The System Cannot Survive What’s Coming | Jeff Booth

They can't see the moment they're spending right now is the most important thing. An abundance that we can't even imagine because we can't see what's not there. You won't even be able to keep up with the rate of change. You'd expect the centralized system to attack this everywhere. You're going to see supply chain shortages. You're going to see inflation like crazy. Then there's going to be printing into that. cuz if there isn't printing into that, there's going to be a deflationary collapse that destroys all money. If what you're saying is right and we're entering this sort of super chaotic period is the only thing to do whole Bitcoin. If you haven't done the work to understand this and you're trusting somebody else and you don't have agency, then you're likely to get annihilated. But the point here is you have a choice. You've been deceived your entire life. You don't want to believe it. It gets easier when you face the truth. All right, Jeff, my uh my roommate in Costa Rica, you're back on the show. Um, when we were in Costa Rica, we had a few conversations that I think opened my eyes to the way you view the world. And the analogy that I've come to is is you know that scene in the Matrix where Neo sees like the green code for the first time and he's like, "What? You just look at code." And the other guy's like, "Oh, no, I don't see code." That's like blonde, brunette, red head. >> That's like how I view your thesis. Like when I I see the world. I'm a Bitcoiner. I live on a Bitcoin standard. I totally understand everything you say in your argument, but I struggle to just naturally see the world that way. Um whereas you seem to see the world and everything fits into your thesis. Like how do you get to that point? Um, that's a big question. And I think before I go there, I would say most people see the world and everything fits into their thesis and it reflects back to them and they're completely convinced that they're right and and they can't see other people's view because their their their reflection of the world is is true to them. So, you've probably heard me say before many times that that um our reflection of the world is is us, right? The world we observe is is literally a reflection of our thoughts, reactions. Um and and we create that, too. And so when I say that, some people think that, okay, that's true for Jeff, but it's not true for me. But but I didn't say it's true for me. I said it's true for every single person. So, so your construct of what reality is to you is true for you and and you will make it true. You will you will sort information to make it true. You will you will en ensure that that view cannot be distorted. Um and and and it'll be other people's problem. And when you look around the world and you look at everybody else viewing the world on and and how could how could they think the world looks like that and and you think they're like completely crazy. If you realize the entire world looks like that, then you must be subject to the same thing. So then how would you know? Like so how would I know that my view of of reality or what what I call reality is true for me and I would need an outside objective measure that because it's not true true it's right it's a belief system that feeds back on itself. So, how would I know my my belief system is right for me is probably um that takes us uh that that could take us down a crazy journey. Um, and one of the things I constantly uh think about in my my own journey to this and we'll go into Bitcoin and what so but if everyone else believes their truth unconditionally and they'll push back and they'll fight people and they'll so sure then and they're only human then wouldn't that mean that I would be subject to the same thing? And so how would I know? And I spend a lot of time on I I spend a lot of time in how would I know what is actually the sand down to the sand. What is true for sure? Um and then and then how do I reconstruct my actions and reality from that truth for sure. And I and and I'm constantly challenging those assumptions as well. So, um, I know that's a that's probably a different answer than you were looking for. Um, and we know we can take that into why I wrote the book, what Bitcoin is to me, what that looks like uh to me. But the but I think that's the fundamental thing. I wonder I I constantly curious if we if we live in this call it matrix of all of these ideas bouncing into each other and I'm a construct of a whole bunch of ideas of people that touched me in my life that have changed me. In other words, those people are in me. those ideas are in me and I believe this a certain version of the world and then until I don't and then it changes and I'm a different then that means that those intersections of people touching me impact me in a big way right and then you see you watch other people have the same interactions but nothing changes in their life their belief system just carries on and in and what could be a zero to one moment and have something that totally changed. They're so they're so dealing in their past reality is their reality that they can't see that the moment in front of them, the moment they're spending right now is the most important thing. So they don't never see the change that could change everything in the future and they continue to st stay in a very narrow path of a belief belief system. So there's a load in there that I want to dig into but the the first one you said everyone believes their own truth and like I agree with that but I don't know if everyone has has thought as deeply as you have about this. So like for all the people that are still supporting and living within the the current system that we have, I don't think they're necessarily viewing that as the right thing to do or the good thing to do. I think it's they're just seeing as this is the way it is. Um and what I have never fully got is like what has to change for that to change. >> Yeah. And and that's why so so this is all of us in every single 8 billion people on the planet. So if there are 8 billion people in the planet going through a structural change and most people were fighting that structural change because their own beliefs from past past biases then the expectation would be this would be really hard because most of the people and it would be really noisy because most of the people were feeding back against the system that they said they hated and using the exact same money that they said they hated to ex to to to increase the power of the state and and and and the system over them. And and what they would find is they would find always somebody else. They would find Candace Owens. They would find Tucker Carlson. They would find and and really good people yelling at the system, but with no solution to the system. And so they would find themselves in they would find themselves in this hate, right, that they didn't know that they were creating because they were using the same money that funded it all. And they would and and they would find they would find