society.

Br Cornelius

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Its still magic thinking to believe the symbol (gold) is equivalent to the thing (the real wealth). Symbols are powerful things - but they are not real, unlike real wealth (ie things that we need and perform work for us).

RAW is quite clear about the fundamental issues at work here and see's the primary failing in that those who understand the power of symbol have got one over on those who don't. That is the magic of the Fed. It all comes down to choices about what we want to believe, the Gold standard is simply another form of magic which has been tried before and found wanting for the needs of society.

Br Cornelius

Money may be abstract symbolism in any form, but he's not contesting that gold can be passed off as money, he's contesting the Federal Reserve Note which is paper turned into money with a magic wand and using that as the basis for the symbolic abstraction argument.

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If RAW had have thought that Gold was a viable alternative - you can bet your bottom dollar that he would have said so.

His ideas on economics await a mature mankind which doesn't get fixated on shiny stuff or numbers in a bank account, he was thinking of the coming evolved mankind.

Br Cornelius

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If RAW had have thought that Gold was a viable alternative - you can bet your bottom dollar that he would have said so.

His ideas on economics await a mature mankind which doesn't get fixated on shiny stuff or numbers in a bank account, he was thinking of the coming evolved mankind.

Br Cornelius

Actually since he didn't say anything one way or the other, I'll withhold judgment rather than betting my bottom dollar. <--- Hey that's like a pun for this thread. Or at least a Freudian.

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Nowhere did he advocate gold and he wrote quite a bit on economics, I think we can safely conclude he wasn't a fan.

Here's a nice challenge, find me one quote from RAW where he gives a positive assessment of the gold standard. If it exists it should be relatively easy to find.

The RICH economy is what he advocated, here is an article by him on what that means;

http://www.whywork.o...k/rawilson.html

Much more revolutionary than a discussion of currencies.

Br Cornelius

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Nowhere did he advocate gold and he wrote quite a bit on economics, I think we can safely conclude he wasn't a fan.

Here's a nice challenge, find me one quote from RAW where he gives a positive assessment of the gold standard. If it exists it should be relatively easy to find.

Br Cornelius

No sign of him mentioning gold at all. Already looked. But gold doesn't suffer from the criticism of magic Federal Reserve Notes in the OP video you presented for discussion and so whether or not he's a fan of the gold standard doesn't matter to me.

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No sign of him mentioning gold at all. Already looked. But gold doesn't suffer from the criticism of magic Federal Reserve Notes in the OP video you presented for discussion and so whether or not he's a fan of the gold standard doesn't matter to me.

It does in that unless gold is the actual currency it can be debased just as it always has been in history.

Gold vs Fiat is yesterdays argument - neither solve the economic crisis we are in. RAW dissects the causes of our crisis and proposes an entirely new direction - the RICH economy. Trying to retreat into the dubious certainties of history is a recipe for disaster.

Br Cornelius

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It does in that unless gold is the actual currency it can be debased just as it always has been in history.

Gold vs Fiat is yesterdays argument - neither solve the economic crisis we are in. RAW dissects the causes of our crisis and proposes an entirely new direction - the RICH economy. Trying to retreat into the dubious certainties of history is a recipe for disaster.

Br Cornelius

LOL the US fiat currency has lost over 95% of its value since the advent of the Federal Reserve system and its magic printing press. A gold standard would stabilize the value of money as it did for over a hundred years.

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Tilt at that old windmill all you like - its dead already.

As usual you misunderstand the purpose of money and you confuse me with a FED fanboy :no:

I can point you to a 15 page thread where your assertions were roundly routed and save us all the trouble of repeating the discussion.

