Nature & Blockchain

Thoughts for today

Frederick Bott
3 min readMay 1, 2020

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We might dismiss the possibility that the technical phenomenon of blockchain appears in nature.

But we would be wrong.

We read again relevant points from our most trusted definition of distributed ledger technology, of which blockchain is the best known form, and we see some similarities with another phenomenon of recent interest in nature; genetics.

We see that genetics are actually a form of distributed ledger.

All of the historical information of the development of all species is captured there.

The genetic code of every creature shows its relationship with every other, in its own genome.

Any creature can theoretically be recreated from its genetic code.

That code exists identically in every cell of the creature.

A creature itself is a distributed ledger.

The progression of a species from generation to generation shows genetic variation.

That variation is a change of information, from one generation to the next.

Where the rate of change of genetic information in a species from generation to generation is low, we see a species nearing extinction.

This correlates with the fundamental principles of information theory

Information is defined as something new and accurate. That is the only thing of value.

The change in genetic information from generation to generation, is the actual thing of value.

That might explain the instinctive fatal attraction some of us know so well, to others who are completely different from ourselves in every way imaginable (Maybe I digress).

We can see that this applies also to species. Little or no change of genetic information from generation to generation is of little or no value to the species, and the species comes to an end.

The distributed ledger of a species can be thought of in two distinct dimensions, i.e. a two dimensional matrix:

  • Width-wise, from column to column, a row represents the cells of an individual, giving robustness to the genetic record of the individual through decentralisation, the information in every successive cell in the individual is identical, with the length being defined by the number of cells comprising the individual, ensuring the information defining the individual cannot be destroyed, unless every cell of the individual is explicitly destroyed.
  • Vertically, the variation in the cells from row to row, represents a transaction, a change from parent to child, where the information in each cell of the row changes, from one row, down to the next.

It follows that the greatest value that can be imparted to a child from parents, is for those parents to have the greatest variation in genetic information between one another, thus maximising the change of genetic information that will occur from parents to child (Am I still digressing?!?).

The object of these thoughts are to investigate the possibility that a link might be established between the way nature actually functions, and the way a proposed distributed ledger personal cryptocurrency is most likely to work best, by closely emulating nature.

Currently, the scheme proposed is based on energy consumption, where each human individual in theory absorbs a certain amount of energy, which at its root source, comes from the sun, which generates a constant energy, of which the amount consumed by each human is infinitesimally small, but roughly the same from human to human, every day.

Each human uses that energy to create information, the only thing of value, and adds this to the world. The amount of information produced from human to human varies hugely, which will result in a natural variance of reward, which we would expect is a fair way for the system to operate. Every human should rightfully have the same opportunity to improve their individual rewards by improving the quality of their information output.

So we see this as a fair scheme for the generation, distribution, and function of money, directly related to human energy consumption.

But it might possibly be improved by consideration of genetics.

But how, exactly?

I think it is wise to instinctively avoid any possibility of relating rewards to genetics, as there, we see some dangerous paths, according to our values.

The best way to do that is to define a safe path, lowering the possibility that other more dangerous paths might be taken later.

Any ideas?

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