belonging in that hate. They would find I know more than those other people, those stupid other people because because and and it would feel like love. It would feel like belonging. It would feel like I know something that the rest of the people don't do. And that would expand everywhere while using the exact same money that funds the entire thing. And and and when I look at when I look at that, I I totally understand it's natural. It's what people do. Um I but but I wonder why. I wonder I wonder if if you can't solve the problem, what are you doing? Right? So what are what are you doing to actually solve the problem? And and what because what it's actually saying is is in in all of those versions of their realities is somebody else will save me instead of I will I have agency. Every single other version says somebody else is to blame. And but by the way we would easily see we would easily see in a in a world that that that looked like this. We would easily not see our own agency and we would easily see that uh we would we would be led to believe from that same system that it's not you, it's somebody else and we would we would want to believe that because it couldn't be us. The thing that keeps me up at night is the idea of a critical error with my Bitcoin cold storage. And this is where Anchoratch comes in. With Ankoratch, your Bitcoin is insured with your own A+ rated Lloyds of London insurance policy and all Bitcoin is held in their time locked multiig vaults. So you have the peace of mind knowing your Bitcoin is insured while not giving up custody. So whether you're worried about inheritance planning, wrench attacks, natural disasters, or just your own silly mistakes, you're protected by Anchorwatch. 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Uh there's so many people who have different views and everything else that same similar to to that make me smarter in this space either or try to clarify what I'm saying to bring it tighter and tighter in something that's so obvious to me that uh but but when I watch this space evolve right and I and I and I and I try to put simple language to something that's really complex um what that's when I start with the natural state of the free market is deflation, right? People laugh at that because I say it over and over and over again, right? And you're smiling now. But if you think of the magnitude of those, what is it? Seven words, what they actually mean to every other nonsense that you've ever heard and that you choose. Right? So, so when I say that, I mean entrepreneurs have, whether you're working for an entrepreneur, you're working for a new business, or you're an entrepreneur, you in the free market, you have to create more value for somebody else to get paid. If you don't, the company fails. Why does a company fail? Because us as users, producer, us as purchasers of the product or service demand more value. So how could those two things, right? You have to create more value than what was there before and we use more value. How could those two things in a free market not produce more value? It's it it and and why I try to drive into this so carefully is because it has to and people can hear these words and you've heard these words and you smile at these words without thinking about the repercussions of the world the imaginary world that you've always lived in that looks nothing like I just described and so if you had one the natural state of the free market is deflation you had two, our ideas move exponentially to create more value. Then three, you would expect exponential deflation or prices falling or value increasing for humanity. Four, you would expect with AI where it's going every single person to be able to contribute to humanity and accelerate that curve. And you would expect an abundance that we can't even imagine because we can't see what's not there. We can't even measure what's not there. We measure from the other system. So, but if those things are true and they are most certainly true, if those things are true, then the entire nonsense, everything we've been taught about economics, every single other thing means we lose our agency to somebody else's agency. We everything is and and we trust the e econ economists, we trust Trump, we trust Biden, we trust it's somebody else always has to be the person that we trust because we don't live in a free market. And so so it's actually really simple. It's really simple. Now the only question now then the next question the derivative of that question can Bitcoin withstand all of our nonsense actions trying to stop it. >> That was going to be exactly my next question because like there's never been a time in history where Bitcoin has been more ingrained in in the old financial system and can it remain a free market? So, so, so, so, so then to to that degree, what what you would have to do, and this is where I've spent a a lot of time, a a lot of time, why would I believe it does, and this is I'm going to talk about this and uh in my speech in Vegas, but why I believe it does is because of people like you, right? And and I I mean that actually very seriously because of people like you that are bringing this to other people, even if you didn't know it all the way to this end, right? But um and and not just you, but all of the others that I meet every day who are who know this is a protocol emerging in layers and are building on a protocol. And if you if you added up all of those people, it might be it might only be 10,000 people. many of them private for most of the nonsense maybe. But building protocol technology in service of humankind that is the free market that is and protecting it like and and what would you expect? You'd expect the centralized system to attack this everywhere. But and and so if there were 10,000 people like call it 10,000 and it's probably 10,000 might even be be more but you have to assume some of those 10,000 people will sell for pieces of paper and go back to the other system right so um and they'll be replaced with more and more people that are understanding this and devel developing in as this this changes um then those 10,000 people are against not against but but but but are building the future. Their actions are are building the future that 8 billion people don't know yet. And so if you looked at the market at any given time, you would the expectation would be the noise of all of these other people with their own observations of what Bitcoin is to them or what money is to them or or who should be in charge of money. And all of those people would drown out these people, but they wouldn't drown out these people inside that bubble. and those people and and so what I live in every day is is circular economies expansion a network effect on Bitcoin that is like it's just it's so incredible what I live in is I and I recognize that for somebody observing uh this system without living like I do investing in these companies investing in these people seeing who these people were and they're never going back no matter what. If I didn't, if I wasn't here, I can imagine what