By: Daron George on November 12, 2022
The book How to Read Numbers: A Guide to Statistics in the News (and Knowing When to Trust Them) is an enlightening guide to the numbers we read in the news and why they are so often misleading. The author’s Tom Chivers and David Chivers make sense of dense material and offer insights into sampling…
By: Shonell Dillon on November 11, 2022
What year was it when this author put pen to paper? I don’t want to misinterpret but is he saying that racism is not really a problem anymore. I might not get to five hundred words on this one. So many thoughts run through my head as I agree with some of what he is…
By: Shonell Dillon on November 11, 2022
I am a music buff. I love love love music. In certain genre’s I can belt out every oh and ah that comes out of the artist mouth. I guess you can say when it comes to some music I am a lyricsmith. I am careful to sing the words at the right time and…
By: Mary Kamau on November 11, 2022
The whole idea of Cryptocurrency and Blockchain technology has caused a storm and excitement as the world embraces globalization and unprecedented freedom, away from government bureaucracy and control. Many have benefitted and made fortunes by transacting with Cryptocurrencies without paying taxes and being subjected to government bureaucracy. There is even new talk about converting national…
By: Henry Gwani on November 11, 2022
The Bitcoin Standard: The Decentralized Alternative to Central Banking explores the emergence of Bitcoin as a significant cryptocurrency. Tracing the history of money from the primitive times of trade by barter and the use of monetary metals to this age of digital money, the book describes how the use of money became centralized and how…
By: Denise Johnson on November 11, 2022
“Change money? Change money? Dollar? Marks?” This phrase still haunts me when I am in certain places in Poland. These persistent pleas of individuals with hopes to unload the local currency for a more value stable one.[1] Every Westerner knew these cries, as the hard currency they had could buy their way out of any…
By: Kayli Hillebrand on November 10, 2022
Saifedean Ammous is an Austrian based scholar focused on the research and teaching of bitcoin. In his foundational book The Bitcoin Standard: The Decentralized Alternative to Central Banking he lays out the various components and interworking of the cryptocurrency bitcoin. I must admit that this is not a topic that I easily understand and even…
By: Alana Hayes on November 10, 2022
Have you ever heard the phrase that 99 % of statistics are made up? The joke is that you can throw any number you want in there because numbers hold no relevancy in statistics. I’m not saying that generalization is accurate, but I do wonder if that phrase came about because the mainstream population didn’t…
By: Nicole Richardson on November 10, 2022
There are a few things I just don’t understand: Facebook algorithms, people that drive on the road like they are the only one there, those who can’t seem to have their money ready at the register, and cryptocurrency. Somehow, I have a better grasp on the Trinity than I do on bitcoin/NFT’s. Saifedean Ammous, author…
By: Elmarie Parker on November 10, 2022
Reading Saifedean Ammous’ book, “The Bitcoin Standard: The Decentralized Alternative to Central Banking,”[1] added another layer to my global perspectives’ leadership map. Part history of money and economics, part societal-political analysis through this history lens, and part technology guide to the newly developing arena of cybercurrency—specifically Bitcoin, Ammous sheds light on “…the problems money attempts…
By: Troy Rappold on November 10, 2022
Saifedean Ammous wrote, “The Bitcoin Standard: The Decentralized Alternative to Central Banking” in 2018, ten years after the Bitcoin phenomenon began in November, 2008. An individual, or perhaps a group of individuals, used the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto to announce that they have produced a “new electronic cash system that’s fully peer-to-peer, with no trusted third…
By: Chad McSwain on November 10, 2022
“I told ya’ll!” That was the declaration during our car ride as my friend exuberantly pointed out that he is the winner of the bet, and that he is (almost) always right. The latest bet was on the price of pomegranate at Wal-Mart and who can guess the closest price. The bet ensued to raise…
By: David Beavis on November 10, 2022
“The more you see, the less you know. The less you find out as you go. I knew much more then, than I do now.” These opening lyrics to U2’s City of Blinding Lights constantly ran through my mind as I read Tom and David Chivers’ How to Read Numbers.[1] Countless articles, statistics, and “facts”…
By: Shonell Dillon on November 9, 2022
One of my favorite groups the O’Jay’s has a hit song that has a line in it that says… Money, Money, Money. The lyrics go on to say,” some people got to have it, some people really need it”. I thought of this song as we were told we would be reading about Bitcoin. My…
By: Jonathan Lee on November 9, 2022
Dr. Saifedean Ammous is an economist who holds his Ph.D. in Sustainable Development from Columbia University. In this book, The Bitcoin Standard: The decentralized alternative to central banking, Dr. Ammous presents the economics and history of bitcoin to introduce the workings of the new digital currency for the new digital economy of the future. Bitcoin…
By: Becca Hald on November 9, 2022
“Your son has autism.” When I first heard those words in 2004, I had no idea what they meant. Autism? You mean like Rain Man? I felt a sense of relief that the behavioral issues we had seen were not “my fault.” I felt a sense of empowerment, I could do something to help my…
By: Michael Simmons on November 9, 2022
In the book The Bitcoin Standard: The Decentralized Alternative to Central Banking, Saifedean Ammous lays out a fabulous history and sociology of money. He dives deeply into this discussion, while dropping one-liners and understandable definitions that summarize and synthesize his main points. As someone who is frankly averse to economic concepts, Ammous makes this conversation…
By: Roy Gruber on November 9, 2022
In The Bitcoin Standard, author Saifedean Ammous states a bold premise. “Bitcoin represents the first truly digital solution to the problem of money, and in it we find a potential solution to the problems of salability, soundness, and sovereignty.”[1] Ammous argues for bitcoin as the world’s first government-free, unchangeable, and sound currency. He refers to…
By: Andy Hale on November 9, 2022
“I’ll trade you this for that,” words spoken in many languages across every continent and reaching back before written history. Bartering and currency exchange are the bedrock of civilizations’ financial systems, no matter the context. The idea of coin currency came about in 770 B.C.E., all thanks to the ancient Chinese. [1] It came in the…
By: Eric Basye on November 9, 2022
As a college student studying social work and psychology, I was required to take two economics classes as part of my core classwork. I am pretty sure that in another life, I would have gone on to study business and economics in pursuit of a life of entrepreneurship. Well, maybe that, or I would have…