Br Cornelius

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A fascinating article which touches on the many inadequacies of our current economic system;

The money game ... We are all forced to play it, whether we like it or not. A few leap across the Monopoly board with great gusto, building or toppling companies, gobbling up futures on resources and minerals, speculating on currencies. Some market new cultural products -- images, memes, books, lines of software code, musical jingles -- as their gambits and dice throws in the global casino. Others, dealt a worse hand, play a more brutal version of the game in the back alleys of third world cities, begging for baksheesh, selling their sex for a meager sum, sending their children to work in factories or collect bits of nickel and aluminum from toxic trash heaps. Simply by virtue of being born into this single global system, this omni-oppressive world order, we are all conscripted into a relentless contest, a ceaseless tumult.

http://www.realitysandwich.com/impossible_alternative

The future is bleak if we allow it to be.

Br Cornelius

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Been an enemy of the Fed/Central bank system doesn't automatically make you a fan of the Gold Standard.

Br Cornelius

I realize you're not a fan of the gold standard, but I'd think it would beat what we've got hands down. At least, in the "wild west" days, when the money was redeemable in gold, and many-if not all- of the coins were gold or silver (at least the higher denomination ones anyway, the mil was copper I'm guessing) it seemed to work fine. The problem with a gold or silver-backed currency nowadays is there might not be enough gold and silver in the world to back the amount of money in circulation. Not unless you placed gold and silver at a ridiculously high price per ounce. Anyway, I'm more or less thinking out loud, I don't pretend to be an economist. This would be an interesting area of study though.

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Tilt at that old windmill all you like - its dead already.

As usual you misunderstand the purpose of money and you confuse me with a FED fanboy :no:

I can point you to a 15 page thread where your assertions were roundly routed and save us all the trouble of repeating the discussion.

Br Cornelius

Oh please do. Your imagination is running wild now.

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I realize you're not a fan of the gold standard, but I'd think it would beat what we've got hands down. At least, in the "wild west" days, when the money was redeemable in gold, and many-if not all- of the coins were gold or silver (at least the higher denomination ones anyway, the mil was copper I'm guessing) it seemed to work fine. The problem with a gold or silver-backed currency nowadays is there might not be enough gold and silver in the world to back the amount of money in circulation. Not unless you placed gold and silver at a ridiculously high price per ounce. Anyway, I'm more or less thinking out loud, I don't pretend to be an economist. This would be an interesting area of study though.

It's a lousy way to show how against the Fed one allegedly is to spend as much time and wordcount denying and defiling a proven alternative like Corn does.

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I love RAW. Such a shame when he died. No real comment on the topic, just love RAW.

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I realize you're not a fan of the gold standard, but I'd think it would beat what we've got hands down. At least, in the "wild west" days, when the money was redeemable in gold, and many-if not all- of the coins were gold or silver (at least the higher denomination ones anyway, the mil was copper I'm guessing) it seemed to work fine. The problem with a gold or silver-backed currency nowadays is there might not be enough gold and silver in the world to back the amount of money in circulation. Not unless you placed gold and silver at a ridiculously high price per ounce. Anyway, I'm more or less thinking out loud, I don't pretend to be an economist. This would be an interesting area of study though.

You have pointed out one of the myriad flaws. However the more fundamental flaws are what it does to the economy in that it causes much more serious boom and bust cycles. There is a huge body of research on why the Gold standard is inadequate for a modern money supply.

Yamoto's hatred of the Fed blinds him to the possibility that there are other alternative than Gold. RAW was not so naive.

Br Cornelius

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You have pointed out one of the myriad flaws. However the more fundamental flaws are what it does to the economy in that it causes much more serious boom and bust cycles. There is a huge body of research on why the Gold standard is inadequate for a modern money supply.

Yamoto's hatred of the Fed blinds him to the possibility that there are other alternative than Gold. RAW was not so naive.

Br Cornelius

My hatred for the Fed doesn't lead me to believe that there aren't alternatives to a gold standard. If you were more honest, and had more respectful spelling, that 15 page discussion you referred to but won't dare revisit would highlight alternatives I identified there.

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My hatred for the Fed doesn't lead me to believe that there aren't alternatives to a gold standard. If you were more honest, and had more respectful spelling, that 15 page discussion you referred to but won't dare revisit would highlight alternatives I identified there.

You spent 15 pages defending a gold standard against every comer. You basically spent 15 pages repeating yourself.

Br Cornelius

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