they would think about what this looked like. So now, how do I know I'm right? Right? If they all think they're right inside a system that has to steal their money to be able to to and and they stay in it, how could I know I'm right? And why I know I'm right is is objectively I'm watching more and more people build this I'm watching more and more layers being built on top of Bitcoin. I'm watching prices relative to Bitcoin fall exactly as I would expect they them to fall. Not that all the risks don't exist because if all of these people stopped tomorrow and said, "Ah, nice experiment. Let's go back." Then Bitcoin wouldn't be a thing. Th this is why like one of the things I've said over and over again is Bitcoin without the freedom money aspect isn't interesting to me. This is exactly why. And to get back to your point a little earlier, you said like the people that aren't going to leave Bitcoin. Like this is a thing that I say over and over again. It's like people ask you when you're going to sell Bitcoin. And I'm like, sell it for what? Like I'm not going to sell it for more dollars. That's for sure. Um >> but the thing that I will do at some point is sell it to buy my family and nice house. And does that reinforce the old system? because when I do that, I'm going to do it with as big a mortgage as possible to basically short the fiat system with with the housing market. Um, and is that not a reinforcement of that system? So, so why do houses have as much value as they have? They have as much value as they have because money is broken, right? >> Yeah. And so when you decide to make that, so I've told this story many times, right? My house five, six years ago was 300 Bitcoin. Now it's 15 Bitcoin. >> Um, if I want, so pretend I don't have a house and I have 300 Bitcoin. Um, then then I can choose when to buy that house and I can buy it for one bitcoin if I want to hold off or I can buy it for 15 bitcoin or I can or I can put a mortgage down and buy it for one bitcoin and uh and and have have a mortgage. All of these are free of choices as this new system imposes discipline around the other around that and each choice has has repercussions, right? So when you buy a house, you're choosing to buy now for your lifestyle of your uh of your family, which is totally fine, which was mean meaning you're going to distribute your Bitcoin to other people and other people are going to take them and then buy a house later for less Bitcoin. And it's just part of the evolution of this this thing repricing the entire world that has to look like this. And each of our choices in a free market when we want value, when we decide that this is the right price for us is part of those choices. >> But you are kind of propping up the debt ponzi for a for a period of time though while this happens. >> So So let's let's change that subject. So and or tackle this from a different way. in the next little while in the economy, you're going to see supply chain shortages. You're going to see inflation like crazy. You're going to see uh you're going to see crazy and and then there's going to be printing into that. Cuz if there isn't printing into that, there's going to be a deflationary collapse from money that can't allow deflation that destroys all money. And so there is going to be it it and it's likely an order of magnitude higher than what co was as that happens and pushes prices up like crazy at the same time as jobs are leaving the market because the business the businesses have to use AI to get you to use their system to remove the job because if they don't um you won't use their system because you won't have the money. So you're going to create So you're going to create this inflationary pulse, massive inflationary pulse. There's going to be food insecurity. There's going to be uprisings all over the world and and everything else because fertilizers are also going up in price and all of these inputs are going up in price. At the same time, there's going to be massive printing to save the financial system. at that time at at that time that inflation is going to cause um demand destruction, right? Because people won't be able to afford it. Their jobs and what they get paid, especially and the businesses that pay them that are going to have to shed that. There's going to be massive demand destruction and it's going to collapse in a deflationary spiral. So now let's say and and so these things if you look back into Weimar Germany as it was going through this you see this chart that goes up and down and up and down and it flushes people up and down and down. We're used to living in stability. But when it looks like that and we think we're outsmarting the market, we're going to take massive leverage at this at the time thinking it's going to be devalued and then it's going to go into deflation and we're going to owe the leverage and we're going to get wiped out. So a lot of pe a lot of people inside of this system and it has nothing to do with Bitcoin, zero to do with Bitcoin that this is happening. It has to do with money being debased at a crazy rate and physics coming due, right? And the and the free market come coming do and re and a realization that we live in a nonsense nonsensical world that is more and more control. And this is going to create it's going to create psychological breaks everywhere too in people because they're not going to be ready. They're you they're thinking they're living in a normal world that's always looked this way and it's not going to look that way and they're going to take and and so let's say now you Danny take this and take a huge mortgage bitcoin at this time and then mortgage rates go way up at uh at the wrong time and what does that do to you when you think you played the game properly? Mhm. >> So um so from the other system which is growing in in instability and has to do a certain number of things which have second order consequences to people and third order consequences to people and those people change what they think right from from that. You can expect this crazy chaos or you could just hold your Bitcoin, >> right? >> Just stay in stability. >> Yeah. Or Yeah. or um and and and and and no matter what side of it, you're going you're going to win. And now we look back to fonder times and and say, "I want a family home. I want it to look like that. I want a white picket fence with the kids and everything else." In the next little while and where we're going, it's unlikely to look like the past 30 years, past 40 years. It was a construct out of manipulated money that felt right and that construct is going to break down. And so so so so all of these individual choices including in Bitcoin, right, are going to long for those times and make choices and they're going to sell their Bitcoin and then many people will sell all their Bitcoin for the pieces of paper that then it will go to zero and all they'll do is distribute their Bitcoin. If you just stay with the natural state of the free market is deflation, exponentially exponential technology gains should mean exponential deflation or prices falling or abundance. If Bitcoin stayed decentralized and secure, it is measuring that and just stay there. everything else is uh everything else the pro the problem in what you're doing and house the question too what you're doing is an emotional need to what does security look like and family look like to you tied to an old system wanting that wanting that to be true but it's no longer but but it's it's less and less true >> if what you're saying is right and we're entering this sort of super chaotic period is the only thing to do hold Bitcoin So it so that would be so imagine you so now that's an entirely different vector. You just hold Bitcoin. Um you don't spend it. If you just hold Bitcoin and just and didn't spend it and it looked like that then Bitcoin would get centralized just like people held gold and they used a monetary system that they knew was always broken. And why they needed an asset underpinning the monetary system is because the monetary system was broken. And so Bitcoin is different in that way in and that um you don't need an asset underneath the monetary system because the money isn't broken. The the money itself is the network and and you can store your money in money without having to store it in a piece of paper that tied to a broken monetary system. So that change is another huge change in in our perspective of what reality looks like. Now in Bitcoin, you have a whole camp of people talking about digital credit and and what that would look like. You have an entire camp of people that that believe that that this is a the strongest asset in the world, but it's not money. It's it it's credit. Well, what is credit? Credit is loaned into existence from nothing. So, if you had the strongest asset in the world and you had this credit that was loaned into existence for nothing, then most people would centralize their Bitcoin just like they centralize gold. And you would have this nonsense system of broken money on top of gold. And then what would happen eventually is gold would break, right? you'd repric gold. And so we can expect if we look back at history and we know human nature, we can expect these things to happen. We can expect lots of people to be fooled just like they were in FTX, just like they were in some of these others and like they will be again. We can expect tons of people to go into ETFs trusting somebody else, removing their own agency and tr and and and and trusting somebody else to get a higher yield. Um and and if if Bitcoin all looked like that, if it looked like that, it won't. Um but if it all looked like that, it would fail. >> So like you're obviously talking about Sailor there. I so and again I want to be careful this because because I can coexist in a world that I like Sailor I think he's good for Bitcoin and I think he does a lot of great things actually like the and and I'm investor in the business at least in my RSP investor in the business but but and and think he's brilliant but also disagree with him on a fundamental premise of uh of and and he can be right for a long But he can actually be he can consolidate a lot of Bitcoin by telling the world that it's just an asset. But but that is fundamentally different than it is money and it is used as money. And so I I can I can I can like him. I can think he I can think he's really smart. I can see a lot of things that he does that are well for this and I can disagree with him. on a that that I believe it's a protocol and a pro and the protocol is emerging as money and privacy and everything else. It's a new internet protocol. So, and and so and that's why I want to be careful of the creating an us versus them and everything because it's really easy to bite and say, "Yeah, he's terrible." And everything else. He's done a lot of great things for Bitcoin and a whole bunch of people that have understood his actions in Bitcoin will then in turn understand it's a protocol. Do you want to pay less in taxes and stack more Bitcoin? Of course you do. Well, by mining Bitcoin with Blockware, you can. Under section 168K of US tax code, Bitcoin mining servers qualify for 100% bonus depreciation. This means every dollar you spend on miners can directly offset your income in a single year. And that's true for both business owners and W2 earners. If you have $100,000 in ordinary income, you can purchase $100,000 of miners and potentially offset your tax liability entirely. Blockwise mining as a service does all the heavy lifting. 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Yes. So, so that digital credit narrative will get wiped out, not might get wiped out. It's it's binary. An inflationary system is opposite from the free market. An inflationary system must centralize. If you're using digital credit on top of Bitcoin and trust somebody else with your keys, it is being centralized. And at some point that's going to create a chain fork in Bitcoin. And one of those two, it's it's binary. One will win, one will not. If you were the US government and you were saying, "I need my US dollars to be uh the strongest," you would you would um you would try to co-opt Bitcoin to uh using Tether and stable coins and everything else to concentrate other people so they don't hold their their keys to concentrate enough Bitcoin. But the concentrating enough Bitcoin in sheer volume doesn't concentrate the nodes, doesn't concentrate the votes, doesn't concentrate the the the econom the activity on Bitcoin. And so by doing that you're taking massive risk by trusting somebody else with your keys that is eventually has to stop because the inflationary system has to stop the deflationary one or said differently um the system of abuse or centralization that we've always lived in can't allow the free market. But the point here is you have a choice. Your actions determine the choice. And and what gives me so much confidence in this in in my choice being being the one that's going to resolve and and and win is it's not alone. It's with thousands, tens of thousands of other people. And most of those people are hardly even known. >> And that's the number that goes up. >> They're their heart and soul of Bitcoin. And they're proving it with their actions every day. And so when I watch what's happening there and and the emergence of the protocol and developing privacy and everything else and and and and money and circular economies against what I would expect to happen with the vast majority of most people getting stuck in the old system. It's just I expect it. I completely expect it. I expect it to. And and then now if you're if you're taking if you have if you don't hold your own coins, if you don't hold on keys, if you haven't trusted if you haven't done the work to understand this and you're trusting somebody else and you don't have agency, then you're likely to get annihilated. >> So when you say that digital credit can't survive, does that mean you don't think strategy as a business model will survive? No, I think that I I I think that that depending on how much uh so so I think strategy as a business model could actually do extraordinarily well um and and because we're so early in this ch this change but but um but many others will get hurt along the way and strategy could get hurt if they're overlevered against a deflationary collapse. right at some point they could get really hurt. Um the um but I don't think they are overly I think like what what you're talking about I think Sailor is brilliant. I think he's he understands the game that's is being played. He might not uh he might not be able to as a public company. He might not be able to talk like I talk, right? You're part you're part of your public company and and and you might get tapped on the shoulder and say, "Hey, that um or and and all all of the people around just that that you can't go against the US dollar." >> I've always had that opinion. I I I think Sailor has left the dollar alone very purposefully. I don't know if he like he said that he doesn't think Bitcoin is a threat to the US dollar. I don't know if he believes that or if that's just the line he has to tow. >> Yeah, I would just say say keep going back to what I said in the beginning. Natural state of the free market is deflation means every single human being on the on the planet is working for you trying to create value for you. If you take where AI is going and where it is today, that means 8 billion people can create new apps and new technologies and attempt right now using the technology we have right now to collapse price and deliver you more value and you're only going to use the things that deliver you more value. So how in that world how possibly in that world could that be inflationary? It's impossible, right? It's the free market is is is massive abundance delivered by you ch you choosing more value and the other system is a control system whether it's US dollar yuan everything else and and the emergence of the US as the greatest nation in in in the world was actually the free market. If you look at uh in the 1800s you had something called the great deflation and what it what it was is a whole bunch of people moving to the US from these countries where they couldn't make it. >> Yeah. >> So their ideas could make it and that and those ideas create the value. So those ideas that creating value for other people is the thing that creates value for all people. Um and and the more you constrain that so so let's go into a different vector of what we're talking about which is which is so if you have an inflationary system that punishes people that most people can't contribute and you only very few people can contribute then all society suffers. you know when you wrote this book um AI was obviously a pretty big part of it but I think did the book come out in 2019 is that right? >> Yeah. >> Yeah. So the it was while it was a big part of the book there was not that much happening in the AI space at that time like it was all very behind the scenes and then today like it's crazy like the rate of change is unbelievable. These are getting super powerful and only they're basically on like an exponential curve upwards. Does that speed up your timeline of when you think this change will come? >> No, it's been the same timeline all along. So when I wrote the book, so so you remember in the book that I wrote the about the paper folding. >> Mhm. >> And and I wrote >> it's like 50 folds get you to the sun or whatever it is. >> Exactly. But most most people guess 2 in at 50 folds. You can only fold a piece of paper seven times. But if you could continue folding it, it reaches from here to the sun. And most people when I say most people 99.999% guess 2 in um it means we can't understand exponentials but that um but what I what I wrote and I I'm pretty sure I wrote exactly this in in the AI chapter that it's been the exact same rate since the ' 50s. It's just the first fold created the first AI winter because the expectations were it would do everything and it did nothing. And then there was another AI winter in the late 70s 80s and the expectation that now is the time and call it fold 15 or 16 that now is the time it's going to do everything and then the fold just kept on now they're bigger steps but now what does that mean so this is why like nothing I wrote is changed and and nothing in the f you can see perfectly what's going to happen out of what I wrote then right the this is the slowest by far that AI is ever going to get. And every day you hear something, oh my god, Claude just removed this. Now it's open source because it's now in Rust libraries. That's yesterday. And then Deep Seek comes out and then this. So it's every day you're going to hear these things and you won't even be able to keep up with the rate of change because it's moving at such a rate. So the AI we're using today is is by far the worst it's ever going to be. Um, and that means that AI is going to be free. It's going to be abundant. It's going to be ubiquitous. And it's going to tie into it's going to tie into physical goods, too. Robots and different physical goods that are going to do the same thing, create that abundance in all of those jobs and and and such everywhere. It's it's inevitable, right? And that's what I wrote about in my book. It and um and you knew exactly where it would be now. So nothing's changed. It hasn't accelerated at all. It's exactly the same path I wrote about in my book and why you needed honest money because the a debt based system couldn't allow that deflation. You know, you say humans can't understand exponentials which is like the first time I heard the paper analogy I got it miles wrong. Um do you understand like what how do you see this? So what what I recognize is if every I always ask myself is every if everyone else is confused I must be too. That's my starting position. So where might I be confused if so the f when I even when I wrote that and when I came up with the paper folding analogy for the book um and the the same analogy um is you know the rice on a chessboard doubling >> that you've heard that one. I never have heard that one. >> So, so that it's an ancient story. Somebody tells the king of China or I will 4x I will um each grain of rice. So, you need to double a grain of rice on each uh chessboard piece and the grain the grains of rice take over the entire kingdom, right? There's so and um but you hear something like that. You hear some you hear exponential patterns and then your brain goes, "Yeah, I get it. What a nice trick. What a cool story." And then you go straight back into your linear life. And so so these things that that I realize other people do, then I realize I must too. And I work really hard to try to say to error correct that thing and and adjust my thinking for the thing that I'm not you used to thinking. So not perfect, not uh but but those when I see something when I observe something in everybody else, I realize it must be in me too. >> Um when you say that like with the AI growth, it's going to get to the point where you can't even keep up. I feel like we're really close to that now. >> We're past that now. >> Yeah. And that's obviously very linked to the sort of debt based system that we live in because AI is going to be hugely disruptive. And earlier in the show, you were talking about us going into this really chaotic time. Do you think this is the final sort of debt bubble, debt cycle that we're going to go through before something actually breaks and we have entirely different system on the other side? >> Yeah, a really good question. I suspect not. I um and and it could be. So when I say agency, if let's let's just do a toy experiment. If everyone today stopped using um pieces of paper and used Bitcoin. If they knew what you knew and were actually living in Bitcoin and building in this, how fast the world would move to abundance would be it would take your breath away, right? It would be so crazy. There'd be a repricing of everything. It would be uh it would be all in Bitcoin. We be using Bitcoin. It would take your breath away. So, so then the question is is to your to your thing, it has nothing to do with Bitcoin because we know that's true and we know we can make it stronger with our actions within it yet we choose not to. The vast majority of people have their agency giving their agency away. And so it's not about Bitcoin, it's about us. And so what would be more likely if if what I said that somebody and you can see this in other countries, you can see a currency completely lose everything, complete reset. People lose everything and then go back immediately to believing in that currency. That's that's way more likely. >> Why? Like why does that happen? What's the the sort of game theory behind that? So it it happens because because we we don't want to look at first we don't want to look at these first principles like so what I talk about over and over and over again like I might they it's actually really simple. You could explain economics to a 5-year-old. >> Mhm. >> We compete to provide value to other people in the world and and and we use the things that give us more value. That's it. It's that's it. There is no there is no more to economics. Meaning everything the construction of our belief system inside those other people who are smarter than us is is so wound part of our psyche that we don't want to take our we don't want to claim our own agency. It I don't I find it really hard to understand that mindset though. Like when I first got into Bitcoin, um it was almost like hearing a conspiracy theory in the sense that it was like everything that you think every way that you think the world works is actually wrong. And but unlike other conspiracy theories, it had an answer. Like Bitcoin was the answer to this other system. Um, and as soon as I heard that, I was like, if you're telling me there's this asymmetric bet that I can make that there's a ton of fraud and Ponziike dynamics with the debt based system, then I'm going to take that bet every single day. And I don't know how once the curtain gets pulled back, people can still opt to live in that other system. >> I I I can't tell you why. I can just tell I can just observe what is, right? And if you looked around the world today, I it it what do what do most people do? They live in that other system. And they they might they might hear this. I was just at lunch. I was just lunch with people who've read my book three times and they said the exact same thing. I know it's true, but I but I'm spending all of my time in the other system. It >> but I guess it is hard to break out of. But one of the things you've said a few times in this is that you know it's true and I I believe that you know it's true but what happened what has to happen for it to be like provably true. So, so, so it's a really good, you know, how in Bitcoin there's if you're INTJ, ENTJ, it's a very small fraction of the population. And, uh, but, uh, but it's a really high percentage of Bitcoiners. >> It's actually, >> this is on the personality test thing, >> personality test. Um, I think it's it's because people that are that uh that not not that they're better or worse, but but they can handle an abstract concept. They can hold it and realize that they in turn create reality of the new thing where other people need to see the thing logically fit it in and it it it feeds back and everything else. So, so if you have this new new thing that's never existed before that's really abstract and it's protocol emerging in layers and it has so many lay layers then the people that are being most attracted to that new new thing would be the people that that that would drive into wait how could the world look and what are my actions in creating the world to look like that and that wouldn't make the other people bad they would just need to see more and more evidence of that of that working and there wouldn't be evidence because it was emergent. It was emergent from the actions that people took. And so so I think that's why I think that I I I I I think that's we just have different we have different strengths, weaknesses. Each person has different strengths uh or weaknesses. And some people are more likely to to grab on to something like this that that creates something to totally different. And some people need to wait until it's it's proven in their minds. And and so what would that feel to people that that that are used to measuring physical reality from proof from a system designed against them? It would be really chaotic, right? It would because this new thing would feel abstract. It would feel like what I'm It would feel like what I'm talking about right now is word salad. They wouldn't be able to hold on to to to an abstract concept that was emerging. They would they would hold on to I have pieces of paper and the government says they're they're real and here's how GDP works and everything that they believe from their from their system. they would hold on to that. >> I remember when I don't know a few maybe like a year ago Brandon Quitum put a thing on Twitter trying to get people to do that personality test and he was taking data of it and I was like oh I'll be different and so I did the test and yeah I was the one of the two groups that basically every Bitcoiner falls into which is a really like that is strange that it has attracted that particular sort of personality type over others. Um, but one of the interesting things is that as you get more and more into Bitcoin, talking about the price becomes less of a talking point. Like no one really desperately wants to talk like when we meet up, how many times did we talk about the price of Bitcoin like >> but like Safe Dean said something to me that I thought was really interesting when I had him on the show. He he said that the price is the ultimate scoreboard because that's how we see how much we're winning. If Bitcoin goes to a million dollars, is that your thesis proven out as you were right? >> No. No. So, but but again, I I I can totally accept somebody else's observation of what they think it is to win and have a different observation of what I think it looks like to win. what when I when I think about so let me let me you let me talk about say fedine what he just said in in the way that I would look at that we know in in in fiat land prices are imagined >> right print more money and house prices go up and asset prices go up but it's all an imaginary construct from infinite units that are un it it be able to be printed infinite. If you have infinite units pricing the world and you keep on printing those all prices will rise. So house prices and everything else would rise. If you had non- infinite units in Bitcoin, then those then those will rise to against that dollar and all of it will be if you said pricing will be kind of an illusion because it was not because because it's it's it's based that price based in US dollars is based on an infinite variable. If you said what should happen in a free market is prices fall of everything and and they might fall really fast because because some of that money is has already gone to money heaven. It's just been propped up, right? It's it's it's it's completely gone. And so so some of those companies are going to fail spectacularly. They're going to be wiped out. Um, but if you just looked at the trend, you would you could just say if the natural state of the free market is deflation, and we know it is for sure. And if Bitcoin stayed decentralized and secure, it will price number one. No matter what, it will price the free market. And then if the pre free market is now we don't live in a free market so there's all these crazy prices all over the places and so some prices are going to fall like like in a in a straight line. Um, but over time anyways this is going to reper everything if it it stays decentralized and secure. And so I don't that's why I don't think in price and in fiat dollar because because it take takes Bitcoin into the denominator of something that's infinite and tries to pull me back to the other system. I just think about goods and services priced in Bitcoin. Now, that's hard to do. That's hard because it's it's almost like if you're the first time the first time you ever you've traveled a lot in the world when we went to Costa Rica when when you're changing your US dollars for clone A, right? And you're trying to figure out what does this mean for goods and services and everything else, it's a it's a mental tax that you're constantly having to do. It's the same thing in Bitcoin. It's a mental tax because you're used to doing this and a mental tax and what is the value in Bitcoin and it's probably a harder mental tax because it's never existed be uh before but that's what I try to constantly do try to constantly and and and what what would my expectation in the free market look like and in Bitcoin if it stayed decentralized and secure and and that's what I see that's what I observe I observe that happening around the in the um I'm sure you saw Elon Musk talk about in the sort of AI world of the future, we're not going to need money because as you say like the cost of everything drops to its marginal cost of production like things might just be free and abundant. Um do you think that's true? Do you think we will still need money? >> Uh very little. So a better better way to look at it and and and imagine how complicated this is right now and then somebody wants to make that complication and and typically when they do that they're jumping the jumping the shark and they say there like Elon Musk is not a Bitcoiner most of his money comes from government contracts and government and subsidies >> subsidi subsidies and and and such that ex that ex I'm not saying he's not a great entrepreneur or a great marketer or something. >> He clearly is. Yeah, >> he clearly is. But if you actually understood uh what what it would look like in a free market, >> prices would fall and he would have to compete broadly with every uh w with everybody. And and so I is it's a logical to me that you could say we don't need money. Well, he uses money that's growing infinitely to create a create create a crazy empire cuz what cuz what that means is he controls a means of production and and he controls the means of production and everybody operates on or he does, Google does, Amazon does uh um maybe in China a couple other but the means of productions are controlled by the technocrats and we all use that and we can get shut off of that anytime. time and and and the means of why those are centralizing is because of money. So so a free market looks looks different. So to to answer your question, in the year 20 2140 when Bitcoin mining when we've mined the last block, um would we ever go back to a time where we where we thought it was normal to manipulate money and that was normal? Nobody would ever make that choice. It would be insane to make that choice. So the the the thing we would use as money, not that we wouldn't still still use an abstract concept of Bitcoin, right, to base the free market, but you wouldn't feel like you needed it. You'd never go back to a time where like if we go to that point, if you just move forward, just assuming Bitcoin stays decentralized and secure and what that world looks like, can you imagine those people looking back at this timeline and saying, "What were they thinking? How could they how could they trust all of those people that were extorting them and and constantly believe in that nons nonsense and and do more of it, >> right? We never go back. >> Have you ever read The Mandibles? This is the obligatory hat tip to Odell. Um because in that you do kind of see in that book. So, this is a book about basically fiat collapse. And then there's the the free state of Nevada where they it it they basically have zero tax and the whole point of the book is these people trying to go from New York to Nevada. Um when they get there, I think the last line of the book is and then they implemented like a 5% tax. Do you think there's no way that if we do move to this world, we don't end up very slowly moving back into a fiat type system? >> No, I don't think so. So that and that's chosen by us. If we if we move just about all that way, if we move to it's just a store of value, then guaranteed that's what we do for sure. But I don't think and and that's why this is going to be a chaotic transition because I I think all of these observations or truths in the market are true today equally and each person is making one more true than the other. And so what's happening is at least from my observation is as you have a protocol that's emerging and it's adding privacy and it's adding payments and you have these circular economies growing and you have this emergence. Um those people just like us in Costa Rica. We're not talking about price. If you go back on on crypto Twitter or Bitcoin Twitter, it would look like everybody is right. But but those people don't at all. They're building something entirely new that's totally that's totally different. They don't care. They're they're never going back and they don't see it as a store just a store of value. They see it as money. And so of course it has to go through all of our belief systems and only one's going to win. Last question on this sort of um future Bitcoinized world is what do you think happens with credit markets because I I I don't believe you can ever get rid of credit. What would that look like in a Bitcoin world? >> Yeah. And and and a lot of your questions actually most of these even the entire in the entire way start from a credit based system which you're used to and move into what does Bitcoin look like? If you if you want to know the my simple how how I make it easy for myself. I start with first principles. Natural state of the free market is deflation. You have exponential technology growth from the free uh from the free market. And if Bitcoin stayed decentralized and secure, you have an energybacked system protocol emerging around the world. What would it look like? So I start from a different place than you start from. So what you're what you're you're starting from is to buy a house I need credit to start a business I need credit I start to uh from a different point natural state of the free market is deflation I invest in companies all all the time and I always have I've in so and when I start company when I've started a company I can never get credit I have to get equity somebody has to believe in my view of the world is is going to produce more return for me and them by delivering value to somebody else. No one gives you credit. And so so I start from from that spot. And so so people say, well, there's no way there's no way business could survive. And I ask why? That's the way the world looks, right? That's the way the way way that's that's the way it looks right now. So, so what happens is credit gets smaller and smaller and smaller and smaller um as a percentage of the overall economy today. It is the economy because we live in credit based money that is always manipulated. And if you're if you're the biggest credit provider, then you provide systematic risk. If you fail, the entire system fails. So, government always bails out the the the the largest credit providers. Um and and so if you knew that and you were a credit provider um systematic, you would want to get as big as you could fast as fast as you could. So you had tail heads I win tails. Now that feeds uh feeds back everywhere in the market. So, if you're bidding on other companies, if you're private equity company, um, and you can't lose, then if other people are going to bid four times for for a company, you would bid six because you always have somebody else to. And so, what it's a rational game to overpay when you have a backs stop of credit money, which is more and more debt forever and you can never lose. So all of these things that people's perception of what the what money looks like and debt looks like and then the prices because those are overbid and um seem so high you think you need more debt. So is and then the other part of that which is important is if you had productivity gains all the time and you take took debt then the debt gets more expensive in real terms. So so if you took too much debt the debt would fail. So I I do I could totally understand what you're saying there. But in this future world, if someone like I everything's abundant, everything's marginal cost production. So very cheap abundant world, there's still going to be people people striving for things that they may not have the capital to do on their own. And so like if you're a creditworthy person with an idea that you think you're going to add more value to society, there's going to be people that are willing to back you in that and offer you credit. Like but how how does that work in this Bitcoinized world? >> Yeah. So what is so probably they offer you equity. They want to be owners of your business with you if they believe in you. >> It's not just credit out of thin air. >> Not just it's not just credit out of thin air. And and the credit out of thin air the credit out of thin air on a Bitcoin standard will blow up >> if it's Bitcoin standard. if it's a so the credit of it'll get less and less and less and there's going to be so now if you think about this even the conversation we're having right now I'll bet you most people that are listening to this right now go that's insane because they're measuring it from the other system too and they're used to living in a credit environment that is unlimited credit when we say 39 trill remember in my book I I said in the last 20 years credit had grown $185 trillion in last in that was to 2019. That's that's more than doubled down. Crazy. So, but it had to it's mathematically it's mathematical because deflation is one side of the axis and the credits the other. It has and but what people don't realize is that's centralization, right? That's centralization of everything. why they think see big tech, big government, big um and they're you're they're yelling at all of these centralized things is because it's part of the uh it's ma it's mathematical. It's part of a system designed to extract has to >> it's I I just wish I thought like you more, Jeff. I'm getting there. Um I I I always love talking to you. Let's close out with if if there was one thing that you could say to all the listeners that helped them get a little bit closer to Jeff Booth's way of thinking like what is it? >> I I I know I joke around about the kind of when I say the natural state of the free market is deflation but they should hold that thought in their head over and over and over again. And if it's true then then the next step is I have agency or I don't. Right? Every time I use a piece of paper that somebody else can print unilaterally, I lose my agency. If I if if I move my time into this other into this other system, I have agency in the world that's that's emerging. Um, and so those are the things that I would I would get them to to if something's true, even if it's uncomfortable, if it's true, it's true, right? And this is an uncomfortable truth. Meaning that we've always lived in a lie. >> Uncomfortable truth. >> And that's the the the hardest thing, the hardest thing in that is to to examine that for what it is. And because we don't want to believe we've always lived in a lie. And that's probably the thing that's going to perpetuate this system longer. Yeah. Is that no one's willing to admit that >> you you don't want to believe it. It's just too hard on your own psyche to to believe you've you've you've you've been deceived your entire life and into this in this system that you thought was a free market and that that you have a construct for your belief on what what it is. That's why I'd say you you have to break that. Uh you don't have to. You could stay trapped, but uh but it gets easy. It gets easier when you face the truth and then decide. >> I love it. Jeff, um, when we were in Costa Rica, I said we had to make a show on this. You said a few things to me that kind of blew my mind. Um, I think you were the only person in Costa Rica that can snore louder than a growler monkey. But, uh, it's been awesome hanging out, Jeff. I appreciate you so much. Um, thank you for coming on the show. >> Yeah, you too, buddy. >> All right. I will see you soon. See you in Vegas. Yeah, sounds good.